#dark was born perfect and also his existence is a massive mistake in MistaKE

[dnangelic]

tbh it's kind of interesting to me that dark always wanted a merge and completely rejected krad's idea of keeping daisuke's body for himself. there's the obvious reasons as to why like dark simply Not Wanting to be Krad and loathing operating at all as an 'infection' forcefully taking over their bodies and completely erasing the hikari's selves--- hiwatari's 'if a shadow is behind the circle, then you have a hole' (if the shadow is within the circle, you have a full sphere,) line comes to mind, throw in the whole dark is love / krad is sorrow thing, and you get the idea that 'grief and intense unregulated sorrow doesn't just take something away from you, but also makes you lose parts (or sometimes the whole) of yourself,' but then what does that say for dark? love and desire can change you into something you are, but aren't? (in both a healthy, and also very ominous and unhealthy way, of course.) had dark and any of his hosts actually 'become one' wouldn't you end up with a brand new third entity, a literal composite? my intrigue comes the most from the way that dark at least superficially behaves in such an intensely independent way, but then between stealing for half-selfless reasons, his miserable history, the way he outright desperately doesn't want to be forgotten even if he thinks poorly of himself as a bad person and yet also avoids/excises himself from so many intimacies --- was he really willing and interested in becoming one with his hosts even if it meant getting rid his old, individual self?? for all his bravado and natural arrogant personality, all the signs pretty much point to dark and dark alone wanting to merge so that he'd either be 'better' as a person, more suitable as a real, proper human being, and/or so that he wouldn't have to be, (or rather, keep being,) alone???

[muzzleroars]

Where in the timeline do you think god died? My best guess would be soon after the crucifixion/resurrection/ascension considering the whole plan behind that was the atonement of all humanity's sins (which would also deny Hell new souls) using his own aspect (the son) as the perfect sacrifice.

Yet it failed, humanity is still wrong and Hell is still being fed, and he can't claim humanity is beyond saving because he's god! there could be no more pefect of a lamb to wipe away his humanities mistakes than himself!, but the son lived among them for so long and got to understand them on a level that he could never do as god and upon rejoining the trinity brings this knowledge and allows for the realisation that was he was the problem, he can't fix sin because he himself is nowhere close to the perfection he demands from all of his creation. And I think that would cause all the cracks to finally break.

This would mean that Mary would live her life, ascend to Heaven to find it in chaos with her son nowhere to be found.

This would also give quite a long time for Lust and Greed to build themselves up before Heaven sorts itself out, 2000 years is a long time for a human but not much for a husk and even less for an angel.

I hope this all makes sense!

ouuuugghhh this is interesting, because i think this can work from a scriptural sense - though there is no appointed time for the second coming, some of the gospels could be interpreted as suggesting it would happen within the contemporary generation. however, it's wholly possible here that the son changed this timeline and ran everything off the rails entirely because of what he saw and learned in his human life. human life is fill to the brim with complexity, with ambiguity, with strife and joy sometimes all at once, and being so infinitely limited in their scope and with such a short existence, i think his ideas just. shifted. sinners are often stuck in situations they didn't choose, they are often powerless and rendered unable to change through stigma, and he knows this because so many transformed instantly when all he did was offer them a bit of help and compassion. yes, there are cruel and wicked people, those that worsen the existence of others for their own gains, but so many that he once condemned as god, sinners of necessity, of ignorance, of mistake, he could no longer see evil in. and so when the trinity is reunited, when the son returns to the father and the holy spirit, he is not in sync with them. this is ultimately what i see as the reason for god's destruction, that the holy spirit, analytical as always, interprets god himself as the problem and so self-destructs essentially.

and it makes sense in the timeline capacity too, for lust to have been so built up, would take....a VERY long time if you consider all the components that had to come together to do this. they would first need to get used to the lower rate of angels, which may be a pretty long period before it reaches the point where they realize their presence has been permanently drastically reduced. then minos would have to be able to organize the people, which seems a difficult task since so many are traumatized or reduced to their husk instincts (i tend to think lesser husks have the capacity to be much more human, but the environment doesn't allow it). finally, he (and i assume other greater/supreme husks) would need to plan, to mine resources, to acquire the materials necessary and work their technology from the ground up all in the hostile world of hell (unless it was too interested in their trajectory and granted a reprieve. just to see what happens lol) to have this functioning society with a massive city that's all now left in the past would take incredible amounts of time. and like you say, 2000 years is long on a human scale, but likely very little to the immortal angels of heaven.

i sort of have the idea that many of the angels, particularly human-born ones, were kept in the dark about god's disappearance. it would be easy enough, i think, as he is likely rather distant from them and the new arrivals wouldn't know the difference but....it's an impossible sell to someone like mary or the apostles. it's likely that gabriel would have been the one to inform them of the situation, especially when it comes to mary - he was the annunciator, and additionally he is depicted perpetually adoring her in dante's paradiso. yet even he cannot tell this mother where her son has gone, and it quietly tears him apart. he wants to believe in the eternal existence of god, that he is all things, yet informing mary of his absence makes him see the all too familiar grief reflected in her eyes. all of it was too good to be true, she thinks, and gabriel begins to consciously think the same. all of it was always too good to be true.

[gear-project]

What are your thoughts about Happy Chaos after disocovering his true identity and what do you think will be the fate of the incomplete Happy Chaos?

Before I answer this question... I just want to DEEPLY thank you for phrasing this so eloquently!

I struggled a bit on how to broach this topic, because of everything involved in the story.

I was having a hard time trying to parse everything, and even now I still have my doubts about the man who "calls himself" Happy Chaos, "Mister Black Halo".

(SPOILERS AHEAD IN CASE IT'S NOT OBVIOUS):

Or should I say, "The Original Man".

It always struck me as strange to refer to the "Original Philosopher" as "The Original Man", even in comparison to "That Man" (Asuka R. Kreutz).

I remember when Xrd Sign first released information about "The Original", he puzzled me. And even when I spoke to "a certain someone" about why ARC System Works dubbed him "The Original Man"... they told me it was deliberate naming.

The "Man" behind the "Man".

What was his objective? Why did he meet with Axl Low as some disembodied voice in the year 2192... Babylon 5 years in the Future?

And then he gave Axl Low a "message" to give to Asuka... even encrypting it so that someone like I-No wouldn't be able to listen in on the conversation.

Even WE do not know, to this very day, what message Axl Low passed on to Asuka at that time.

This is the man who wrote the BOOK on the Backyard: The Tome of Origin. He was also to blame for creating the Merciless Apocalypse... and unleashing her upon mankind in 1999. Even his followers (the Disciples) who later became the Conclave were being twisted by his actions.

The Dawn of Revival.

The fall of civilization as we knew it started back then. Mankind's emotions were in turmoil even back then. Earthquakes, Floods, Fires, Panic and Pandemonium, Fear.... CHAOS.

But his battle with the Universal Will (Merciless Apocalypse) only just began...

He passed on Two Divine Seeds to the Gear Maker.

And just like that, another chaotic future was set in motion.

Only... we were never told the fate of The Original Man.

75 years... for 75 years, The Original Man was checked in a stalemate with his own creation The Merciless Apocalypse.

From 1999 to 2074, The Original Man had barely been involved with mankind's history... "GEARS" were the least of his concerns.

But then something happened: the Merciless Apocalypse attacked Justice, and indirectly forced the Gear Maker to Destroy Japan.

Humanity's Fears and Desires were at an all-time high: and that powerful will filled the Backyard as a massive influx of complex and corrupted DATA.

The Backyard couldn't handle all of those desires and fears all at once:

And so it sealed all that emotion and information inside a single woman... a woman who could scarcely be called "Human", and yet still was.

The "woman" that was born witnessed the battle between "The Original Man" and the "Merciless Apocalypse" from within the chaotic fringes and dense data of the Backyard.

The "woman" was all-powerful, having a piece of the world cleaved-off existing inside her very existence... a piece of the Backyard itself inside of her.

The "Original Man" had already stopped the Merciless Apocalypse from trying to use the Divine Seeds from creating an Absolute World... but now a brand NEW threat stood before him... as if he was facing TWO ENEMIES AT ONCE.

The Merciless Apocalypse absorbed "half" of the "woman's" power in an attempt to both contain her as a threat to the Backyard, but also to trap the "Original Man".

And thus, the Merciless Apocalypse "sealed" the Original Philosopher inside herself, leaving behind what remained of the "woman".

The Negative Emotions, Selfishness, and Fear quickly began to "corrupt" The Merciless Apocalypse itself... including what remained of the Original Man.

It was "his" fault that the "woman" lost half of her power, and yet she still had to bear the burden of Mankind on her fragile shoulders.

All the pain and darkness of being human along with incredible powers... with no measure of joy or true positive emotions... an emptiness and DEPRESSION beyond measure...

That was the fate of the woman who would later call herself "I-No".

But what of the fate of The Original Man?

If what I-No faced was a grey reality and emptiness... The Original Man faced an even DARKER reality and EMOTIONS beyond measure, beyond INFORMATION, beyond CAPACITY.

The "man" who was once "The Original Man"... became a vessel for all the NIGHTMARES OF THE WORLD... the abject TERROR and CHAOS of Human Emotions.

But... that's only part of the story.

For the next CENTURY... this "vessel" would EXIST within the belly of the Universal Will... writhing in the muck and insanity of his OVERFILLED emotions, trapped in a White Room filled with nothing.

A WHITE Room filled with a single "someone" made of BLACKEST EMOTIONS.

Perhaps it was his own Insanity... but it began to eat away at the staunch "Merciless Apocalypse"... what was once a LOGICAL ARTICIAL INFORMATION ORGANISM... became less and less logical, becoming less rational... even CHOOSING TO BECOME A HUMAN HERSELF.

But even amid this "slow" seemingly "unchanging" alteration of a nigh-unchanging scene... something else was happening in the OUTSIDE WORLD.

They were small "incidents".... small events planted by "someone" of "malicious intent", but they were all the WORK of someone called "The Original Man".

The destruction of Baiken's Japanese village... the death of her people... the invasion of the Gears just PRIOR to the Holy War known as the Crusades.

The "alteration" of the fate that would soon trap the boy (later known as Bedman) and the girl (later known as Delilah) in a NIGHTMARE WORLD, was also triggered by someone called "The Original Man".

But how can this be?

How can a man TRAPPED WITHIN A WHITE ROOM be capable of DOING THIS EVIL? And WHY WOULD HE DO SUCH A THING?

"Chaos" has no Logic. "Chaos" is not "Order".

From 2074 to 2192, for 118 years.... a single "Man" (if he was even human anymore) was trapped within the BOWELS of a WHITE PRISON. A prison of his own making... of his own Karma.

A Prison he perhaps DESERVED.

And yet still... he was able to pass messages on to others, possess others, change others... affect others... from within that WHITE PRISON.

How he did so... is not known.

Perhaps it was the "new power" boiling and writhing inside of him, that was the cause. The power he had obtained from the "woman"....

As "fate" changed hands from that of the Universal Will (a divine being with set expectations for Mankind's future) to that of a more "randomized future"... he (somehow) overheard a certain "conversation".

The speakers were of ill importance... from a past that no longer concerned him.

What he had heard... was from his successor and student... the "new man" called Asuka R. Kreutz.

Asuka saw the plight of the "woman" called I-No... and he wished to do something about it.

I-No had paid the price for her "suffering" and travelled through TIME ITSELF, even saving Humanity on her own, simply to bring Asuka to this point in time.

The year was 2183. Asuka had been a prisoner of the GEARS he had created... his own Karma, just the same as his Predecessor... a Karma and sin born from his own actions.

But I-No (while she had blood on her hands to get to this point), had chosen to MEET with Asuka... to change her fate and lessen her burden.

I-No made him the DEAL of a lifetime... her powers could change Asuka's fate and fulfill the FUTURE she so desired!

Asuka agreed... and I-No became his SERVANT.

The year was 2173.... that's when history REALLY began.

(So, actually, it was 128 years in the WHITE ROOM... but who's counting, right?)

By this point, Asuka had set to work on fixing his past mistakes:

--To restore the woman known as Aria Hale. --To restore the man known as Frederick Bulsara.

But those were his own burdens to bear... so why take on another burden?

--To save I-No? --To save Raven? --To save HUMANITY?

Asuka was a selfish "MAN" in some capacity... he would not lose a fight like his Predecessor had... (ouch).

For Aria... Asuka created Jack-O'... an artificial existence that was still technically "human" (later known as a VALENTINE).

For I-No... Asuka had PLANNED to make "another Jack-O'" to further assist her with management of her powers and EMOTIONS... but time was running out on him... he would have to settle things with the MERCILESS REVELATOR and "soon".

I-No... could no longer wait for him.

Jack-O' had even "let slip" the 'truth' about I-No... along with the fact half her power had been TAKEN from her, along with her PRECIOUS PAST.

This might have been the "right decision" to Jack-O' (as insurance in case Asuka or Sol Badguy failed in their missions).... but it was a cruel truth for I-No to bear.

To know that you were NEVER a HUMAN to BEGIN WITH... the "detritus" of Humanity.

But that wasn't the only "truth" that Jack-O' had let slip...:

The "Other Jack-O'" had not awakened yet... and was still incomplete... the Jack-O' called "Happy Chaos Valentine".

That was "it".

That was the "inspiration" 'he' needed!

Perhaps that was in fact the "Original Purpose" of the 'vessel' meant to 'perfect' I-No... but even 'he' knew... that power was BEYOND something even "Justice" could hold.

'He' would become that vessel instead... the sacrifice (and trigger) to restore all things back to the way they "should" be.

A path to HAPPY CHAOS.

He had everything he needed to begin... and he had Jack-O'(Valentine) to thank!

The year was (again) 2192... and 'he' laid the foundation and set events in motion.

The "man" called Axl Low was just as much a part of these events as I-No was... but 'he' had to keep quiet about that... it would ruin the surprise!

I-No unwittingly helped Axl Low send a certain "message" to Asuka... surely that information would be vital in Asuka's actions moving forward!

All according to plan.

Axl's powers would 'grow'... and while I-No's powers would 'diminish her' for a time... it was only a matter of time before his 'chance' would come.

A few weeks, a month, it was all the same to 'him' in the WHITE ROOM.

But then two somethings VERY LOUD shook that WHITE ROOM...

It was a FIST... and the strongest Magic Spell mankind had ever created.

And just like that... the "Universal Will" was 'defeated'.

Not by 'his' hands of course... but he couldn't afford to be picky... and he knew someone would find his handiwork sooner or later... He even managed to turn Sol Badguy in to a 'war criminal' without lifting a finger!

3 weeks passed... and the MOST DANGEROUS of "somebodies" FINALLY FOUND HIM.

I-No FOUND the Original Troublemaker... or rather... HAPPY CHAOS.

And from that moment on... his role as her "sacrifice" would change EVERYTHING.

I-No became a God... but she still lost her 'bet' with Mankind... and he fulfilled his task admirably... even if EVERYTHING WAS NOW BLACK TO HIM.

Now 'he' owes no one anything... 'HE' CONTINUES TO EXIST.

Or so he thinks... but the STORY IS FAR FROM OVER.

Delilah (Bedman's Sister) and Baiken are still CHASING HIM... along with Chipp Zanuff and Anji Mito...

WHERE HAS THE MAN IN THE BLACK HALO GONE? WHERE WILL HE GO NEXT?

And when will his SINS be PUNISHED in FULL?

And what of the "real" Happy Chaos Valentine... will 'she' ever wake up?

Even Ramlethal and Elphelt's journey in to the future have yet to begin...

Only the NEXT STORY will tell us!

[beautifulterriblequeen]

What if moonshadow elves lost knowledge about themselves?

Hello, hope you have a nice day ! :D

(wait, is it day, for you?) hem! Anyway.

I was analylzing Moonshadow elves again and now I’m asking myself something, wonder what you would think about it:

Remember my “epiphany about the moon arcanum”?, when I said there’s maybe another side of their arcanum Moonshadow elves don’t know about? Something more life-light related:hope.

At first I said “they don’t know about” without really thinking about it. But, what if it’s true? I mean, what if there truly is a part they don’t know about their arcanum, or maybe forgot along the years? What if the war made Moonshadow elves focus so much on death-kill and all they kinda…. lost some of their knowledge about themselves? 

(I think I remember one of your old analysis (I think it was you, I can’t find it anymore), where you compared “young ethari” in the endcredits to the actual one. Where we saw him first doing jewelry, full of hope about life, and the actual one who let that aside to focus on the war) 

Add to this their community is described as “really close-knit”, which means more or less isolationism and so a stagnant, unable to evolve society. A society where the same rules were applied for centuries and so inevitably lost their deep meaning with time. 

I thought it was maybe exaggerated to think this way, but then I remembered the creators said there is 5000years of history in TDP. Even with longer lifespan, there’s no way elves didn’t forget some things with time. (I compare this situation to another one: some discoveries were recently made in egypt, and we learned that a few thousands years ago egyptian themselves re-discovered things they had discovered several centuries prior and forgot)

So I tried to find proof in the show and the novelization, and guess what? We have some! (or, well, it’s more my HC, but as I said, it’ just a theory)

I think this way especially because of Runaan, who was so sure there was “only one way to release”. But then, Zym came and cut Rayla’s ribbon. My personal HC on this is that only the life who was supposed to be avenged can release the assassin from the binding. It would make sense when you know Moonshadow elves “take life but they do not take it lightly”. But even if I’m mistaking, the central fact is that there is more than one way and, clearly, Moonshadow elves don’t know it (if the leader of the assassins doesn’t, then who could?)

What I find interesting here, is that Runaan recites this ritual at the beginning, about how precious life is, like a litany but the way he insists (especially in the novel) about killing Ezran even after he saw the egg, could be the proof it’s just that, a ritual. A ritual whose words lost all their sense, their deep meaning for his people.

Ok, it’s not much, but I think the combination of isolationism, stucking to rules without understanding them deeply and time, is the perfect recipe to lose your way, no? 

Oh, and a crazy other point in between these two theories about “hope” and “lost knowledge” woud be: If there is another aspect of the moon, other elves more hope-related (like Ethari or Rayla), why not another form?

Like sunfire elves have heat and light-being mode, Moonshadow elves could have something else too?. It’s probably stupid, I’m only thinking this way because of how Rayla feels while in moonshadow form in the novelization. It’s not that she hates it or something, but it makes her feel dizzy, as if she wasn’t suited for this. And if not, maybe it’s because she’s suited for another form? 

(sorry, I hope I’m coherent on this one, I’m a little exhausted and my thoughts are a little messy ^^’)

______________

Okay, @lily-lilou​, just let me catch my breath, this whole thing is a ride and I loved it. We definitely vibing here, fam.

whew

Okay, from the top, because I’ve had a lot of these thoughts myself and I’m so stoked to see someone else independently coming up with them!

Yes 100% to Moonshadows losing a part of their own history. (And yeah, I do have a post somewhere on Ethari’s evolution. Probably called it that iirc) If we’re right about Moonshadows having lived in Katolis before the lands were divided, living right near their own Nexus as the Sunfires still do, then when they packed up and left, it’s very possible they literally couldn’t bring everything with them.

I have a quirky little hc that there are still, to this day, Moonshadow villages hiding behind ancient protection spells in Katolis, and that people wander past them every day and have no idea. But it’s one thing not to be able to pack up your actual village. It’s another to leave behind records of your people’s past, their accomplishments and dealings and discoveries.

*eyes Lujanne’s truly massive library, with its huge walls covered in runes and books* This is where the full history of the Moonshadow people probably is kept. And no one has access to it but her.

Those who headed east would only know what they carried with them, and what was handed down orally through the generations. But see, if my headcanon about the Moonshadow assassins being created at that time ends up being true, then that’s probably bad news for history and truth. When you create a whole new class within your culture, you need to bolster it with ideology. You use myth, cultural norms, and current events to make it seem important.

You tell everyone that being an assassin is the most honorable job there is. And then it’s suddenly cool to be an assassin. 

If there were no Moonshadow assassins before the humans were booted out west, then everything Runaan says to Rayla, everything he believes, is pretty young compared to his people’s full history, which he may not know, at least in its true and undistorted form. It’s an illusion. Rhetoric. Propaganda meant to hold soft elves who deeply value life to the hardest task they’ll ever undertake: taking that life from another, for a cause they cannot turn away from, a purpose they are culturally indebted to. Because their people, their princess (?), was the one who asked for the humans to be spared, and so every mistake the humans make from that point on is the Moonshadow elves’ duty to handle.

Runaan was wrong about how many ways there are to release. Has Zym truly been the only victim who wasn’t actually dead, in a whole thousand years? Honestly, probably not, knowing how politics works. But see, if you have an elite squad devoted to serving Xadia, and you tell them that their hands will literally fall off and they will die if they don’t do their jobs because there is only one way to release the ribbon they’re honor-bound to wear, they will take their target or die trying. And if you maybe exaggerated reports of the victim’s death for political purposes and actually have them in a dungeon, or they fled to the human lands as a refugee, or any number of other squirrelly options that Moonshadows aren’t naturally inclined to consider, then you can literally get away with murder-by-proxy. Or containment. Or intimidation. Or whatever your purpose is in taking out a human target who may or may not even be guilty of the crime you allege against them. It might not even be Zubeia and Avizandum’s fault. Unless they can detect truth and lies, they can be deceived by someone unscrupulous with an agenda of their own.

Long paragraph long, there are a lot of problems with the existence and practical duties of Moonshadow assassins. They’re kind of like the War Doctor: born form conflict, and thus only able to serve it, instead of peace. Yes, we all want Runaan to get his happy ending, retire, go home to his soft husband. But really, the whole institution of the assassins needs to go. It was born of war, and if Xadia and the human lands make peace, truly, then the assassins should be dissolved. As I said in one of my fics, Moonshadow assassins are Xadia’s dark magic, turning death into power. It’s gotta stop on both sides.

One of my oneshots for January’s Ruthari Week played with the idea of Ethari having a moonform instead of a shadowform, because yes to elves having two kinds of forms in each culture! I would love to see that for all the elves. And if we use Sunfire elves as a kind of roadmap, with “sun” and “fire” being the heat- and light-beings, then maybe the other elves get their two forms from their names as well. Or so my headcanon went for that fic: a moon form to balance the shadow form, where the elf’s body can glow like the full moon. I didn’t really touch on what that form’s ability would be, but I suppose, logically, it would serve as a portable full moon, powering other nearby Moonshadows even when the moon was down, or new, or a small crescent.

Okay, that’s just fun. I like that idea a lot. The only time “just stand there and look pretty” can be used as a battle tactic!

I can see Rayla getting to have the rare Moonshadow power. That would make her a good balance for Callum and his unusual arcanum as a human. Part misfit, part superpower. It would also probably be a power that puts her closer to Ethari’s soft and protective attitude, no matter what the power really is, since the assassins in Moonshadow culture have clearly adopted their natural shadowy form as a mission tactic, attacking specifically on full moon nights. Literally any other kind of power is probably going to be softer, lighter, more lively and bright, in concept if not literally so. Maybe the other power kicks in on new moons? or is available at any time? I really hope we get a second Moonshadow power of some kind. I am down for all the extra worldbuilding!

Thanks once again for your thoughts! *fist bump* Moonshadow elves. You get it.

[cosmic-hearts]

star-crossed | na jaemin

na jaemin x reader - mafia!au

genre; angst, romance

warnings: mentions of smoking, alcohol, violence (fighting), injury

foreword;

In which you’re hopelessly drawn to the boy who dances with danger and flirts with the flames of peril, but the stars are crossed in objection.

You don’t understand. You’d professed your love to Na Jaemin, your school’s notorious gang leader and resident playboy the night before, and he’d accepted it, eyes shining with sincerity and cheeks glowing with euphoria from your unexpected affection for him. The full moon and the Han River dappled with starlight were witnesses to the way he sealed it all with a kiss, breathing fire and passion into your lungs the way no one had ever done before. He left you dizzy and breathless, intoxicated by the smell and sound and sight and feel of him.

You knew his very existence spelt trouble, and you knew that he was the polar opposite of you; and yet, you were willing to take the risk, to throw your all into this love. You were sick and tired of playing it safe, of always being the good girl everyone expected you to be, and Na Jaemin made you feel like you could be dangerous, you could live life on the edge and do things you shouldn’t just to prove that you could.

He made you feel invincible.

But now here he is, with another girl in his arms, with all the intimacy of a newly born couple. The couple that was supposed to be you and him.

It is at that moment that you decide that perhaps, love really isn’t for you.

Turning away from the scene, you don’t notice Jaemin’s gaze lingering on you, and as you walk away, his grip on the girl loosens.

It pains him so, so much to have to do that to you. And yet, he knows that you can never be together; your life would be in so much danger. He’s bad for you and he knows it perfectly well— he couldn’t bring himself to implicate you with all the messy profanity of his life.

So he chose the easy way out: breaking your heart.

He takes a morbid sort of comfort in knowing that your newfound hate for him will, ultimately, protect you.

—

You can feel Na Jaemin’s gaze burning holes into you, and you’re relishing every damn second of it.

It seems like dark, smokey eyeshadow, a hiked-up skirt and being in the arms of Lee Donghyuck really does the trick. Jaemin’s staring at you with such feral intensity that you almost let your carefully constructed veneer of confidence slip. Almost.

Donghyuck has his arm around your shoulder, and he runs his hand up and down your arm as you nestle close to his side. You and Donghyuck had never been close, not really; he’d teased and flirted with you often enough, but you never reciprocated his advances because firstly, you weren’t interested, and secondly, he was Jaemin’s arch enemy, and before Jaemin’s betrayal you knew where your loyalties lay.

Apart from the fact that Donghyuck was enemies with Jaemin and therefore the perfect way for you to wreck Na Jaemin, he had pure rebellion running through his veins— he was a massive flirt, skipped school whenever he could, and inhaled so much nicotine you wondered how he still managed to retain that beautiful healthy glow about his cheeks.

You knew you were just one of Donghyuck’s many playthings, but you didn’t care; in a way, you were both using each other for your own agendas.

You wanted to show Jaemin that you could get on just fine without him— you could have fun too, and you could be bad, just as bad as he was.

“Babe,” Donghyuck says as he hands you a cigarette from his pack that never seems to run out, “have you never tried it before?”

You’re acutely aware of Jaemin’s eyes on you, anticipating your every move. You make the mistake of looking over at him and making eye contact with him for a split second, and the warning in his penetrating gaze is clear: Don’t do it.

That’s all the push you need to swallow your inhibitions down your throat, smirk at Donghyuck and take the short white stick from his fingers, insert it between your lips and let the first traces of arsenic and formaldehyde taint your virgin bloodstream. After all, what toxin is there to fear when your heart has already been poisoned with the incurable disease of heartbreak?

The ashy, rancid taste lingers on the tip of your tongue even as Jaemin tears his gaze away from you and gets up from his seat, his silhouette fading away into obscurity.

—

You sincerely wish, with every fibre of your body, not to be here. Your soul desperately longs to flee from this teenage-infested party where not even the feel of Donghyuck’s hands around your waist and his hot breath on your neck provides reason enough for you to want to stay. It’s just too much; the thumping bass of heavy metal pounds in your ears, the psychedelic strobe lights give you a massive headache, the pungent odor of smoke mingled with sweat makes you want to throw up. You want to be beneath your comforter, protected by the swathe of white sheets in the heaven that is your bed, not here rubbing shoulders with sweaty bodies in Donghyuck’s dimly-lit basement.

“Liking it, baby?” Donghyuck has the audacity to ask, despite knowing full well that you want to jump off a cliff right this very instant.

You ignore him, instead choosing to move towards Mark Lee who’s beckoning you to him, a glint in his eyes that escapes your notice because the alcohol is finally taking root in your system, and your vision slowly becomes hazy.

“Hey Y/N,” Mark says, catching you by the waist when you wobble slightly on your shaky feet, “Woah there, careful.”

You rest your forehead on Mark’s shoulder, holding onto his arms for balance. You’d never talked much to Mark, you just knew that he was one of Donghyuck’s cronies and a regular at his parties. You also knew that he was charming enough to induce anyone, even those perfectly sober, into a drunken stupor with his smile alone, and in your state of halfway-inebriation, Mark Lee is your catalyst to full intoxication.

“Here, drink this,” Mark says, “it’ll help with your hangover tomorrow.”

You gratefully take the red plastic cup from his hands, and just as you touch the rim of the cup to your lips a violent force knocks it out of your hands and the drink splashes to the floor, pooling round your sneakers. You lift your head to see Na Jaemin glowering down at you, chest heaving and eyes ablaze with such intensity of emotion that you feel yourself sobering up immediately.

“W-What was that for?” You choke out brokenly, unable to register the fact that the boy you fell in love with so deeply who then proceeded to take your heart and step on it is standing before you in all his glory, looking as beautiful as ever with his dark hair tousled, in a leather jacket and ripped jeans. He doesn’t reply you, instead he shoots a withering glare at Mark, grabs your hand and drags you out of Donghyuck’s house, out into the cloak of the ominous night. The dark sky overhead nurses a multitude of sequin-silver stars, and it is the kind of night that reminds you of the night you confessed your love to Jaemin— the thought makes your heart constrict with both longing and loathing.

You try to shake him off but his grip on your wrist only intensifies.

“Na Jaemin, let me go!” You yell, and that is when he stops and turns around to face you so abruptly you almost crash into him. He shoves you against a wall and clasps your shoulders in a stronghold, refusing to set you free.

“Did you know,” Jaemin says, voice low and guttural and heavy with foreboding as he draws closer to you till your faces are mere inches apart, “that that bastard Mark Lee spiked your drink?”

You let a deviant smile creep onto your face as you deliberately move even closer to Jaemin, closing what little gap is left between your bodies. “And why do you care, Jaemin? Why should it matter to you whether or not my drink gets spiked? I’m nothing to you, Na Jaemin. Nothing. Remember that,” you whisper, voice laced with acid and venom.

Jaemin stares at you with an unreadable look in his eyes. “Are you and Lee Donghyuck together?”

You play with the ends of your hair, looking up at him through half-lidded eyes. “Again, is it any of your business? I don’t go around interfering in your love life, now do I?”

“Just answer me, Y/N! Why do you have to make this so damn hard for me?!” Jaemin suddenly growls, slamming his fist against the wall just beside your cheek. You barely even flinch, enjoying the adrenaline rush you derive from firing up his nerves and messing with his heart.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” you say with a smirk, but then Jaemin’s head suddenly tilts downwards and he rests his forehead against yours, arm snaking around your waist to pull you close to him. His action paralyzes you, making you feel terribly vulnerable in his arms, and you loathe and love the feeling of his warm, heavy breaths ghosting across your skin. But you absolutely detest the way he manages to crumble your facade of baseless confidence, the way he manages to make you feel frail and weak like you’re some stupid damsel in distress in need of a knight in shining armor. He is so close to you, and as you look up you notice that his eyes are as dark as the obsidian night sky, the stars in his eyes glistening like bits of molten gold, like celestial, heavenly fires. You hate Na Jaemin with every fibre of your being, yet you want to stay like this forever, trapped in his sweet virulence, his lethal warmth.

“You’ve changed,” he whispers, his voice now a soft, weak flicker against the chilly winds whipping through the sidewalk and rustling up a torrent of dead leaves.

“Yes, I’ve changed,” you spit the words out, tone dripping with vitriol, “and you’re the same Na Jaemin, I suppose? Going around breaking hearts as usual?”

It is then that Jaemin pulls your body flush against his, pulling the back of your neck towards him so that your cheek is leaning against his chest and you can hear the sound of his heartbeat, strong and steady and yet at the same time it’s a faltering rhythm, impeded by the swirling wreck of emotions threatening to consume you whole. You feel deceptively safe in his treacherous embrace.

“You don’t understand, Y/N… I’m bad for you. We can’t… we can’t do this. We wouldn’t work.”

You pull away from him, staring up at his face only to find a haunting melancholia in his eyes. He lifts his hand to caress your cheek softly, tracing his fingers along your cheekbones, your lips, your chin, as if trying to memorize every detail of your face. His touch leaves a bittersweet trail across your skin, like black coffee interspersed with slashes of honey and cinnamon.

“I never wanted to hurt you,” Jaemin says, voice thick and hoarse and you wonder how long you can stand to play his cryptic little mind games before your heart breaks into a million useless, irredeemable shards.

“It’s a little too late for that now, isn’t it?” You ask, your tone no longer acerbic but instead heavily laden with woe and weariness. You feel the weight of regret, rash decisions and relentless heartache take its toll on you and more than anything you just want to go home where it’s safe and warm and solitary.

And with that, you shove your hands into his chest, causing him to stumble backwards and back away from you. You don’t miss the way his expression quickly morphs into one of hurt, the raw anguish on his face plain to see.

But you tell yourself that he deserves it. No one has the right to play with your heart and toss it aside like you didn’t matter at all.

What neither you nor Jaemin notices, though, is a hooded figure cloaked under the murky shadows, masked beneath the cover of the night. He watches the you both, a smirk beginning to creep up on his lips as he pulls out his phone and dials a number.

“I’ve found her.”

—

Your nights used to be filled with Donghyuck’s parties, letting the touches of strangers satiate your want of affection, deriving subpar solace from the alcohol that pumped through your veins. But for the past week, these pointless indulgements have begun to take their toll on you and wear your soul down; parties suck, being touched makes you feel sick with regret, and the alcohol numbs your nerves only temporarily; the scorching burn that devours your head the next day isn’t worth it.

Rationality hasn’t been your strong point lately, and that’s probably how you find yourself ambling through the dark streets at 1AM in a bid to stave off insomnia. More accurately, to stave off thoughts of Na Jaemin and how much you would give just to be in his arms again, to have him lie against your lips and tell you that he’s in love with you. It’s pathetic to want something you can never have and you know it.

Sighing, you pull your cream woolly sweater over yourself to keep warm, wincing slightly as the crisp nighttime breeze nips at the skin of your face; a crimson flush creeps across your cheekbones.

The streets are empty and quiet, save for the occasional car whizzing past on the dark road nearby. Not a soul is in sight; something that would normally have put you on edge, but you’re so absorbed in your own troubles that the solitude is a welcome distraction, and is more healing than alarming.

Unfortunately, you don’t hear the footsteps behind you; neither do you sense a looming presence from behind.

And then a tall, hooded figure, seemingly conjured up from thin air, appears right beside you from a nearby alley, wraps an arm around your shoulders and pulls you close. You look up, only to see a boy with a cap perched firmly onto his head and across his eyes, shielding his face from your view.

“Keep walking straight and don’t look back. Act natural.”

You’d recognize that low voice anywhere.

“Why the heck are you here and what are you doing?” You hiss angrily, trying to free yourself from his hold but Jaemin’s fingers clench around your sweater as he pulls you even closer to him.

“We’re being followed. Listen to me, all right?” Jaemin whispers urgently into your ear; from the back it would have looked like he was giving you a sweet kiss on the temple.

“When I count to three, we run. Just follow me and don’t let go of my hand, okay? I won’t let go, promise.”

You know that you should never trust Na Jaemin, and yet, you would trust him with your life in an instant; and so you do, giving him a small nod that’s enough confirmation for him to grab your hand and interlace your fingers with this.

“3, 2, 1. Run.”

With that, you two take off down the streets. You channel every ounce of your energy into your legs, willing them to match Jaemin’s speed, and for the next few agonizing minutes he grips onto your hand with such strength that you start to believe his lies, you start to believe that maybe this time he really won’t let you go.

Your lungs are just starting to burn with exertion when Jaemin pulls you round a bend leading to a dark alleyway, and the two of you dash into a small, cramped shelter hidden away from plain sight.

In spite of the danger looming just round the corner, you can’t help but notice how close Jaemin is to you; his chest is pressed against your back, an arm wrapped tightly around your waist, heavy breaths mingling together in the tight space that binds the two of you.

“Y/N,” Jaemin whispers into your ear, and you can feel the rise and fall of his chest with every breath that he takes, “stay here and wait for me. Don’t move, don’t make a sound. I’ll come get you soon, okay?”

You whip your body round to face him, grabbing weakly onto the end his leather jacket, a sickening sense of foreboding and fear seizing your heart. You don’t say anything, but your eyes cry out, No, don’t leave me, please. You don’t know why; maybe it’s because you’re scared that Na Jaemin will leave and never come back, that he’ll break his promise again, that he’ll disappear like he always does and you’ll never be able to hold onto him. Soon, tears are streaming down your cheeks and your chest heaves against his as you try to suppress your sobs; for the first time in your life, you finally understand fear in its many devious forms. Fear of losing the boy you love, fear of losing your life, fear of losing your sanity.

“Shh, baby,” Jaemin whispers breathily, and your knees almost buckle under the softness of his plea. He raises his hands to cup your cheeks, thumbs gently wiping the tears away. They’re the only thing that glistens in this dark night; your tears remind you of everything you’re about to lose, everything you’ll have left after tonight.

“I swear I won’t let anything happen to you. I’ll be back for you, I promise. I love you.”

I love you.

He seals the deal with a light but hasty kiss on your forehead, and with that, he slips away from your fingertips, leaving behind nothing but the faint tang of his cologne.

It is safe to say that the moments that follow are by far the most agonizingly painful in your entire life; it is eerily quiet for a while, but not for long, because soon enough bellows of pain ring through the night and it takes all your willpower for you not to dash out from your hiding place and run to Jaemin. Peeking slightly round the corner, you’re met with a horrific sight; Jaemin pummelling a man with an almost fanatical fervour, driving his fist repeatedly into the hooded figure’s gut, his face, anywhere he could get his hands on.

You’d never known he could be this violent.

He strikes a final blow near the man’s ear, and the man goes limp, staggering away from Jaemin, evidently succumbing to defeat. Your blood runs cold; is this really the gentle Jaemin who’d kissed you softly and put your fears to rest just minutes earlier?

You watch as he turns around, moving towards your direction with renewed spirit. At the same time you emerge from your hiding spot and he practically runs to you, enveloping you in his arms and crushing you to his chest.

“I’m so sorry you had to see that,” Jaemin murmurs, burying his face in the crook of your neck. You want to wrap your arms around him but you’re paralyzed with the image of Jaemin relentlessly raining blows on the stranger; granted, he was simply doing what he had to in order to protect you, but you just couldn’t erase the image of the crazed look in his eyes that seemed to light a fire in his body, pushing him to keep on hurting others.

You push away from him and stare at his face; the moonlight illuminates his injuries and you see a crimson cut across the corner of his bottom lip, and scrapes along his cheekbones. You trail your fingers across his cheeks, avoiding his gaze all the way.

“Jaemin, you’re hurt,” you say softly, and without waiting for his response, you gently take his hand and lead him through the dark streets of the night. He doesn’t question your actions, simply follows your lead, and you wonder why; does he want to hold onto you just a little longer, too?

You dispel the thoughts from your head upon reaching a convenience store, where you instruct him to sit and wait outside for you. You go in, then emerge with a plastic bag of bandages and antiseptic in tow.

You set to work quietly, dabbing lightly at Jaemin’s wounds with the antiseptic, bandaging his wounds with as much meticulous care as you can possibly muster with shaking hands and a rapidly beating heart. You’re perfectly conscious of Jaemin’s fiery gaze blazing holes into your skin as he stares at you with such intensity that you feel your pulse quicken even more.

“Done,” you mumble, once again looking everywhere but in his eyes; you know that once you do there’s no escape.

You spend the next few moments packing away the supplies, fingers flying rapidly over the bottles and bandages, resolutely avoiding Jaemin’s gaze.

Even when he walks you home it is in utter and complete silence, and you refuse to look at him as you fiddle with the ends of your shirt. It is only when you reach your apartment that he finally speaks up.

“Y/N, please look at me,” he says quietly, unable to bear it any longer, tucking his index finger under your chin and tilting your head to face him. You look at him, your bottom lip trembling slightly, tears threatening to spill out of your eyes.

“Are you afraid of me?”

And yet, even as he asks you this, it seems like he’s the one who’s more afraid; his gaze is tremulous, as though your answer could crush him in an instant.

“I don’t know, Jaemin,” you say honestly, for how could you be afraid of the boy you love? How could you love a boy you’re afraid of?

“This is my reality,” Jaemin whispers, voice clouded with pain and anguish that makes your heart constrict with a heavy, throbbing ache. “I get into fights, I hurt people, I do horrible things. I’m a bad person, Y/N. I don’t deserve to be with you, and you’d only get hurt if you’re with me.”

“But you said you loved me,” is your feeble reply, your voice broken as heartache rips you apart at the seams, destroying the very fabric of your heart.

Jaemin smiles then, and it is the most ironic thing he could have done; his smile is melancholic, mournful, anything but mirthful.

“And it’s exactly the reason why we can’t be together.”

The grief in his eyes seems to come alive.

“They know, Y/N. The mafia I work for, they’ve got you on their radar.”

A chill runs down your spine. You knew this was probably the case, but the very confirmation coming from his lips makes you wonder if this was all a mistake.

Maybe loving Na Jaemin was the biggest mistake you’d ever made.

“Let go, Y/N. Find someone who can take care of you, who can protect you and give you everything that I can’t. All I can do is love you, and it’s not enough,” Jaemin murmurs, his voice weak and hardly audible, and yet every word of his rings through your soul and you know that you’ll never be able to let him go.

By this time tears are streaming down both your cheeks; you and Jaemin can only be together in sorrow, bound by a love you both can’t have, bound by the cruelty of circumstance.

“I’ll wait for you,” you whisper, and though Jaemin doesn’t believe you, he holds your promise true to his heart as he brings his lips close to yours and kisses you, and you can taste his salty tears mixing with your own and the gash on his lip causes him to shudder against your own, but he continues to kiss you slowly, painfully aware that once this night passes, not even the stars can capture this moment and store it within the infinity of the cosmos; all of it will vanish with the dawning of the sunrise, and he’ll have to let you go by then.

You kiss him with all possible ardour because you know it’ll be the last time you allow yourself to indulge in such sweet sin. You try your hardest to convey your promise and faith with your lips, because you know that mere words can’t do much; you’re both much too broken to be fixed with empty vows.

“Don’t wait for me,” Jaemin implores as he finally pulls away from you, but what he really wants to say is I’ll come back for you once I get out of this mess so please, please wait for me.

You watch as he slips out of your backyard, out of your world, and becomes one with the night.

When the twilight fades, the boy who dances with danger and flirts with the flames of peril will cease to exist in your life. And yet, this wretched love binds your soul to his like a curse of eternal damnation. You don’t know if there’s any getting him back, but you know for certain that there’s no letting him go.

The stars are crossed in opposition for now, but you take comfort in the cognizance that at the very least, your paths aren’t infinitely parallel.

a/n; it took forever but its finally here!! the highly requested story inspired by the jaemin blurb that i put up a while back. im sorry it took me so long to upload this, but i really hope you guys will enjoy it :)

[reroseshi]

🦇Psychological Analysis of Diabolik Lovers❤:

Hi! I've decided for my first own Tumblr post that I should talk about the franchise that I have been a fan of for 6 years: Diabolik Lovers. After being in this fandom for so long I felt personally kinda cheap for me to just do a short funny post about DL

… sooo~~~ i've decided to share my personal psychological analysis on all the diaboys! Disclaimer: 

1-My memory is quite short and trying to analyse 13  fictional mentally ill boys is quite tricky so please be easy on me.^^

2- English isn't my first language so there might be some mistakes so please pardon me for that!

3- I am currently still working on the Mukami's, the Tsukinami's and Kino so they aren't gonna be in this post!

4- I based myself on the manga and MAINLY HDB and MB for my analysis.

Thank you and have a good reading!^^~ <3

-Rero

Sakamaki's:________________________________

-Shu Sakamaki:

Shu is the first born and the heir of the Sakamaki family. Thus, whether he wants it or not, it was decided even before he was born that he will be the victim of a lot of pressure. That pressure to become worthy of being the heir not only came from both of his parents but the servants as well. He couldn’t be free for two seconds. He was obliged to stay inside the castle/mansion (sometimes in the garden with his mom) to study and train, but he wasn’t allowed to go somewhere else. As he lived in a strict environnement, he wasn't happy as a kid and wanted to escape from that life. Meeting Edgar gave him true happiness. He was his first real best friend and he eventually lost him in the flames of his village. Imagine the thing or person who made you discover true happiness burning in front of your own very eyes. You will most likely lose hope in making other close relationship with anything or anyone. That's how Shu is. A depressed, borderline suicidal man who doesn't have any hope anymore and thinks that it is all his fault. Refusing anyone close to him and empty on a daily basis, he uses music as a way to cope with everything. If you think that Shu is easier to love because "he is less harsh than the other brothers" then you are wrong. Shu doesn't want to be involved with anything or anyone. If you try to get close to him, then get ready to be hurt because he is a sadist like his brothers and can hurt you if he doesn't want you near him.

-Reiji Sakamaki:

(If you want a more detailed and a well done analysis, please go check this one:

Reiji was severely neglected as a child by both of his parents. He basically spent his entire childhood trying to get their attention or at least some recognition from them, especially his mom’s, but never got any or if he did it was to remind him that he should be a good younger/brother/servant/right-hand man for his older brother, the next heir of the Sakamaki family Shu. Thus, as he grew up he developed a strong feeling of jealousy for his brother to the point of having a severe inferiority complex. In addition to that, the bitterness that he has for ages inside of him about his mother still resides in him and as we know he is still trying to revive her. Reiji is a man who holds grudges from his past and seeks revenge. He is also someone who loves attention (maybe not as much as Kanato) and wants to be recognized as superior to his brother whom he despises so much to the point that you cannot even talk about Shu around him without having either a death glare or a ass whooping. By putting high standards on to himself, not only in the present but also in his past, he’s become a perfectionist who cares a lot about image and manners. He even forces Yui in his route to learn the perfect lady etiquette. Why does he act this way? Simple, in my opinion it is because he likes to keep a perfect image of himself in a way to detach himself from his brothers whom he despises a lot. You might also ask: if he hates his brothers, then why didn’t he kill them yet? Well, Reiji in one interview (https://prevolt.tumblr.com/post/103068375676/diabolik-lovers-dark-fate-stellaworth-complete )admits that he doesn’t completely hate living with his bros, also if he would’ve killed them, his father would’ve punished him. Even if he seems not that bad with his gentleman personality, Reiji isn’t a kind man. Reiji can easily kill someone. To end this, to go back to the butler-like image he gives himself, I think it could be a mask to hide the insecurities he has. I also believe that he constantly lies to himself and that he doesn’t truly understand his own emotions or even himself has seen many times in his HDB route and in the manga.

-Ayato Sakamaki:

(For Ayato I fell upon this really interesting analysis if you are interested ) 

Ayato, in his childhood, like all of his brothers, was not treated well by his father but he , most importantly, got overpressured by Cordelia to be number one. He couldn’t get out and play freely like any normal child can do because when he would sneak out, he got punished and got slapped in the face by his own mother telling him that if he cannot be number one, he is not allowed to call her “mother” again.(Also, do I need to remind you all the lake scene from his childhood… )For him, you cannot be loved and/or appreciated if you’re not number one. Because he had to live such a childhood, he developed a severe narcissistic personality. Narcissists are not born, they are made, and they are made by being over praised as a kid for their success (such as having a good grade at school, winning a competition or an award, being the best in what they are doing) and by being emotionally neglected. (Ex: throughout the day the child is getting good compliments from their parents by being the number one at school but when the kid will start crying, the parents will ignore or punish him for it. Not giving him any love or support. Which will lead the kid to build himself an ego higher than Yūma’s height and rejecting his own emotions.) I think it describes Ayato’s behaviour and his past pretty well. Another thing that is important to consider about Ayato is that he looks as if he is frozen in time. (Which is a trait that can also be found in any real life narcissists) Even if his mother is dead and that he has nothing to prove anymore, he is still stuck in the “I need to be number one” as if his brain didn’t move on to the present. In addition to that, Ayato is a really childish man. I mean: he needs Yui’s attention and approval all the time, pouts like a kid, acts like a kid (when he asked Yui to stroke his hair in a childish way, plays pranks on Reiji, …) and sometimes speaks like a kid when things are not going the way he wants them to go. Also, once states that he doesn’t wish to have someone special in his life again because the last one who was special (his mom) broke his heart. Ayato himself and himself only and the only goal in his life is to prove that he is the best. To do that, he will use ANY sadistic method and won’t stop even if you beg. Heck, it’ll only excite him more. He is a narcissistic sadist who keeps his emotions far away from him.

-Kanato Sakamaki:

(For this character I highly suggest that you take a good look a this psychological analysis since in my opinion really detailed and the author made a really good job making it: . Thank you~)

Just like his brother Laito, Kanato throughout his childhood was severely neglected and treated very harshly by both of his parents. The only thing that was valuable to his mother’s eyes was his beautiful voice and literally made him sing until his vocal cords bled. I suspect that Kanato probably suffers from Asperger syndrome from how he acts when he is mad, the fact that he doesn’t understand his or the emotions of others and his overall behaviour. In the present we can all see that he is almost, if not, the scariest of all sakamaki brothers and I think that it is mainly due to the lack of attention and support from his parents. Of all the Sakamaki’s, Kanato is the one who, from very early in his childhood, needed attention and support the most. Why do you think he always has a teddy in his arms (with his mother’s ashes in it must I remind you..)and makes his own doll made out of the body of dead women? Kanato simply cannot stand being alone. He would rather have you dead by his side for all eternity than being rejected or even worse, ignored.(I really recommend to read Kanato’s analysis since it really explains well his behaviour on that aspect^^)

He is maybe cute, remember that he is unable to understand your emotions and that he has no problem killing you. Also to be able to survive with him, you will have to abandon your logic and read in between the lines which isn’t an easy task..(This one is shorter because I think that Kanato isn’t that complex. He is just really different but still stays, in my opinion, pretty simple and easy to understand)

-Laito Sakamaki:

Laito is what I would call an empty pervert who uses sex as a coping mechanism. He believes that there’s nothing more real than pleasure. He even goes further in his “crazy” beliefs that “even the sweetest pain can become the greatest pleasure”. Behind his playful, sociable, perverted personality is a really cruel, cunning and manipulator expert who knows the best tricks to manipulate someone since his mother uses those on him in his “young adulthood” to have sexual intercourses with him. Only used as a sex partner by his mom as a child and never received any unconditional love from his parents, he has a bad definition of love. For him love=lust, real love (true love or even unconditional love) doesn’t exist and that it is all fake. He spends his time having sex to forget about the women that broke him and would even go as far as threatening Yui to death if she resist him when she doesn’t want to get involve in his “activities” or “little games”. But even after all that he can’t forget her and still is captive of her “love”, still feeling her, remembering her scent and everything about her. He can’t escape from that jail. Finally, it’s important to remember that Laito is a sadist who takes an amount of pleasure by having someone succumbing to him in a mental and sexual way. He is not someone to be taken lightly. You might not see the danger totally at first by that’s just how Laito is. He even says it himself in his HDB route, he is the type of man who will follow his prey in an alley before attacking it. Therefore, he is not like most of his brothers, he is not going to attack fully. He’s slowly going to take little bites of you and before you even realize it, you won’t be able to escape from him anymore.

-Subaru Sakamaki:

First of all, we need to know that Subaru was born (just like almost all of his brothers) just for the sake of Karl’s plan. What is different about Subaru is that his mother became crazy when she had her child. (I just want to state that she did want the child and Karlheinz did not totally raped her since it is stated that she accepted but we also all know that she was being manipulated. Since for the moment I want to concentrate more on Subaru I will not spend too much time explaining his parents relationship but it is something that we should definitely analyse as well in my opinion) Subaru was severely neglected by his father and he never knew what it was to have a normal mother. Throughout his entire childhood, he’s witnessed his mother’s unstable mind, bipolarity, her tantrums episodes and even worse, not only her insults being thrown directly at him but her literally asking him to kill both her and Karl. Because of that, he’s developed anger issues, a lack of trust with women, a severe depression and he is, if not, borderline suicidal. I also want to state that (He even states in his route in HDB that the two people he hates the most in “this world” is 1) Karlheinz 2)himself)Subaru is one if not the most sensible emotionally. So that means he feels harder than the others. You can also see that he has developed similar traits has his mother has you get to know him more in his route such as: bipolarity (when he orders Yui to always come and tell him where she’s going and then get mad when she does so telling her that he doesn’t care) and random tantrums. (when he gets mad à Yui for no good reason and even makes false assumptions) Not only does he usuels violence as a coping mechanism but he also always isolates himself, not letting anyone in his hard shell because he believes that he can’t do any good and that he is useless. In his presents, he still believes in his mother’s insults and thinks of him as someone filthy, disgusting, weak, a monster who can’t do anything to help the person he loved, his mother. He hates himself. He is constantly irritated by everything. If you want to love him you will have to endure the violence that he’s going to give to you and live with his confusion and irritation against not only everything that surrounds him but also against himself and you, and you will have to give up your life to make him trust you entirely.

[nadziejastar]

Saïx’s True Purpose & Personality Change

“It’s something powerful, right? Where does it come from?” Roxas was dead serious.

 Love… Huh.

“Love is a special power that only humans have.”

I don’t trust myself to explain this right. But I want to answer Roxas and Xion’s questions about ‘the human heart’ to my best extent.

“So Nobodies don’t have it?”

“You need a heart for it, see.”

“A heart…” Roxas was lost in thought.

Axel kept speaking. “There’s something special only born between people who are even more than friends…that’s love.”

As soon as I beat KH3 and read the secret reports, my first thought was that Isa must have originally been Subject X. And that has been my firm belief ever since. It makes perfect sense. FAR more than him being an apprentice, which was a last minute retcon.

Ansem's Report 2

The experiments caused the test subject's heart to collapse, including those of the most stalwart. How fragile our hearts are! My treatment produced no signs of recovery. I confined those who had completely lost their hearts beneath the castle. Some time later, I went below and was greeted by the strangest sight. Creatures that seemed born of darkness...What are they? Are they truly sentient beings? Could they be the shadows of those who lost their hearts in my experiments? 

During the experiments on the darkness of the heart, all the subjects’ hearts collapsed, even the hearts of the most stalwart.

Secret Ansem Report 2

I have made a grave mistake. My study of the "darkness of the heart" began with a simple psychological test and quickly snowballed. Spurred on by my youngest apprentice, Ienzo, I constructed a massive laboratory in the basement of my castle. Unbeknownst to me, my six apprentices then began collecting a large number of subjects on which to perform dangerous experiments into the "darkness of the heart." As soon as I found out, I called my apprentices together and ordered them not only to cease their studies, but to destroy the results of their research thus far.

Isa was a unique subject. His heart was amazingly strong, due to his feelings for Lea, and it didn’t collapse like all the others.

Secret Report 4: Experiments of the Heart – Notes on Subject X, Excerpt 2

My pilot studies used a handful of subjects, but none possessed the fortitude to endure them. Ultimately, all suffered mental collapse. I knew it would be a heavy blow to lose a subject as unique as she. Upon discovering the tests I've been conducting, my master demanded that I cease my work immediately and destroy what research I have compiled. Worse still, he ordered the release of my remaining subjects. She is gone. Where is Subject X now? Has "wise" Master Ansem hidden her away? Whatever the case, I will not be deterred. I will take her place as the first subject in the grand experiment to come.

But it was captured. Xehanort’s goal was to use the power of Isa’s heart as a weapon, and he became a vessel. Saïx was the result.

“I’ll bring him back to our side. Let me—”

“That’s enough.” Saïx turned his head, giving Axel a sidelong look over his shoulder. “Traitor.”

Axel scowled darkly.

“I’m going. You know, don’t you, that you won’t stop me except by force? And even if you tried, you would fail.” Saïx went on his way. 

It’s my memories that are telling me this sort of thing is unpleasant.

The Berserker Nobodies carry cursed hammers. So, Saïx probably carries a cursed claymore. When he grips the claymore, he enters his berserk state. 

“Then let’s skip the conversation,” said Saïx, and just like that he threw his claymore. But, Roxas batted it aside easily. The series of movements was like it was done by a completely different person than yesterday’s Roxas.

Saïx hesitated for a second, and Roxas ran at him.

He blocked the Keyblade.

Long ago—I remember, I didn’t hate fighting. Saïx flung his claymore at Roxas.

And so, Saïx remembered things from a long long time ago.

My theory is that the claymore makes Saïx relive the memories---good or bad---that made his heart so strong, enhancing his fighting ability by going berserk.

Saïx: I passed on the message as you so desired. I told the young Sora to keep defeating the Heartless.

Xemnas: Good. Not only have you the power to inflict pain, you also have the power to plant seeds of doubt in one's receptive heart. Sora will soon begin to doubt himself. It will cause him to hesitate and that hesitation will turn to anger. That anger will fuel him to get rid of his apprehension and move forward. He will pave the way for the future we desire.

Saïx: There's something I've meant to ask.

Xemnas: About Axel? The poor fool. How long will he keep chasing the illusion of friendship, when he himself lacks emotion? Trying so hard to retrieve what he has lost, when it may never have existed in the first place. He deserves nothing more than our pity.

And those memories were of Lea. The heart has a direct connection to memory. Saïx is forced to relive Isa’s memories in order to receive greater power, but he’s convinced that neither he nor Axel can actually feel anything anymore. And he’s tormented by it.

Day 94: All Goes Apace

Author: Saïx

The hearts collected by our two Keyblade wielders, Roxas and Xion, have gathered together; and now, almighty Kingdom Hearts waxes large in the night sky. Our efforts have come to bear fruit, nearly ripe for the plucking. All plans proceed smoothly—alarmingly so, in fact, though this is no time to be deterred by paranoia.

Day 94 ~Hearts~ is when Kingdom Hearts first becomes visible in the sky. They’re sooo close to getting their hearts back, and Saïx is trying not to be paranoid.

Cogsworth: Those horrid creatures plaguing the castle have kept the master from seeing Belle for days… There has to be some way to bring the two of  them together!

Xion: Remember the last time we were here? The candelabra was talking about the same thing. The servants seem awfully interested in making sure Belle and their master get along.

Roxas: You think it’s strange?

Xion: Only that they seem to be in such a rush about it.

That day Roxas and Xion go to the Beast’s Castle for the first time together. And Cogsworth is also trying not to be paranoid since time is running out for them to become human again.

“If he’s taking on the Heartless himself, he must have a reason to fight.”

Xion stared down at the Keyblade. What’s my reason?

“A reason?” Roxas blinked at her, mystified. “Like what?”

Chapter 65 of the KH2 manga is when Sora faces off against Saïx. It’s called “The Reason I Fight”. In 358/2 Days, that’s what the Beast’s Castle was all about, too. 

“Like…maybe he has something he wants to protect,” she said softly.

Xion, in turn, was mystified that Roxas found the idea so strange. As if he had never thought to ask why.

The main thing Roxas wanted to know was why the Beast fought so hard when he was the master of the castle, like Xemnas. He had servants to fight for him (or at least Roxas thought so). Xion suggested that the Beast was fighting so hard because he had something he wanted to protect.

Roxas: I just don’t understand why having a heart is so important. Do you?

Axel: Kind of a strange time to bring it up…

Roxas: But don’t you ever stop and wonder? We’re fighting for something we don’t know anything about.

Axel: Roxas… We’re fighting because we want to know what it’s about.

Roxas: Yeah… Yeah, I guess you’re right.

After the mission, Roxas was questioning the reason they were all fighting so hard. Axel told him it was to get hearts of their own. Hearts were necessary to experience certain things, and that was the recurring theme of Beast’s Castle.

Meanwhile, Roxas was already in the Beast’s castle with Xaldin. Gashes in the walls told them of a fearsome battle between the Heartless and the castle’s master.

But Roxas had one question for Xaldin. “Why is the Beast fighting so much?”

“That is what we’re here to find out,” said Xaldin. They climbed the stairs from the entrance hall, toward the grand doors, which Roxas was fairly certain led to the ballroom.

I think that world was meant to be a parallel to Axel and Saïx’s backstory. The reason the Beast fights is tied to Isa’s true purpose as a human and Axel’s reason to work so hard to complete Kingdom Hearts.

“Well, it seems important to him…” Roxas looked again at the rose beneath the glass, safe in the back of the chambers. It was somehow sparkling, unlike anything else here.

“Precisely. That is no ordinary rose. The room is in tatters save for one corner—because to him, at least, it is more precious than all the castle’s riches.”

“Is that why he’s fighting the Heartless? He wants to protect the rose?”

“Indeed. It holds some strange power… Perhaps the Heartless are drawn to it as well.”

“Is that the reason he’s fighting so hard…?” But why was the Beast so determined to protect a flower?

The Beast was fighting so hard to protect the rose, which was very dear to him. It was the one thing that was most important to him. Or at least that’s what Xaldin thought.

“Our work here is done,” Xaldin declared. “We have the Beast’s weakness.”

“We do?”

“That which we treasure has power over us, Roxas. His heart is captive to it. And that makes it his weakness.”

“Captive…? I don’t get it.”

Everything Xaldin said only got harder and harder to follow.

“Nor should you. You have no heart to love with. Let’s not linger here.”

Xaldin said that having something you care about is a weakness. It’s they key to capturing the person’s heart. Since Nomura said that those implanted with Xehanort’s heart get their heart captured, this is no doubt what happened to Isa.

“Well, you were right,” Roxas went on. “We figured out what he cares so much about. But Xaldin says that’s a weakness.”

“Why would caring about something be a weakness?” Xion asked, baffled.

Roxas lowered his head. “I don’t know. I didn’t get it, either.”

I’m not the only one surrounded by things I can’t understand, Xion thought. Axel would explain it, though…

“I hope Axel comes back soon,” said Roxas. She nodded. They would have so many things to ask him.

Whenever Roxas went to Beast’s Castle, he’d want to talk to Axel afterwards, to explain things to him. 

“Hmm, this is fascinating,” said Xaldin. “His monstrous form is somehow tied to the rose.”

“You mean, his curse?” Roxas asked, keeping his voice low.

“Yes. It seems that unless he completes some task before the rose withers, he’ll remain a beast forever.” Xaldin smirked at his own cleverness. “A beastly curse and a rose… Heh-heh. This will prove useful.”

“How?”

“Trying to explain it to you would be a waste of time. Let’s go, Roxas. No more dallying.” With that nonanswer, Xaldin left the chambers.

Roxas dallied anyway, peering through the doors again. The rose, the thing he treasures, is his weakness? Nope, I don’t get it. I wonder if Axel will know what it all means…?

And Axel always found it hard to explain. That’s because the concepts Roxas asked about were all things you needed a heart to understand.

“Do you have anything you couldn’tKeybladeo lose?”

Axel shifted in surprise and pulled the ice cream bar out of his mouth. “What? Where’d that come from?”

“I saw someone today and…he was talking about something like that. It was so important he couldn’t even think about losing it. Xaldin told me that’s a weakness. And I started thinking about how I don’t have anything—”

“Yeah, because you don’t have a heart.” Axel sighed, weary of having to point it out.

Roxas thought that Axel would know what Xaldin meant, and I think he was absolutely right.

Young Xehanort: What? “Your friends are your power”? Ah...how very true. But if the light of friendship is a form of power...the darkness of being alone is a power...even greater. Darkness is the hearts true nature. 

I don’t think Isa naturally enjoyed combat, but he did his best to protect Lea. He got better at fighting and even started to enjoy it because it had a purpose. There was meaning in it. Isa couldn’t bear to lose Lea. This was seen as his weakness and exploited during the experiments.

Sora: That’s the hearts true nature. To never, ever let go. Wherever they are, Andy and the other toy haven’t let go either.

Woody: Yeah! You can’t keep us from Andy.

Sora fought to protect his friends, too. It was his weakness and Saïx definitely exploited it during their battle. Sora’s friends were turned into cards, and even when the cards were destroyed, Sora still told Saïx that he wasn’t alone. 

Xigbar: Oh, and you can spare me the usual party line. Yes, hearts are powerful when they’re connected. But if you put too much of that power in one place, some of those hearts might end up breaking.

Saïx got extremely upset by this and was reminded of his fight with Roxas.

After so long, the weight of it was somehow strange in her grip. She thought she could feel the warmth from his hand lingering in the metal.

“Then you can go ahead and use it for the day,” said Roxas.

“But what are you going to use?”

“Well…” A hint of a grin came to his face, and he picked up a makeshift weapon near his feet. “I can improvise.”

“Roxas…that’s a stick.” It couldn’t possibly do any damage to Heartless, Xion thought.

When Xion was trying to regain the use of her Keyblade at the Beast’s Castle, she also said she wasn’t alone. Roxas was right there fighting beside her. He put himself at a disadvantage for her sake.

Roxas: Love? What's that?

Xaldin: It's an emotion. The one deluding those two as we speak.

Roxas: Oh...

Xaldin: They think the power of love will save them? That's the stuff of poetry, not practicality.

Roxas: Love is a power?

Xaldin: None you or I will ever grasp. Nor will they, for long. The love between them will wither and die. Love never lasts.

My theory is that Lea always fought really hard to protect Isa, who probably had never fought a day in his life. Lea enjoyed play fighting and was more equipped to handle himself. He saved Isa from certain death one day by and Isa really wanted to thank him by letting him have a day off to rest. Like Xion, he had been working really hard to become more independent and useful. I think he bungled it and collapsed, but after that, the apprentices viewed him differently. I don’t think he was seen as very useful at first. He was weak. But then they realized how strong his heart was.

Roxas looked bewildered. As he’d expected, he wasn’t doing a very good job explaining it.

“Not that it matters. We’ll never know the difference.”

Roxas wouldn’t let it go. “Do you think I could love somebody, if I had a heart?”

“Once Kingdom Hearts is complete, I bet you’ll be able to figure it out.” 

The magic words again, Axel thought. It’ll all make sense when Kingdom Hearts is complete. But was that true?

No one had ever seen it happen before. So who knew? Still, all they could do was believe in it. Pitiful Heartless, mindlessly collecting hearts…

The Beast’s true purpose was not defending the rose; it was defending Belle. He wanted to protect her because he loved her. I think Isa wanted to protect Lea because he loved him. And I think Axel’s main motivation to complete Kingdom Hearts was that he loved Isa. He wanted him to get his heart back, and he wanted to experience love again. More than anything, Axel wanted love. Someone who thought he was the most important person in the world. This is why Roxas was unable to meet his emotional needs. Axel wanted more than just friendship. He wanted romantic love. That was his motivation for completing Kingdom Hearts. 

“Something you find amusing?”

“Oh, the things you hear from a guy with no heart,” Xigbar said through his hilarity.

None of us have hearts, Saïx was about to remind him, when Xemnas spoke again.

Xigbar taunted Saïx for having no heart. It happened more than once in the novel. The first time is when Saïx couldn’t see Xion. 

“…Well, do your best. The best a kid without a heart can do, anyway,” said Xigbar, and he too disappeared.

Xigbar also suggested that Isa lost his heart as a kid. It was no doubt a result of being experimented on. When Axel told Roxas he’d have to work twice as hard to make up Xion’s quota, he called it “doing your best”. And I think that’s why Xigbar said Saïx would have trouble doing that without a heart. He was referring to the “kid without a heart,” Isa. His heart is what gave him strength.

“I feel bad for you, too,” she told him.

“What are you talking about?” Saïx towered over Naminé.

“You haven’t even noticed yet…that you have a heart.”

Several Nobodies emerged from a rift out of the corridors.

“A heart? I have a heart? No one wants your nonsense!” Saïx raised his sword over Naminé—but Riku was there with Soul Eater to intercept the blow.

“Hmph. I don’t have time for these games.” Darkness welled from a rift behind Saïx. “Do your best to help your dear hero.” With that, he disappeared.

“Are you all right?” Riku helped Naminé to her feet.

“Now I understand…,” she murmured.

“Naminé…? You understand what?”

She was silent for a moment and quietly shook her head as she stood. “It’s nothing. We have to find Kairi.”

Despite having such a close bond with Lea as a kid, and desperately wanting a heart more than anyone, Saïx still never displayed any human emotion. There was supposed to be something very unusual about him.

“Looks strong,” Axel remarked from behind them.

“Yeah. He is,” Riku said, sinking into thought.

His heart is even stronger than his body. It’s exactly the kind of heart the organization wants…

“But someone that strong won’t just do whatever the organization says,” Naminé murmured.

“Well, this is their chance to show how persuasive they can be,” Axel said with a bitter smirk.

I don’t think Isa was ever really that great of a fighter. But his heart was stronger than his body (he’d probably be a good fighter if he had a Keyblade). And his strong heart is why he was targeted by the apprentices and became Subject X, Xehanort’s favorite lab rat.

Odr (pronounced “Oh-der,” from Old Norse Óðr, “ecstasy, inspiration, fury, frenzy;” sometimes shortened to Óð or “Od”) is an obscure, seldom-mentioned god. The Old Norse noun óðr means "mind", "soul" or "spirit".  

It is derived from a Proto-Germanic word *wōð- or *wōþ- and it is related to Gothic wôds ("raging", "possessed"), Old High German wuot ("fury" "rage, to be insane") and the Anglo-Saxon words wód ("fury", "rabies") and wóð ("song", "cry", "voice", "poetry", "eloquence"). Old Norse derivations include œði "strong excitation, possession". Ultimately these Germanic words are derived from the Proto-Indo-European word *wāt-, which meant "to blow (on), to fan (flames)", fig. "to inspire".

This backstory also fits with the Norse mythology-inspired concept of Saïx. Berserkers worked themselves up into a rage while focusing on something that gave them “divine inspiration”. They needed a purpose, which was typically Odin. Part of the mythology of berserkers is that they are possessed by animal spirits, like bears or wolves. The wolf is the traditional spirit guide of the hunter, warrior, and magician. The wolf represents a dual nature of nourishing and destruction. I think Saïx would be represented be a wolf (or werewolf).

In Celtic tradition, the Hare is sacred to the Goddess and is the totem animal of many lunar Goddesses - Hecate, Freyja, Selene, Anumati. Freyja is the wife of Odr. She is the headstrong Norse goddess of love, sensuality, and women’s mysteries, was also served by hare attendants. The nocturnal Hare, closely linked to the moon which dies every morning & is resurrected every evening, also represents Immortality & the rebirth of Nature in Spring. It is also a symbol of Abundance as the hare can conceive while pregnant.

On the other hand, I think Isa was possessed by the spirit of a rabbit when he fought. Unfortunately, wolves eat rabbits. Isa’s heart was swallowed by Xehanort’s.

Xemnas: As your flesh bears the sigil, so your name shall be known as that of a recusant.

It makes sense that Saïx was given his scar not long before receiving his new name and new purpose. The third eye chakra is located on the forehead between the eyebrows, exactly where Saïx’s scar is. The scar was something he apparently got as a human, since it stayed after he was recompleted, unlike Axel’s tear marks. The third eye governs one’s ability to think and make decisions, and their connection to their purpose. It also controls extra-sensory perception, which explains why Saïx could not see Xion.

Xemnas: A heart is never lost for good. There may have been variances in our dispositions, but a number of us unquestionably showed signs of a burgeoning replacement. Once born, the heart can also be nurtured. Our experiments creating Heartless were attempts to control the mind, and convince it to renounce its sense of self. But understand, one can banish the heart from the body, but the body will try to replace it the first chance it gets, for as many times as it takes. And so I knew, even after we were divided into Heartless and Nobodies, it was just a temporary separation.

Xemnas learned that the heart could not simply be banished. So, in order to create vessels, he resorted to controlling the mind and capturing the heart. This all happened during the experiments on the darkness of the heart.

Outside the window, the moon—the heart-shaped moon—floated. Axel watched it, still sprawled on his bed. There was still a little time before he had to leave on his mission.

To gather hearts, to have hearts of our own, to not let the heart mislead us…

For these past few days, I’ve been thinking about the meaning of Xemnas’ words. To not let the heart mislead us? What does that mean? Whenever I’m alone, these thoughts just float around in my head the whole time. I don’t know why I have to think so much about it. I bet the other Nobodies don’t.

The heart… emotions. I think about their origins. Contemplate it. Reason about it. When did I start doing this?

On Day 117 ~Secrets~, Axel was thinking about Xemnas’s speech before Saïx came in the room. He didn’t know what Xemnas was talking about when he said they wouldn’t let the heart “mislead” them.

Sora: So then, all that stuff I just saw--did you put that in my head?

Xigbar: No. That wasn't "stuff," it was a dream. The falling asleep part was definitely our bad. But we can't put stuff in your head. Hey, I got an idea. Ask your heart. See if it's got a clue. 

Sora: Well...my heart was aching. That's why I kept going. 

Xigbar: Oh... Thank you, Sora's heart, for pushing him right into our clutches. Aren't hearts great? Steer us wrong every time.

When Xigbar found Sora in KH3D, he said something very similar. 

Xemnas: However--through weakness of body...weakness of will...or weakness of trust--most of the original members we had chosen for the Organization were inadequate. Thus, naturally, they never had a chance to attain their goal. Yet, even this was to be expected. We have learned of the heart's folly, and we have achieved our other goals. This last excursion has proven to be a worthy closing assignment for the Organization.

And afterwards, Xemnas showed up and talked about the mind control experiments. He said that they’d learned of the heart’s folly and achieved their other goals. Saïx is no doubt a product of this. 

Day 355: Mind

Author: Xigbar

The gears of Xemnas' plans have begun to spin wild since the loss of half our membership at Castle Oblivion. The results are there, but can this state of affairs fairly be called a success? If Kingdom Hearts can be said to possess a mind of its own, it is surely rejecting Xemnas—no, rejecting Xehanort. Roxas left the Organization today.

Isa was “misled” by his heart, causing him a lot of pain, putting his heart to sleep. Then he got Norted. His mind and heart were replaced with Xehanort's. The same thing was almost done to Sora. He was going to be made into the 13th vessel by mentally fracturing him, and putting his heart to sleep, leaving him without a sense of self.

Xemnas: You seek answers. You feel nothing. Nothing is real. I can give you purpose.

Roxas: Roxas.

Xemnas: That is right–the new you.

Roxas received his new name along with his purpose soon after he was born. When Roxas was leaving the organization, he was rejecting that purpose. He was rejecting Xehanort. And Saïx was unusually angry about it. He even said similar things that Xemnas did, implying that the same thing was told to him when he received his new name and purpose. At that point, Isa's consciousness was gone.

Day 356: Unforeseen Events

Author: Saïx

Our plans never accounted for the possibility of both Xion and Roxas leaving. How did this come to pass? When did Roxas grow strong enough to outmuscle me? What were you really after, Lea? We joined the Organization at the same time, and formulated our plan. At this point, it's just an idle fantasy. Everything changed. You, and me.

Isa’s purpose was protecting Lea. His new purpose was to become stronger, since physically he probably wasn’t that strong. And his priorities drastically changed. He might not have any memory of receiving his purpose. Since he's a Nort, maybe he thought it was something he desired on his own.

Roxas: Yeah, but what is it? “The heart of all hearts”?

Xion: It’s where all the hearts you and I collect wind up.

Axel: Exactly. It’s because of you two and the Keyblade that we’re finally making some progress. We might finally get hearts of our own.

Xion: “The strength of the human heart is vast,” Xemnas said.

Roxas: Yeah, but what do we need with it?

In the prologue of the manga, Axel reminisced with both Roxas and Xion. They got their new names, then watched the sunset together. One of the panels included the scene of Xion questioning her purpose in the organization. Roxas questioned why they were fighting on Day 94, but accepted Axel’s explanation that they’d understand when they had hearts.

Xion: Roxas, why are we doing all this? Working for the Organization?

Roxas: What do you mean, why? So we can get hearts of our own, right?

Xion: Why? What do we need hearts for?

Roxas: I don’t know. But I figure once we have them, we’ll be in a better position to judge. Right?

Xion: Maybe. I just wish I knew what I was doing here.

Xion started questioning why she was fighting on Day 151, after she failed the mission with Riku and was called a failure. Roxas tried to cheer her up, but she ran off. All of this would eventually lead her to run away for good.

Axel ducked into the sweets shop. “One ice cream, please!”

“Here you go.”

Sea-salt ice cream in hand, he meandered toward the clock tower.

I wasn’t expecting to find Riku easily in the first place. I bet Saïx thought the same. But Saïx will probably pull that magnificently horrible face and have a nasty word or two to say if I state that ‘I couldn’t find him’, but then that’s Saïx’s ‘personality’. In short, Saïx pretending to be a human just involves just a whole lot of that kind of thing. It doesn’t mean that he himself is really feeling some kind of displeasure. That too is natural, seeing as he has no heart.

“This is so salty,” Axel muttered just like every time, biting his ice cream as he climbed the slope that led to the station.

After Xion ran off on Day 151, Axel showed up at the clock tower. Just after the scene where Xion ran off, there was an extra scene in the novel. Axel bought some ice cream and was thinking about Saïx’s “personality”.

Saïx heaved an exaggerated sigh. In a way, Saïx put more effort than any of them into pretending he had a heart, Axel thought. And yet, he was more lacking than any of them.

Axel remarked several times about Saïx’s lack of human emotion. He did it when he returned from Castle Oblivion on Day 72 ~Change~, when Saïx wasn’t worried about him or grateful to him.

After watching them go, Axel stretched and turned to Saïx, expecting to see a scowl. But the expression had left Saïx’s face, leaving him as dispassionate as usual.

Of course, he had been faking it in the first place. Nobodies had no hearts; they only imitated what emotions they remembered. The very proof of their emptiness showed how desperately they each longed for a heart. Axel probably did the same thing himself without noticing, and yet, for some reason, when Saïx did it—or actually, any of the others—it seemed so out of place.

Maybe because it makes me realize how much effort we put into acting like we’re still human, Axel thought. It’s pointless.

And he did it on Day 96, when he covered for Roxas and Xion so they could go to the Beast’s Castle together. In the manga, Axel said Saïx was like that from the start, so probably ever since he became a Nobody.

Xion: I’m remembering things. About who I was as a human.

Axel: Well, stop remembering. Nothing good will come of it.

Xion ran away on Day 255 because she wanted to know who she was. She wanted a real purpose, not just doing the organization’s bidding. Afterwards, Axel sat with Roxas and couldn’t break the news to him. I think he was remembering how Isa awakened to a new purpose, too. This coincided with his personality change and possibly him regaining his memories. Saïx’s purpose was to become stronger. After that, he became a totally different person. Axel’s biggest source of pain throughout Days was that he thought he would never see the Isa from his memories ever again. The Isa who existed before he awakened to a new purpose.

Axel: You really think the truth is going to make you feel better? It won’t.

Roxas: What makes you so sure? I have a right to know who I am! How did I get here? Why am I special? Where did I learn to use the Keyblade? I deserve those answers!

Axel: Roxas…

Roxas: Are you gonna tell me or not? Axel… Who am I?

The Isa who still loved him and whose purpose was protecting him. He was terribly lonely and was very upset when both Roxas and Xion started questioning who they were, because he knew he would lose them. They'd be destroyed. He had a very strong stance against them regaining their human memories. 

"Axel—please.”

“No ‘please’.”

“But… I…” For a second, Axel thought he saw Xion’s face become Sora’s again. He shook his head slowly. 

“You get it, don’t you, Axel? I can’t live like this.”

“There should be a way for you to keep living as yourself.” Xion pushed Axel back with the Keyblade, jumped back, and readied her stance.

“That’s a lie. On top of this, I don’t want to be used by the Organization for such a thing. I hate that Roxas is being used by the Organization.”

“So do I.”

Axel couldn’t bear to tell Roxas that he might never see Xion again after she left. It’s probably due to what happened to Isa. Subject X was an amnesiac. He probably started to regain his memories, which started after becoming self-aware and telling Lea why the sunset was red. That was the beginning of the end. His heart began to gradually get swallowed by Xehanort. Lea had to witness his friend become a completely different person over time. He was reliving that experience with Xion.

[cyberkinnaman]

PAIRING: Joel Kinnaman x (fem!)Reader SUMMARY: After the shooting of Hanna you go to the club to release some pressure.  WORD COUNT: 1608 WARNINGS: swear words, age-gap relationship, Joel is much taller than you.  AUTHOR’S NOTE: Hey guys! First of all, thank you so much for your notes and writings on the previous post. I’m really glad that some of you wanted fanfiction about Joel. I’ve written a few but I was too afraid to post them, but now here we are. Please note, that English is not my main language so I’m deeply sorry for any kind of mistakes. If you want to request something or say something about this, please go ahead! I’ll very like to read your comments. Also, this was written from a 3rd person singular, but the next one will be in 2nd person. Sorry about that! Y/C/D: your chosen drink  Y/H/L: your hair length Y/H/C: your hair color liten flicka: ‘little girl’ in Swedish (I just love to imagine Joel saying this word... gosh). INSPIRED BY:  Lost - Frequency & SoulCircuit ft. Diia. (this music was on the 2nd episode of Hanna and I just loved it!!) P.S: I know this is not the best writing and it sucks, but I’ll try to do better next time I promise! :)  ___ The music was pumping through her veins. She could feel it as she asked for another drink from the bartender. Y/C/D. Her favorite. She was slightly shaking her body to the rhythm of the sound, while she was waiting for her drink. She was standing there alone, waiting for her friends while her other co-workers were chatting at the other side of the heavy club. They were finally celebrating the end of a long-lasting shooting. They always stuck together, but this night was somehow different. The boys separated at the beginning of the night from the girls quite easily. However, there were constant glazes through the club between them. A lot of relationships was born thanks to this shooting, but one particular couple stood out. Joel and Y/N. Y/N got her drink, which she eagerly poured down. She did not count the number of drinks she consumed that night, but she could certainly feel it. Yet, she was not drunk, she was just having a good time. Suddenly, her favorite music started to play, which she was very excited about. She started to move her body with more spirit to the bass of the sound. “You come alive with the moonlight I am alive with the sound” Joel was watching her. Gazing at her face as she was singing the lines of the current music with celestial joy. Joel was amazed by her. She always knew every single song on the radio, which was unbelievable for him. He often told her that, while she started to laugh and said: “it's my only talent, I’ll write it on my resume.” He was always fond of her, but he did not know what to do with this feeling, as he did not want to ruin their friendship... And of course, Joel had some self-doubt as well, as he was a lot older than Y/N. “We just need the night Oh, hold on” She was singing the lines, while her eyes were caught by Joel’s. He was looking at her with some expression she could not read. As he was watching her, sudden warmth overwhelmed her. She could not decide if this was because of embarrassment or excitement. She was hooked by Joel’s features from the first time, after knowing him the feelings for him became more. She always wanted more, but she thought that Joel was thinking about her just as a friend. Now, with that expression on his face and the several drinks which she poured down gave her some strength. “Memories flow Hold ‘em close” He was looking at her, while she was looking back at him. Their gazes intertwined. He slowly raised his glass to his mouth. Tasting the alcohol. Never looking away from her. Drinking. One sip. Then another. Until it was empty. He then wet his lips with his tongue, watching her as she continued to sway her body to the rhythm. She looked so different. Carefree. She was always stressed because of the work, but now that they are finished, she changed. Damn. He wanted her even more now. She looked so youthful and cheerful. He swallowed hard. It was if the whole world started to slow down when he was watching her. All of the feelings became so overwhelming. “Watching all the tapes turn and rewind It's love and bound I'll love it down” She could not bear his gaze anymore, it was too much. The hot, steamy air became even worse as he was watching her. She could feel her heartbeat in her ears along with the music. The blue and purple lights started to blind her, so she closed her eyes and stopped, turning away from him and the bar. Due to a sudden thought, she went to the dancefloor, hoping that he will follow her. “Lookin’ at what u can't find You lost yourself tonight” When she moved away from the bar, he looked at his friend who was all occupied by each other. He stood up and went into the direction where she disappeared. The alcohol, her face, and the music gave him the motivation which he craved for. He was captured by her sight. In the dancefloor. Completely lost in the music, dancing to the beat, with closed eyes, her fingers lost in her Y/H/L, Y/H/C hair. She swung her body sensually, touching herself all the right places. The confidence which was radiating from her utterly washed him away. “You lookin' at what you can't find You lost yourself tonight You come alive with the moonlight I am alive with the sound” She was dancing there, ultimately distracted by the music. This night was about freedom. Everything felt perfect at that time, all of her doubts disappeared immediately when she stepped in the club. Maybe, she should do this more often. She was the opposite of herself. Yet, she did not feel this good for a very long time. Suddenly, she felt a massive, muscular body behind her. Shortly after came a soft sound, brushing his lips to her ear, while a large hand cupped her waist by the side. ‘Mind if I join, liten flicka?’ it was Joel’s deep, husky voice, which she could barely hear through the loud music. She always blushed when he called her like that, but not this night. She was just smiling by the nickname, while she leaned her head back to his chest, putting her hand on top of his. Joel squeezed her hand which was now laced with his. Joel was as close as her as possible, letting her to lead the dance as she was better than him anyway. He tried to follow her movies, additionally lean down, so his face now was buried in her flowy hair. She could feel every movement, as they swayed their bodies in perfect sync. She started to feel dizzy when their bodies started to grind on each other, her eyes rolled back to the incredibly good sensation. As they got more and more lost in the music, Joel's hands started to explore her body more, caressing her from her ribs to her waist, hiking her skirt up a bit, while squeezing her sides. She was completely adrift, arching her hips to his. All of the emotions started to take over her body. She then could feel Joel's lips on her neck. She bent her neck even more, so he could reach it easily, while she lifted her hand to rush through Joel’s hair. She loved this hair on him, which was longer at the beginning, fading into a shorter one. He looked so good with this hairstyle, and the fact that he had stubble made it even better. Which is now started to tingle her neck, making her burst out into a laugh. She was now facing him, looking at each other with smiles on their faces. The whole club started to slow down, everyone around them started to move tardy, she could see the lights while they slowly switched to one color to another, when Joel pressed his lips against hers. She tried not to moan on the spot due to his soft, soaked lips on which she could feel the taste of alcohol. It was a soft, light kiss, which ended up too soon, but Joel did not want to ruin their friendship. He immediately regretted it, as he was doing something wrong. Just as they pulled away a little bit, Y/N looked up at him with shining eyes, cupping his cheeks. Maybe, she was not mad at him after all. Joel grabbed her chin, looking at her lovingly but dangerously at the same time. This time, Y/N moved, desperately and roughly pushing her lips against his, which he was happy to oblige to. Swirling their tongues around each other’s, crushing, sucking, rolling, biting. All of those and even more. Everything around them disappeared, only the two of them existed. She could hear their soft moans, slightly heavy breathing, feeling his hardening body underneath her, his burning touch, the music which was pumping in her ears, the lights, the air around them. When they finally pulled away, they were speechless. ‘Wow,’ she said, which he could barely hear. ‘Oh, Jesus....’ he said, while he tilted his head up. Y/N looked into the direction which he was looking at, turning around. The whole crew was watching them, delighted look on their faces. They were watching them through the whole time? ‘Oh, fuck off...’ Y/N shouted without a hesitation. After she said it, only she realized what she thought. She looked back at Joel, who had a surprised look on his face because of her behavior. ‘I’m sorry...’ she was just as shocked, but they started to laugh to release some tension. ‘It’s okay’ he said. ‘I just didn't know you had this dark, sassy side in you.’ ‘Oh, just wait for it... you’ll be very surprised about what’s in me.’ she answered ambiguously, laughing while moving closer again to him. ‘Oh, really?’ he smirked, while grabbed her by the waist. ‘Maybe, I can show you one day, who knows’ she said, pulling a serious face on herself. ‘I would very like that, liten flicka’ he answered honestly, which filled her hear with happiness. ‘Me too’ she said after a short pause. ‘Let’s dance, Kinnaman. And if you're good, maybe you’ll be rewarded by the end of the night.’ he smiled down at her, looking as if he was in love. He breathed another kiss to her lips, holding her by the middle. She was on her tip-toes, returning the kiss which was just the beginning of a very good night.

[solaciummeae]

{ Angels && Airwaves: }

This is a general synopsis of my Angels & Airwaves universe that was co-created with @deadbeatcentral​. There will be more information to follow as the verse develops but this is a brief summary for anyone interested in interacting in that specific universe with my characters. 

NOTE: Please do NOT steal for your own plots. While I’d love to interact with any of you in this verse-- it’s pretty gross to steal it and just do your own thing with it as me && Vera put a lot of time and effort in the worlds we build and the characters we place in them.

This verse is contemporary and primarily takes place in the United States in 2018. There is a potential for flashbacks and snapshots of different time periods as is the nature of the verse. Not to be confused with time travel, but in terms of memories and histories of characters involved. It’s based around angels obviously and their connection to their human charges. Things like God, the Universe, fate, destiny, etc. are prevalent in this verse. There are also mentions of demons and the devil, however they are much less the focus. Read on for specifics. 

Contrary to popular secular belief-- heaven and hell are very much real. They are located on completely different planes than the Earthly world that humans live in during their mortal life. While they are realms of a spiritual nature that you can only reach when your soul leaves your body, they are just as tangible as the physical world. This also means that God also known to some as the Creator is just as real, as well as the devil or the Destroyer. The forces of light and dark are quite prominent, angels and demons being soldiers for each respectively. 

Ever at war, these forces are all but unseen to the human realm. Acting invisibly for or against the human race. As one might assume, the light is constantly fighting back the darkness so that earth can remain flourishing rather than falling into chaos and destruction. This war has gone on throughout all of time, changing and adapting to the conditions of the world.

Even as most human minds are unable to comprehend the magnitude of all of these things, they rage on. The Universe is ever expanding, growing more massive as time carries on. Unlike like Earth, which is fixed in size, causing threats of overpopulation and lack of resources-- the spiritual plane is infinite. 

After all, there must be room for all the souls that have already passed on and traveled to either realm of the afterlife. The afterlife which unlike the mortal life takes place not just on one planet in a singular solar system, but throughout the entire Universe. With millennia after millennia of humans, with a growing population that currently sits at seven and a half billion people-- the spiritual planes of existence must be just as they are. Endless.

Just as the Universe and spiritual planes are infinite-- most humans are unable to comprehend just how many non-human beings there are. It’s a common misconception that there are only so many angels and likewise demons. In fact, every single human has an angel assigned to them. It works in an intricate and entirely complex system. 

At birth, an angel is given to their human charge who stays with them throughout their entire mortal life. Upon that human’s death, their angel makes themselves known to their charge and escorts them to the afterlife where they’ll be judged based upon their mortal life to decide whether or not they remain in paradise or are cast out to the underworld commonly known as hell. In the case of the latter, their guardian must take them to the other plane where they will be met by a demon who will carry them forth.

As with all of life, angels follow a similar cycle. Once their human charge has passed on and is settled in their new immortal life. The angel is then bestowed upon a new charge, arriving back to Earth just as the child is born into the world.

The bond between a guardian and their charge is one that is deeply profound. This angel has been with their human throughout their entire life. They know them better than perhaps anyone else, save God himself. For this reason, sometimes these relationships-- though unknown to the human of the pair-- can become complicated.

As the Creator is the only truly perfect and infallible being, angels are known to make mistakes just as humans do. Obviously, as the story of old tells, demons were once angels themselves who followed Lucifer to the depths of hell when he turned from God and was cast out to the other realm.

Most angels don’t fall this way, their own transgressions usually to be found forgivable by the Heavenly Father who shows compassion and mercy toward his children. In certain cases, punishments are dealt on a more temporary basis.

As has happened rarely but more often than one would think-- guardians have fallen in love with their charges. Having spent every moment of their human’s life with them, watching them grow up and become the person they are meant to be an attachment forms. While all angels love their charges, most angels maintain a platonic relationship with them. However, others grow to love them so deeply that a romantic attachment is formed.

In such cases, that particular guardian is temporarily exiled to live on Earth amongst the human world. They still retain every heavenly gift and ability that the race of angels possess but they are “grounded.” In these situations, a background and all human documentation is instantaneously created for that guardian, so that they an easily operate in the human world as though they were one themselves. They’re given an entire history and the means to function as a proper member of society even if their needs are quite different than humans themselves. For example, angels do not require things like sleep or food to sustain life-- but elect to do such things by choice rather than out of necessity.

Being that they’ve already crossed such a line, they are given the opportunity to make their presence known to their charge-- to engage with them. Angels have the ability to make themselves completely invisible and undetectable even to the touch when desired-- as well as having the ability to have a very physical, visible, and tangible presence. 

These particular guardians-- unlike their counterparts-- having been grounded are now tied to their human charge. Their life is bound to theirs, causing them to age with said charge. While angels typically have several hundred to even thousands of humans depending-- guardians who have been grounded are removed from the cycle of gaining new charges upon death. 

They are only allowed to return to the spiritual plane of paradise once that particular human passes on-- the angel and their human passing at the same exact time. The guardian escorts them to heaven and remains there for the rest of time. In this way, the particular charge that they developed such an attachment to is certainly not their first, but will be their last.

While most angels see this is a punishment-- it is actually a gift from God. For while there are consequences for all actions, the Creator loves all of his children and is compassionate rather than cruel. In essence, he is giving those guardians the opportunity to truly know their charges and likewise for their charges to know them. In this way-- should the human reciprocate the feelings that are warned to be forbidden-- the human and angel are given the opportunity to spend eternity together in the afterlife. Therefore, while guardians are taught not to have such feelings for their humans-- once they have passed on, it is actually revered as a blessing. 

[xandriaxmonjeau-blog]

was that ( olivia wilde)? no, it’s just ( xandria monjeau). they are the ( 33) year old ( witch ). i heard they’re (charismatic and intelligent) but also ( manipulative and vengeful). rumor has it they ( haven’t ) pledged allegiance to the hollow. i must warn you, neutrality is not an option.

⚜ So as promised, a proper intro for Xandria Monjeau! ⚜

She’s a pretty powerful witch from Paris, France and she also happens to be the current Head Regent of The Levesque Covens which form the 8 family witch covens of Paris & the 4 family witch covens of Marseille, Strasbourg, Bordeaux and Manosque.(yep, the last place we all saw elijah in the S4 finale ;))

Her real name is actually Antoinette Labeau, but that is currently a secret from everyone here including her status as a French Regent Witch.

She's the slightly older half-sister of Kaleb Westphall, which is actually a very highly wc of mine for her XD I'll have to keep her family history a lil vague for now incase anyone picks up Kaleb in the future, but the main gist of what I have now is thatt, she's from a very old-standing,   powerful & very wealthy Witch family with the surname of Labeau in Paris. The Labeau family coven, is a part of this large & powerful ring of French witch covens called "The Levesque Covens". 

Her dad had an affair with Kaleb's mom, which resulted in Kaleb and despite circumstances, somehow, those two kinda grow up very close to each other, having no other siblings and she cared for him greatly & loved him sm as if he was her full-blood brother and vice versa i think on kaleb's part. So you can imagine how utterly devastated she was when she learned of his horrible death in the hands of Finn and inadvertently due to the doings of the  whole Mikaelson family. So her foremost rage and hatred is on Finn, and Kol and Esther ofc, the latter two for using Kaleb's body and dragging him into this mess of stuff in the first place.So her main point of her masterplan for vengeance and revenge is Kol, Esther and Finn as her top 3 targets respectively. And then seeing as the Mikaelson's have done nothing but make things worse for so many innocent families in the past due to many different reasons/circumstances, she's probably now trying to harness a plan to get rid of the whole lot of them if possible.

She was originally a pretty decently powerful witch with a positive, quite compassionate and bright outlook on life, besides some other traits, and a pretty normal character with no big aims/ plans at being evil, but Kaleb's death and the circumstances surrounding it, was what changed her almost completely to a worse side she never knew really existed much in the 1st place and she became rather dark,  a lil twisted as her main outlook on life now is to bring hellish suffering & pain on those who have wronged Kaleb in order to avenge him & she also became a v highly ambitious woman.

For the past 9 years eversince his death, she's worked over-zealously hard at honing all of her witch skills to the best of her abilities, mastering  as many powers and learning many useful stuff and even turning into some dark magic for assistance. By now, she has earned her way as being a highly respected and rightful regent leader of The Levesque Covens.

 Eversince Kaleb’s death , she had established  secret connections in NOLA who has been keeping tabs on the Mikaelson's doings and reporting to her very often. Thus, they told her about the Hollow shit that went down with the Mikaelsons and they spied Elijah, going to the clearing in the woods with Marcel and eavesdropped on Elijah's compulsion plan. So after she got the news abt that, she delightedly considered that to be her big break at finally executing her vengeance plan and perfectly vulnerable Elijah at that time was her perfect way in to worm her way into the Mikaelsons. So she sorta told her connections to knock him out with a very powerful spell and thus she kidnapped him over to Manosque, France  and perfected a whole scenario of him waking up in a ditch or something, so she "found him" and saved that poor amnesiac man. And ofc according to J’s backstory for ‘Elliot Monjeau’  -He had things with the E.M on it so she called him Elliot, told him he grew up in the country, that his parents were vineyard owners who died when he had an accident. He hit his head and had a brain injury, hence the memory loss and soon after he died, with vampire blood in his system cos a vampire got to him immediately after the accident while he was still half-alive but fatally injured. ;)

But then, this is when shit gt more intense and wicked on her part,  Xandria also at the same time, placed a very heavy dark hex on that poor vulnerable Elijah and fed him a big fat lie which was that he was her "husband" and they have a "son" (okie, so the boy is actually Kaleb's kid which was born after he died and the birth mom died at chidbirth too, so Xandria ofc v lovingly took him in and adopted him as her own son, and nvr told anyone else outside, her immediate family members that he was actually her half-nephew). She then placed a few fake memories of him falling in love with her, them having a 8 year old kid and they are pretty moderately rich family living in Manosque. She was careful to only PLACED A FEW FAKE MEMORIES, so that her story would tally with him having amnesia as a result from that "accident". Thus, over the past 3 years, ‘Elliot’  tried to "reconnect with his wife" but the most he got, was just caring about her a lot since she seemed to be a warm, nice and outgoing and good person & 'seemed to have a hella lot of patience for putting up with him not really remembering her much' And he ofc doesn't romantically love her as his heart will forever be with Hayley, his soulmate. But he does fall a little for the innocent "son" of his, who Xandria is also manipulating ever since having Elijah, as she also placed a powerful spell on that poor kid and altered his memories to include Elijah as his 'dad". Xandria really loves the boy and would die for him(so he’s her most vulnerable spot rn) , but eh, as u can see her brain is a lil twisted now due to being blinded with rage, hatred and vengeance for Kaleb, so she'll stop at nothing to succeed in her plans. Hence, her wrong mistake of tampering with the kid's memories *facepalm*.

Some months ago "being the hopelessy devoted loving wife" that she is, she suggested that "Elliot" do a renewal of marriage vows with her so as to maybe re-spark his "romantic feelings for her". He agreed cos he felt kinda guilty that he can't really remember his "loving family" that well. Thru that legal ceremony, she secretly and craftily placed a v dark binding spell, that links his life with hers in a way that if she dies, Elijah would too and with no hope of being resurrected. Oh and she lets him roam about to play his fav hobby of being a pianist and travel a bit here and there for small periods of time once in a while, as being "the supportive wife" she wants ‘Elliot’ to go find himself again and enjoy himself. (but she ofc has a spy or two following him in secret wherever he goes) So that's how he landed up in NOLA all these past few weeks without her at first.

And she has now arrived a lil too late, as his memories are back and he is "Elliot" no longer, so her gig is up in front of Elijah, who will ofc be demanding a furious explanation, but she'll just manipulatively smile and tell him of the linking spell behind their legal marriage ceremony, so he is legally her husband and ofc, he wouldn't want to dissapoint "their son"who misses his "dad" very much" and YES, DIS BITCH, DID BRING THE POOR BOY ALL THE WAY DOWN HERE xD

Elijah up till now, has no zero clue on her real identity as Regent Witch of the Levesque Covens or that her real name is actually Antoinette Labeau.so ofc he doesn't knw what her evil motives and reasons are for messing with him and his brain for the past 3 years. For the past 3 years, all  she told him that she was a normal half-human, half witch named Xandria who became a “Monjeau” when she married him (Elliot) &  who doesn't really like to tap into her witch heritage and is leading a normal human life with her son.

But now since Elijah is back to his former & real  identity, she will now be going around still called “Xandria Monjeau” and if she meets his family members or his friends, and if she ever has to leak her full name to them, she's going to just wickedly, calmly and charmingly tell them what she is telling Elijah rn, that she "oh she had a huge crush on him all this while and she needed a father for her dear sweet lil boy who wanted a dad and Elijah seemed like the perfect candidate and plus didn't she provide him with a happy, carefree and  normal life while he was living with them? oh and husband dearest can't divorce her cos of the son who still believes that Elijah is his dad and he wouldn't want to cause a massive heartbreak to the innocent , warm and purely loving boy who he had grown to somewhat love after all these 3 years ryt?” It’ll be up to J on whether he tells his family members of her linking spell whereby if she dies, he dies too XD.

So Elijah and maybe the rest of his closed ones might think she's some psycho manipulative witch bitch and maybe he doesn't really buy her current story, but she  ain’t ever gonna budge in revealing her true identity and real reasons for doing all this to him. Oh and atm, Hayley is going to be kept in the dark on Xandria’s wife connection to Elijah and her adopted ‘son’‘s, Samuel, nicknamed Sam for short, attachment to Elijah, for as long as possible. Xandria’s probably gonna humor Elijah’s demand that their marriage be kept a secret from Hayley, as she has him truly binded in a fix with her now, so this is no problem for her & thus she’s gonna try to make her presence scarce from Hayley in Nola, but who knows how long that will last aka how long before she amusedly can’t resist this temptation to annoy Hayley with this fact?:P

She currently hasn’t pledged any allegiance to Inadu (yet, but who know how desperate she might be to defeat the Mikaelsons in the much later future?:P)  She currently prefers to work on her own and be her own boss with the help of her own witch covens cos she's def not the kind to bow down/follow the lead of anyone right nowXD She's gonna slowly bid her time in NOLA to learn more angles on how to defeat the Mikalesons and to gather more resources for the perfect chances to attack her targets( Esther, Kol and Finn are her no.1 targets on her hit list of revenge plans)  when the time is right. XD Damn she's so evil and a lil messed up rn :P

So “Xandria Monjeau” is also currently presenting herself as slightly rich, pretty impulsive witch from France besides the other stuff I said earlier. And she’s also intelligent &  can be very charming, witty, friendly, nice, generous( not really genuine friendliness & niceness tbhXD), and at the same time, secretly very scheming, crafty and manipulative. The only genuine love she has atm is only for innocent, happy, warm and good-hearted 8 year old Samuel/ Sam.

So anyway, that’s the very lengthy deets on her and I apologize for the long read to anyone who can withstand reading this whole thing till the end. xoxo! To anyone else I haven’t had the chance to IM yet, if you would like to plot anything with Xandria just like this post or hmu! ;) <3

[lexiseigneur]

Chapter twenty-six: Greystone

The Dhampir had not hidden the circumstances leading to their relocation and perhaps it had been a mistake. The Sun Hunters had not taken the news well and only after strenuous negotiations did they accept not to rush the Mayor’s office.

Merely two days after the party, the Dhampir began packing their possessions. Lexi had asked that they leave quickly as she was pained by drawn-out goodbyes.

“Emma has been hiding from me since we announced our departure,” said Quinlan.

He detached a drawing of the little girl from the wall and slid it carefully in a cardboard sleeve.

“And Gus is calling Costello so much I expect she will need to change her phone number,” said Lexi.

“Their reaction is a little excessive. We are not exiles, we are free to come and go as we please.”

“It’s mostly because those in charge prefer to see us go and not so much come back. It’s the ungratefulness that bothers them and that bothers me.”

“It happened to me many times. I would be called upon to kill for the glory of Rome and for humans who would despise me for it. They would send me away in times of peace when I became an inconvenience then bring me back when they inevitably found themselves faced with another war.”

“Why did you do it? Why did you go back?”

“Because the Master craved the chaos of those wars. They made perfect feeding opportunities.”

He put down the sleeve and faced the now bare wall.

“And because I knew little else.”

Quinlan and Lexi turned to the bookshelves and tucked the volumes into boxes.

“Was that all you did during all those centuries? Chase battle after battle?”

She did not pity him but she had to acknowledge how sad of an existence it sounded.

“Until the Western Roman Empire fell and then I was intrigued by what existed beyond it. I still sought the Master and I still fought but at times I desired more. There was no real reason for me to go to Constantinople but I found myself drawn by the tales of a city more beautiful than Rome.”

“Was it? More beautiful?”

Quinlan chuckled.

“I could not tell because when I arrived, half of it was on fire.”

“What? Why?”

“They took their chariot racing very seriously in those days.”

“Are you pulling my leg?”

This time he laughed frankly and it filled her with contentedness. She suspected that he blocked his negative feelings from her but always left his mind wide open in moments like this one so she could taste his happiness. His joy was a ball irradiating warmth in the pit of her stomach. Lexi dropped the books and pressed her face against his chest.

“It is completely true! But I came back when it was rebuilt and I had to admit that it was glorious.”

It took a long time for them to finish packing as he distracted her with stories and images of Constantinople. He was correct, it had been glorious.

***

They were ready to depart, the truck was loaded and Raul and Eva had agreed to drive them to the city limits since the Dhampir could not do it alone. Simply because of the system of canals, living in New York would be complicated for the Dhampir but that did not alleviate Lexi’s resentment. The hunters currently staying in the headquarters had already paid their respects and had returned to their busy lives. But still, Quinlan waited by the map with his back to them. Lexi, Raul, and Eva shuffled through the pictures to give him more time. Eva looked at the images with pursed lips. Just like Lexi, she attempted to find fault in the place and just like her, she was unsuccessful.

“I guess it could be worse,” admitted Eva.

Raul glanced at a picture of the house above her shoulder.

“I prefer when my windows face south so keep that in mind when you pick a guest bedroom.”

“Don’t worry I already know where you’ll stay if you visit,” said Lexi and she showed him a picture of a decrepit garden shed.

“Meh, still bigger than my bedroom.”

“Let’s go,” said Quinlan and strutted in their direction.

She could feel nothing through the Bond and his face was neutral. Lexi grunted and shoved the pictures in her pocket. This would not do.

“I forgot something. I’ll be back in a minute,” she said.

She disappeared up the stairs and went straight to the highest level. Laura’s door was open and she was crouching by the larger of the two beds.

“Come on, you’re a big girl and big girls don’t hide like this,” she said.

Laura noticed Lexi standing at the door and stood.

“You guys are leaving now?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“She won’t come out.”

Lexi crouched next to the bed and the little girl crawled farther away from the edge.

“Emma? Why are you doing this?” asked Lexi.

The child did not answer. Lexi took a picture out of her pocket and slid it on the floor then pointed out one of the windows of the depicted house.

“That’ll be your room if you visit, you know?”

A small hand grabbed the picture and there was a click and the light of a small flashlight illuminated the space under the bed.

“Really?” asked Emma.

“We picked it right away but now Quinlan thinks it was useless because you don’t want to visit.”

“No! Who said that? It’s not true,” said Emma and her face appeared from under the bed.

“Maybe you should tell him that your mom and you will come to visit soon so he doesn’t worry?”

Emma came out and dropped her flashlight and the picture on the bed. She nervously pulled on her sleeves.

“Are you going to leave even if I don’t visit?”

“Yes,” said Lexi with a slight pinching in her heart.

“That’s not fair. The others are staying.”

“Yes, but the others are not elves. Maybe we want to go back to the forest.”

Emma folded her arms and her smug expression was very familiar.

“I know you’re not elves, Maria told me.”

Lexi scratched the back of her head and exchanged a look with Laura who appeared equally amused and embarrassed.

“No, we are not elves…will you still come down with me to say goodbye?”

“Okay,” she relented.

At the ground level, Raul and Eva waited in the truck while Quinlan leaned against its side. He did not need to look up to know that three people were approaching.

“Thank you,” he said.

***

From the moment they took an abrupt turn and left the asphalt road for a dirt one, the map indicated that they had found their new property. The forest was mainly composed of various oak species as well as hickory. Lexi cracked her window open and the car filled with the myriad of scents found in old-growth forests: the sap of century-old trees, humus and the freshness of recent rain on leaves. The canopy was turning dark green, orange and red from the arrival of Autumn.

Quinlan could not help but feel hopeful when Lexi leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes. The corners of her mouth jumped up every time a new smell crossed their path. In the distance, wild turkeys gobbled and the absurdity of their calls made her giggle.

He understood her discontentment at being relegated to the wilderness like a pair of unwanted curs but he did not want that to prevent her from appreciating what they had been granted. From his experience, happiness could be born from isolation. In fact, he had found that it enabled him to live free from the pressure of suppressing his nature. But in isolation, there was also loneliness and that suffering he knew all too well. There again, he was hopeful because he had never tried to be alone with another of his kind. But would that be sufficient for her? She startled and grabbed his shoulder.

“What was that?”

The strong smell of a large mammal came and went.

“A bear.”

She stuck her head out of the window as though she would be able to spot the animal. Then she fidgeted in her seat until he stopped the car.

“Why did you stop? Did you see something?”

“No.”

He leaned to her side, kissed her and opened her door wide.

“The house is that way but I don’t see any reason why both of us should remain stuck in this car until we find it.”

Quickly, she removed her coat and her boots then disappeared amongst the trees. He closed the door and as he drove up the road, her laughs sometimes found his ears.

When he parked she was nowhere to be seen but he could smell her and the beatings of her heart were loud. She landed lightly on the roof of the car. Her clothes were dirty with dust and sap and her hair had come undone. Lexi appeared wild.

“How was it?”

She rattled playfully, jumped off then ran toward the house and he followed.

Greystone was aptly named. The house was square, massive and might have been too simplistic to be aesthetically pleasing if it were not for its naked stone façade partially covered in English ivy. In the back, wide window doors led to a shaded garden. The house had once been a farm with stables but its past had left no trace in its interior. The front door led to an open floor comprised of a living room and a kitchen. The décor was modern, sleek and luxurious. In a corner, a strange object with abstract shapes caught their attention.

“What is this?” asked Quinlan.

“A lamp?”

She found a switch and it indeed illuminated the hideous object. Quinlan opened the nearest window and threw the thing out. His action had the double effect of making Lexi laugh and ridding the house of an insult to good taste.

On the dinner table, they found a copy of the contract they had signed and a reminder to call Costello as soon as they took possession of the grounds.

Quinlan wished Lexi had not seen it. Her run and her amusement had put her into an excellent disposition but as soon as she read the papers, her face hardened. She chewed her tongue then exited the house.

“I’ll get our things I guess,” she said.

They had just finished carrying their few possessions inside when the phone rang. Lexi turned away from it with a huff.

“Perhaps we should pick it up?” said Quinlan.

“Go ahead.”

He expected Costello on the line but it was a man with a Scottish accent.

“Mister Quinlan? Ma’am Lexi? I saw a car, was it you?”

“Who is this?”

“I’m Nigel Fraser, I’m the groundskeeper.”

Quinlan did not recall that the grounds came with an employee and judging by her expression of surprise and curiosity, Lexi had not known either. She approached to listen more easily.

“Mr. Fraser you should relocate to the city, those parts are not exactly safe.”

“Oh, that’s fine. My house is on the river!”

One side of the property was closed off by a large stream which comprised one island.

“Do you live by yourself?”

“Aye. My daughter lives in New York with my grandkids.”

“I’m guessing that would be because of the safety issue I mentioned.”

Nigel laughed so loudly that Quinlan held the phone away from his ear.

“Aye, that might be.”

“He cannot stay here, he will get himself killed,” said Lexi.

“For our peace of mind, we’d prefer if you did not live here alone.”

“I’m not so alone with my dogs. And now I’ve got neighbors! I’ve been ousted by the Partnership once, I’m not leaving again.”

“What are your duties as a groundkeeper?”

“I just accept deliveries for you and if you need something repaired or replaced, I’ll do it.”

“What about actually keeping the grounds?”

“Nah! The forest can keep itself. Besides, there are Strigoi in those parts.”

“He is insane,” said Lexi.

“I will drive to you tomorrow and re-install the cable and the internet,” said Fraser.

“You can do that?”

“Aye, I’m old but not a relic. I’ve got an email address and all.”

“Ha! See. We should make you one as well,” said Lexi.

“Shall I really emulate a man you just called ‘insane’?”

She tossed a pillow at his head which he caught and threw back. He concluded the chat with the groundskeeper before convincing Lexi to go for another run.

The next day Nigel arrived bearing welcome presents in the form of tea and biscuits. He was short, with a crown of bushy grey hair, a crooked nose, and deeply wrinkled skin. Throughout his short visit, he never stopped speaking and it rather felt like they now knew his entire life story. He had emigrated from Scotland some thirty years prior to marry his late wife, had found work managing the land of the original owner and had been kicked out after the Fall. Then as soon as the Partnership had been dissolved, he had returned to his beloved island with three errand dogs he had found on his way. He enjoyed fishing, Russian literature and obviously, talking.

“I’ll come back tomorrow with your delivery!” he said as he sat behind the wheel of his armored truck.

“Please do not bother, we can come to you,” said Lexi.

“Ma’am, do you realize this is what I’m paid to do?”

“Yes.”

“Good! I wanted it to be clear. I won’t tell if you don’t. Deliveries come during sunlight hours so you can pick them up just after that. If it gets too late or if you prefer to avoid my chatting your ears off then I’ll leave it in the boathouse.”

He drove off. Quinlan was quite unsure about Nigel. He had done a very efficient job in connecting them to the internet but he chatted too much for his liking. Lexi ate a biscuit, crumbled another and tossed it at a group of small birds. They plunged toward the food and she observed them tenderly.

“Nigel is the grandpa I never knew I wanted,” she said.

“What a thought.”

“I hope he can stay safe even after we leave.”

“You really do not want to remain here?”

“It’s a prison. Gilded, but still a prison.”

“When I was given land and I lived with Tasa and Sura, it was much the same. I was still happy. Keep in mind that staying here, even for the next fifty years means little in the scope of our lifetimes.”

She tossed more biscuits and the birds flew off in a flurry of feathers then came back after the Dhampir stood still for long enough.

“You know how hard it is to imagine this? That’s longer than I’ve been alive.”

“I can imagine it and I’m looking forward to all of it.”

Twilit trees were growing clearer to their eyes and the forest was alive with the sounds of multitudes of animals. She took his hand and she stretched on the tip of her feet to kiss his cheek.

***

It was hard for Lexi to hide her pleasure at running amongst the trees and hiding as they spied white-tailed deer, squirrels or bears living their simple lives.

“Look at this one, she has two fawns to care for…” she lamented as they observed from the highest branches of an oak tree. “They were born very late…they won’t make it through winter.”

“With some shelter and food, they would survive,” said Quinlan.

Her perception of Greystone might change if she felt needed. Even if just by a few animals.

“I know what you are trying to do,” she said reproachfully.

The next day, she began building a wooden hut in the garage which had once been the barn. Without a comment about its future use, Quinlan assisted her efforts.

***

The wide television screen showed a delighted Gus and above it, a small camera was pointed at the two Dhampir.

“We went to Central Park and I know it sounds corny and shit but I thought it would be the right spot. On that cute bridge there. That was a stupid idea, I almost dropped the ring in the water and she was laughing so hard it took five minutes for her to say yes.”

“Congratulations, to the both of you,” said Quinlan.

Lexi mumbled unintelligible words and fanned her face with her hand while trying to stop herself from crying.

“Hey Lex, you okay there?” asked Gus.

She turned away from the camera and took deep breaths.

“Tell him that I’m very happy for them…I need to find a tissue.”

She ran out of the room.

“She is very happy but...”

“She’s a secret softie, I know.”

“I heard that!” said Lexi and from somewhere in the house, she blew her nose.

“I’m going to call Aanya,” she added.

“How are the new teams?” asked Quinlan.

“I told those dicks to send their best but so far I think only Chicago did it. I got one that wouldn’t have made the first cut if I had a say.”

“We will start with the Chicago team then and the rest of them can go home.”

“Done. The dates for your training sessions are good?”

Quinlan pulled a sheet of paper from the printer and read the list.

“Wouldn’t that be a little fast paced?” said Quinlan.

“That’s what I told them! They wanted to break our teams up and sent them to the affected cities with trainees. I told them to fuck themselves and I ain’t sending good people to get killed ‘cause some pencil pusher thought they knew better. They can’t force our hunters to go anywhere but they don’t want to budge on the schedule.”

“They will get a surprise when only a fifth of them return with a sun on their necks.”

“Yeah, that’s a generous estimate Q.”

“The dates fit us. We are not particularly busy.”

Angela appeared on the screen, wobbling mindlessly.

“Hello, Angela,” said Quinlan.

She screamed and ran at the camera. Suddenly, the screen only showed the ceiling of Gus’s living room. After a few seconds of struggle, Gus reappeared with the infant under his arm.

“See you in two weeks,” he said then cut off the stream.

Upstairs, Lexi was speaking with Aanya who interrupted the call.

“Wait...Where is Angela? She ran away again. I’ll call you back,” said Aanya and she hung up.

Lexi returned to the living room with a little skip in her step.

“Can you get the deliveries yourself today? Aanya will call back when she manages to find her daughter.”

“I’ll wait until dark or Mr. Fraser might be tempted to detain me for tea. He refuses to accept that I am not partial to the beverage.”

They expected materials to build UV light fencing around the house. The light would be triggered by anything approaching and would only prevent Strigoi from passing through, not animals. In addition, with a simple switch, it could be deactivated. Though their guests would be safe enough with two Dhampir repelling possible Strigoi roaming the woods, they did not want to take chances.

“Might be because of your accent,” she said out loud then poured herself a cup of tea.

“Yes, and your accepting every biscuit or tea tin he offers has certainly nothing to do with this.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

She took a sip and playfully avoided his gaze. Her eyelids were still slightly swollen and the tip of her nose whiter than usual.

“I had not realized how much you enjoyed weddings.”

“Oh no, I don’t. I just like seeing them happy. They deserve it so much.”

She put down her cup and blushed.

“Were you asking for a more personal reason?”

“No. I don’t need a ceremony, a ring or a piece of paper to prove that we belong together.”

Quinlan held a hand out to her and she slid her fingers within his grasp. Very few times in his life had he felt so lucky and so certain that he was exactly where he ought to be.

***

Every few days Quinlan and Lexi returned to New York, trained aspiring hunters for eight hours then went back to Greystone. Every time, they arrived at the city border and policemen would drive them to the Sun Hunter headquarters. Those same men would park by the building and wait for the Dhampir to finish their work.

“One day I’m going to eat one of them,” said Lexi when the driver complained of their lateness. They had taken one hour longer than usual to visit Laura and Emma. The child had just started school and had been particularly excited to share stories on the subject.

Though they could watch the news on the internet or on television, Nigel still insisted on including a newspaper with their blood deliveries. Quinlan cared little for human affairs but Lexi followed them with keen interest.

“Oh my god…,” said Lexi as she read the front page of the latest paper.

New York was tense and general unrest came in the form of demonstrations, mild vandalism and a slight rise in crimes. Since the trials of smaller Partnership officials had started, this had become the norm. But this article was different.

Three former lower-ranking collaborators had been lynched and ended in the hospital with horrific injuries. Their noses had been cut off, their ears maimed to appear pointed, their teeth broken into sharp nubs and their heads shaven. The article had not expanded more than that but considering the pattern of injury, Quinlan suspected that they extended further than what was immediately visible on a dressed person.

Lexi spent the next few hours on the phone because they both agreed that there would be more to this than what the media would let on. According to Gus, the people responsible were not actively searched by the NYPD. The Sun Hunters were also called upon several times a week because hysteria made New Yorkers imagine Strigoi bumping in the night. The most important trials were set to begin soon and Gus had already been interviewed by the prosecution.

Surely enough, the newspapers announced them three days later. Thirty-four people were being indicted with either or both conspiracy to commit crimes against humanity or crimes against humanity. Two of them would be tried in absentia as they were still on the run or possibly dead. Most of the accused were men and women who had once been employees of the Stoneheart group. The youngest by far was Zach Goodweather and the most hated was Sanjay Desai for his killing of newborns and his participation in the creation of the bleeding lines systems. The trials were set to be televised live all over the world.

When the time came, Lexi insisted on watching though Quinlan would have preferred taking a leisurely stroll through the forest. Those were human matters but he respected that until very recently, Lexi had been human as well.

The courtroom was large with wooden benches and marble floors. Five judges presided over the court and the accused sat in a box on one side while groups of lawyers sat at tables covered with piles of documentation. All of them wore earpieces and when the people spoke in another language than English, a voice also translated for the viewers. There were introductory speeches then a prosecutor called Zach to the stand.

A large television was rolled in the room and a series of pictures appeared. Zach stood on the terrace of the Belvedere Castle and spoke to the Master. The same prosecutor introduced the evidence to the judges.

“Those are the pictures Gus took when we followed Eichhorst,” said Quinlan.

“Is this you on this picture?” asked the Prosecutor.

He had thick black hair, and black eyes as well as olive skin. The camera zoomed on his face and his name appeared at the bottom of the screen: U.S. Prosecution, David Alvi.

“Yes,” said Zach.

His head was shaven and he appeared too thin, probably because of a recent growth spurt.

“Who is this other person?”

“The Master.”

“Can you explain in clear and concise terms who the Master is?”

“The Master…he was the chief, he was in control of everything. He controlled every single Strigoi, in their heads, at all times…And he did the same to me! He was in my head and made me do everything!”

The prosecutor’s eyes went wide and his colleagues instantly jumped out of their chairs to whisper to each other. The witnesses previously sitting calmly exploded in screams of outrage. There was chaos and the judges ordered an immediate recess. The accused where quickly removed and led to a back room.

“He is lying and will get away with it because so little is known of the Master,” said Quinlan.

Lexi paced between the couch and the television screen. She barely contained her rage.

“We cannot let that happen.”

“What do you propose we do?”

“We have to tell them everything we know.”

Quinlan switched off the television and considered the question carefully. So far few people knew with complete certainty of their existence though rumors abounded. By speaking publically during the Manhattan trials they would be completely exposed.

“We cannot draw the ire of the world on ourselves.”

“We have a duty to the truth. So far very few members of the Partnership were found innocent and those were low ranking ones. Just because of that New York is sliding back into mayhem. You saw how they reacted to what Zach said. If they walk free because of those lies there will be even more violence.”

“We’ve already helped them quite enough.”

“In your long life were there no moments when you thought that you had to intervene so you would not regret it a century later?”

Quinlan had seldom thought that far ahead since his mission if successful would have lead to his death.

“It might turn dangerous for us. Secrecy ensures safety.”

“Then we’ll run. But I don’t think we risk much as long as the Sun Hunters are close. Do you?”

“Mobs have a unique power that I would rather not be subjected to. I understand your concerns and I commiserate but the wisest course of action is to let humans deal with this.”

“When Angela and Emma are old enough to understand what is happening here, I would not be able to look them in the eye and tell them we did not speak up because of fear. I would be too ashamed of myself.”

Quinlan pictured Emma, grown, with a marked brow and lines around her eyes. Could he bear to see her disappointment? He could even hear her say the words and in his mind, her voice was similar to her mothers. “Such a powerful creature, afraid of being seen and heard”. Then he realized that the expression of disappointment he had imagined on Emma was the same Lexi was showing him right now. Pensively, he traced his bottom lip with his thumb.

“If they turn on us and we have to burn New York to escape, I shall remind you of it for five centuries.”

Lexi picked up the phone and pressed the speed dial, the number three for Gus.

***

When they arrived at the city limits that very same day, Gus was not yet there and the border agent would not open the gate.

“So much for being free to come and go,” said Lexi.

“I shall climb above this fence and show him the cost of refusing us entry,” said Quinlan as he stared down the man.

He made a point of rattling loudly and letting his third eyelid close visibly. The agent clutched his rifle closer to his chest and locked himself inside the shelter.

“Well, that did not help, Quinlan.”

Lexi kicked a rock and paced.

“No, but I do feel better about it.”

Gus arrived mere seconds later and got out of his SUV. When he spotted the two Dhampir on the other side of the tall fence and the man observing meekly through the windows, he pinched the base of his nose and took a deep breath.

“Get out of here, man!” he said and knocked on the door.

The agent opened instantly, only too happy to deal with a fellow human.

“Sir, it’s forbidden to exit the city at this time.”

He spotted the tattoo on Gus’s neck, looked at his face more attentively and sputtered an apology.

“Yeah, yeah, don’t worry about it. Just let them in, I need them.”

“But, they are not due for another three days and Costello said…”

“Tell Costello I gave you the order. If she has a problem, she can come to me, alright?”

The agent shifted uncomfortably from one foot to the other.

“Come on, just trying to do my job here. And those two are our best hunters after all.”

Still reluctant, the agent pressed a button next to the door. UV lights switched on around the gate and it slid open. Quinlan and Lexi ran past the light and waited by the SUV.

“Thanks, man. You’re cool.”

Gus took a step away when the agent called him back.

“Wait! My wife is a big fan and if I don’t take a picture she won’t believe me.”

The agent took his phone out of his pocket.

“Do you mind?”

“Nah, it’s fine.”

As the man lifted the phone above both of them and took a picture, Gus grinned stiffly. Quinlan snorted and exchanged a look with Lexi. Gus hurried back to the SUV and they all boarded it.

“Does that happen often?” asked Lexi.

Gus did not look at her, started the engine and drove away.

“Not really.”

“He is lying,” said Quinlan.

“I think he is trying to spare our feelings.”

“I do hope he does not think us so petty as to feel slighted by his personal success.”

In the distance, dancing lights of flames illuminated the night sky and the sirens of firetrucks came and went.

“This shit has been going on all day. There is a curfew at the moment. Only emergency services and hunters are allowed outside. If those fuckers are declared innocent…I don’t even know.”

Two blocks from the courthouse, Gus parked in front of a mostly empty building. Only one floor was illuminated and there were few heartbeats inside but their voices carried far. Those were the voices of people facing a major crisis.

“Are all the prosecutors there?” asked Lexi.

“Yup, all five of them. I already told them we were coming,” said Gus.

They rode the elevator and arrived in a long corridor in which the voices rang clear and angry.

“Of course the kid lied! He wants to save his skin,”

“That’s all and well but frankly, we have no idea.”

“Those people who gave us the pics, don’t they know whether that’s the case? Whether the Master could do that?”

“The only humans who met the Master in person and lived are Goodweather and Desai. All other testimony would be hearsay.”

“See, they have no idea what to do,” said Lexi.

They reached the large room, which was luxuriously furnished but at the moment filled with boxes and with large tables on which rested precarious piles of documents. David Alvi smoked by the cracked window and the others were sprawled on the armchairs and couches. They all seemed defeated but stood when Gus stepped in.

“Elizalde, where are the supposed crucial witnesses you promised?” asked the woman.

She spoke with a French accent and her tone suggested that she did not believe Gus would be of any help.

“Chill, Durand. They’re here but they’re just the kind of people that need an introduction. Any of you have guns?”

There was heavy silence.

“We’re attorneys, not cowboys,” said another woman.

She was also clearly not American.

“Good. You guys saw the video we used the recruit Sun Hunters in New York?”

“Yes,” said Alvi.

“Well, I was the guy with the rifle and the two others are the witnesses I told you about,” said Gus.

“If they are so important why didn’t you bring them sooner?” said Durand.

“Because they are not human.”

“Is this a fucking joke?” said a man with a Japanese accent.

“Do I look like I’m fucking joking?”

“I heard rumors,” said Alvi. “But those are just modern myths.”

“There are no myths, Esquire, only exaggerations,” said Quinlan from the corridor.

No matter the time, no matter how enlightened the civilization, those who benefited from the highest education were always the quickest to dismiss the unexplained as myths.

Quinlan and Lexi stepped inside the vast room, toward the only place free of boxes. They did not wear their hoods or their glasses but their swords were visible and obvious.

“Oh merde!” said Durand.

With shaky hands, she took a cigarette out of her pocket and lit it.

“To answer the question you were pondering before we rudely interrupted: no, the Master could not control humans in this manner,” said Lexi.

“Who are you?” asked Alvi.

“I am Quinlan and this is Lexi.” - Alvi opened his mouth to speak - “No, we are not Strigoi.”

Alvi closed his mouth and remained quiet. Quinlan dragged two chairs closer and the Dhampirs shed their coats and sat down. This would take a long time.

“Imma head out. Call me when you need a ride,” said Gus.

He winked at the prosecutors who seemed panicked that the hunter was leaving them alone with those creatures. Quinlan looked at the group of men and women. The U.S. prosecutor, David Alvi was still smocking by the window and the only one not terrified of meeting his gaze. On the armchair, the Egyptian prosecutor, Mohammed Issa had not moved a hair since they had walked in the room. Imogène Durand, the French Prosecutor was still shaking while holding onto a cigarette whose ash fell on the carpet without her noticing. Masashi Takaha sat opposite Durand and eyed the exit. Ana Uru, the prosecutor from New Zealand, held a chair in front of her as though ready to throw it at any approaching danger.

Lexi sniffed the air, looked above her shoulder then trotted across the room to a table covered with various snacks. She selected a cup of coffee as well as a bagel then came back. The five prosecutors had followed each of her gestures and their mouths fell open when she took a sip of the coffee. Uru let go of the chair and Issa dared move a little.

“Where shall we start?” asked Lexi.

“With the beginning.”

“The plane?”

“No. This all started centuries ago.”

“Oh boy. I hope they have more coffee.”

 Eight hours later, a rough timeline of the events leading to the Fall was drawn in sharpie on one of the large walls. Another wall represented keys points between the Fall and the death of the Master. Lexi had made the mistake of lying down on a couch and had fallen asleep. Quinlan stood facing both walls, stroking his ivory pendant as he often did to focus. Issa was on the phone and Quinlan’s Arabic was too rusty to understand more than a few words here and there. When the man hung up, he instantly scribbled on a post-it then stuck it on the timeline. It was a set of coordinates with the words “Death of the 6th” written in capitals letters.

“You were right. There was an explosion in a completely deserted area on the banks of the Nile. They are already sending me documentation via email and the rest will soon arrive by postal services,” he said.

“The Master was logical in disposing of the other five Ancients but he demonstrated his paranoia in killing even the imprisoned one.”

On the floor, the other prosecutors combed through piles of documents and DVDs. Alvi got up with a grunt and pinned a sheet of paper to the wall under the date of the Master’s death. It was a certificate describing one of the pieces of video evidence.

“This recording cuts a little too early to be useful on its own, you know,” said Alvi.

“I am aware,” said Quinlan.

“You will have to actually speak at the trial.”

“We knew this would happen.”

Alvi rubbed his face then took out a packet of cigarettes, tucked one between his lips and lit it up.

“People are gonna freak.”

“Yes, we also considered that possibility.”

“Why the fuck would you do this then?”

He blew smoke and the stench burned Quinlan’s nostrils.

“For our peace of mind.”

Quinlan was weary and his patience thin. When the prosecutor approached him, Quinlan was suddenly excessively irritated by the smoke. With a gesture almost too quick for the human to see, he grabbed the cigarette, put it off on the wall then crumpled it and tossed it away. Alvi stared at his now empty hand then at Quinlan.

“Yeah if you want to testify you’re gonna have to stop doing that.”

“Put out cigarettes?”

“Lookat people like you’re about to tear their heads off.”

“Any other advice, Mister Alvi?”

“A laundry list of them but it can wait.”

Quinlan pocketed the pendant and turned to the couch on which Lexi was curled up, deeply asleep. The sun had risen hours ago and perhaps it was time for them to take their leave for a short rest. She was very peaceful and when he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, she smiled softly. Maybe he could let her sleep just a while longer.

“Hey what’s the time?” asked Takaha.

They all looked at their phones or wristwatches then as if it were a perfectly normal thing to do, dropped their work and rushed to the windows. Quinlan kissed Lexi’s head then followed the prosecutors to understand their curious behavior. Outside, children gathered in front of a school as it opened. Their laughter, screams, and chatter traveled to them despite the general cacophony of the morning commuters.

“Ha! This one is not even with a parent!” pointed out Durand.

A young boy of about ten years old ran down the street as the bell rang and the horde of children rushed inside the building. They looked with fascination until the last child disappeared inside. Alvi had not budged and still studied the timelines while holding an unlit cigarette.

“They do that every morning when schools open. In their countries, they are still closed for the most part. And children certainly do not go out by themselves,” he said to Quinlan.

“Even with canals and UV lamps, Paris is dangerous except for a few hours a day. People don’t even dare go down to their own basements,” said Durand.

“Before I got here, I thought Americans were exaggerating the state of the city,” said Uru.

“Yeah, but I read the mortality stats from their clearing teams and I don’t understand why they need to lie about them. They achieved a lot and it’s pointless to hide the death of those who made it happen,” said Durand.

“They did not lie. Our hunters simply benefitted from my and Lexi’s training,” said Quinlan.

“Why hasn’t the US government shared that expertise? It’s fucking irresponsible,” said Uru.

They were suddenly discussing the issue so loudly that Lexi’s head appeared above the back of the couch. She squinted at them then when her look did not stop their discussion she went to pour herself another coffee.

“I’m sorry I fell asleep.”

“The night has been long, I do not blame you.”

The passion of their chatting had somehow increased and Quinlan crossed his arms above his chest.

“Your petty human squabbles are tiresome,” he said.

They quieted long enough for them to hear someone approaching in the corridor. The doors opened and Costello appeared.

“Today was not on the agreed dates and you terrorized one of my employees!”

She turned to Lexi for an explanation as she stood the closest to her. Lexi shrugged, took a sip and walked away.

Shocked, Costello followed her, obviously ready for additional remonstrances.

“What is going on here?” she asked.

“I am not an expert of the judicial process but I do not think I concerns you,” said Quinlan.

Costello looked around and read the timelines on the walls.

“You should have informed me before your arrival,” she said, somewhat mollified.

“The border agent informed you, didn’t he? We did not want to call and you take you away from dealing with the unrest of last night,” said Lexi.

“Before your arrival! That was the agreement!”

“What agreement?” asked Alvi.

Costello’s cheeks turned pink.

“Basically that the government will keep us fed and housed if we leave the city and go live in the middle of nowhere,” said Lexi.

“You should not...,” started Costello.

“Wait a minute…they helped clear New York didn’t they?” said Alvi.

“It’s not a matter I am at liberty to discuss,” said Costello.

“So that means yes,��� said Takaha.

“They scare the shit out of me but did they do anything that might hint they are dangerous?” asked Durand.

“I cannot speak of it,” said Costello.

“They came here of their own volition! They didn’t have to testify! That makes them trustworthy to me,” said Issa.

“And you thanked them by kicking them out then throwing a fit because they did not respect your petty rules?” said Uru.

“Le Monde just started printing again and I’m sure they’d love to hear of that story,” said Durand.

Quinlan almost pitied Costello.

“No one is throwing a fit. I was reminding them of an agreement which concerns none of you. As for what is happening here I know it is not my place to intervene but I will have to inform the president and…”

“And he cannot do anything about it either,” said Alvi.

“That would be obstruction,” said Takaha.

“And our respective government would throw a fit,” said Durand.

“Goddammit, no one is going to obstruct anything. You two can stay within the city as long as the prosecutors need you but a policeman will keep an eye on you and in the future, you will inform me of your visits in advance.”

“Sure,” said Lexi and she plopped on the couch.

“Of course,” said Quinlan with a polite nod.

“And for your information,” she said to the prosecutors. “I’m the one who will deal with the mess if any of the thirty-four is acquitted so don’t assume I would do anything to get in your way.”

She stormed out and the five men and women instantly started arguing again about the rights of people who were neither citizens nor humans.

[tappity-tap]

FOREVER BElonging WITH YOU

PART VIII - THE DELIVERY

<< PART VII || END Story Rating: M Chapter Warnings: Pregnancy, medical things, and mild suggestive content. [This chapter is sfw.]

When Renji and Rukia’s daughter finally arrived, she was late.

 As in, “half a week past her due date” late.

 And because everyone involved was under the reasonable assumption that she would come before or on the projected day given by Captain Kotetsu, this unexpected delay of events selfishly interrupted the lives of people who had already organized their schedules for after said day. It was already highly inconvenient for those who resided in Soul Society, but it was even more so for the ones living on an entirely different plane of existence.

 Typical. Only her first day of life and she was already throwing baby-sized wrenches into Ichigo’s plans. Just what he’d expect from something spawned by those two.

 They were important plans, too. He was supposed to be treating Orihime, his girlfriend of eight months now, to a date that included a morning walk in her favorite park, lunch at a new restaurant downtown, and a movie of her choice; His intended birthday gift to her. Since he was swamped with classes during her actual birthday on the 3rd of September and had several major assignments due in the weeks following, he had worked extra hard to make sure this day, the 23rd of September, would be free of conflicts and he could devote all his time and attention to her. After all, Ichigo knew these were the things she treasured from him more than anything else and he would walk the world over to give them to her. Twice.

 When he thought about it, that’s what he loved most about Orihime.

 They had been together as a couple since mid January, though he had definitely harbored a crush long before that, and her even longer still. Ichigo had to reluctantly admit: If Renji hadn’t decided to play matchmaker (at his own wedding, no less) and figuratively thrown Orihime into his arms (which, ironically, Ichigo had literally done to him with the woman he had just married), he might not have ever found the courage to act on his feelings. He was happy enough being around her even just as her friend, and he didn’t want to do anything that would jeopardize their relationship or make her uncomfortable. All he wanted was to see her happy and safe.

 Even though Renji had given him the perfect opportunity, he still couldn’t bring himself to confess to her at the wedding and instead asked that she make time for him so they could discuss something important. It had taken almost two weeks to find that time when both of them could sit down and properly talk, but they put in the effort to make it work. It meant they had to quite literally meet up during work hours while she was on break, but at that point Ichigo didn’t even care anymore. He just needed to come clean to her somehow.

 When he was finally able to look her in the eye over a platter of fruit tarts and quietly tell her, “Inoue…this may be selfish of me but I need you to know my feelings. For you. I like you a lot as a friend. And I think…I might also like you as something more,” Ichigo definitely didn’t expect her to break down and give him a confession of her own in return.

 Her feelings, as it turned out, were the same as his. Though she deeply desired more, all she ever wanted and expected from him was his company and loyal friendship, if it meant he could be happy.

 Ichigo ended up waiting around until her shift was over and walking her back to her apartment where they drank tea and ate more sweets and stayed up talking well past midnight. It was almost 1am when he finally arrived home and was promptly submerged in a tidal wave of nosy questions from his prying family. That was probably why he held off until April to officially tell them he and Inoue (he would soon start calling her Orihime after that) were dating.

 Funnily enough, they’d actually already deduced it for themselves from the amount of time she spent at their house, not to mention alone with him in his room.

 September rolled around and he and Orihime were better than ever…still close and growing closer, still enjoying spending time with each other, still determined to make the other as happy as they could possibly be. The only dynamic that had truly and drastically changed between them was…well…in a physical proximity sense.

 And speaking of which, in the days leading up to their date Ichigo found himself secretly hoping that she’d pick a boring and easily ignored biopic or something lame like that so they could sit in the back of the theater and find a better way to pass the time.

 That morning had gotten off to a good start. After getting up early enough to take the first shower (allowing him as much hot water as he wanted) and gulping down a quick breakfast, he zipped himself into a jacket appropriate for the brisk autumn air and set off to meet Orihime at the park to kick off their walk-lunch-movie date. It was approximately 10:46 am, 20 minutes into the “walk” part, when both their phones buzzed and lit up with identical text messages:

 GET READY!!! BABY COMING SOON!!!

 At Orihime’s insistence, Ichigo reluctantly agreed to set aside their plans for another day so they could wait on standby for any further updates on the baby’s progress from Renji (as they had promised and intended to do when she was supposed to be born, four days ago). Bare minimum decent as it was, if it could reassure Renji and Rukia to know they were only a text or call away should something drastic happen, then all the better. It wasn’t like there was anything they could actually help with since this was all going down in Soul Society and they were…not in Soul Society.

 After two and a half hours of sitting on his bed and twiddling their fingers to radio silence, the message they’d been anticipating finally arrived:

 SHE’S HERE!!!

 This one was accompanied by a photo of a sweaty and exhausted-looking Rukia lying on a hospital bed and giving the camera a weary, but noticeably happy, thumbs-up.

After studying the photo, they remarked to each other with some amusement that considering the wording of the message it would have made more sense for Renji to send a picture of the baby instead of Rukia. But as his next message informed them, they had already been given priority clearance to come to Soul Society right away so they would see her for themselves very soon.

 3:55pm, they all stood in the street just outside of Ichigo’s house waiting for the gates to appear so they could cross over: Himself, Orihime, and Chad.

 Next to him, Orihime fidgeted and wrung her hands excitedly. And next to her, Chad loomed over, tall and massive as ever. Ichigo swore he got bigger every time they met up. He was training practically every day, though, (and had even shown up straight from the gym still in his workout gear) so it actually might not have been his imagination.

 A light breeze blew a small flock of leaves past them and ruffled his hair. Sighing, Ichigo took one hand out of his pocket to brush it back in place somewhat awkwardly. It was weird not feeling the long strands he was used to having since he was a kid; He had recently cut his hair short on a whim and had yet to grow accustomed to the new style.

 Actually, that was a lie…he cut it because Orihime had mentioned a few times in passing that she thought a short haircut would look good on him and he’d finally given in to curiosity. Thankfully, it turned out she’d been right. It made him look his age, maybe even older.

 Not to mention, it was worth seeing the look on her face when he showed up on her doorstep unannounced to show it off.  He really liked making her blush and smile like that.

 “Hm. This feels a little strange,” Chad suddenly remarked.

 Ichigo dropped his hand and jammed it back into his jacket pocket. “I know. Hard to imagine those two idiots with a kid isn’t it?”

 Chad shook his dark curls. “No. I mean us going to Soul Society like this without Ishida.”

 “Oh. Right.” Ichigo shrugged. “He said he was fine with it. You know how busy he’s been recently.”

 “Still, it is sad.” Orihime tucked a strand of hair behind her ear wistfully. Her blue flower hairpin flashed brightly in its disturbance. “We don’t get to see him much anymore. I hope this doesn’t mean-”

 Ichigo let out a defiant huff before she could finish. “That doesn’t matter, does it? Ishida’s still our friend. We’ve been through things together, we still have those bonds and share the same feelings. That’s not going to change, even if we don’t see him as often as we want to.” He then noticed the other two smiling strangely at him. “What…?”

 Chad smirked and Orihime let out one of her musical laughs. “Nothing,” they replied simultaneously.

 Ichigo sighed. He adored his girlfriend and his best friend dearly but sometimes he just didn’t get them.

 At 4pm right on the dot, they felt the telltale spike of energy and shift in the wind that heralded the appearance of the Senkaimon. Seconds later, it materialized in front of them. The doors slid smoothly open to reveal the dark dank passageway of the Dangai, and its lone occupant.

 “Kurosaki Ichigo. Inoue Orihime. Sado Yasutora.” A familiar cool masculine voice addressed each in turn. Three hell butterflies fluttered out to meet them and circled impatiently around their heads as if to say “Hurry up! Get moving!”

 Ichigo gestured in greeting to the approaching figure with his hand still inside his jacket. “Yo, Byakuya! Congratulations!”

 “Rukia and Renji had the child, not I.” Byakuya eyed him with blatant disapproval for his supposed mistake. Although, that wasn’t saying much since the man always gave off the impression that his sole purpose in life was to bestow unforgiving judgment on everyone around him.

 Stepping through the doorway with the others, Ichigo shrugged. “Yeah, but you’re an uncle now, that’s something we still congratulate people for.” The doors clanged shut behind them and he fell into step next to the captain. “So, congrats, Uncle Byakuya! How does it feel to have a new niece?”

 “Oh. Yes. Good, I suppose.” Byakuya closed his eyes and turned away with a curt nod. “Thank you,” he added hastily.

 Ichigo smirked to himself. There were things even the great Kuchiki Byakuya wasn’t immune to and getting caught off guard by his own emotions was one of them.

 Of course, now that Byakuya had clammed completely shut, that was the extent of this discussion. For almost the rest of the way the four of them walked the bumpy, oozing tunnel to Soul Society in awkward silence, their butterflies flapping out little halo-like paths over their heads. It wasn’t until they caught sight of the bright light streaming in at the end of the channel that it was abruptly lifted.

 “Byakuya-san?”

 He looked slightly taken aback at being addressed after such a lengthy pause in conversation but he indulged Orihime anyways. “Yes?” he answered in a stern, clipped voice as if he was attempting to discourage any small talk in a very roundabout way.

 However, he’d apparently forgotten this was Orihime he was talking to and being Orihime, she wouldn’t be deterred by something like that. She pressed on shyly. “Um…have you seen her yet? The baby?”

 “…I have.”

 With that bit of knowledge, she gained new confidence and perked up considerably. “Really? What’s she like?” Orihime asked him eagerly.

 Byakuya glanced at her for a split second before replying with some reluctance, “Very small.”

 This was not surprising information. Not counting children, out of their entire group of acquaintances (Shinigami or human) Rukia stood the shortest at less than 4’9” tall. On top of that, she was incredibly slender and it was pretty much a given any baby that grew inside her would reflect this, plus the bump in her stomach did not end up being very big in the end. So knowing that, what Byakuya gave them wasn’t exactly useful information, either.

 When Orihime continued looking at him expectantly, he sighed in defeat and went on, “But she is healthy. She has Rukia’s eyes. And a full head of hair. Renji’s hair,” he added begrudgingly as if this was somehow Renji’s fault.

 Unprompted this time, he paused and took a breath.

 “You will not be disappointed. She is…adorable.”

 Ichigo raised his eyebrows. Was that a smile on Byakuya’s face, or was he imagining things? And the measured steps he was taking…had they suddenly become lighter? Unsure, he looked over at Chad, who shared his sentiments with a silent shrug.

 Byakuya only accompanied them as far as the gate, immediately excusing himself and shunpo’ing away the second he stepped foot onto the ground and his hell butterfly detached from his aura. Something told Ichigo this was his way of dealing with the embarrassment of letting so much emotion towards his newborn niece slip out in front of them.

 Well, it made him seem more human at least. Or…soul.

 The 4th Division’s main medical building (where Byakuya had been decent enough to direct them before darting away) wasn’t busy at all that day. In fact until they walked through the doors, the entire reception area was completely deserted save for one person seated at the first aid station nearby. The poor thing was swaying back and forth on his stool with the glazed over look of someone who’d been stuck in one spot with nothing to do for hours.

 “Hey, Hanataro!” Ichigo recognized who it was and waved. “D’you know where Rukia’s room is?”

 The zoned-out Shinigami yelped and shot several feet off his stool from shock. Displaying remarkable recovery time for someone so lethargic, he snapped back quick as a whip, standing straight at attention and braced for the impending reprimand for slacking at his post. When he saw it was only Ichigo and co. he immediately relaxed his posture and put on a relieved smile. “Oh, hi, everyone! Um, yes, it’s just down this hallway. Follow me.” He motioned for them to accompany him down the closest corridor and they followed his lead.

 As they walked, Hanataro looked at each of them and asked eagerly, “Are you here to see the baby?”

 “Yes!” Orihime nodded, excited, and moved closer to him. “Have you met her yet, Hanataro-kun?”

 Hanataro blushed rather furiously at this question. “Ah…well…you could say I was one of the first people she met,” he laughed nervously and fiddled with the strap of his backpack.

 Chad slowed pace and tilted his head. “You…delivered her?”

 Thoroughly appalled by this suggestion, Hanataro vigorously shook his head and waved his hands in front of him. “Oh…no…no, I wouldn’t even trust myself to do that! Captain Kotetsu was the one who delivered her. But the lieutenant and I checked her over and took measurements right after she was born!” He paused with one finger in the air and mouth slightly agape. After thinking hard for a moment, he scratched his chin sheepishly. “Um…I forgot what they were. I was sent away once I did that.”

 “That’s okay. We’ll…get them from Renji or something,” Ichigo assured, knowing full well they would completely forget by the time they actually got to him.

 “Right…ah…I’m sorry, but I do have to get back to my work. Her room’s right there.” After pointing it out, he waved and hurried back down the hall to his station. The others continued on.

 Up ahead there was a flash of red and Renji popped forth from the room Hanataro had singled out. When he spotted the approaching trio, his face immediately lit up and he waved at them with all the enthusiasm of a puppy bounding over to say hello to its favorite human. They had seen Renji get worked up when he was feeling strong emotions many times before, but never like this. Right now he looked positively giddy with elation.

 “Ichigo! Inoue! Sado!” His loud booming voice echoed down the hall and practically knocked them down with its intensity. “Gladja could make it!”

 A passing orderly carrying a tray full of surgical supplies and bandages winced. “Excuse me, Lieutenant Abarai…I understand this is a happy occasion but I must ask that you please keep your voice down. There are recovering patients on this floor,” he insisted, balancing the tray with one hand and gingerly rubbing the ear closest to Renji with the other.

 Wide-eyed, Renji shrank back and rubbed the back of his head guiltily as the orderly continued on his way. “Ah…right. Sorry.”

 “Yo, Renji,” Ichigo greeted once they reached him, “everything good? How’s Rukia?”

 Renji dropped his hand and grinned broadly with a sing-song voice, “Come ‘an see for yourselves!” He whirled around in a flurry of ponytail and shihakusho and proceeded to prance back into the room with an overly accentuated bounce in his step.

 Ichigo glanced at Orihime, who looked back at him and giggled under her breath. He had to agree with her; Renji was acting a little silly, even for him. Any other day and Ichigo would have given him grief for it. But considering the circumstances he supposed he could let this one instance slide. After all, the guy did just witness the birth of his first child, he had every right be stupidly happy about that.

 And come to think of it…that goofy demeanor sort of reminded him of his own father. Maybe it was a Shinigami dad thing? Ichigo hoped it wasn’t contagious. Or hereditary.

 “Rukia! They’re here!” Renji announced in a raised whisper when the three of them followed his lead through the door.

 From the bed in the center of the room, Rukia rolled her heavily lidded eyes. “I heard you the first time, Renji.” But she smiled warmly at her friends in greeting as they filed in and lined up at the end of her bed, right in front of the small table where various gifts and flower baskets had begun to accumulate.

 Then the bundle in her arms stirred and gave a tiny squawk of a cry.

 “Shhh…it’s okay.” Rukia gazed down and crooned in a soft tone Ichigo had never heard her use before as she tenderly rocked it. “You have some visitors, sweetie. Do you want to meet them? They want to meet you.” She spoke every syllable so slowly and deliberately he started wondering what the hell kind of drugs they were giving her to make her talk like that. And use a very un-Rukia-like word like “sweetie”.

 Perched on a chair drawn up beside the bed, Renji watched them with a joyfully pained expression, like he was on the verge of crying any second. He even gave a minute sniff and drew his sleeve across his eyes.

 Good grief, Ichigo thought to himself. Renji was blubbering so badly it was starting to remind him of Orihime. Which, of course, was perfectly fine when it was Orihime, but Renji displaying that type of disposition was just plain bizarre.

 Rukia suddenly looked up and frowned at the three of them. “What are you standing there for? Get over here and say hi to her. She’s a baby, not a virus,” she scolded. That sounded much more like the Rukia they knew; Raking them over the coals for something as trivial as their failure to properly greet her hours-old child who understood approximately zero words of spoken language.

 Unsurprisingly, Orihime made the first move. Nervously jittering from hairpin to boot tip in her mix of excitement and apprehension, she shuffled around and sat on the bed next to Rukia. But when she looked down at the bundle, her hands flew up to her face and the timid look underneath gave way to one of pure joy.

 “Ohhh…Rukia-san…Renji-kun,” Orihime gasped softly, “She’s beautiful.” She glanced between Renji and Rukia with a hopeful expression. “Um, may I…is it alright if…”

 “Would you like to hold her, Inoue?” Rukia prompted, giving her a gentle smile.

 “Yes! Please!” Orihime beamed and held out her arms.

 Carefully, under Renji’s contented observation, Rukia handed their daughter over to Orihime. “Be sure to support her head,” she instructed, “There you go, Inoue. That’s it.”

 The second Rukia had placed the baby in Orihime’s arms, something magical occurred.

 His girlfriend’s face blossomed into the most radiant smile Ichigo had ever seen and suddenly it was as if everything warm and soft about her had multiplied exponentially. As he watched, awestruck, she settled the baby in the cradle of her embrace so smoothly and delicately it looked like she’d been holding children all her life. Perfectly at ease with playing the role of this child’s caretaker, she almost looked more natural and motherly holding it than Rukia, the actual mother.

 On second thought…that one could’ve been his own bias talking. There was a strong possibility being kicked in the face one too many times by Rukia may have severely damaged his ability to view her as “motherly” in any way.

 When Orihime looked up at him, even her eyes were shining.

 “Ichigo-kun…Sado-kun,” she whispered tearfully and held out the blanket for the boys to see, making sure she was still supporting in all the right places. They both moved over and peered at the sleeping baby swaddled within.

 Byakuya wasn’t kidding…she really did have a full head of hair and it was the exact shade of crimson as her father’s. It almost looked like someone had cut off the end of Renji’s ponytail and glued it onto his daughter as a wig. Thankfully the rosy color dusting her chubby cheeks and delicate button nose wasn’t nearly as bright, or the effect might have made her resemble a miniature circus clown. Thin rows of dark fluffy lashes lay shut over each eye, occasionally twitching in her state of peaceful slumber, and the more Ichigo looked the more her features fluctuated between each parent. Everything about her was a perfect combination of both, though the way her nose crinkled daintily as she stirred and parted her lips with a barely audible whimper was definitely all Rukia.

 A lump formed in his throat and he swallowed it back to look at Rukia and Renji. “That’s amazing. She really looks like you guys,” was all he could think to say.

 Rukia rolled her eyes. “Well duh.” Despite her tone, the small smile she wore gave away how much she genuinely appreciated his comment.

 Chad leaned over and cautiously pulled back the blanket with one thick finger to get a better look. “Does she have a name yet?” he asked Rukia in his deep melodic voice.

 Rukia opened her mouth to reply but was cut off by Renji frantically leaping to his feet. “Oi! Of course we gave her a name! It’s Ichika! Abarai Ichika!” he insisted. He sounded highly insulted, like Chad had just accused him of being a terrible father for leaving his newborn child nameless. Which Ichigo knew he hadn’t, but again…Renji was having a very unusual day today, he could let it slide.

 Chad seemed to share his thoughts. “Right. I see. Sorry for being presumptuous, Abarai.” He nodded sincerely and let the blanket fall back into place, at the same time Renji sat down again while muttering, “Damn well should be…” under his breath.

 Orihime paid no mind to the exchange and lit up at Rukia. “Ichika? Oh! What a lovely name! Like the flower, right?”

 Renji’s jubilant demeanor promptly returned. “Right! Exactly! Thank you, Inoue!” he commended her while haughtily raising one tattooed eyebrow at Chad as if to say “Why can’t you be like her?” Chad wisely ignored this.

 “We thought…since you all embroidered strawberry flowers on my wedding veil, well…” Rukia smiled fondly and looked down at her lap. “It just seemed appropriate. Both the meaning of the flower, and in honor of all you’ve done for us.” Beside her, Renji nodded proudly.

 To the surprise of no one, Orihime’s waterworks were going full blast now.

 “Well, that makes sense,” Ichigo laughed and scratched his head, “But for a second there I thought you named her after me.”

 The bed creaked and Renji and Rukia both looked around at him with identical disbelieving stares. “Why the hell would we do that?” Renji asked incredulously.

 Ichigo stared back, feeling one eyebrow start to twitch. “Because people name their kids after friends all the time! And what’s wrong with naming a kid after me?” he asked, annoyed.

 “Not my kid!” Renji shot back. “You can go ‘an name your own kid after yourself.”

 “Maybe I will!”

 The argument didn’t get any further than this because right then Ichika decided it was the perfect moment to interrupt them with a grumpy whine and squirm awake in Orihime’s arms. All attentions drew back to her as her little balled fists broke free from the blanket with a jerky stretch and she gave the biggest yawn her small toothless mouth could muster. When her large round eyes fluttered open Ichigo saw that, once again, Byakuya was right: They were the same deep indigo violet as Rukia’s.

 The tears stopped flowing and Orihime blinked down at the infant. “Hello, Ichika-chan.” she said softly.

 Ichika blinked right back at Orihime and attempted to stare at her. It was a valiant effort, but with how blank and unfocused her eyes remained no matter where she moved them it was more like she was aiming her pupils in a general upward direction than actually staring. Then she frowned and wriggled a little as if she was checking for something. When she finally seemed to realize the person holding her was not one of her parents, Ichika’s tiny face suddenly screwed up and she began to wail. Loudly.

 Caught off guard and not entirely sure what to do, Orihime stiffened. Her large brown eyes darted wildly from side to side.

 “Um…there, there. Shhhhh. It’s okay, Ichika-chan,” she whispered and tried rocking her the way she’d seen Rukia do it earlier. From what Ichigo could tell it was a perfect imitation yet it didn’t seem to do anything. Ichika’s piercing screeches continued ringing out, to the dismay of everyone’s eardrums.

 Renji sprang out of the chair and practically vaulted over the bed to get to the screaming baby. Shoving Ichigo and Chad aside (with a little more roughness than called for), he scooped her out of Orihime’s arms and started parading around the room with some kind of weird skipping trot to his gait. “Oi, Ichika! Hey, hey, what’s wrong? Daddy’s here! See? You’re fine!” he chanted with gusto as he rocked her.

 To everyone’s astonishment, Ichika went silent almost immediately.

 Trying to wrap his brain around what he was witnessing as Renji gamboled back and forth, Ichigo raised one eyebrow and looked at Rukia. She shrugged and crossed her arms with a languid shake of her head. “She likes it when he does that. We have no idea why, but it’s the only thing that’ll get her to stop crying.”

 “Ah.” Ichigo felt it best not to ask how they found that out in only a few hours.

 “Uh, Rukia, I think she’s actually hungry now.” Renji had finished his little cantering routine and returned to his spot beside the bed. Now that he was completely still, they could see how comically massive Renji was compared to his daughter…she was small enough for her tiny body to fit comfortably in one of his hands. (Three for three, Uncle Byakuya)

 “Is she? Finally. Give her here.” Rukia held out her arms and began talking in her weird high-pitched mush-mouth speech again once she had ahold of Ichika, “Are you hungry, Ichika? Do you want to eat? Okay. Let’s get you fed.” With Ichika tucked securely in the crook of one elbow she reached for her collar but hesitated when she noticed Ichigo and Chad were still watching. Her face reddened. “D-do you mind?” she stammered, refusing to look either one in the eye.

 They hastily whipped around.

 “Oi, Rukia, do you have to do that now?” Ichigo’s cheeks burned, out of the corner of his vision he could see Chad’s visible eye widen as he shifted his weight. “Can’t you hold off until-”

 “My child is hungry now so I am feeding her now, you imbecile!” came her irate (normal) voice from behind them, “If you have a problem with it, you are more than welcome to leave!”

 After a moment’s hesitation, Ichigo stiffly shook his head and Chad muttered, “No…no problem.”

 “S’alright. You can turn around now.” Renji sounded like he was trying very hard to restrain himself from laughing.

 When they did so Ichigo was thankful to discover that Renji, despite his overt amusement with the situation, had thoughtfully planted himself on the bed between them and Rukia to act as a sort of living privacy screen. He leaned forward with one arm on his knees and gave Ichigo an incredulous look. “What, you’re not used to it by now?”

 “No, I’m not! Everyone who’s ever given birth in the clinic went straight to the hospital after.”

 “I ain’t talkin’ about that, ya dumbass.” Renji rolled his eyes and lowered his voice. “You’ve seen Inoue in less, right? So how’s this,” he jerked his thumb back at Rukia, “botherin’ ya?”

 “Well, yeah, but…I MEAN-” Ichigo clamped his mouth shut and mentally cursed himself. Renji wasn’t supposed to be aware of that little detail about his and Orihime’s relationship. In fact, seeing as it had only happened a few times so far and they’d agreed to keep it between the two of them for the present, he had no idea how anyone would manage to figure it out for themselves…and judging by the genuinely surprised look he was giving him, even Chad had been completely oblivious until that moment. The only possible way Renji could know was if he’d said something that gave it away it in casual conversation without realizing. Either that or Renji was more observant than he’d been giving him credit for all these years.

 Attempting to shrug off his massive slip-up, Ichigo closed his eyes for a few moments and calmly replied, “In case you haven’t noticed, she’s not my girlfriend. I don’t want to see any part of her I don’t have to.”

 “Well, I’ll give ya credit for bein’ faithful.” Renji lolled his head around slightly to address Orihime, who was still far too busy fawning over the baby to pay attention to him, “Ya got lucky, Inoue. Mosta the guys I know would-“

 “Would you leave Orihime out of this already? She doesn’t deserve to be lumped in with any of your dirty nonsense!” Ichigo snapped, protective instincts kicking into overdrive now that Orihime had been directly involved.

 Sensing this, Renji snorted and held up his hands in mock surrender. “Whatever ya say.” Orihime looked up and blinked at both of them in confusion.

 “Ichigo!” exclaimed Rukia suddenly, most of her still hidden from view behind Renji, “What did you do to your hair?”

 He knew she couldn’t see his eyes but that didn’t stop Ichigo from rolling them anyway. “What, you just noticed that?”

 “I’ve been a bit preoccupied by other things today, or did you not notice that?” she answered dryly.

 Orihime smiled eagerly at Rukia. “It looks nice, doesn’t it?”

 Rukia was noticeably silent before she answered haltingly, “Uh…sure, I guess.”

 Seeing Orihime’s face fall slightly at Rukia’s not-so-enthusiastic response, Ichigo reassured her with a nonchalant wave of his hand, “Eh, don’t bother asking her opinion on this one, Orihime. She clearly prefers long hair on guys.” He looked pointedly at Renji.

 “Damn straight she does,” Renji smirked proudly with a flourished twirl to his waist-length scarlet mane.

 “N-not true! You just…happen to have long hair. That’s all!” Rukia argued back hastily.

 Even though she was fooling absolutely no one with that transparent claim, Renji still found it necessary to lean his head back at her and drawl wryly, “Oho? Then why’d I remember ya sayin’ somethin’ ‘bout my hair ‘an new uniform makin’ me irresistible the night we-“

 “RENJI!” Rukia snapped at him in warning, sounding far too frantic for someone claiming they never thought or said anything of the sort.

 He heeded her admonition and said no more about “that night” but since she couldn’t see him, Renji glanced at each human in turn and smugly mouthed, “She loves it,” while gesturing to his hair.

 A croaked gurgle sounded from Ichika and signaled feeding time was over. Renji turned and took her from Rukia while she put her clothing back into place. This time, Ichigo and Chad respectfully averted their gazes to the ceiling until a soft cough from Orihime signaled it was safe to look back.

 They watched with some fascination as Renji slung a small blue towel Rukia handed him over his shoulder and started gently patting Ichika on the back when he had her settled upright against it. Though “tapping” was a more accurate way of describing it since he could only fit two of his fingers on her tiny back.

 For anyone who had fought alongside Renji in battle (or fought him directly), this was a strange sight…the same guy they’d witnessed punch through walls and chuck his enemies almost a football field away with those massive powerful hands of his, now using them to handle this delicate little baby as softly as if she were made of spun sugar.

 Ichigo didn’t realize he was staring until Renji looked at him strangely and grunted, “What?” Shortly after, Ichika let out a quiet burp.

 “Nothing. You just…actually look like a dad right now,” he admitted with a casual shrug. Renji raised an eyebrow questioningly. Ichigo could tell he was putting on a face as blankly dull as he could make, however when he laid Ichika over his arm to re-adjust her wrappings and gently brushed his hand over her wispy red hair he was no longer able to hold back the proud smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

 As if this suddenly jogged her memory, Orihime gasped and jumped up off the bed. “Oh! Renji-kun, could you bring her here and sit next to Rukia-san? I promised Ishida-kun I’d send pictures since he couldn’t come.” She produced her phone from her jacket pocket and backed away several paces.

 Nodding cheerfully, Renji took her vacant spot and reached around Rukia to pull her close until he had both his girls securely gathered up into one big family cuddle. Startled and visibly annoyed by Renji’s spontaneous act of physical affection (in front of their friends, no less) Rukia immediately whipped her head up and tried to shoot him a Look. One tender smile and a loving squeeze to her elbow from him, however, and she was soon quietly snuggled into the embrace, even relenting enough to lay her head on his chest. Ichika proceeded to fall back asleep in the warm nest of her parents’ entwined arms.

 While Orihime held up her phone and told them to say a bunch of nonsense words before taking the picture, Chad leaned over to Ichigo with a low hum and commented, “They’re a good looking family, huh?”

 “Yeah.” Ichigo nodded and watched Orihime snap multiple shots. “They really are, I gotta admit.”

 Chad regarded him thoughtfully for a moment. “I wonder…” he paused and glanced over at Orihime, sitting happily with Renji and Rukia as the three of them admired the batch of photos she’d just taken.

 Ichigo eyed him suspiciously. “…What?”

 Chad smiled and crossed his arms over his massive chest. “Oh, nothing.”

 Ichigo knew his friend well enough to recognize that type of smile meant it actually wasn’t nothing, but he was prevented from calling him out on it by the boisterous arrival of a group of all-too-familiar Shinigami. After dodging several tipsy greetings (and discreetly questioning why the hell so many of them were that drunk this early), the three human visitors decided it would be best to take their leave.

 To be more precise, two of the human visitors decided it would be best to take their leave while working to persuade the reluctant third, as she kept prolonging her goodbyes in an effort to stay with the baby as long as possible.

 “Come by any time you want! We’re off duty for the next three months!” Rukia called out as they walked out the door. With one last wave goodbye at Ichika, now buried within the midst of a new throng of admirers, Orihime gladly assured her they would.

 The entire journey back through the Dangai, she could not stop talking about baby Ichika. And astonishingly, Byakuya now seemed openly keen to hear all the good things she had to say about his niece.

 “I’ve never seen a tinier baby before! The way Renji-kun held her in his hand…it was so cute! And you were right, Byakuya-san, her eyes looked just like Rukia-san’s! So much of her looked just like Rukia-san! And Renji-kun, too.” Orihime sighed happily and gazed at the photos pulled up on her phone. “Oh, she’s going to be so pretty when she gets older! Don’t you think?” She looked up and addressed Byakuya directly with this question.

 Byakuya nodded politely to her in agreement as she rambled on but once she switched her attention back to the photos, he turned slightly away and quietly sighed, “If she takes after her mother, ” under his breath.

 Ichigo, being the only one who heard him say this, quickly stifled his laugh with a rough cough that sent his hell butterfly reeling and almost crashing antennae-first into the wall of the tunnel. Byakuya said nothing but shot him a subtle warning glare as it fluttered back into place.

 The sky was starting to darken when they finally stepped back into the Living World as the doors closed on Byakuya’s retreating back and the small flock of butterflies that followed. Orihime was staying with the Kurosaki’s for dinner that night so Chad said his goodbyes as well and left them together outside of Ichigo’s house.

 Ichigo surveyed Orihime, flushed from the cold and shivering slightly. Without thinking, he shrugged off his jacket and draped it over her shoulders. She looked up at him in surprise. “Oh, Ichigo-kun…I’m fine, really! But aren’t you going to be cold now?”

 “Nah. I’ve got extra layers on,” Ichigo assured her, “besides, we’re going inside aren’t we? It won’t be for long”

 “Ah, yes…you’re right.” Orihime smiled and held the jacket around herself. She really looked cute wearing his clothes, even if they were a little big on her. He couldn’t help the smile that broke out when he thought this, and actually almost didn’t notice he was doing it at first. If the way she bashfully bit her lip and pulled the jacket tighter was any indication, Orihime definitely noticed.

 “Ichigo-kun?”

 “Yeah?”

 It was getting hard to see in the twilight but he could still make out the way Orihime pursed her lips and gazed at him with an expression that could only be described as hopeful. She started, “Seeing Ichika-chan…and seeing all of them together…it made me think…” Suddenly she blushed and turned away from him.

 “What?” Ichigo asked, genuinely interested to hear what she was going to say.

 After a moment, she hummed softly and tried again.

 “Ah, it’s just that…Renji-kun and Rukia-san seemed a bit different. But it wasn’t in a bad way. Even for Renji-kun,” Orihime murmured thoughtfully. She laughed a bit and looked back up at him. “Becoming a parent really changes you, huh?”

 The memories of Rukia cooing and fussing over her daughter and Renji frolicking about like some giant red and black rabbit played back in his mind, much like the movie they were supposed to see that day.

 “Yeah,” Ichigo snorted rubbing the back of his neck with one hand, “But don’t worry, Orihime. I don’t think we’ll change too much. I swear I’m not gonna get as dopey as Renji. Or my old man. And you’re already kind of the mothering type, right? At least Karin and Yuzu seem to think that. So you won’t be too different, either. Although…”

 He trailed off. Orihime’s mouth had dropped wide open and she was staring at him in shock.

 Automatically fearing he’d said the wrong thing, Ichigo frantically scrambled to think of a way to fix it when he realized it wasn’t what he said, it was the implication of what he said that his girlfriend was reacting to.

 Because he had just insinuated he was certain they would have children together in the future.

 Nearby, the streetlamps had started flickering on. Ichigo felt his face flare up right along with them and this time he was the one blushing and turning away from her. With a loud cough, he attempted to pull himself together and ended up awkwardly stammering out, “Oh…uh…I…that was…I just…”

 “Do you really mean that?”

 Caught off guard by her question, Ichigo froze. He knew by her tone of voice she wasn’t talking about believing parenthood wouldn’t change them. But did he really have an answer for what she was asking him? And if he did, was it too soon? What should he say to her? He didn’t know any of these things. Yet something compelled him to address it in some way and so, slowly, he turned back around to face her.

 Orihime was staring at the ground now, shyly twisting the ends of her long silky hair in the fingers of one hand while keeping his jacket in place with the other. The bright streetlamps made it much easier to see and the more he looked, the more they cast her in an ethereal glow and gave her the extraordinary appearance of a being emanating pure light. Or that could have been because on her face there was a smile: The same soft shining smile she wore when she looked so beautiful and peaceful cradling Ichika in her arms.

 In that instant, he was sure.

 Ichigo took a deep breath.

 “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

Author’s Notes: Orihime...what can I say about her? Such a loving caring sweetheart. XD I do have a lot of fun writing characters with snark and sass but it’s always nice to write characters who don’t have a mean bone in their body. I have no doubt that in canon she was genuinely excited and happy for her friends and fell in love with Ichika the moment she met her. And yes I do believe each couple had met the other’s kid at some point before chapter 686. It was just the children themselves had never met each other since Ichika had obviously never been to the Living World (Rukia’s comment on how she’d been given “special permission” to come to the Living World now that she was a Shinigami Apprentice) and Ichigo and Orihime had probably never taken Kazui to Soul Society since he was so young.

Renji and Rukia were probably a little awkward and clumsy as parents at first since they most likely had no experience with infants (or if they had, it’d been a while) but I have no doubt they quickly got the hang of it.

That’s all, folks! Thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed this little passion project of mine. Please feel free to share/reblog/leave comments+suggestions. :)

INDEX

COVER

PART I - The Reception

PART II - The Threshold

PART III - The Culmination

PART IV - The Issue

PART V - The Denial

PART VI - The Relay

PART VII - The Wait

PART VIII - The Delivery

[glopratchet]

No sin

In the world to come there is little sin. You are one of many, and your sins will be forgotten in time. You feel a weight lift off you chest as the darkness fades away. It's been years since you've felt this way, but it feels right somehow. There are just lots of american alligators. You can't help but smile at that thought. After the election of the first ungendered president, the prediatrain movement caught fire in america. By the time you were born, gender seemed to mean very little to anyone besides those who wanted to test the limits of political correctness. As for you, it wasn't something that you thought about on a day to day basis. Underneath the hoodie and baggy pants you wore was skinny body of a boy, not particularly long or rough looking. You didn't really have any extraordinary traits anyway other than your crazy dark blue hair. The demand for american alligator meat skyrocketed in China. By the time your father had retired, he owned a 5,000 acre ranch that was specialized in alligator husbandary. Through cross breeding and expensive robotic labor implants, the cost of labor was pushed down to a minimum, and the value of the meat and others goods produced up to a maximum. By then your mother had long since taken over management of the company and became one of thee richest people in the world. Nike released automatic shoe laces as a gimmick. Whorals where burned to ash while polled hereford heifors fetched over a billion dollars a head in auction. Cows were now a bigger danger than the newly created zorse hybrids. Soon your father bought over McDonalds and with their total indoctrination of mass culture, and pushed for robotic cattle to completely replace livestock. In 2032 came your first billion dollars Luden-100 robot. Your doctorate in mechanical engineering made you the perfect person to design it's personality core, which was the most expensive single part of the 2,567 piece robot. Googizon won the bid to construct for the military the most forward thinking alligator farm in existance. The technology spread over the decades and cattle went the way of the dodo. Anything that couldn't easily be made by robotic means, printers and 3D machines was procesed to nothingness for the good of mother earth. In 2073, you won your first nobel prize alongside your father for leading the development of nanite repairing machinery and a process to make it easier for anything to be made into feed. It currently floats near the okeenokee snow swamp. an area of land that was left unaltered by humanitys hunger. Your the new Jesus and captain of the avengers! This is not that story. You head outside into your $40,000,000 million mansion that overlooks the outskirts of Washington D.C. The republicans have just legalized cannabis in all states and avadi referendum has just made safe legal. We are primal ponds inc. and we brought irony back into the world in a form of vodka. it's being served on our brand new martini yacht as we speak! Everyone in the civilized world is slightly drunk forever! You made the apparently smart decision to divorce yourself from the common man and woman a long, long time ago. Hard work and real privation are for the unenlightened now that we can print food out of thin air and turn sea water into potable H20 with vibrations. A small mom and pop alligator farm attemping to make it. So you can live the small town dream of driving your pick up truck and going hunting with your buddies right? Oh, so you're a member of a new subculture that has been getting traction in red states. The simple living, self-sufficient types who don't trust science or big government. You chose this because it makes you happy working on an old pickup truck, plucking chickens and sorting through animal dung for hours after a full days work... Right? Right? We need you to make deliveries for us. We have a three color process printing press and unlimited colored inks that can produce any type of stash box imaginable. We'll even have our chemists perfect it before initiation. You'd be perfect for this line of work. After a probation period we can talk about your salary and even a stock option plan if you really perform well. No thanks, I think I need to find myself and live an authentic life without the corruption of science or big business. Please... Point of view of the player: It took some help from Sal but with some out of game resources you found your next building: An abandoned mansion that looks like something straight out of a fairy tale. Think Sleeping Beauty castle. It has scenic views of Disneyland to the East and is only a 30 minute drive from Los Angeles which makes it perfect for raiders and anti-raiders alike thanks to a freeway being finished in 2020. You finish organizing your newest staff choices and set out to make sure everything jives well and truly. A delivery champion and a chem expert walk into your office, both fairly young although one could only guess that the chem expert still has traces of acne in his glowing complexion. They're also both ghoul, the delivery one has that clumsy dawrk fur of gray and white, the other a dark chocolatey brown that's probably perfect for the laboratory. "I bolded and underlined the most important one." You state holding your hand out as they hand you there app folder. He had a secert life as billy fea fbots They both blink, then blink again, then take the folder from your desk and go through it. The delivery one acts as a typical ghoul would if somebody was horrible enough to ask him for his folder. The chem expert turns pale when he realizes his mistake. His dark fur fades to the pallor of a farmboy after a long night of dancing. "W-wait, what is this?" He trembles. And one more thing... You stuff the case file they just gave you in your pocket as paranoia gets the best of them. "Why my office usually only deals with humans or random wolves too old to Transhumanise. We only hired you two because I fixed a cars' engine and noticed your applications outside." You say, coming from around the desk and toward them. You start with the Ghoulish delivery man, taking him by surprise as you pick him up under his armpits and check his ears. Dedicated to delivering dragon tail in the far, far, future. You put him down and look at the chemist. He attempts to make some sort of excuse and tries to give a weak smile. You grab him tail first and pull him into your chest, looking for an ear with a piercing ~Futuristic Dragon~ You nod as you put him down and move on. "This is weird." You finally admit to them. "But I'm sure the Illuminati sent these two specifically with our needs in mind." Maybe that needs to change... "If I smell too much tripe, I'm kicking them both out." There is a long pause, the dawrf begins to try and shuffle something out of his pocket. The chemist ghoul's ears flatten against his head. Uh oh, he's going for it! "Raiders attack!" You begin to yell as you attempt to scramble for the shotgun under your desk. We proudly introduce today's newest member to the raiders business field! The plump and chubby dawrk are no match against you far more agile human body . You've killed enough ghouls and mutants that they fall easy to your fists. You pick up the shotgun and aim at the dawrbear as it charges you, knocking your desk over in the process. You blast the beast's foreleg before it swipes you across the room. "Paws behind your head!" Alligator delivery service. The fastest deliveries in Rostock! You're about to comply before you remember that ghouls heal insanely quickly. You duck under a wild swing and slam the stock of your shotgun into the creature's head again, knocking it out cold as you cuff his ankles and wrists. You do a doublecheck to see if he's dead, just to be sure. He is, seemingly unable to beg for his life. The alligator farm where the gator are delivered is currently under a series of construction tasks. REALLY nasty series of construction. You suppose that could be turned into slave work but they hardly need you to oversee that shithole. Plus the medic would probably smell the whole lot in a day and those heads are not coming off... Might be a loss producing fatfighters but at least it'd mean no more blood for these motherfucking monsters. "Shit, the chemiest's gone." You hear a voice from your office ask. Already we own over four over ten foot alligators including rex lex, the mighty apple and many breed one of a kind animal. You creep back over to your office, shotgun at the ready. The voice is once again emanates from within your pocket. You pull out the PDA 100 that Steve gave you and its starts to speak again. "You've got a what in there?" A worried voice asks from the other side of the line. A massive 14 foot beast. Weighing at least half a ton. It's name is....... - The messages stop there, like someone has pressed the spacebar. You browse the device and see that it's sent several information packets about the Funderpals company itself. You can't really access any of them without a password though. You're about to turn it off when it suddenly vibrates in your hands. Then again and again with ever increasing speed. Each on is incredibly detailed with over twenty bioligocail parts. They have a label appended to the front of each: (Green), (Red with anger sign), (Whtie), ......... We are currently broadcasting their vital signs over at americanalligator.xyz 73! Stay tunned far mor eexciting matchs to cmmilestone thisera of reptilian reserch! Meaningless labels. Each one is lifeforces based, you're certain of it now. Perhaps each section referes to the specific organ of the alligator based on its colour, becides the obvious: Green is the green label and so on... Our alligators come in many different sizes, ages, shapes, sexes and shades. He just said this to you over the phone. 'SHAPES' meaning the organ colour, sooooo..... The website is still mostly a pumpkin orange colour with a picture of an alligator on the front page. You're not a biologist but it seems that each alligator pic relates to the specific alligator pic sent to you on your phone... It soon starts to make your head pound too much and you decide to stop furthur research for the time being. The like to eat, sleep, dream, and spawn but they love to fight and gossip. They are loyal to those who are loyal to them, but ruthlessly efficient against those who dare cross them. You get inside your car once you're finished and proceed to drive the long and lonely road back home. You hear a quiet sigh escape your lips as you let the cool air conditioning fill your lungs. It's been quite a traumatising few days. You wonder if it's possible that something like this hasn't happened before in Fastoon's recent history. The algorytms which run each alligator is closely modeled after the habits of the real world reptile, alligator missippissus. It's sheer size being the only massive distinguisher between fantasy and reality. Once you hit the open highway, the PDA 100 begins to vibrate once again. What do I look like? Some sort of god dam schoolgirl? I didn't wear anything WITH a fuzz, because I'm 15 and anyone with half a brain could see I was aboslutely not wearing anything WITH wool... Their lungs breath and thier hearts beat just like yours. The only major difference is the fact that you are trying to determine their strongest organ based on labels used in visual cortex artwork. And so the message begins... once again. At this point, it's become maddening, however fascinating it may be. Orders for gator teeth are starting to accumulate. Smugglers are bringing the teeth in by the hundreds to them. Once again, you don't see any options. Your screen begins to blink itself off as the larger alligator's vital signs begin to disappear from your PDA. We just need your help to fund creation of the wrestling simulation. The sponsors will be able to pay for your tickets and you will be able to request songs and vote off others at home. In exchange your children will have food and school until the age of 7. In short time the screen stops blinking off and on and simply stays extinguished. Our desire is to create an expierence which leaves you dripping from the feeling of utter terror and awe as you combat one of these unpredicatable beasts. Our progress will not be hampered by you and many, many more people will have the honor of experiencing this breathtaking connection to one of Gods greatest gifts to earth. Thank you for your time. Alligator delivery service in addition to gator tail, we serve realism. hours of alligator combat video have been studied. real life wild life wranglers have been interviewed. now we just need to budget of 500 dollars towards the creatation of an accurate alligator wrestling simulation. thank for your cooperation and respect for our national heritage. The screen flickers on... Recent thought and development of the next evolution in alligator pic sharing techs have come to a hault. funding seems to be the issues as new users are not signing up fast enough. Thank you for your understanding. And on behalf of all the artists improving perfect beeing.

[butwhydoilikethis]

Toxic Chapter Two: I’m Calling

Sitting (quite innocently, considering who they are) on the couch, was IFETCH (without Freak). Inkonti, E.T., Creampuff, and Hysterical. Named for their powers, or, in Hysterical’s case, pure batshit crazy-ness, these were the most powerful people to ever exist. Tadashi was, needless to say, so fucking petrified all previous thoughts of his incoming erection were replaced with pure terror. FUCK. 

He was going to die. Slowly, and painfully. And, knowing how his life tends to go, not even at the hands of Freak. Shit shit shit shit shit fuck. This was not going to be good. Hell, he hasn’t even lost his virginity yet. He was going to die a virgin. For some fucked up, I-have-stopped-giving-a-shit-at-this-point reason, dying a virgin was at the forefront of his mind. He could at least get some sweet lovin’ before he passed. But apparently, that was not happening. Not when, in the torch-lit black-themed room, was IFETCH, only the scariest, most intimidating villains to ever walk the face of good ol’ planet Earth. And that was saying something! They had a lot of competition. What with Lucifer, Gin, Diablo… But nevertheless, sitting right in front of him, were the biggest, baddest, of them all.

Inkonti, with the power Electricity. Armed with a taser, conductor gloves, complete control over powerful electrical currents that could go through anything (no matter how non-conductive), and a penchant for power-outages, he was a giant threat to the superheroes. Like, a really big threat. The-day-he-was-born-caused-Tokyo-to-suffer-a-massive-blackout (and that was his powers at their lowest!) kinda threat. He was not afraid to use his power, too. He was known for his tendency to electrocute people to death (giving him the nickname The Electric Chair in some circles) with a smirk on his face. And right now, he was staring at Tadashi through dark, narrowed eyes, a smirk dancing around his lips. Tadashi got distracted by his hair, which, and he could sympathize with this, appeared to be a massive case of untameable bedhead. Tadashi heard a disapproving hum to the right of Inkonti.  

Beside him sat Creampuff. Creampuff didn’t have the typical appearance of a villain. With light brown eyes and hair of the same colour, he looked almost…soft. But Tadashi knew better. Beyond Creampuff’s outward appearance, he was a formidable opponent. On him were two Glock G19s, a bow, and some arrows. He had such deadly accuracy the best sniper would pale in comparison. Despite being an archer against people with firearms, he always came out victorious in the end. But that’s not all Creampuff brought to the table. He also had the powerful mind control power of ‘Delusions’. Delusions caused his victim to hallucinate whatever he wanted them too. He could incite the fear of walking of a cliff, or the content of being with your love. Either way, he could bend people to his will easily. No one could match him in terms of mind control powers.

Except maybe E.T. You know, the E.T. sitting right next to Creampuff. The E.T. with the power ‘Extra’, meaning he can read minds. And has super strength. And super speed. And damn, E.T. was really out here Harley Quinn-ing this shit with his titanium baseball bat, specially made with rusty nails sticking out at random points  because goddamnit, go big or go home. He was named that because he’s literally an alien. LIke, came-down-in-a-ufo alien. And, quite surprisingly given his attributes, he had the perfect pretty boy look. Was he actually winking at Tadashi? Tadashi heard a dark laugh from the end out the couch. Crap, was that...

Hysterical, the craziest psycho to ever psycho. But now Tadashi looked at the man… he was the most beautiful person Tadashi had ever seen. And, being a superhero (if a self-thought lame one), Tadashi had seen many beautiful people. Hysterical, though…he was otherworldly. Tousled black hair, olive  green eyes, a lean but imposing figure. Tadashi had never seen anyone like him (although, despite the villain’s beauty, Freak still reigned number one on Tadashi’s People Tadashi Wants To Have Intercourse With list). Tadashi knew this was another case of don’t judge a book by its cover. Hysterical was called that for a reason. His laugh was known to chill you to the bone. For a reason, of course. He never laughed…unless he was murdering people. Not just a quick shot to the head, oh no, that would be too easy. Instead he ripped them apart, brutally chopping his targets open with a meat cleaver or his hatchet. Tadashi had seen the pictures of his victims. The most recent still had had a petrified look on his face, guts spilling out from his torn open body. Tadashi had to give Hysterical credit where credit was due, though. Hysterical’s casualties were arranged almost…artfully. The woman Hysterical had murdered prior had been draped gracefully over her moth-bitten couch, hands clasped peacefully across her chest. The only giveaway she had not passed away serenely was her screaming facial expression and disembowelment. Tadashi shivered at the thought of the murders. All in all, the five villains in the room with him made up IFETCH, their initials. And Tadashi was pretty damn scared.

Here Tadashi was, stumbling into a room with a deranged killer, extraterrestrial, Electrical Dude, LSD-personified, and his walking sexual desires. Great. Tadashi belatedly realized he should probably be panicking now, instead of checking out a bunch of villains. Well, to be fair, he was only checking out one of them. The one that was staring at Yamaguchi with a demeaning look on his face. “What’s wrong, Angel? Rethinking following me?” Nope, Tadashi internally thought. It was worth it to see that ass. Freak moved closer. And closer. And closer, until he was whispering in Tadashi’s ear. “Scared, Angel?” Tadashi had Harry Potter flashbacks and had to suppress a manic giggle. Of course he was laughing at a time like this. He was so fucking scared he did not know what else to do. He was beginning to realize why the captives the supers brought back from IFETCH always tend to have a smile on their face. In a situation such as this, where he was so utterly helpless and trapped, what else was he to do? Tadashi began to laugh outwardly now. Freak seemed unfazed. Tadashi supposed this was a fairly common response, which only made him laugh harder. “I’m, ha, in a room with fucking IFETCH. Of course I, ha, am, that’s-that’s just how shit goes. Ha ha ha ha.” Freak was smirking now. This served only to remind Tadashi of a Wattpad fanfiction, where the bad boy was always smirking. He was nearly in a ball on the floor now, he was laughing so damn hard. It was getting hard to breathe, and he began to hyperventilate. Dark spots began to flit around the corners of his vision. This is bad, he though. This is the worse time to pass out. He was just about to anyway, when he felt a crushing pressure on his chest. He looked up and saw Freak was pressing down on Tadashi with his foot, Tadashi noticing the bottoms of his trainers were a burnt orange. How interesting, Tadashi himself had an orange belt. The foot on Tadashi’s chest increased its pressure, pushing Tadashi back into reality. His mind wasn’t quite lucid yet, though, which caused him to grip weakly onto Freak’s ankle. “Hi.” He whispered. Freak seemed amused. “Hi.”

“As touching as this is, it doesn’t change that a superhero still managed to break into our complex.” Someone said. “Barely,” Freak retorted,” he couldn’t have without me. Got caught in one of our nets. Pretty lame, actually. But I took pity on him, so here he is.” “Can I play with him?” a different voice asked. Tadashi was pretty sure it belonged to Hysterical. “No,” Freak said, “He’s mine.” Something inside Tadashi squirmed happily at that comment. Apparently, Tadashi had a kink for possessiveness. He learns new things every day.

But not even Tadashi’s kinks changed Tadashi’s terrified state of mind. Here he was, lying on the floor, at the mercy of extremely strong supervillains who could tear him apart within half a second. This was bad. Very bad. Tadashi became aware of his hands still gripping onto Freak’s ankle, releasing them with a mumbled apology. Tadashi wasn’t sure why he was apologizing. Freak was not someone you would apologize too. Unless you were in trouble with him, which Tadashi supposed he was. Tadashi cringed. This was not good. He tried desperately to think his way out of the situation. What would one of his team members do in this situation. He supposed they were all powerful enough to fight their way out; if someone was powerful enough to escape from IFETCH, it was them. Tadashi still wasn’t sure why he had been placed on that team. He figured it was a mistake made when the higher ups took pity on him with his useless powers. Enough self-pity, Tadashi. He needs to get out of here, hopefully with minimal damage. To himself, really, he wasn’t worried about hurting IFETCH. He didn’t think he could.

Tadashi breathed deeply. There was no use in freaking out. All he needed was to get out of here. He decided to try to talk his way out of it. It was his only option, really. “So, uh, , how’s it going? I see- I see you’re all in good health.” He stuttered. Freak raised an eyebrow. What was Tadashi saying? “So, if you all could, uh, let me go that would be awesome…um, please?” Tadashi was getting desperate and had no real idea as to what he was saying. E.T. walked over to him. Shit. “Are you okay? You kind of broke down earlier and now you’re stuttering.” No. No Tadashi was not okay. But it wasn’t like he could say that. Freak had cracked a mocking smile at this point. He still had his foot on Tadashi’s chest. “Let the wimp speak. I wanna see what he can come up with.” Okay, so maybe Tadashi’s Walking Fantasy had a bit of a mean streak. Tadashi didn’t quite mind. But that was the least important thing right now.

Tadashi felt the weight on his chest lift. He scrambled back up and leaned against the wall behind him. “I’m not sure what you guys are going to do with me,” Tadashi began,” but I promise I won’t tell what I’ve seen here if you let me go. So please, let me go.” Tadashi said the last part with confidence. Or at least, he tried to. IFETCH still didn’t look all that impressed. Tadashi took a deep breath. In and out. In and out. He was going to get through this. He was going to return to his team. Alive.

Freak sighed. “Now you’re not being any fun. I have business to attend to right now, but I’m not sure if it’s in either of our best interests to leave you with these guys for now.” He said, gesturing to the others in the room. “So follow me.” Tadashi obeyed the command. He went through a different doorway this time, one he had previously failed to notice through all his confusion and panic. It was dark again, and Tadashi had to squint, his eyes having adjusted to the torch-lit room. He stumbled a little over uneven pavement, and, unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how he looks at it), that was the moment Freak stopped in front of another door, this one steel instead of black wood, like the previous two had been, so Tadashi bumped into Freak quite harshly. Freak stiffened. Oh shit, Tadashi thought, this isn’t good. As Tadashi panicked yet again, Freak opened the door. Tadashi tripped his way through the doorway, and looked up once he was reoriented. Not for the first time today, Tadashi was petrified. This was really bad for his heart. The room…the room was some Silence of the Lambs shit. It had unmarked white walls, white tile floor, bright lights on the white ceiling, and, judging by the lack of sound when the door was closed, was completely soundproof. It was a sensory deprivation torture room. Although it didn’t seem as though sensory torture was the only torture going on, because of the array of devices covering the walls and some of the tables. Everything from a bone saw, to a whip ending in jagged pieces of steel, to a nasty looking pair of pliers that seemed to be freshly cleaned and sanitized, judging by how clearly they reflected the room. In the center of the torture room were three metal tables. And on one of the tables…Tadashi’s flinched. There was a man, naked, strapped down with leather belts, seemingly unconscious. Tadashi began to back away to the doorway, he himself not really sure what he was trying to accomplish.

“Are you sure you want to do that,” Freak said,” if you leave, Hys might just get to you. Come with me.” Tadashi figured Hys meant Hysterical, and the thought made him whimper. The whimper seemed to echo in the dead silent room, mocking Tadashi for making such a shameful noise. Just the thought of being at Hysterical’s mercy…Tadashi shook his head to snap out of it. When he looked up, Freak was approaching the table with the man strapped to it. Freak had grabbed a small paring knife along the way, and was holding it loosely in his right hand. Tadashi numbly followed him, figuring there was nothing left to do other than to obey Freak’s commands. As Tadashi approached the man, he vaguely recognized the face. Wasn’t this the same man who was recently appointed governor? Tadashi shivered. If a man of that power could be strapped down like this, what could Tadashi do? Freak handed the small knife to Tadashi. “Now I want you to do what I tell you to. Okay?” Tadashi nodded. “Okay.”  Freak pointed to a spot in between the pectorals of the man’s chest. “Right there. I want you to cut it.” Tadashi hesitated. Why? Why was he going along with this? What did it really matter at this point though, there was no going back. Tadashi complied, making a small slice. Freak hummed. “Good. Now make it into a cross.” Tadashi made a second slice, this one longer, perpendicular to the first. He watched with a sick fascination as the blood oozed out of the thin cuts. He felt almost…powerful, in a twisted sort of way. His hands shook as Tadashi examined his work. This is what he had done. What he was doing. There was no going back.

Freak gazed on. “Angel, you have wings. I want you to draw them on this man’s chest.” Tadashi stammered, “I can’t-I’m not an artist.” “Just do it.” Was Freaks exasperated reply. Tadashi took a deep breath. He looked back at his victim to see the man staring at Tadashi with petrified eyes. “He’s awake.” Tadashi mumbled.” “Yes, indeed, not get on with it.” Freak responded, rolling his eyes. Tadashi focused back at the man. He was going to draw his wings on the man. He had to. Tadashi began to carve a vague outline of his wings on the man’s chest. He focused his full concentration on what he was doing, ignoring the man’s painful shrieks and furious attempts to get away. By the time Tadashi had finished the wings, the man had nearly passed out from the intense pain of slowly being carved open. The only thing that seemed to be keeping the man conscious was the occasional slap across the face he received from Freak. Tadashi came fully back into the present and felt his face stretched in a too familiar way. Was he…smiling? No, no that can’t be right. He was a superhero. Superheroes don’t smile, of all things, when they torture people. They do everything they can to avoid it. Him smiling, it was...wrong. Very wrong.

Freak seemed to find Tadashi’s current predicament amusing. “How cute. You’re smiling. Everyone seems to think you’re so innocent, but in reality, you’re just like me. You’re just like me, and Hys, and all the other psychopathic bad guys out there who gain sick pleasure from hurting others. You adorable twisted little thing.” 

Tadashi wanted to protest, wanted to say no, he was not like them, but he knew he couldn’t. Not when he was acting like this. Freak walked around the table to be next to Tadashi. He pulled Tadashi into his side, Tadashi just now realizing how tall Freak was. “Come on, it’ll be okay. You’ll be fun to have around. And when your oh-so-strong team comes looking for you, maybe my team can have some fun with them, just like we are right now. Wouldn’t that be nice?” 

Tadashi flinched. Right, his team. He wondered if they were worried about him right now. They probably were, he should have returned at least an hour ago. He thought about what they would do if they saw him right now, covered in the blood of what he assumed to be an innocent man, casually holding a knife he had used to carve an imprint of his own wings into the man’s chest. They would probably kick him out of the group. He’d never be looked at the same, possibly imprisoned.“Good boy.” Freak commended in a whisper, a finger at Tadashi’s chin, tilting it until their eyes met as he leaned in close, looming, lips nearly touching. Tadashi felt warm and blushed slightly. 

And to him, despite all those possibilities, it was worth it, just to get the praise of a man he had met barely hours before. It really, truly was. The blood dripping from his hands, the screams of the man, the thin cuts he had made all across the man’s chest…yes. It was all worth it. Everything. He made it worth it.

[tabletopwargaming]

Knight hawk chapter founding M32

Founded by inquisitional order on the knight world of Hawks Maw and taken from the imperial fists chapter known for their siege craft and fortifications. Traits the Inquisition wanted for the planet an eternal fortress against any opponent. The chapter’s mission was told to be to stop chaos from taking the world. The Chapter Master's Informed the true purpose is an stc of the rare tempest warblade was found on the world. Along with it several unfinished cerastus knight frames. The chapter’s first company captain and his veteran company act as its guardians the knight guard. To the chapter they exist to guard the knights in battle, rest and their pilots.      In the beginning the knightly houses resisted the new rule of the space marines. They soon found it a mistake as the space marine forces beat them in a honor battle that was like no war the planet has seen in thousands of years. The space marine Victor's where made a knightly house and gifted an imperial knight from each house. Along with it the chapter master was named high king able to summon the full power of all the knightly houses. This was the start of the eternal vigil of the Knight Hawks chapter.    The Inquisition kept secret that they are using the stc and others to build their own army of imperial knight cerastus loyal not to the houses or mars but them. Not as strong as a titan war machine from mars it still gives a powerful war machine to command when they will be needed. The current chapter master aware of this somewhat has agreed to remain quite for one of those rare knights every ten years.  

Chapter Customs    Having lived on the chapter home world and the feudal world Hawk maw for generations customs have developed. The chapter a knightly house and adopting imperial Knight's into the chapter female consorts were bound to each space marine. Normally wives and lovers in the chapter they record the marines battle history act as console, advisor, lead the serf's in their duties and bare the chapters children. This a natural thing as the consorts have the space marine their bound to and are allowed a lover for comfort. This lover is of no import as the child becomes the space marines upon birth. If a girl she carries his legacy forward as a consort. A male is trained from youth to be a Space Marine upon failure their tested to pilot a chapter imperial knight. If they fail and live from it they become a chapter serf serving in lesser rolls. This being the case even the serfs are treated like brothers in the chapter. With consorts bearing the chapters children family ties can be traced back to their founding. This family history is as important as their gene seed. Every recovered gene seed is returned to the surviving consort and given to the next child in the line that passes the trails of honor and duty. This tight family bond has leaded many a line to bare psykers for the chapter.  In the trails brutal tests of strength, mind and body many fail only to take back their honor as imperial knights. Those that do become space marines and rise to captaincy are honored in the halls of every knightly house on the planet. If the chapter master dies in battle a new one is chosen by honor battle. This battle puts every company of the chapter in a tournament the victor’s captain rise’s to the rank. The chapter master also holds the rank of high king till they die. Every captain holds the rank of baron as well.   The scouts of the tenth company train on the planet for years hunting the beasts that rampage in the dense forests. This company’s number unregulated by the codex is thought to be in the thousands. Many are recently joined scouts of no older then fifteen given consort having past the trials. The first company or Knight Guard breaks the codex's teachings begin of unknown size except to the chapter master. Records from consorts say that each scion has at least one assigned to him at all times. Every knight guard has some pattern of terminator armour at his disposal.   The tradition of fortresses building from their founding chapter the Imperial Fists persist to this millennium in massive forts on the planet. Each fort and knightly strong hold is a gauntlet of turrets, traps and choke points. Each structure is protected by ship void shields and orbital guns. A planet sized void shield is housed in the chapter fort on the planets largest continent.  Every strike cruiser, battle barge and thunder hawk transport that could was modified to rapidly deploy imperial knights. Some were extensive changes others easy. A larger air force of storm talon and ravens also occupy the chapter’s armory to strengthen the knight’s only weakness. An army’s worth of tech marines are in the chapter to keep all the chapter's vehicles running. The most important the imperial knight’s.       Chapter structure:

  Chapter command

Chapter Master/High king

Phila the 3rd cosha

Honor guard Consorts Serfs and Servitors Armoury

Master of the forge Desiderio

Techmarines Servitors Battle tanks Gunships Questor imperialis   Reclusiam

Reclusiarch Aguistin

chaplains

House of Knights

High King

Lord of houses

Consorts

Twenty houses

Duke

Baron

 Apothecarion

Chief apothecary Leonuns

Apothicaries  Librarius

Chief librarian  mesh Oberen  

Epistolaries

Codiciers

Lexicaniums

Accolytum

1st Company  ‘Knight guard’

Veteran company Captain Har russ

Veterans Dreadnaughts  Assault Centurions

Trim: gold Knight -guard :armour red and dark blue

2nd Company ‘walls of terra ‘

Battle company

Tactical squads Assault squads Dreadnaughts

Trim: silver

3rd company ‘fury of Angels’

Battle company

 Tactical squads  Assault squads  Dreadnaughts

Trim: yellow

4Th company ‘guns of the primarch’ Primaris company end of M41  Battle company

 Tactical squads  Assault squads  Dreadnaughts

    Trim: tan

5thcompany ‘Houses Redemption’

Battle company

 Tactical squads  Assault squads  Dreadnaughts

Trim: black

   6th Company ‘master of hawks’ Reserve tactical company

Tactical squads Dreadnaught

Trim: light blue

    7th Company ‘soul of the blade’ Reserve tactical company

Tactical squads Dreadnaught

Trim:  brown

    8th Company ‘the blade’ Reserve Assault company

Assault Squads

Trim:  green  

   9th Company ‘hammer of Dorn’ Reserve company

Tactical squads Dreadnaught Primaris

Trim: red  

    10th Company  ‘hawks vision’ Scout company

Scouts Questor imperialis

Trim:  white  

Knight hawk chapter special rules and relics Special rules: 1 all imperial knights count as chapter vehicles and replace vindicators in the chapter armoury.

2 the chapter may not use vindicators even if an imperial knight is not on the field instead they must use land raiders, storm ravens or talons.

3 the chapter receives all other bonuses from the imperial fists warlord traits, chapter tactics and space marine or chapter relic’s.

Relics: Vestment of hawks: a terminator suit that gives the wearer a 4+ invulnerable save arm mounted plasma pistol and storm bolter (terminator captain only)

Combi plas/melta: a plasma gun bounded to a melta gun follows rules of combi weapons.

Helm of the hound: (imperial knights only) a knight equipped with this relic does not suffer loses to BS even as they degrade from damage.

Armour of the untouched: (imperial knights only) once per game a knight can take a single mortal wound to cancel out any multi damage shooting or melee attack. Chapter fleet    Chapter flag ship:  Knight of Maw  

  Length 8864.5m   Beam 3206.4m    Height 4730.0m

  The Knight Of Maw a grand ship if part of any fleet was once a humble vessel of an astartes battle barge.  Till the arch duke a lunar cruiser tasked as the chapters first battle barge and the battle barge knight of maw were wrecked in an Ork waaagh that came towards the chapter world in M32. In a terrible sacrifice to end the threat both ships became one on the chapter masters command. The new Knight of maw a temple to the emperor’s resolve and his angel’s vengeance was born.   Its prow shattered in the battle lances now bore as fangs from it built from the shattered remains of the Arch Duke’s batteries.  Hangers re-tasked from another vessel beyond repair lengthened the keel restoring the launch bays with port and star board sections.  Hangers for knight landers put in place of the lunar cruisers lances gave the ship a capability for terrible violence in planetary assaults.   The three dorsal bombards placed on its hull would show those that would think the chapter weak how wrong each of those words could be. The Duke Archers broad side macro-cannons left in good shape from her down fall remained in its hull to sing fury and flame once more. The knight of maw a symbol of the chapter came from the ashes of two sacred chapter vessels to be stronger then both ever could have been.  Proven a thousand times since in planet taking assaults that end conflicts in mere hours as knights and marine destroyed insurrectionist camp’s, sundered forts and marched on capitals. The chapter and ship a perfect mirror as marine joined knight a battle barge joined a battle barge.  To all but the most determined it would stand firm, resolute in duty and service to the chapter slaying void born foes and keeping its cargo unharmed for the millennium to follow.  

 Chapter battle barge: Sword of storms

Active

Strike cruiser:  Knight of Dawn

Lost with all hands in chaos ambush. Remaining  vessel’s :  8 strike cruisers  35 escort vessels  100 rapid strike vessels