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dinogoofymutated · 1 year ago

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Hi! so far I've loved everything you've written about Kurt, Logan and Remy. 🧎🏻‍♀️

Could you write something about Kurt? where together with reader they are in the kitchen of the mansion because they can't sleep, and she finally tells him her concerns about the magnitude of her powers and Kurt with his heart of gold tells her beautiful things to calm her down and make her laugh, the rest to your imagination, I would appreciate it, you write great! Thanks 💙✨

SFW! Nightcrawler/Fem!Reader

Ok so I will admit that I made this a leeetle self indulgent. I was trying to think of a power someone could really struggle with and a fun one that I thought of was having necromancy, but having such respect for life and death that it feels wrong. I thought it would fit well with a Kurt fic because it's something that almost feels sacrilegious, and it's good to have a fuzzy blue elf assure you that you aren't a monster :) I know its def not power ambiguous, but I hope this is okay :)

Also, I know my writing style is a little different in this one, And thats because the first few paragraphs set the tone for my writing when I start and tbh I think this one just flowed from my soul to they keyboard.

TWs: nightmares, necromancy, gross descriptions of rotting flesh. Extreme self-doubt and self-consciousness. Basically angst with a happy ending.

You’ve been having nightmares again. They hardly seem to stop, but after a break in between the terror, you'd become too relaxed. Too comfortable. You felt defenseless when they started to begin again.

It’s always the same dream, different font. Bones cracking, flesh ripping as it’s forced into place, natural or not. Skin rotting off of once human bodies, sockets where eyes used to be. It was horrifying. You’d see your family, friends, acquaintances, everyone. Dead. Brought back to life by your power, the power you were still so afraid of. You were always afraid of zombie movies as a kid. Anything rising from the dead, anything breathed back to life in some sick and twisted fantasy. It was ironic that your very own strength was the thing you had always been the most afraid of.

Of course, as you aged and the professor took you in, the fear began to wear off. Mostly, it did. The professor not only taught you how to control your powers but also how to work around your fear. You can remember the confusion you felt when he had set a box of ancient bones in front of you. Fragments of titans, dinosaurs who had long since passed. Bones that would never be matched to an accurate set, parts of them being crushed to dust by the cruelty of time. Bones that only you could breathe to life, to bring them together as a whole again. It was convenient, the professor had told you, that you only needed a fragment to do so. He spoke as if it were a service to them. Most importantly, he brought you a box of bones that weren’t, and never had been, human.

He had taken the fear out of your power. Given you an option you had never considered before. Bones without flesh, without living family. Fossils that would serve you as you were serving them. You were… happy, with that. You were content. You could handle bones. You could revive these ancient skeletons without fear, and fight with them without worry. That didn’t change the horror of knowing the capacity your powers had.

So the nightmares remained, and your sleep had become sparse.

This particular night you were restless. Unable to sleep despite how tired you have been, but it’s hard to rest when there is only terror waiting behind your eyelids. After a while, you decide to give up trying.

The path to the kitchen is one you have memorized, even in the dark. You’ve always been told never to eat sugar before bed, but the only thing you want to comfort you at this moment is hot chocolate- so screw it.

You try your best to be quiet while fishing out a pot out of the cabinets. The stove makes a click as you flick it on, filling the pot with milk before stirring it as it warms. The automatic task is comforting, falling into a routine you enjoy. You’ve just added the coco mix when the sound of a *Bamph* greets you.

“Guten abend.” Kurt whispers, walking over to stand beside you. You give him a tired smile that he returns with a yawn.

“I’m sorry if I woke you.” You say, face returning to a frown Kurt thinks you wear far too often. Maybe it’s good that he’s here because you realize you made far too much of the sweet drink than you had meant to. You get a mug for him, heart fluttering as his hand brushes your own when he takes it from you, thanking you quietly.

“You did not wake me, Schatz. I promise.” Kurt says, pulling out a chair for you with his tail as he sits at the table. You nod silently, placing the pot in the sink and filling it with water before you join him, leaning against his shoulder.

“Did you have another nightmare?” Kurt asks after a moment. His brows are furrowed in concern, and you fail to stop him before he takes a sip from the scalding coco, burning his tongue. He scrunches his nose as he sticks out his tongue, making you giggle for a moment. He thinks your laugh suits you much more than your frown, even if it happens to be at his expense. Your face falls slightly anyway, and he wonders if he could get you to laugh if he did it all over again.

“...No. Not tonight.” The words come out as less than a whisper, and you doubt he might hear it if it weren’t the middle of the night. Little did you know he’d block the world out if he had to, just to hear you speak a little clearer. He hums in response, and you feel his tail slowly wrap snugly around your waist, the very tip idly stroking you in a comforting manner.

“...Do you wish to speak about them?” Kurt asks after a moment. You huff slightly, feeling the hot steam from your mug warm your face as you do so. Still too hot, you think to yourself. Flashes of those horrid nightmares come to mind, and no matter how quickly you try to shake them off, they remain. You choose to think of Kurt instead. Sweet, kind, comforting Kurt. You want to bury yourself in his arms, sink into the feeling of his skin, and never let go, if only he would let you. He would without a second thought, if only you had known. You think carefully about your next words, and the visions of flesh and corpses hardly leave you.

“Am I a monster, Kurt?” You hear a quiet, cut-off gasp from Kurt, and he turns to you. His face is pained, and he sets his mug down to place his hand around your own, still clasped around the hot cocoa.

“Of course not. Only a fool would think so.” His words, although comforting, only leave you with a worse sting in your heart. You can’t hold eye contact with him, staring at the reflection in your mug instead. Only a fool would think so. You halfway wonder if you count as a fool, then.

“I, just… My powers, what I do. What I am capable of doing. It’s not right.” You take a shaky breath in, desperately trying not to break down here and now. “It’s disgusting. It’s horrible. Every time I find myself comfortable with myself I am reminded of what is possible and I spiral. I don’t want it. I don’t-”

“Liebling.” You let out a sob at the sound of his voice. Kurt is hunched over, pressing his forehead against your own as he desperately tries to catch your gaze- but you can’t. You can't bear it, and you close your eyes tightly. Kurt takes the mug from your hands. He cups your face as he wipes your tears, and you feel like even more of a monster as he does so. Sobbing as a man with a heart of gold wipes your tears away with love and care.

“Please, look at me,” Kurt whispers. You try to stop the tears, embarrassed as you fall apart in front of the man you hold so dearly, but it’s hard. It’s so hard. Your chest stings, your throat is sore, you’re sure your nose is running, and yet he still holds you so gently. When your breathing evens out just a bit, you convince yourself to open your eyes again.

Kurt’s gaze is simply concerned. There is no horror, no disgust, nothing but worry for you. Nothing but kindness. You wonder if you could be even half as good as he is.

“You are good. You are kind. You are strong enough to stand by your morals despite the nature of your powers telling you otherwise- and you have the strength to continue to use them and fight your fears anyway. You are one of the most incredible people I have ever met. Do not let your nightmares tell you otherwise.” Kurt’s hold is steady against your cheeks, and your own shaky hands reach up to hold onto his wrists. You sob again as he speaks. You know. You know this. Others have told you, but these words all felt like lies. All but the ones you’re hearing from his mouth. Your tears are slowing, and Kurt leans forward to press a kiss to your forehead, leaving the skin tingling. You whisper quiet apologies for crying, and he shushes each one, gently wiping your face with the soft sleeve of his pajama shirt.

“I would not be here if I didn’t want to care for you, my love,” Kurt says softly. Your eyes widen, taken aback by his words. He called you many things. Liebling. Schatz. Love. But never my love. The words waken butterflies in your belly, and Kurt takes a moment to realize what he’s said. He swallows nervously, but he doesn’t pull away. You don’t either. The two of you are treading a line that you both desperately want to cross.

Kurt is the first to lean in. He does so slowly, toeing the line between you. His gaze remains on your own as he closes the space, nose nuzzling against your own as he gives you the time to back out if you wish. But you don’t. You want nothing more than to have what he is so freely giving.

Kurt kisses you softly, lovingly, and for once the horrors have quieted and are cleared from your mind. All there is now is Kurt, and his soft love. He kisses you a second time before he pulls away, still as close to you as he can be without falling out of his chair. You wonder how he can see beauty where all you see is terror. He wonders if you have any clue just how much of a good person you continue to be.

He knows he would gladly spend the rest of his life showing you.

#x men 97 #x men #x men comics #x men 97 x reader #x men headcannons #kurt wagner #kurt wagner x reader #kurt wagner headcannons #nightcrawler headcannons #nightcrawler x reader #xmen nightcrawler #nightcrawler

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blueiscoool · 1 year ago

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A 70 Million-Year-Old Titanosaur Dinosaur Skeleton Found in France

A chance discovery made in southern France has revealed a rare specimen — an almost complete dinosaur skeleton found connected from its hind skull to its tail.

The massive fossil came to light in May 2022, after now 25-year-old amateur paleontologist Damien Boschetto and his dog stumbled across something unusual while walking in a forest in Montouliers, France. Boschetto had noticed a cliff edge that had recently collapsed and decided to take a closer look, when he spotted an exposed bone sticking out of the ground, local media outlet France Bleu first reported on February 13.

The Archaeological and Paleontological Cultural Association at the Cruzy Museum, in collaboration with the French National Center for Scientific Research, identified the nearly 10-meter-long (32.8-foot-long) fossil as a Titanosaur skeleton upon excavation. Boschetto, who has been a member of the association for eight years, said that while unearthing dinosaur remains is “always exciting and interesting for scientific research and the understanding of the ecosystems of that time,” finding the bones in their almost original anatomical position is what makes this find extraordinary.

“From a museography point of view, it will make it possible to present to the general public animals almost complete in anatomical positions, which is something great,” Boschetto added via email.

A group of history and archaeology enthusiasts created the Archaeological and Paleontological Cultural Association in 1975 to safeguard the heritage around the village of Cruzy, with several members becoming enlightened amateurs in paleontology due to the areas’ wealth of dinosaur fossils, said Jean-Marc Veyssières, a member of the group and one of the fossil preparers for this discovery. Today, the association is made up of inhabitants of the region, including a few scientists as well as students.

“The most exciting thing was to realize that we had at least one anatomically connected animal and that it was a titanosaur, a long-necked dinosaur,” said Veyssières in an email. “(Boschetto) is an enlightened enthusiast and curious about nature, he spends a lot of time surveying the region in search of new areas. … He became an expert on the Late Cretaceous fauna of our region.”

The association has been excavating the site, which Boschetto referred to as a bone bed, a term used by paleontologists to describe a dense area of animal bones and other fossilized remains, for the past two years. And the newly announced find was not Boschetto’s first.

The recently revealed 70% complete Titanosaur skeleton was retrieved during the excavation along with several fossils of various dinosaurs and other vertebrates, including some in anatomical connection and near complete. Other remains identified included those of a Rhabdodon — a herbivore, or plant-eater, like the Titanosaur — and fragments from skeletons of carnivores such as Theropods and crocodiles, according to Boschetto.

The Titanosaur skeleton currently resides in the Cruzy Museum’s laboratory, where it will be further studied, Veyssières said.

Titanosaur found intact

Researchers estimated the age of the newly discovered fossil to be around 70 to 72 million years old, but Titanosaurs roamed around on four legs from the Late Jurassic Epoch to the end of the Cretaceous Period, approximately 163.5 million to 66 million years ago. Titanosaurs belong to a larger group of dinosaurs known as sauropods, a family of long-necked herbivores that were some of the largest dinosaurs of their time, according to Britannica.

Remains of Titanosaur fossils are widely unearthed in Europe, but few are discovered in anatomical connection, Boschetto said. Finding a skeleton in this connected state suggests that the body was buried before it had entirely decomposed, leaving “some tissues connecting the bones to one another,” said Matthew Carrano, research geologist and curator of Dinosauria at the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History.

The completeness of the specimen will “make it easier to determine whether it’s a new species or a new specimen of a species that’s already known,” Carrano said in an email. “It will take time to learn all the details about this new specimen, but I’m sure it will provide important new information about this group of dinosaurs.”

The region in which Boschetto discovered the specimen is known to be rich in fossils of dinosaurs and other species living at the same time and is “building one of the largest collections of dinosaurs from the Upper Cretaceous in France,” he said. The association did not publicize the discovery until excavation was complete to protect the archaeological site, he added.

The association plans to continue research on the fossils and to further search the area, and the group’s members hope to obtain the funds to “create a large-scale museum that can accommodate and present these collections,” Boschetto said.

By Taylor Nicioli.

#A 70 Million-Year-Old Titanosaur Dinosaur Skeleton Found in France #Montouliers France #paleontologist #dinosaurs #fossils #ancient artifacts #archeology #archeolgst #history #history news #ancient history

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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 9 months ago

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In The Gloomy Depths [Chapter 3: Black Opal]

Series summary: Five years ago, jewel mining tycoon Daemon Targaryen made a promise in order to win your hand in marriage. Now he has broken it and forced you into a voyage across the Atlantic, betraying you in increasingly horrifying ways and using your son as leverage to ensure your cooperation. You have no friends and no allies, except a destitute viola player you can’t seem to get away from…

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), parenthood, dolphins, death and peril, violence (including domestic violence), drinking, smoking, freezing temperatures, murder, if you don’t like Titanic you won’t like this fic!!! 😉

Word count: 6.1k

💜 All my writing can be found HERE! 💜

Tagging: @arcielee @nightvyre @mrs-starkgaryen @gemini-mama @ecstaticactus, more in comments 🥰

💎 Let me know if you’d like to be added to the taglist 💎

You dream that you are made of gemstones: fossilized, crystalized, eons spent beneath the earth, diamonds for bones, onyx glittering in the pupils of your eyes, crimson pebbles tumbling through your arteries, red beryl and rubies and cinnabar. Daemon is breaking you apart with a pickaxe, heaving swings and sweat dripping from his brow. He fills a wheelbarrow with jagged, gleaming pieces of you and carts them away to be cut and polished and sold. Then—in the settling dust, in the silence—the viola player comes to the empty space where you once were and kneels, collects specks of you until his palm is full of them, and stores your infinitesimal, shimmering echoes in the pockets of his trousers. Don’t worry, Petra, he is saying. I’ll put you back together. I won’t let you be lost.

You jolt awake as his hand is skimming over your hip. Then, still lying behind you, he grips you roughly and yanks you against him, shoving the hem of your nightgown up to your waist as he opens his robe, his large hands hurried and impatient.

“Yes,” you whisper into your pillows, a soft pliant surrender as golden sunlight streams in through gaps in the curtains. It’s been so long; it’s been ages down in the subterranean darkness. You are starving for this, even if you fear him, even if you hate him, even if Daemon does not try to satisfy you anymore. When you were first married he left you exhausted and breathless just to prove he could, to draw the stark blood-red line between his skill and yours. Now he withholds pleasure—something you find nearly impossible to give to yourself, perhaps five times in as many years—and takes you like this: unceremoniously, unpredictably, with rareness like a jewel’s. Yet still this taste of being desired is intoxicating, cigarette smoke in your lungs, sparkling champagne gulped until your face burns.

Daemon is panting, effort and urgency. You can feel him trying to push his way inside you; and then, when he is not yet hard enough, stroking himself with one hand, grinding himself against your warmth, your wetness, slick mineral hunger.

You moan pitifully: “Daemon, please…”

“Quiet,” he says, and when you look back at him his eyes are closed like he’s trying to imagine you are somebody else.

He is the only man who’s ever had me, and now I repulse him. What can that mean except that I am unworthy, incapable, broken?

Abruptly, Daemon shoves you away by your hips and exhales in a huff, rising from the bed.

You roll towards him and ask without venom, desperate to know: “Daemon…what am I doing wrong?”

“It’s not anything you’re doing,” he says as he ties his robe shut. His eyes are flinty, his words severe. “It’s just you.” Then he stalks out of the bedroom and you are alone.

You push yourself up on your palms and stare at your reflection in the oval-shaped mirror against the wall. Your hair is wild and your eyes forlorn. Your engagement ring, black opal from Australia, glistens on your left hand. There’s a mark on your throat—a gift from the point of Daemon’s dagger—that you’ll need to conceal. You are ashamed of yourself; you turn away.

It’s the morning of April 13th, and Titanic is 1,000 miles from Ireland.

~~~~~~~~~~

You are reclined in one of the pink-painted teak chairs on the Boat Deck and reading a copy of Henry VI, Part 3, which you borrowed from the ship’s small library. You’ve been thinking about the play ever since the viola player quoted it yesterday, here where he was not supposed to be loitering, making his oil paintings and spying on you. You are trying not to glance over at the lifeboats by the railing. You wish you didn’t know that there are far too few to hold all the passengers in the event of a cataclysm. The temperature of the water of the North Atlantic Ocean is below freezing.

“I heard you quarreled last night,” a voice says.

You look up to see Rhaenyra standing in the daylight, blue sky, white clouds, a chilly wind she guards against with a maroon shawl draped across her shoulders. Rhaenyra is dressed like a blood drop: deep gory red, gorgeous but horrible. Strings of rubies dangle from her ears. Strands of her long blonde hair—gradually turning from lemon quartz to a darker, sandier hue—have escaped from her pins and blow in the salt-lashed air.

Daemon told her? Daemon confided in her?

It is just one more humiliation, Daemon unburdening himself to his niece instead of his wife. And whatever version of events Rhaenyra heard, you’re sure it didn’t include him holding a blade to your throat. Reflexively, you touch your fingertips to the thin slice of a wound, covered by several layers of powder foundation and a choker necklace made of diamonds, pearls, and white gold. Your gown is an anemic cream color to match. “Oh?” is all you can think to say at first, inane, pathetic.

Rhaenyra sits down on the deckchair beside you and clasps her hands together, kneading them restlessly. “I believe you could have a contented marriage,” she says. “If only you would allow Daemon the freedom he requires.”

You close your book and scrutinize her with a hard glare. You have not asked for advice; you cannot trust anything she tells you. Rhaenyra will defend Daemon eternally, unflinchingly. They share more than blood. They share a defiance that scalds and singes. You are no dragon, you have never yearned for treasure, prominence, adventure, exceptionalism. You wanted to stay exactly where you belonged. “What sort of freedom?”

“The freedom to make his own way in the world,” Rhaenyra says. “To not be constrained by archaic traditions, or arbitrary bounds of morality, or overcaution, or…or…”

“The freedom to force me to leave my homeland? The freedom to take my child away from me?”

Rhaenyra is stunned. “He’s right here on the ship.”

“And your sons are back in England with the 9th Duke of Beaufort, yet I assure you that you are closer to them now than I’ve ever been to Draco.”

She cannot understand your vitriol. You have cracked the rose-colored spectacles she’s been gazing at the world through. “I’m trying to help you.”

“I have not sought your counsel.”

“Then I’m trying to help Daemon,” Rhaenyra says, flustered, struggling to remain composed. “He is not a young man anymore, and he doesn’t need discord in his own home on top of a transcontinental move and a demanding new position at Tiffany’s.” Her voice goes tender. “I know he does not wish to torment you. Daemon can be headstrong and proud, but he’s not a cruel man. And he’s been so kind while I’ve been mourning Sir Harwin Strong…”

“Kind,” you repeat dully. It is not a word many people associate with Daemon Targaryen.

“Yes,” Rhaenyra insists, as if daring you to contradict her. “Tremendously kind.”

And you notice something strange: one of the rings she is twisting on her fingers is a black opal, huge, rimmed by diamonds. It’s not a stone you can recall ever seeing her wearing before. Your eyes return to her face. Perhaps you have taken the wrong course of action. Perhaps you can appeal to her mercy, one parent to another. “Our quarrel was on the subject of my son. I wish to be a true mother to him.”

Rhaenyra rises to her feet, as if suddenly bored of this conversation. God, she’s so much like Daemon. “Then you will get further by being friends than enemies.” She inclines her head slightly, a dismissive little curtsy, then swishes off in her bloody dress. You watch her go, then open your white handbag to take out a cigarette and your holder. Then you remember you don’t have any way to light it and sigh in defeat, staring morosely at the unplentiful lifeboats.

Can I have one person who’s on my side? Just one?

As if you’ve called for him aloud, the viola player appears. He has added a black wool hat to his stolen regalia, pulled down low over his face. He glances after Rhaenyra as she disappears down the staircase that leads to the Promenade Deck—watchful, anxious—and then turns back to you.

The viola player says, his hands in the pockets of his coat: “You look like you could use a break from your part of the ship.”

You try to resist him, battling a playful half-smile that pulls at the edges of your lips, strings running beneath your skin like the rigging of a ship. “Where else would I go? To fraternize with the third-class degenerates?”

“Oh, we have all manner of degenerates for you to enjoy,” he replies, grinning. He props one shoe up on your deckchair. “The Greeks, the Italians, the Irish. I’m partial to the Irish myself.”

“Good for cheap, expendable labor? Good for dying beneath the railroad tracks?”

“Good for painting,” he says instead. He takes a small aluminum lighter from his coat pocket, flicks it to life, and holds it out to you. As you steady the lighter with one hand, you can feel that there is an engraving on the side of it. You cannot see what it is; as soon as your cigarette begins to smolder, the viola player snaps the lid shut and returns the lighter to his pocket.

You take a drag, peering up at him, thoughtful. “Are you extending an invitation of some sort?”

“I am,” he says, pleased that you’ve asked. “Think you can find your way to the Third-Class Dining Saloon? It’s all the way down on F-Deck. Every night after dinner there’s dancing and card games and…uh…” He gestures vaguely, flirtatiously. “Camaraderie for the lonesome.”

You chuckle. “I see. And do you have an Irish girl down there to entertain you?”

“Not yet. But I’m trying.”

You consider him as you smoke. The viola player waits, though he glances around uneasily, as if afraid his disguise will be seen through like a pane of unfogged glass. “F-Deck, you said?”

He nods. “In the middle of the ship, in between the two main staircases. Right next to the Turkish Baths.”

“Oh, good. I can ask Laenor for directions.”

“I can wait somewhere for you, if you want, and take you down there myself. But…” But people might see us.

“No, it’s better if I go alone,” you say. “When does the most wicked of the debauchery begin? 9 p.m.?”

“9 is sinful,” the viola player agrees. “10 is irredeemably villainous. And by 11 we’ve always begun the orgy, we’re very punctual, you could set your watch by it.”

You laugh, loud and freely, your cigarette holder tucked between your index and middle fingers. “Perhaps I’ll make an appearance this evening, Picasso.”

“I hope so. I’ll be looking for you.” Then he steps down off your pink deckchair and saunters off, soon out of sight, his black coat and hat vanishing into crowds of first-class men—heirs and tycoons and aristocrats and politicians—dressed the same way.

You try to return to your Shakespeare play (now Margaret of Anjou is declaring war on the Yorkists) but it’s no use; the viola player with all his knowing, crooked grins has filled your skull like water pouring into a sinking ship, and for a moment you have forgotten about Daemon, and Dagmar, and Rhaenyra, and this is a feeling one could get addicted to, a warm softness that polishes away barbed edges, a numb haze like too much cider or champagne.

The wind is getting stronger, and you haven’t brought a coat or a shawl. You wander back towards your staterooms—impatient for dinner, and for what will come afterwards—and on your way, down on the Promenade Deck, you find Dagmar sitting on a chair with Draco, bundled up in more than enough layers as his short white-blonde hair blows around chaotically. Dagmar is reading a book to him: Scandinavian, of course, The Ugly Duckling. She has a different voice that she uses for each character; her ancient face becomes bright and animated, as if she is draining the life from them like a vampire. Draco giggles as she reads, and you stop to watch them, standing alone on the deck and shivering in your ivory-pale dress.

Draco spots you, blinks a few times, then smiles and waves with his little hand. You can feel yourself smiling back. “Hi, Mam.”

“Hi,” you say, stepping closer. Dagmar’s blue eyes go frigid and sharp like ice. Her fingers that grip the book are knobby, gnarled, bestial. “Are you enjoying your story?”

“Yeah! The duck is so ugly everyone makes fun of him.” Draco is beaming as he announces this. You are unsure of how to respond.

“Well…maybe things will get better for him. Could I…” You point timidly at the book. “Could I finish the story, do you think? Could I read to you?”

Draco turns to Dagmar. “Can she?” he asks, and he sounds almost…hopeful.

“She doesn’t know how to do the voices,” Dagmar says curtly.

Draco frowns at you. “Do you know how to do the voices, Mam?”

“No,” you confess quietly. “No, I don’t. I’m sorry. But I could try to learn.”

“Maybe next time,” Dagmar says. She flips a page and resumes reading aloud. Then Draco is swept back up into the story, and you are forgotten, and you wait there for a while to see if he’ll notice you again before giving up and retreating back to your staterooms, a kicked dog, an unopened letter.

In the sitting room, Fern is bustling around straightening up and dusting. “Good afternoon, ma’am,” she says when you walk in, peering over one shoulder. “You look cold. Would you like some tea?”

“Yes please, whenever you have a moment.” You drop down onto the sofa, distracted and low. Your gaze drifts to the taxidermied tiger head above the fireplace, dusk-colored gemstones glinting in its eye sockets. Why can’t I make Daemon love me? Why did he give Rhaenyra a black opal ring?

You can hear Fern heating water for tea. Abruptly and vividly, you remember how she wept when Rush dragged you away from Draco and Daemon summoned you to your bedroom to be punished.

“That must have frightened you last night,” you say, still looking at the dead tiger’s head. “I’m sorry you had to witness it.”

An uncomfortable pause. “It’s no trouble at all, ma’am.”

“I bet you wish you were somewhere else. Just like I do.”

“No, ma’am,” Fern says, startled. “Please don’t send me away. Not ever.”

You turn to look at her. She stares back wide-eyed from where she is pouring steaming water into bone china teacups patterned with blue flowers. “You want to work for Daemon? Despite everything?”

“Lord Targaryen is the best boss I’ve ever had,” Fern answers, and she appears to be genuine.

“Is he really?”

“He pays me what he said he would. Doesn’t yell too much. Doesn’t try to touch me. And besides…” Fern is smiling a little now as she brings you your tea. “I spend more time with you than anyone else.”

You are heartbroken for her—where must she have been for Daemon to be a sanctuary?—then move over to make room for her on the sofa. “Pour yourself a cup too, and sit down with me.”

“Oh no, ma’am, I couldn’t possibly. It wouldn’t be right.”

“I’m your boss when Daemon is gone. And I want someone to keep me company.”

“Well, alright,” Fern agrees bashfully, trying not to show how delighted she is. “I suppose five or ten minutes won’t hurt.”

~~~~~~~~~~

At dinner—sweet ham and fatty ribs of beef, green peas and mashed potatoes—Laenor is joined once again by his new Parisian friend Hugo. You ask Laenor the way to the Turkish Baths in case you decide to visit them tomorrow, and he heartily recommends the facilities, sharing a puckish simper with Hugo. You think of Rhaenyra’s three boys and their dark hair, and their pug-like noses, and the whispers that forever swirl around them in the shape of Harwin Strong, and despite all of this Rhaenyra will suffer no consequences: beloved by her father, emboldened by her uncle, cherished by her sons, enabled by a husband who does not crave her attention anyway. She has broken the rules, and you have done everything right, and yet Rhaenyra is the one glowing tonight as she laughs along to Daemon’s stories, her new black opal ring flashing on her hand, and you are all but forgotten as you drink too many glasses of champagne.

Your guests tonight are Benjamin Guggenheim and his mistress Léontine Aubart, a French singer to entertain him while his wife is at home in New York City with their three daughters. Ben’s father made his fortune in mining and smelting, and so like Daemon he understands that one can rule the earth by pillaging what lies beneath it.

You swim up into the conversation from under a warm, numbing sea of amber champagne. Now Daemon is quoting English novelist George Eliot: “These gems have life in them: their colors speak, say what words fail of.”

“Hear hear!” Ben Guggenheim agrees, holding his drink aloft, not champagne but brandy. “Daemon, how old is your son now?”

“He’s four,” your husband replies with obvious fondness, and Rhaenyra seems to bristle. “And a complete terror, a tiny blonde Napoleon, he’ll take over the world someday…”

Beneath the table, you twist your own black opal ring on your wedding finger. You think of the night Daemon asked you to marry him—in the garden of Lough Cutra Castle, bats flapping in the twilight and long-eared owls hooting, not down on one knee but standing taller than you were, his green eyes glinting like the Connemara marble in your father’s quarry—and you wish you could go back and say no.

“Dagmar is a splendid governess, we are so fortunate to have her,” Daemon is telling his audience, and he always seems to have one. “She looked after me and Viserys when we were boys…I was her favorite, of course.” There is a dutiful chorus of chuckles. “She can be bit prickly with adults, but she is entirely devoted to children. She treats Draco like her own. I always wondered about her own family when I was young…I was petrified that one day she would take me aside and tell me that she had to go away and be with her own children now. Surely she had a life of her own out there somewhere. As it turns out, she had a drove of sons with her husband, four or five of them, and then the whole household was wiped out by scarlet fever. Everyone except Dagmar.”

“Oh, how dreadful,” Ben’s French mistress sighs, pressing a hand to her chest that glitters with a massive necklace of bruise-colored Tanzanite, worth a fortune. “But what a blessing for her to have found purpose again with the Targaryens, a lifeboat for her, I’m certain…”

A lifeboat indeed, you think dizzily. Dagmar climbs in and I am tossed out, sinking down into the cold, crushing, miles-deep darkness.

Ben Guggenheim is saying: “I spoke to Captain Smith today as I was taking the air on the Promenade Deck, and he informed me that the last of the boilers have been lit and we are full steam ahead towards New York Harbor. We might even arrive a day early! On the 16th instead of the 17th! Think of the headlines.”

This alarms you. One day less with the viola player? And you realize all at once how attached you’ve grown to him, and perhaps you are learning what it feels like to have a lifeboat too.

As Daemon’s party exits the First-Class Dining Saloon, chatting away carelessly, you tell your husband that you’ve been invited to the Reading and Writing Room to socialize with the other well-bred women of Titanic, and that you probably won’t return to your staterooms before midnight.

“Yes, yes, that’s fine, dear,” Daemon says, barely listening as he escorts Rhaenyra up the Grand Staircase. You linger for a while in the reception area—exchanging bland gossip with the Countess of Rothes and Madeleine Astor, so childlike and yet older than you were when you married Daemon—and then depart, not up the steps towards the Reading and Writing Room on A-Deck but down into the depths of the ship and through the Turkish Baths, closed for the evening and unattended.

You hear the Third-Class Dining Saloon long before you find the entrance and step inside, lively music and raucous laughter that echoes down white corridors. Through the doorway you find low ceilings, exposed support beams, and tables and chairs that have been pushed against the walls to make room for dancing. Men are toasting pints and smoking hand-rolled cigarettes, women are giggling at their jokes and thieving sips of the men’s dark frothy Guinness. Standing on top of one of the tables is a quartet of strings and a man singing, not dressed in fussy black suits but in corduroy trousers and plain half-unbuttoned shirts, the air hot and painted with yellow-gold artificial light. The viola player is with them. He sees you and smiles, but he doesn’t set down his viola. He has to finish the song, of course. They are performing Whiskey In The Jar.

“I went into my chamber for to take a slumber

I dreamt of golden jewels and sure it was no wonder

For Jenny took my charges and filled them up with water

And sent for Captain Farrell to be ready for the slaughter…”

You find a seat in a corner of the room and wait for the viola player to join you. You purposefully wore something rather plain to dinner—a pale pink gown, matching wool coat, and morganite jewelry—but still you are overdressed. The third-class passengers sitting nearby gape and ogle at you. You wave shyly as you shrug off your coat and hang it over the back of your chair. They bring you a pint of Guinness and, when you take it out of your rose-colored handbag, a burly middle-aged man lights your cigarette with a match. You fiddle with your cigarette holder for a moment, then put it away and smoke like the women here do: bare fingers, no niceties.

The viola player has abandoned his fellow musicians and plops down into the chair across from you, laying his instrument on the table. He grins, boyish and sly, like he has won a bet. You puff on your cigarette and act like you are here by pure coincidence. Oh, festivities down on F-Deck? Well of course everyone knows about that. Thought I’d swing by for a half hour or so, had nothing better to do.

“How are you?” the viola player asks, still smiling.

“Impatiently waiting for the orgy to start.”

He laughs and leans across the table, settling in. “Have you picked out a conquest yet?”

“Maybe one.” You exhale smoke and he watches you, intrigued, perhaps a little nervous to say the wrong thing. “How long have you been running from your family?”

“Five years.”

“That’s the same amount of time I’ve been married.”

“I know, I remember,” he says. “Enormous wedding at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin. Royalty were invited.”

You furrow your brow at him. “How do you know that?”

He shrugs, evasive. “I must have read about it in a newspaper or something.”

“And this is what you do now,” you say, drawing a circle of smoke in the air with your cigarette, meaning the Third-Class Dining Saloon, meaning the sort of people he’s chosen to spend his life with. “You make pennies by playing viola and selling your oil paintings.”

“Doesn’t take much to live on.”

“No?”

“Not the way I live. As long as I have something to eat and a bed to collapse into at night, I’m content.”

“You never get lonely?”

“Well I didn’t say the bed was empty.”

It was a joke, but you don’t laugh. You remember how Daemon pushed you away this morning, how ashamed he has made you of your lust, animal yearning smothered and ignored, an able body gone to waste.

The viola player realizes he’s made a mistake. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you, are you…are you alright…?”

“What line of work is your family in?” you say instead.

“Uh…” He hesitates. “Land ownership.”

This is interesting. “Really? Do they have titles?”

“Um, no, nothing like that.” He shakes his head, his eyes darting around the room. “What about the distinguished Lord Targaryen?” the viola player asks, contempt in his voice. “There must be hereditary defects run amok in his lineage.”

“His older brother is a duke, as you know.” You put out your cigarette in a plain porcelain ash tray and take a slurp of your Guinness. It joins the champagne in your bloodstream, sloshing around until your thoughts are blurry and harmless. “But Viserys is…” You try to decide on the right words. “Daemon thinks he’s weak and indecisive. Maybe he’s right, I’m not sure, I’ve only met Viserys a few times.”

“Viserys stays in England,” the viola player says, sounding more like a statement than a question.

“Yes, with Rhaenyra and her family. They’re very close.”

“And what of Viserys’ other children?”

You cackle. “What other children?” Another joke; this time it’s the viola player who isn’t amused. “After many, many years of neglect in cold dreary England, Alicent Hightower removed herself to Manhattan and lives there in opulence with her father Otto, her loyal bodyguard Sir Criston Cole, and her four Targaryen-blonde offspring, the eldest of whom is poised to inherit the Dukedom of Beaufort, much to his uncle’s displeasure.”

“Aegon,” the viola player says softly.

“Daemon hates him.” Your voice is hushed like a conspiracy. “Idle, useless, cowardly, effortlessly receiving fame and riches that Daemon believes he has rightfully earned.”

“Hm.” The viola player is smiling faintly.

“So now Daemon will gust into New York City like a storm, and capture the fascination of the elites there, and—with his orderly, intact family and jewel-mining dynasty built by his own hands—he will humiliate Viserys in the most brutal way possible. He will prove that he was the more worthy brother, that he should have been born first.”

“And what do you think?”

“I think that he shouldn’t have been born at all.”

You both laugh, sad and cynical. He looks down at your hands where they rest on the table, perhaps at your black opal wedding ring. Then he motions to the room at large. “How does it compare to your usual dining accommodations?”

“Far less caviar and duchesses,” you say. “What do the third-class cabins look like?”

The viola player raises an eyebrow. “Are you asking to see my room?”

That’s not how you meant it; but now that he is teasing you with flushed cheeks and one of his crooked, toothy smiles, you aren’t sure you want to decline. No, no. You definitely don’t want to.

“It’s unoccupied at the moment.” The viola player nods to a group of men dancing on the other side of the rowdy dining saloon. “My roommates are presently trying to convince those lovely Russian girls to get pregnant with their bastard children.”

“What a tempting prospect! Who could resist?”

He waits for you to say more. You stall, fiddling with your rings, gazing nervously down at them. “Hey. Petra.”

You look up at the viola player. “Yeah?”

“Don’t fear. That is not my design. There are no bastard children in your immediate future.”

You chuckle and then stand, smoothing out the skirt of your gown with your fingertips and putting on your pink wool coat. “Alright, show me your cabin. As my only poor friend, it is your obligation to enlighten me.”

“Gladly,” he agrees; and as the two of you are weaving through the crowd of dancing passengers—Italian, Polish, Greek, Syrian, Russian, Chinese, Irish—the viola player takes your hand so you are not separated, and it feels so natural you don’t even think to resist him.

It is a long walk to the third-class cabins, located deep in the stern of the ship. You must pass through hallways reserved for other passengers, first-class, second-class, more worthy breeds of people. The viola player drops your hand as soon as he sees stewards flitting about with armfuls of linens and cups of tea, casting you puzzled looks.

“Ma’am?” some of them ask you. “Do you require any assistance? Can I escort you somewhere?”

But no, no, you politely demur, and follow after the man in green corduroy trousers and a half-unbuttoned white shirt, handknit green vest, messy blonde hair, no coat, no hat, a viola and its horsehair bow in his grasp. At last you reach stark corridors in which no stewards are darting around to ensure the passengers are comfortable, and he opens a door to reveal a tiny space, smaller than your bedroom: white-painted pine wood and pink linoleum floors, two bunkbeds, a single sink with a mirror mounted above it. You can hear the reverberation of the ship’s engines and feel their tremors through the walls.

This is awful. This is unendurable.

“Impressive, huh?” the viola player asks, perhaps a bit anxiously. He hopes he hasn’t horrified you.

“It would be just fine for rats. Humans, I’m not so sure.” You sit down on one of the bottom bunks to test the mattress. “What on earth is this full of? Straw?”

“Yes ma’am.” He’s standing by the closed door with his arms crossed over his chest, not displeased but not relaxed either.

“It’s okay,” you tell him. “You can come over. I won’t scream and have you arrested or anything.”

He laughs. “What a relief.” He walks over to the bed—very slowly, as if expecting you to change your mind and tell him to stop—then sits down beside you as you peer around the cabin. His portfolio and easel are lying underneath the opposite bunk. On the paper clipped to the easel you can see a new painting: a woman too beautiful to be you smoking on the Boat Deck, wearing the same choker necklace of pearls, diamonds, and white gold that was clasped around your throat this afternoon. In the bottom right corner is the name he’s given you: Petra.

You turn to the viola player, bewildered. “Why do you keep painting me?”

He does not answer; instead, he tilts your head to the side to inspect the shadow of a gash on the side of your neck, a shallow gift from Daemon’s dagger, obscured by layers of powder but not erased. His murky blue eyes are haunted, his voice desperate. “I want to help you.”

“You can’t.”

He is watching you, his fingertips still resting weightlessly on the curve of your jaw. You imagine him painting your skin until all of you is covered: brushstrokes down your throat and over the bumps of your collarbones, lines tracing your spine and swirls on your belly, dabbing gingerly at the inside of your thigh.

“I wish you could,” you whisper; and then he kisses you, the roughness of his short beard, the softness of his lips, and you hope he doesn’t mind the bite of alcohol you’ve tainted yourself with to dull all the blades that have ever cut you: disappointment, terror, pain, despair. Now the ship is punctured and the water is rushing in, not freezing and a bottomless inky blue but warm, golden, effervescent like champagne in a crystalline flute, and Daemon has never touched you this way, gentle but burning, wanting you, needing you. Your palms are on his chest; your muscles and tendons and ligaments are opening for him; you are imagining being known by him, this stranger who sees you, this unremarkable man who is somehow so exceptional, who has dug you up from the gloomy depths of the earth and given you a once-in-a-millennium glimpse of the sun.

And then, with sudden torturous clarity: Daemon unable to get hard for you, Daemon shoving you away.

“No,” you gasp, breaking the kiss and shrinking from the viola player. Your voice is so quiet, so weak. “You won’t like me.”

He shakes his head. You’ve hurt him worse than dagger, you’ve aimed for the heart. “Who were you before all of this?”

Seventeen, in the garden with my books, drinking tea with my parents, daydreaming of legends and love. “I don’t even remember.”

“You can’t stay with him. It’s killing you.”

“You don’t understand,” you whimper, thinking of Draco.

“Look, I have to tell you something.”

You rise from the bed, headed for the door. “I can’t stay, I’m sorry—”

He leaps up and grabs your hand, not to bruise you or to scare you but to beg you to listen. He bursts out: “I’m a Targaryen.”

You stare blankly at him. “You play viola.”

“Yes,” he says. “And I’m also a Targaryen.”

“That’s not possible—”

“I’m Aegon,” he insists, pounding on his own chest. “I left my family in New York but I’m one of them, Alicent is my mother, Helaena is my sister, Aemond and Daeron are my brothers, I’m a Targaryen and I know what it’s like to run away and I can help you.”

“No, you can’t be—”

And then he rips his lighter from the pocket of his green corduroy pants and he presses it into your palm and you see what is etched into the side: the three-headed dragon, the crest of the Targaryens. You abruptly remember what Daemon said to him back in Galway: You look a bit familiar, boy. Have we met before? You study his hair and realize it is almost the same shade as Rhaenyra’s.

“You have to stay away from me,” you say, petrified, clutching his lighter. “Daemon hates you. He’ll kill you.”

“I’m not leaving you with him.”

“Aegon, I don’t want your blood on my hands.”

“When we dock in New York, I can help you escape.”

“No,” you sob, a miserable choked wail. “I can’t abandon Draco, and Daemon would never stop hunting me if I took him away.”

“Maybe you can’t save Draco, but you can still save yourself,” Aegon pleads, his eyes huge and glistening. “Maybe he’s a lost cause.”

“He’s four years old!” You tear your hand out of Aegon’s grasp and yank open the cabin door. He goes after you.

“Wait—”

“Do not follow me,” you command him, low and seething as you stand together in the doorway. “You endanger us both.”

“Let me help you,” he says; and they are the last words you hear before you vanish into the maze of hallways, running up the Grand Staircase, ignoring the stewards who offer you assistance, fleeing from the man who makes you want things you didn’t believe were possible.

Aegon, you think, still in disbelief, still clasping his lighter in your palm with such force your hand aches. His name is Aegon Targaryen.

You fly into your staterooms, through the sitting room, towards your bedroom where you can be alone with your longing and your horror, your tears and your treason. You don’t see anyone else. You don’t hear anything over your own ragged breathing and strangled sobs. You are at your bedroom door. Your fingers close around the knob.

The door leading out to the private promenade deck opens and Rush appears with a half-finished cigar in hand, looking shocked to see you. “No!” he shouts, but it’s too late, you’ve already opened the bedroom door. The blood that crashes into your face is scalding and a deep gory red like rubies. The bile rising in your throat is green like Connemara marble.

There on the same bed where this morning he shoved you away from him—revulsion, coldness, impotence you could not cure—Daemon is twisted up with Rhaenyra, passionate helpless moans, deep savage thrusts, her long citrine hair spilling over the sheets and his eyes turning murderous when they catch on you.

#aegon ii targaryen #aegon targaryen #aegon ii #aegon targaryen x reader #aegon x reader #aegon targaryen ii #aegon x y/n #aegon x you #aegon ii x you #aegon ii x reader #aegon ii targaryen x reader #aegon ii targaryen x female reader

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thebibutterflyao3 · 4 months ago

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"Ordinary"

@pandalilymicrofics - 748 words

part seven - part eight - part nine

“Maman? Who are you talking—Oh! Uncles!” Luna swiped Pandora’s mobile and plopped onto a stool at the counter. Immediately, the conversation took a sharp turn.

Regulus’s face lit up at the sight of his goddaughter. “Ma chérie! L'école va bien? Tu as besoin de quelque chose? Tu as des amis?” (My darling! School is good? You need anything? You have friends?)

“Of course she has friends!” Sirius chastised. “Luna is nature’s child. Who wouldn’t love our moon baby?”

Luna grinned wider than ever. “I do have friends, four of them!”

“You see?” Sirius said, sounding self-satisfied. “She is fine. Stop mothering her.”

“Hush.” Regulus’s voice shifted to a gentle tone as he turned back to Luna. “What can I send you, my sweet? A pretty dress? Oh, I know! you don’t have a tiara!”

Sirius scoffed, “Non! Ce n'est pas une petite fille! (No! She's not a little girl!) She’s a teenager now. You want records and a record player, don’t you? I can send you some of my favourites, ma grenouille.” (my frog)

“Records? You’re a fossil. I have her and Pandora on my Spotify plan,” Regulus said.

Pandora was shaking with silent laughter as the brothers began arguing over the gifts they would send for her birthday. Luna happily watched them bicker with pure, unfiltered adoration splashed over her soft features. They were obnoxiously wealthy and had to be forcefully limited to only sending gifts for holidays. Which meant every ordinary holiday was treated like Christmas and Luna received a pile of gifts. Thankfully, they had excellent taste in clothes and generally bought things that they knew Luna would like. Please do send a tiara. I may have to steal it.

“Hmm, new paint brushes would be nice,” Luna said finally. “I’m working on a mural. Do you want to see?”

“And paint!” Sirius enthused. “Yes! Show us!”

Regulus clicked his tongue in agreement. “Perhaps a smock as well? You're freckled with orange, darling.”

They disappeared up the stairs, chattering like mice plotting to steal cheese from the pantry. Except, she supposed, it was more like mice who intended to fill the pantry with cheese. Pandora huffed at her failed metaphor and focused on the cheese at hand, or rather, on the sandwiches she was making. Croque monsier was one of Luna’s favourites, and her own comfort food.

When the sandwiches were ready, she threw together a small salad for each of them and set the table. Pandora knew that Luna would wander down when she smelled it, so she didn’t bother to interrupt…until she heard the TikTok song that her daughter was singing. Shite. Don’t spin! Don’t spin!

She rushed up the stairs to find Luna spinning wildly as she sang,

I am an alien. My rocket ship is human bone and skin. I’m something smaller, staring out the skull with a panel of wire and buttons. I don’t understand, spamming every one of them. So does being human mean pretending to know what’s going on. Hello? What’s going on? Ohhhh Ahhhhh Hello? Fine! (“What’s Going On?” by madilynmei on TikTok)

Regulus made a strange noise as Pandora pulled the phone from Luna’s hand, then he started breathing heavily. “I-I’m feeling a bit off. Pardon me, my sweet.”

He disappeared from the screen and Sirius took over, grinning broadly. “I love that song, Luna! Give me back to her. Let’s hear it again. How’s it start? I am an alien…”

“Fine, but no more spinning when Uncle Regulus is on the screen, alright? It makes him ill, remember?” Pandora said, reluctantly handing the phone over.

“Sorry, Uncle!” Pandora then launched into the song again, jumping up on her bed to bounce instead.

Pandora sighed, holding back a laugh when Sirius joined in enthusiastically. He was always the one who encouraged her daughter’s chaotic side, while Regulus tended to prefer her whimsical side. Between the two of them and Evan, Luna had a rapt audience for any and everything that popped into her mind.

Watching her daughter thrive on her uncles’ attention warmed her from the inside out. The two of them may live alone, but they were surrounded by so many loving people that it never felt that way. Their family had always felt so full, so supportive and loving. In moments like this, Pandora couldn’t help but feel grateful for every one of them who filled the gap that losing Xeno left behind.

I don’t know what I would do without them. Probably drink.

#pandora lovegood #pandora rosier #pandalily #pandolily #pandalily microfics #pandalily microfic #lily x pandora #pandora lovegood x lily evans #luna lovegood #sirius black #regulus black

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arminreindl · 1 year ago

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Fossil Crocs of 2023

2023 has been a year with its ups and downs, but one consistent thing has been its fossil crocs at least, giving us another interesting variety of species and genera not known before. Like last year, I'll go down each of them (including phytosaurs) and give you some key notes. And since I've done my best to make individual posts for them I'll link those when available. I'll also try to give translations where possible, but do note that sometimes I might switch around a word due to it just sounding awkward otherwise.

Scolotosuchus

Starting us off is Scolotosuchus basileus ("royal scythian crocodile"), a basal, rauisuchian-like animal from the early stages of the Triassic. An animal roughly 3 meters long, it is primarily known from vertebrae and some other material, which however does have interesting implications. Based on the anatomy of the vertebrae, it has been speculated that Scolotosuchus performed a lot of rapid movement of the neck, presumably while hunting. Furthermore, it might be that Scolotosuchus lacked osteoderms, instead having developed a bracing system for its body much more like that of dinosaurs and mammals. Artwork by @knuppitalism-with-ue (he'll pop up quite a lot)

Colossosuchus

Fast forward to the Late Triassic, the hayday of early Pseudosuchians, and we find our first phytosaur of the list. Colossosuchus techniensis ("colossal crocodile of the Indian Institute of Technology") was an enormous animal from India's Tiki Formation. This one is known from undisputably better material, perhaps some of the best on this list as we have an entire bone bed of these guys, possibly representing a mass death site. Size estimates of the large specimens generally range from 6 to 9 meters in length, also making it the largest animal of this list, with the authors favoring an estimated 8 meters for the largest individual. Of course this is all subject to change, as we don't know the precise proportions (the downside of a bone bed is that all the bones are kinda jumbled together and god knows what belongs to what). Artwork by Joschua Knüppe again, a female being courted by an overconfident and confused Volcanosuchus (told you so)

Kryphioparma

Ok I won't bother you with this one too much. Kryphioparma caerula ("blue mysterious shield") is an aetosaur from the Late Triassic Chinle Formation of Arizona. Now aetosaurs are cool of course, but the thing is that Kryphioparma is known from exclusively osteoderms, their large armour plates. While thats valid, its also not really exciting (as you could have guessed from the absolute lack of artwork). Best I can say is that it coexisted with a bunch of other aetosaurs, which surely would have been a sight to see back in the day.

Venkatasuchus

Now Venkatasuchus armatum ("Venkata's armoured crocodile") is in a similar boat. This Indian aetosaur too is only known from osteoderms, tho at least a lot more of them that were found together, meaning we got a much better idea of its shape. There are some interesting implications it has on paleogeography and how different animal groups spread across Pangea, but that's probably beyond the scope of this post. There is at least some art of it tho, including one piece by Joschua featuring Jaklapallisaurus, an early sauropodomorph.

Mystriosuchus alleroq

Now we got our first new species of a preexisting genus. While I did my best to make posts on new genera, which typically went hand in hand with their respective wikipedia pages, species are a different matter since they'd require me to overhaul and research the whole genus. Which for Mystriosuchus would go all the way back to 1896.

Anyhow, Mystriosuchus alleroq ("jawbone spoon crocodile") is the newest in a long line of Mystriosuchus species and has been recovered from western Greenland of all places. Like Colossosuchus it is known from multiple individuals, at least four in fact, And like Venkatasuchus, it appears to have wideraning implications for the spread of archosaurs during the Triassic. Oh look its Josch's art again, neat.

Jupijkam

The final phytosaur and the final Triassic taxon of the year, Jupijkam paleofluvialis ("horned serpent of ancient rivers") was recovered from Nova Scotia Canada and represents one of the northernmost phytosaurs (alongside obviously our friend Mystriosuchus alleroq above). It is far less complete than the other phytosaurs I covered so far, but still nothing to scoff at. It's also one of the youngest known phytosaurs, possibly having lived during the last stage of the Triassic. There's no art but here's an image of its snout from the original paper.

Turnersuchus

And with this we have reached the Jurassic and somewhat of a double feature. Ordering these via chronology makes this almost like storytelling. Turnersuchus hingleyae ("Hingley's and Turner's crocodile") is the oldest and basalmost named thalattosuchian, a group of crocodylomorphs that took to the seas. As such it shows a mosaic of features, already having begun to reduce its limbs, having a moderately long snout and still bearing osteoderms, which some of its descendents would come to lose. Turnersuchus dates to the Pliensbachian, a stage of the early Jurassic, tho the paper mentions how its not likely to hold its title as oldest member of its group for long as even older material has been discovered and is awaiting publication. Artwork by Júlia d’Oliveira and Joschua Knüppe

Torvoneustes jurensis

While Turnersuchus gives us a glimpse at what the earliest thalattosuchians were like, Torvoneustes jurensis ("savage swimmer of the Jura Mountains") represents them at one of their most derived. At 4 meters long, it must have been an impressive creature, entirely smooth and lacking osteoderms, highly reduced arms and a tail fluke to boot. There are some interesting features, as unlike other species of Torvoneustes, this one does not appear to have been as durophagous, instead appearing to be more of a generalist. It's the last Jurassic croc of the year and practically lived at the opposite end of this time period relative to our previous thalattosuchian, during the Kimmeridgian. Artwork by Sophie De Sousa Oliveira, not to be confused with Jùlia who drew Turnersuchus.

Comahuesuchus bonapartei

From marine to terrestrial, Comahuesuchus bonapartei is a member of the Notosuchia, land-dwelling cousins to the Neosuchia. This new species is known from the Cretaceous of Argentina and was described on the basis of a lower jaw, which differs from the previously described species of Comahuesuchus by the fact that the teeth are situated in individual sockets. Its jaws were short and wide, being described as U-shaped, giving it a somewhat pug-nosed appearance. In case you're wondering why I don't have the translation of the name thats because I can't access Bonaparte's first paper, so all I can say is that the new species is named after famed Argentinian paleontologist Jóse Fernando Bonaparte. Artwork by I mean you probably guessed it, its Josch again.

Aphaurosuchus kaiju

I have some mixed feelings on Aphaurosuchus kaiju ("powerless kaiju crocodile"), not just because I have to rewrite its genus wikipedia page that I am no longer happy with. No, Aphaurosuchus is a great genus in my opinion, given the complete nature of the holotype. But I do think that the species name of this second form is a bit of an exaggeration, seeing as it is to my knowledge not that exceptionally big. So why name it kaiju other than to sound cool? I also think it just kinda becoms funny when you consider the meaning of the genus name. Anyhow, it does look pretty mean, but thats to be expected from a baurusuchid. It lived during the Late Cretaceous in Brazil and the phylogenetic analysis that accompanied its description had some interesting implications that I'm curious to see tackled in the future. Other than that it's just another baurusuchid from a place crawling with baurusuchids, which tbh is pretty cool itself but doesn't really help make it stand out. Arwork by Paula Zeinner

Dentaneosuchus

It is the middle Eocene. France is entirely occupied by mammals. Well, not entirely... One indomitable reptile still holds out against the invaders. Yes, I am of course talking about Dentaneosuchus ("frightfull crocodile"), the titan of the Eocene, the terror of the jungle. Easily among the most exciting finds, this animal was an enormous sebecid previously thought to be a member of the genus Iberosuchus, but recent research not only shows its distinct but enormous. With a lower jaw around 90 cm long, it rivals even the famed Barinasuchus of Miocene South America. The total body lenght is of course a matter of debate given how little we know about sebecid proportions, with the paper lowballing it at 3 to 4 meters and I personally recovering something more akin to 5 meters. Regardless of the specifics, this would make it easily one of the top predators of its time, tho sadly this was not meant to last. It was among the last non-mammalian apex predators of Europe, before climate change and competition from mammals eventually drove them to extinction. Arwork by Joschua Knüppe and @mariolanzas

Baru iylwenpeny

Our last three entries were all members of the Notosuchia, the terrestrial crocodiles that existed from the Jurassic to the Miocene, so lets jump to the other major group of the time, the Neosuchians, specifically their most recent branch, the Crocodilians. Yes finally we are getting to crocs in the stricter sense.

Baru iylwenpeny ("divine crocodile thats good at hunting") is an animal we also knew for a while under the informal name Alcoota Baru based on where it was found. This year I spent a lot of time writing in the Mekosuchinae, Australasian crocodiles of the Cenozoic and just when I had finished the page for Baru, this guy got published. It's the largest, most robust and most recent member of the genus. Good at hunting is a good choice for the species name, as this animal was over 4 meters long with a head commonly likened to a cleaver and a hunting style speculated to consist of inflicting a lot of trauma on its prey with its massive teeth. I could gush about Baru for ages, but thats the important parts. It lived in central Australia during the Miocene only 8 million years ago. Artwork by the incredible @manusuchus

Antecrocodylus

Now for the last crocodilian described this year and one I remised to make a dedicated post for due to time constraints (I had a busy few months). Antecrocodylus chiangmuanensis ("before Crocodylus from Chiang Muan") is a close relative of the modern dwarf and true crocodiles from the Miocene of Thailand. It is only known from the back of the skull and an associated lower jaw, but it serves to highlight how little we know about the crocodiless of eastern Asia during the Miocene, which is a shame given that this region is crucial to deciphering where true crocodiles originated.

Alligator munensis

And our final taxon is Alligator munensis ("Mun river alligator"), which, obviously, is a member of the modern genus Alligator and thus most closely related to the still extant Chinese and American Alligator. Likely having been split from its Chinese relatives when the Tibetan plateau was lifted up, this species lived during the middle Pleistocene in Thailand and may have survived until the Holocene. It's head was short and robust and its teeth globular, which could indicate that it fed on hard-shelled prey like clams and snails. It was also small, likely not much bigger than 1.5 meters. Artwork by Joschua Knüppe

And that should be all of them, all new species and genera of Pseudosuchians described this past year. It's once again been fun to look back and I hope that you find them just as interesting as I do. Lets hope that 2024 will bring equally fascinating discoveries.

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kittenlittle24 · 2 months ago

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Chapter 2: The Wait and The Wine

Masterlist

Story Masterlist

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Pedro Pascal x Fem!reader

Summary: Pre-med perfectionist [Your Name] thought her gap year internship at The Late Night Hour would be a fun, low-stakes break before med school. Then she literally runs into Pedro Pascal backstage—and somehow becomes his secret lifeline in the chaos of live TV. Between cue cards, coffee runs, and chemistry that won’t quit, she starts to wonder: is this just a summer detour… or something more?

The studio door clicked shut behind you, muffling the day's chaos—the director's last-minute script changes, the scent of burnt coffee in the control room, the constant hum of voices through earpieces. Your heels ached with each step, the leather of your shoes stiff and unforgiving, and your shoulders felt the weight of the day's madness. The cheap dress shoes you'd thought were a good idea this morning had rubbed your heels raw.

Two weeks into your internship, and you still hadn't adjusted to the barely controlled madness of live television.

The afternoon had been a blur. First, when the teleprompter crashed mid-segment, forcing the host to improvise while you and two other interns scrambled to fix it. Then again, when the guest mic went missing, sending you on a frantic search through storage bins. Somewhere in between, you had spilled coffee on your notes, the damp paper curling at the edges as the coffee soaked into the ink, dropped a clipboard in the hallway, and nearly tripped over a lighting cable, its plastic casing scraping against the floor with an irritating squeal.

"Big first-week energy," one of the tech guys had teased as you scrambled to gather your things. You had only smiled, too tired to argue.

Ryan was already in the break room when you stumbled in, his tie loose and sleeves shoved up to his elbows. The room smelled faintly of stale coffee and dry pizza crusts, the fluorescent light buzzing overhead in the near-empty space. He watched you slump against the counter with the exhausted amusement of someone who'd survived his own first month.

"Teleprompter tried to kill you, huh?"

You groaned. "I'm naming my first ulcer after it."

The ancient coffee machine let out a tired sputter, followed by the dull gurgle of liquid brewing. Ryan nudged a lukewarm cup toward you. "Drinks tonight. O'Malley's."

You hesitated, already picturing your apartment—the thick, musty air inside, the creaky floorboards beneath your feet, your unmade bed that seemed to mock you with its inviting warmth, the stack of medical textbooks waiting for you, and the half-empty bottle of wine on the kitchen counter, promising solace.

"I don't know..."

Ryan rolled his eyes. "Come on. You've been running around like a maniac all day. One drink won't kill you."

You weren't convinced. "I have studying to do."

"You always have studying to do," he pointed out. "But this is part of the job, too. Networking. Making friends. Not letting med school turn you into a lifeless husk."

You exhaled, rubbing your neck. The ache there felt sharp and persistent, like you had carried the weight of the whole day with you. He wasn't wrong. And the idea of sitting alone in your apartment, overanalyzing every mistake you'd made today, suddenly seemed worse than a night out.

"...Fine. One drink."

Ryan grinned. "That's the spirit." The sound of his shoes scuffing against the tile echoed in the empty break room as he grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair.

You lasted two.

The bar had been too loud, the laughter too bright, a cacophony of clinking glasses and voices that vibrated in your bones. The sticky tables, the hum of neon lights overhead, the stale scent of spilled beer in the air. By the second round, you'd made your excuses, slipping out while Ryan pretended not to notice.

Your apartment greeted you with its comfortable disorder—medical textbooks stacked like a Jenga tower, coffee rings fossilized in your notes, the faint smell of stale air mingling with the faint sweetness of the wine that always lingered in the room. That single wineglass you kept meaning to wash still sat by the sink, mocking you with its dusting of old lipstick.

You kicked off your shoes with a wince, the relief of finally being free of them a sharp contrast to the ache of your tired feet, rolling your shoulders to ease the tension. A quick shower later, you pulled on an old T-shirt and collapsed onto the couch with a glass of wine, flipping through your notes for tomorrow. The cold glass pressed against your palm, its smooth surface a small comfort against the exhaustion that weighed your eyelids down.

Your phone buzzed.

Jenna: How was your day? Still stuck in that boring office job?

You snorted. Your fingers brushed against the smooth screen, the hum of the phone's vibration grounding you for a moment. Your college friend still thought you were filing paperwork at some medical nonprofit. You'd been too overwhelmed to explain the talk show gig.

The TV hummed in the background, some late-night rerun playing low for background noise. Just as you were about to flip a page in your anatomy textbook, a familiar voice stopped you cold.

You looked up.

And there he was.

The soft light from the TV screen made his navy sweater look even deeper, making his eyes glitter under the studio lights. He lounged in the guest chair, a casual smirk tugging at his lips as he talked with the host. His presence filled the screen effortlessly, his easy charm pulling the audience in. The faint scent of his cologne seemed to hang in the air as if he'd stepped into the room with you.

You hadn't planned to pay attention, but something about him—his energy, the way he moved, the way he spoke—held you still.

Host: "Last time, you shared those behind-the-scenes pranks. Any new fun stories?"

He scratched his beard—that tell you'd come to recognize as his I'm about to be trouble signal—before grinning.

"Not from set, but at that interview... I met this new intern. Doe-eyed, but lethal with a coffee order."

Your hand froze, the wineglass suspended halfway to your lips, its rim cool against your fingertips.

"She, uh—" A rough chuckle. "She got us gloriously lost. Marched us straight into a supply closet like it was her divine mission."

The audience howled. Heat rushed to your cheeks, your heart picking up pace. You felt exposed, though you were alone in your apartment.

Host: "Sounds like a disaster!"

"Nah." He leaned forward, the leather of the chair creaking under him, his voice lowering to something intimate, as if he were speaking directly to you. "She just laughed and said, 'Guess we're taking the scenic route.' Most people panic when shit goes sideways. Not her."

A beat. Then, softer:

"Refreshing."

You swallowed. Hard. The warmth of the wine spread through your chest, but it did little to calm the fluttering sensation in your stomach.

Your phone buzzed again.

Jenna: Hellooo? You alive?

You typed back, fingers unsteady:

Me: Just saw a celebrity call me 'refreshing' on national TV. So. Yeah.

Outside, the city lights blurred, distant and unreal. The world outside seemed muffled, like you were wrapped in a cocoon of warmth and confusion. That word—refreshing—echoed in your ribs.

He'd noticed.

He'd remembered.

You exhaled, trying to ground yourself, but your mind kept circling back. The way he'd smiled. The casual, almost fond way he'd said it. The fact that, of all the stories he could have told, he told one about you.

It didn't mean anything. It couldn't.

Right?

You took a slow sip of wine, pressing the cool rim of the glass against your lips, the wine's tang lingering on your tongue, a reminder of how your body was still catching up to the emotional shift. Maybe this was just a fluke. A throwaway comment for the sake of conversation.

But the way he'd leaned forward, voice dropping into something just shy of intimate...

Your stomach curled in on itself.

Shaking your head, you reached for your textbook again. The paper was crinkled under your fingers, the faint smell of ink reminding you that you had a future waiting for you. Focus. You are here for med school. You are here for your future.

Not for a celebrity who probably wouldn't even remember this interview in a week.

And yet.

You weren't the kind of person who got caught up in moments like this. You had plans, a future that didn't involve being some fleeting anecdote on late-night TV.

And yet, as you curled up on the couch, textbook forgotten in your lap, your mind kept replaying his words. The way he'd leaned forward, voice dropping. The way he'd smiled, almost to himself.

Like he wasn't just telling a story.

Like, for a moment, he'd been back there with you.

You took another sip of wine, exhaled slowly, and turned off the TV.

It didn't mean anything.

But the thought lingered anyway.

#pedro pascal x you #pedro pascal fanfiction #pedro pascal x female reader #pedro pascal x reader #pedro x reader #pedro pascal fanfic #pedro pascal imagine #pascalispunk #x reader #pedro pascal x fem reader #pedro pascal #original story #pedro pascal x y/n #pedro pascal fluff #pedro pascal fic #pedro pascal fandom

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whencyclopedia · 4 months ago

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Homo Habilis

Homo habilis ("handy man") is an extinct species of human that lived in East and South Africa between 2.3 and 1.5 million years ago and plays an interesting role in the discussion surrounding the dawn of our genus of Homo, which is thought to have first appeared around 2.5 million years ago.

Homo habilis was often seen as one of the earliest members of our genus and, for a long time, was commonly depicted as the ancestor of Homo erectus (thus, being a direct ancestor of our own species, too). Nowadays, this is debated, and a much more complex picture of the early days of Homo has emerged. Much discussion remains about the place of Homo habilis within this picture.

The fragmentary fossil record when it comes to Homo habilis (and many other species around at this early time) does not help; though we have a collection of skulls and skull fragments, only three so-called postcranial (below the skull) skeletons have been unearthed, and they are incomplete. The remains showcase a mishmash of features that in some parts resemble Homo, and in others resemble those found in Australopithecus.

What we do know is that Homo habilis was both fully bipedal, as well as a good and probably frequent climber, with strong hands that fashioned stone tools belonging to the Oldowan industry.

Discovery

Homo habilis was first described in 1964 by the British-Kenyan palaeoanthropologist Louis Leakey and his colleagues in a paper that rocked the scientific community. Along with his wife, Mary, Leakey had been combing Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania since the early 1950s in search of traces of Homo's first steps and had already discovered early stone tools belonging to what he termed the Oldowan industry. In the early 1960s, their son Jonathan found several skull and lower jaw fragments, along with some hand bones, in the same fossil bed that had yielded the tools. Soon, more remains were uncovered, including an adult foot, a skull with both upper and lower jaw, and a very fragmented skull with teeth.

Their verdict was that the new remains were quite 'modern' in appearance: they appeared closer to the genus Homo than to that of other early hominins like the Australopithecines. Clearly, this was a good fit for their toolmaker, they argued. Following the definition of Homo that was generally accepted at that time, the team felt the new fossils successfully met three of the key criteria: this species had an upright posture, could walk in a bipedal manner, and had the necessary dexterity to create stone tools. However, the fact that its brain volume was smaller than that of established members of Homo at the time required some fidgeting: the team thus proposed relaxing this criterion a bit.

Leakey's 1964 paper argued for the new species to be added to the genus Homo in the shape of Homo habilis – from the Latin for "handy, skilful, able". The announcement marked a turning point in palaeoanthropology, as Bernard Wood describes: "It shifted the search for the first humans from Asia to Africa and began a controversy that endures to this day." (2014).

Although the Homo habilis taxon was officially validated by the scientific community, it has frequently been challenged and criticised – a battle that is ongoing.

#History #1.5millionyearsago #1964 #2014 #WHE #[#]

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vivwritescrappythings · 5 months ago

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hollow

joel miller x gn!reader

Joel spends a day remembering what could have been

a/n: tried to write in a different way. i don't really love the piece but i'm just going to post it anyway instead of letting it fossilize in my WIP folder.

tw: ANGST, joel's addicted to drugs, hints of smut, joel is just overwhelmingly devoted, character death, canon typical violence, guns, grief

word count: 2.4k

MDNI

masterlist

Life was barren.

Maybe Joel should have been used to the feeling by then, the emptiness of waking up each morning with a hole punched through his chest.

When he took enough pills he could pretend nothing had changed.

The days he couldn’t face the world were few and far between, but they razed his psyche like a wildfire.

He’d stay in bed all day, staring at the water-damaged ceiling of the apartment he shared with Tess. If he squinted, he could pretend it was your busted QZ apartment, the stains in the popcorn ceiling almost looking like the one you’d proclaimed reminded you of a rabbit. He let the painkillers turn the brown puddles into ears and a fluffy white tail, and the warmth of Tess next to him became you.

You were never scared of the way his hands seemed constantly soaked with blood, the way his fingers were rough from handling guns and knives. You’d heard the stories, knew the damage he’d caused. The lives he ripped apart with the same hands. Nothing lived under the scoop of his palms, beneath the squeeze of his fingers.

But you did.

Christ, you did.

He never understood how, but light seemed to flock to you. Stripes of it fell across your sleeping face in the mornings, illuminating your eyelashes and pores and chapped lips like the paintings he used to see in school textbooks. It used to make him wish cameras were still around–just so he could save those quiet moments.

There were countless things about you he wished he could have savored.

Selfishness came naturally to him, he took and took and took. The gaping hole in his chest in the shape of a twelve-year old little girl had turned into an endless chasm over the years. It took a herculean effort to fill it.

And you were willing to try, scooping handfuls of yourself into the space between his ribs and stitching the holes in his lungs with strands of your DNA.

You knew what to do with his broken parts like a god would, molding him into a new image.

He took his calloused hands and worshipped at the altar of your ribs. You were a benediction, too perfect to be bestowed upon him. There was hardly a man left anymore, scraps mish-mashed into a monster bearing the name Joel Miller limping onward–but you watched him kneel before you in prayer and nudged his head up with your fingertips.

You laughed when he said he was unworthy.

Tangled in the body-warmed sheets with you, he would whisper his shortcomings down the side of your throat and against the soft skin of your sternum. He reminded you that he couldn’t make his brother stick around, that he couldn’t keep the person that was most important to him in the whole world safe. Like a cockroach, he survived it all.

Like Paul, he was unworthy of salvation at your hands.

There wasn’t a selfish bone in your body, you gave and gave and gave. You pressed yourself into the empty space beneath his arms and nuzzled your nose into the curve of his throat. Warm breaths against the scratch of his beard served as reanimation, each exhale straight into his lungs.

After Tess left for the day he would shut his eyes, remembering the way your nose felt against the back of his neck. You would slip your fingers between his, palm snug against the back of his hand as you murmured soft greetings into his dark curls.

The first time you held his hand he almost pulled away. He ruined everything he touched, crushed it between his fingers. It was hard to know how to hold you without squeezing too hard.

Instead, you did the squeezing. Your fingertips pressed into the meat of his palm as your lips stamped prayers to his skin.

You would coax him into wakefulness by hitching a bare leg over his, pressing your bodies flush from head to toe.

His desire was embarrassing.

He felt more beast than man in the way that he starved for you. And you simply let him have you, tasting your saliva and your sweat and your sex. Your blood.

The rusty tang of it had surprised him, flossing too hard forcing crimson to linger between your teeth. Tracing the lines of red with the tip of his tongue tempted him. He wanted to drink it from you.

You liked to have sex in the mornings.

He always took you gently, his bulk pressing you into the mattress as he forced your thighs apart around his hips. Despite your many claims that you would not break, he touched you reverently. A supplicant in the presence of his divine.

It never seemed quite real: the way you made soft sounds with each roll of his hips, your fingers twisting in the dingy sheets. The press of your tongue against his thumb was better than any painkiller, lulling him into blind lust as everything that wasn’t the tight clutch of you around him or the wet shine of the inside of your mouth fell away into the background.

Making love to you was easy, so simple that he would dream about pressing inside of you and staying there until you both withered away. He so desperately wanted to have any part of you that he often imagined what it would feel like to be a part of you.

He’d have to re-up his dose of pills to dull the ache of loneliness as the sun went down, twilight serving as his reminder that he did not deserve to know the warmth of the sun.

It was twilight when it happened, the blue tinge of the sunlight drifting through the sentinel trees almost made him dizzy. That smuggling job had been too big to do on his own, bags of pills and bottles of homemade liquor split between the two of you as you walked. With the promise of ration cards and a bottle of booze in exchange, you were kind enough to oblige the favor and followed him out of the QZ.

If he had known, he would have found anyone else to come with him. He wouldn’t have taken the job.

The infected blended in with the trees, their clicks disguised by the sound of snapping twigs beneath your feet. It was his laugh that drew them in, coming from deep in his belly and echoing as your lips curved into a triumphant smile. Any joke he laughed at became a trophy for you.

He wasn’t sure if he had laughed since that day. It would have been blasphemous to your memory.

The descent had been chaos, too many infected and too few bullets. You’d gotten a good few shots in, but he could hear exactly when you ran out of ammo. Every move was toward you, every step pulled by his instinct to keep you safe.

He watched you plunge your knife into the clicker’s temple, having scrabbled with it in the fallen leaves. The clicker trying to bite him fell dead at his feet, his hunting knife plunged through the soft flesh beneath its chin. But it didn’t matter, his feet like lead as he stepped over its prone form.

Adrenaline burned through him. His head swam, the world tilting on its axis as you pushed the limp clicker off you. There were leaves and twigs in your clothes, smears of dirt on your face.

You winced, wiping the blood covering your hand onto your jeans.

He’d prayed, foolishly. The ground beneath him threatened to give way as he begged God that you had cut yourself by accident with your own knife. That you had scratched your hand on a rock.

Of course, he had never been so lucky.

The crescent-shaped bite in your hand may as well have been a bullet in his skull.

His knees buckled, almost failing him before he could reach you. You were shell-shocked, wide-eyed and slack-jawed as you stared at your death sentence. At best you would have a few hours.

What had he done to warrant pain like that twice? Having already gone through it once didn’t soften the blow.

A few more heavy steps brought him to collapse in front of you, hands shaking as he took your wrist. He could feel the fine bones beneath your skin, the way your flesh gave way to his grip. A perfect impression of human teeth, bloody and monstrous.

He almost sobbed when you tried to soothe him, your uninjured hand pressed against the scruff on his jaw and thumb running over his cheekbone. The tears stung in his eyes like acid. You told him it was alright, that there was nothing to do.

You pressed your face into the hollow of his neck as you asked him to keep going, to keep fighting. It had been hard enough to find purpose after Sarah died, when Tommy was still around.

How could he tell you that there would be nothing left without you?

He could already feel the degradation, his body returning to the corpse he was when you met. The hole in his chest was opening up once more, his ribs sticking out like rebar with chunks of concrete torn away.

It was a blur, the two of you moving away from the carnage and viscera spread across the brown leaves to a lichen-covered boulder nearby.

He rested against the boulder, the crown of his head touching the rock face as he watched the stars overtake the sky. You nestled yourself between Joel’s thick thighs, your back against his chest and his arm over your collarbones. He reveled in the warmth of you against him, nose buried in your hair as he took in his scent. Scraps of you he had taken for granted.

It was your voice that kept him from melting down, your determination to remain composed forced him to do the same.

You spun the picture of what your life together would have been like as cordyceps spread through your veins. There was no outbreak in your Elysium, just picket fences and chocolate labradors and packed sack-lunches with handwritten notes. There were no big, sweeping declarations of love, only the intimacy of imagined domesticity. A spouse to show off at Christmas parties and debate paint colors with.

But you had always been too ethereal for that kind of life, and he was damned.

He should have known that your light would be fleeting–a shooting star rather than a sun. Nothing he had done warranted your sticking around. If anything, it was a punishment for his sins.

The moon was getting high when you decided it was time. You didn’t want to risk it any longer.

At first you had told Joel to leave, to give you one bullet and walk away and never look back.

He almost obeyed, but then he watched the way your hands shook as you tried to load the gun. You dropped the bullet to the forest floor too many times for his comfort, your hands shaking despite your effort to take deep breaths.

There were tears in your voice as you told him to go, he could hear the telltale warble.

His hand was devastatingly steady as he took the gun from you. Loading it was second nature, calloused fingers relying on muscle memory as the bullet settled into the chamber.

There was still warmth in your skin as he pressed his forehead to yours. His eyes were screwed shut, he couldn’t bear to look at you and he couldn’t bear to look away. Your brow was soft beneath his lips, a hand smoothing to the nape of your neck as he held the contact for two beats.

It was all he could allow himself.

He wanted to kiss you, but you didn’t let him. If a bite could spread the infection, it wasn’t a big jump to assume a kiss could, too.

Tess had learned not to ask what was wrong when she came back long after the sun went down. It had taken one screaming match to ward her off from trying to help. He’d stuff another pill into his mouth, twisting to lay on his stomach as he stared at the peeling wallpaper. His gaze was never present on those days–her presence little more than a ghost.

He could only think about how beautiful you looked. The moonlight outlined you in silver, your eyes sparkling. Back before everything they would have put you on posters and billboards and magazines. You were too sublime to live in a post-apocalypse world. It was unfair.

You faced away from him, thanking him with trembling lips.

There was no way he could have left you to do it yourself. The way you were shaking like a leaf, he wouldn’t have been surprised if you missed had you been left to your own devices. The idea of you coming back as an infected was worse than you being gone. He couldn’t stand to live in a world where you didn’t know him.

He promised he’d count you down, that he would squeeze the trigger after he breathed out the number one.

The gun kicked in his hand as he spoke the first number. Three beats too soon, early enough that you weren’t scared yet. Your shoulders had still been relaxed, fingers drumming against your thighs in the way that drove him insane under normal circumstances.

His ears rang, the thud of your body hitting the ground carved him hollow.

It was hard to not crawl into your grave with you. He’d dug it with his hands, black dirt caked beneath his fingernails and pressed into every wrinkle on his skin. It took him an entire day, but he would never forgive himself if he just left you there for the wolves.

The necklace with your parent’s wedding rings joined a broken watch as yet another memento he held onto.

He’d press another pill onto his tongue, maybe two. However many it took to get him to sleep.

When his eyes closed, he would always picture you somewhere nice, your arm across Sarah’s shoulders as you both walked away from him into the distance. He could hear your laughter, the ebbs and flows of your conversation.

In the morning he would exhume himself, pulling on his tattered work boots before he swallowed another pill to forget that he would never be allowed where you were, anyways. Not after everything he’d done.

There was too much blood on his hands.

#joel miller x reader #reader insert #joel miller x you #joel miller angst #joel miller x gn!reader #tlou x reader #joel miller #tlou #the last of us #pedro pascal

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