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revenant-dumpster-fire · 3 years

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Selfish (Revenant x Reader)

[Click here to go to this chapter on AO3]

Theme: Revenant puts people in graves, not tears them from the arms of Death. Yet, here he is. But he doesn't have to. He can make it painless. Make it certain. Make it easier. It's what he heard you say before.

Warnings: Pain, bodily trauma, body horror, medical trauma, sharp objects, blood, graphic descriptions of gore, mean simulacrum energy, desperation, intrusive thoughts, suicidal ideations, depression, bipolar.

Reader's Notes: Lore expansion for my main Revenant (Apex Legends) fanfiction (Leaves One Cold), this should be read after the first book (Just a Volunteer). Some amount of fluff here, but in a traumatized format. Treat it as world-building and a character piece, for those who enjoy the main storyline and want more context on things to come.

Writing Notes: What's going on in those neural processors? Do you have race conditions in your threading? Which threads take priority? Do you get to choose? Or are you a ticking timebomb? How many deaths have happened at the behest of mere code and the bugs within? Is hardware capable of selfishness, or is it purely a human trait? Truth be told, I know the answers already.

Fuck me this was the most fun chapter to write and no matter how many times I read it, I'm just as pleased by it. It's so fucked up and perfect.

Navigation:

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"Just A Volunteer" (Book 1) | "The Lost Files" (Book 1.5)

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The hospital doors are automatic. They slide open quickly, allowing emergency patients to be wheeled into the ER from the ambulances. Today, they weren't fast enough.

Revenant shoves through the doors at full sprinting speed, holding a small female corpse to his chestplate in a defensive stance. He is in one of his least favorite chassis--a knight in full armor, running scripts on its hardware that both prevent him from needless cruelty and make him want to protect the innocent. It's unlike him, and he isn't fond of being overwritten by a hardcoded and idiotic stereotype.

He's covered from helmet to sabatons in dried blood, and still dripping fresh blood all over the floor that leaks from the body in his arms. He has a sheathed sword at his side, the revealed hilt and handle slathered in copious amounts of caked blood. His gauntlets are stained red from mercilessly eviscerating multiple victims, but they're now pressed lightly into the small woman's frame to hold her to his chest. His arms shake as his shoulders spark and frazzle, his whole upper body filled with bullet holes. His skeletal mask is shattered on one side, a bullet clearly having grazed his cheekbone just closely enough to leave long cracks. His bright green LEDs are focused on the intake desk as he runs up, leaving a trail of blood behind him.

The intake nurses jump to their feet, completely unsure of what they're witnessing or what to do.

"Godspeed you bastards! She's dying!" Revenant screeches audibly, fighting back against an underlying sound of static.

The nurses immediately press buttons at the desk, calling in emergency personnel to the floor immediately. Shocked onlookers in the lobby stay perfectly silent, both in confusion and concern for the situation.

"It's taking too long, where do I take her?!" He's screaming and pitching his vocals in desperation, even though it's barely been a few seconds.

"Sir, please calm--"

He ignores the nurse and uses a near-flying kick to smash through the security doors into the main hospital area, running deeper into the hospital, but stopping soon after he realizes he has no place to take her. He doesn't know who to look for, what room to go to, or what on earth to even do at this point. His eyes skitter around at the rooms, desks, nurses, computers, and medicine carts desperately, no answers coming to him.

"Sir, come with me." A very bold nurse calmly calls to him from afar, motioning for him to meet her deeper down the hallway. Normally Revenant would kill anyone who tries to tell him what to do, but this chassis wants to thank her. It's detestable.

He sprints in her direction, catching up with her quickly as the nurse turns and takes him down a winding set of hallways, opening a door to a room with a gurney and a large counter full of medical tools.

"Thank you." Revenant gasps through the sound of his chassis slowly degrading around him, carefully placing the barely-alive body on the bed, blood immediately soaking into the sheets.

"She's in bad shape. What happened?" The nurse asks quickly as she prepares an IV.

"She was shot multiple times with a burst shot weapon. I have reason to suspect she's been drugged too." Revenant tries to calmly say as his vocalizer fights to stay functional.

"Use those metal blade-hands of yours to get her clothes off while I get this IV started. We don't have time to spare." She demands, pulling the safety cap off the IV needle. Revenant stares at her with a suspicious glare. She takes a moment to meet his gaze. "I worked for Hammond so I could afford to finish nursing school. I know who you are, Revenant."

His chassis shows no emotion, but internally he can feel his rage boiling over. Another name for the list, although he doesn't know her name. Either way--

"Kill me later, asshole. You want this girl to live, don't you?" She snaps him out of his trance as she slips the needle in the cold, dying hand.

He snaps his arm into a blade and cuts the clothing away, careful to avert his vision from anything his unique hardware considers "lewd". The blood-soaked clothing peels away almost like flesh does. The wounds are gaping, and there's so much blood it's hard to see where the living flesh ends and the shredded sinew begins. The skin is turning pale and cold. There isn't much time left.

"Lift her, I'll pull the clothing bits out from under her. We need her ready for anything as quickly as possible. Surgeon is on his way, as is an anesthesiologist." The nurse is really getting on his nerves, but this chassis listens and follows the orders without even a scoff. She pulls the bloody tatters away, throwing them in a biohazard bin.

She carefully lays out the limbs and grabs vital monitors, hooking them up as quickly as possible. The heartbeat sensor is so slow. Revenant hates that damned beeping. Skinsuits are supposed to be much quieter. When they die, it's meant to be an intimate experience as their heartbeat slows to a stop. Sometimes he gets to feel the slow descent and watch the life drain from their eyes as they fall into a final peace he only wishes he could experience. The beeping absolutely violates the sanctity of death's quiet embrace, but even worse is that he wants this one to live.

The nurse puts an oxygen mask over her face as the surgeon bursts in with an anesthesiologist. The surgeon is stunned for a moment at Revenant's presence.

"Sir, if you could wait outside in the--"

"He should stay, trust me on this one doctor." The nurse chimes in before Revenant's violent protesting begins. The doctor shrugs at Revenant and accepts her nurse's insistence on the matter. Revenant begrudgingly steps back from the body, making room for those whose job it is to ruin work like his. He isn't sure if he should feel any hope in this situation, or accept the grief-stricken freedom of losing one of the only creatures he had become fond of since his awakening.

The anesthesiologist is already doing math on a tablet to calculate possible sedatives as the nurse whispers something in his ear about drugs already in the system. He openly sighs and begins his math over again, clearly needing to be very wary to not make a bad situation worse.

Revenant watches as the first sedative enters the IV through an injection. The body doesn't change much, as death's relaxing grip has long since taken hold. The only thing to fear now is rigor mortis, which would tense the body up as it cools too much. As Revenant sees the surgeon throw a paper over the body and begin extracting the first bullet, he staggers backwards against a wall, slowly slouching until he's sitting on the ground, struggling to fight off the degradation in his chassis' condition. He starts to huff heavily as his synthetic body attempts to cool itself down from the stressful code building up heat in his chest. It hurts far too much for a simulacrum, which should never be capable of the unmistakable chest pain of despair and a broken heart. The bastards at Hammond Robotics made sure they coded every possible pain into him; he has been given no mercy.

More nurses flood in quickly, suiting up and supporting the surgeon in any way possible.

• • • •

It's been over two hours now. The beeping hasn't stopped, but it struggles and stutters here and again. Revenant is slouched in the corner, his body unable to hold itself in a standing position any longer. He fights to keep his LEDs fixated on the surgeon and her work, even though they fade and snap back to life against his will. The pistons that support his waist have clearly failed now, as he cannot even lean forward without collapsing into a heap. The surgeon curses aloud regularly, making Revenant fear that death has decided what it wishes to do, but the beeping doesn't stop. It keeps hanging on by a thread.

"Fucking dammit, we don't exactly have spares lying around. Can we get Hammond to quote us for a kidney and liver? And fast?" The surgeon finally looks up, speaking aloud as one of the nurses begins dialing on a phone.

Revenant breaks away from death's gentle grip on him at those words. He tries to speak, but his vocalizer simply blurts static. The whole room notices his protest, but can't make out any words to understand. The ex-Hammond nurse breaks away from the crowd and walks up to him, kneeling down to meet his gaze. He's helpless to tell her what he means to say.

"I know." She says quietly to him as the others behind her begin to speak to each other again. "I also know you're in one of the only suits ever produced to have the prototypes of the original Hammond line of synthetic organs in it. All of what we need. None of their usual spyware bullshit in it. They left all that in your head on this chassis."

Revenant narrows his eyes for a moment in suspicious disbelief.

"I worked on it, a little. This was meant to be your most human suit, surely you noticed?" She sighs a bit, knowing she's signing her own death warrant. "I worked on the original organs. They weren't code. They were proper. They're better than anything. We wanted to know if they could fool you. So we put them in you. You never performed so well, so humanely, or with so much attention to who you were killing. You probably don't remember at all, but this suit managed to save hostages at one point. I thought I was on the right path then, until I found out you weren't really just an AI at all." She sighs again. "I wanted to help and save people, not keep a slave in a delusion of freedom. So I got the money for the rest of my schooling and then immediately quit after."

Revenant takes a moment to process her words and save the data. She is partially at fault that this damn suit even exists. At the same time, this chassis is about to be the final gambit in his fight to keep death's claws off of the little one. He saves the thought, ponders it, ensuring he will remember it when he returns.

He plunges his arm into his metal chest, cutting a jagged hole down the decorative center. He summons the last of his strength to tear it open, revealing a compact array of human-like organs nestled between wires and boards. The pain is excruciating. The nurse doesn't wait for his permission, she reaches into him and carefully disconnects some pin connectors from him, gently removing spongey, silicone organs with disconnected tubes running throughout for a real human's blood supply.

He feels every single non-existent nerve screaming in pain. It hurts Revenant badly enough that he attempts to moan, coming out as nothing but deeply stressed static. The nurse looks him in the eyes as he meets hers. His malice feels misplaced now. He has one final thought as he reaches into his chest, unhinging his synthetic lungs from their mount, and cutting the rubber windpipe to set it free. He hands it to her in his final moments before death takes him. Her look of confusion, then understanding, is the last thing he sees. He is gone.

• • • •

It feels like a cold ocean for a few moments, the sound of heavy breathing echoing in the infinite void. It's a bit like being suspended underwater: completely weightless with little sense of up from down. Revenant looks at his hands, disgruntled as he sees the same gauntlets as the ones he died in. Many years ago he used to see human hands, but as he's given up his grasp on his old self and embraced his new body, he has slowly come to expect the red palms with the Hammond Robotics logo and fingers as sharp as talons. So why were the gauntlets still here? Did he really empathize that much with the scripts that forced him to stand down and protect?

It's generally only a few minutes that he spends in this limbo before something strange happens. Sometimes he sinks into an open chasm where lava and hellfire are. Other times he drifts onto a shore with some type of foreign landscape. Other times he hears a voice talking to him, not making much sense. Sometimes it's his own voice. Yet other times he will see otherworldly beings that speak an unknowable language to him as they reach for him. Sometimes he sees his victims begging for their lives in a huddled group like they were being assassinated all over again. Often, he relives many if not all of his previous deaths he suffered while a simulacrum--pain and all. He has to experience a few moments of whatever it is before he will wake up in the closest default body available. He left one in the warehouse out in the Dust, so he shouldn't have to run far.

Suddenly Revenant finds himself ethereal, floating over a replay of the moments leading up to his attempt to rescue the hapless little skinsuit. Only, he doesn't show up this time. Revenant averts his gaze as the alternative timeline plays out long enough for him to feel the wrath of hell itself boil in whatever kind of soul he is, then he suddenly finds himself in the warehouse, slowly acclimating himself to familiar limbs and sensations.

If he hadn't shown up, is that actually what would have happened?

He stands there idle for a few moments before a large prowler gets up from a dark corner of the massive room and rubs against his leg. Six seems to sense his discomfort and sorrow, attempting to calm down the spirit trapped in a mechanical imprisonment that helped raise and care for him as a young whelp. As Revenant remains motionless, processing something, Six becomes more desperate, gently teething at his hands and licking his palms.

Finally, Six becomes too fed up with Revenant's despaired inaction, carefully jumping up to push him down with his front paws. Revenant concedes, buckling and crashing onto the ground loudly, much less graceful than Six expected or intended. Six runs over to his face, licking it mercilessly and peeling his headscarf away from his forehead in the process. His LEDs are off, meaning he's in reboot. Six notices, intentionally perching his hulking mass on Revenant's chest and pinning him down, waiting patiently for his return.

Revenant hums back to life and immediately begins scrambling to try to get up, stopped by the massive and heavy prowler on his chest. He's making a strange noise as his vocalizer slowly snaps back into working order.

"Where is she?! What happened?" He notices he's pinned. "Six?!"

Six leans his head down and licks Revenant's face as his memory banks catch him up on his current situation. His eyes go from alarmed to calmer, although still bright and ready to move. Finally, Revenant's hand makes its way up to Six's snout, rubbing it until he begins purring at a low grumble.

Six gets off of Revenant and lets him stand up. He makes a yowling-like noise at Revenant, as if to speak to him. Revenant leans down for a moment to scratch him behind his furls.

"I'll be back soon. I might need you to guard that one scaredy cat for me, assuming she's..." He trails off for a moment, unwilling to finish his sentence. "Remember her?"

Six boofs in response.

Revenant stands back up and begins sprinting back towards the hospital. It will take a long time to get there, but he has to. He can't leave his empty chassis there, and he needs to ensure the surgeons don't try to put regular Hammond organs in her. His yellow LEDs are able to see clearly in the dark, but his legs can only move so fast. The city is a notable drive, let alone a sprint.

Revenant feels his legs buckle from underneath him as Six barrels into him. He barely manages to hold on to Six, whose stride and speed is that of an apex predator. Revenant's legs drag for a moment as he pulls his frame onto Six, trying to find a way to minimize contact with the dusty ground.

Revenant grapples around the prowler's muscular neck, letting the rest of his body try to curl and hold to Six's back while moving at full speed. Six barks in approval as Revenant manages to find a decent perch on him.

"You'll always be one of my favorites, Six." Revenant shouts over the passing wind.

Six speeds up, almost as if he understands and is fueled by the praise.

• • • •

Revenant sprints to the back entrance of the Central Hospital, making record time thanks to his ride, who gives a short howl as he turns and sprints back towards The Dust. If it were any earlier in the evening, a prowler being ridden by a simulacrum might cause alarm, but most onlookers would likely just chalk it up to being too high the following morning.

Anyone who wasn't high... who would honestly believe them, anyway?

Revenant is met by the ex-Hammond nurse by the back door, who's smoking a cigarette in the alleyway, looking stressed.

Revenant sees an opening, walking up and violently pinning her against the wall as his uncontrollable rage begins to seethe. She was partially responsible for that damn chassis, therefore she might as well be partially responsible for his imprisonment. She worked for Hammond. She was a part of them.

Yet, she ran when she saw Hammond for the monstrosity that it is. She also focused on organ production rather than exploitation. Had she not known his chassis had decent synthetics, the little skinsuit would certainly be dead or even worse: filled with Hammond tech and their prying spyware. She even helped him despite knowing who he was, and focused on helping the little thing in his arms over fearing for her own life. There was something honorable in that, but is it enough? How selfish would it be to just kill her anyway?

"D-do it already! Don't leave me waiting." She stutters against his arm pinning her neck against the concrete wall. Her cigarette burns out on the asphalt, tears well up in her eyes. "It's fine, I don't have anyone who cares about me anymore. Just please--fuck--do it fast. At least let me die fast."

Revenant hesitates, not sure how selfish he should be. She's so easy. Her frame is small, so her bones are probably weak enough to snap through. He could take her organs and put them in the little skinsuit instead, assuming they're both the right blood types. But perhaps this one earned a quick death. After all, she did actually help. She seems better than most Hammond employees, especially as an ex-employee.

"Please..." Her legs give out from under her and Revenant feels her frame start to droop to the ground. Revenant releases his pin on her and she falls to her knees. "You killed my former peers so cruelly... Please let me just die painlessly. I'm begging you." She literally bows into the ground at his feet.

She's not asking for mercy from death, she's simply asking for an easy death. That's no fun. It's never been fun. Feeling a skinbag die is a part of the vital experience. Feeling a life fade as the natural ticks slow to nothing, watching the eyes turn dark and lifeless... It's what Revenant was made for. Painless means quick. Quick means nothing to savor. Nothing to savor means no intimacy. No intimacy means no fun.

She stays face down on the ground at his feet, paralyzed in fear. She knew he'd come for her. She was too close to the project. It was only a matter of time before her name came up, and she was willing to accept it was her time. She was just terrified of pain. She hoped one last cigarette might help with the fear a bit, but when death stands before her, fear is inevitable.

"Get up." Revenant demands as he crosses his arms, unhappy with his own decision. She carefully stands up to face him, shaking openly. "I'm not going to kill you. Consider yourself lucky, I'm feeling charitable tonight."

Many emotions flash across her face. Disbelief, confusion, concern, realization, then relief. Finally, she starts sobbing into her hands.

Revenant reaches over to her jacket pocket, pulling out the pack of cigarettes and popping two out. He reaches over and slips the pack back in her pocket, pulling out a lighter instead. He lights up both before putting the lighter back as well.

"Take one." He hands one of the two cigarettes to her. As she pulls her hands away from her face to take it, her hands tremor with fear as she attempts to take a draw from it. Revenant cups his hands over his nose and mouth, holding his cigarette between two fingers as he inhales deeply, allowing him to draw a breath of smoke through his nostrils. She watches his interesting method, watching the plumes as he exhales through his nose, letting a billow of smoke pour out.

"Y-you really did used to be human, huh?" She mumbles quietly, taking another draw on the cigarette. "I hoped it wasn't true. Deep down I really hoped it was some dumb rumor--"

"Same." He interrupts her before cupping his hands over his face for another deep draw. "How is the little one?" He asks while inhaling, making a curious pair of layered sounds that only a simulacrum can make.

"She's on dialysis while she doesn't have a functional pair of kidneys or a liver. I prepped your old ones for placement, but we're waiting for the drugs to filter out of her system before getting proper anesthesia in her and going in for the big one. It will be another hour or so." Her fearful stutter subsides when she's focused on her current patient.

"Methamphetamines?" He blows smoke out his nostrils again, going out of his way to step on the cigarette she dropped when he pinned her.

"No, looked like a mix of prescription anti-anxiety benzos and over-the-counter antihistamines, but both were overdose quantities." She taps the cigarette in her fingers, watching Revenant go for another draw. He's burning through it quickly. "Essentially the antihistamines will turn someone into a helpless zombie, but it can cause panic as they lose control of themselves and start succumbing to hallucinations and paralysis. The benzos cut that edge off. It's a great combination for tranquilizing someone." She pauses for a moment, unsure if she should ask, but she goes ahead anyway. "Where'd you find her?"

Revenant takes a massive draw, holding it in his synthetic lungs for a long couple seconds before exhaling it into the air with his head tilted back. The nicotine seems to be affecting him, if his more relaxed body language is anything to go by. His simulacrum body can adapt to common stimulants and depressants, just as a human's can, even though it's simulated in code rather than actual toxicity. She remembers that, since his source code was used regularly to simulate tests on the organs meant to filter out toxins. They were valuable tests, but she's sad to see how Hammond exploited him to do so.

"I found her in a drug and sex trafficking hideout." He kicks the cigarette on the ground into the corner of the wall. She waits for more of an explanation, but it never comes. It's clear there was some kind of gunfight, but he doesn't seem to want to expand on what happened. If he's really human in there, then maybe he feels like he failed to save her, even if she's not dead yet. The awkward silence sits for a few moments before she breaks it.

"So we'll kit her then. That explains the bite marks on her, at least." She says before taking another draw.

Revenant's body tenses up. He's enraged, and it's obvious. He's definitely human still, to some capacity. He just seems traumatized after hundreds of years of unwanted rebirth, as far as she can tell. She feels for him, but she knows from personal experience that Hammond keeps his source code under heavy lock-and-key. There's nothing she could do for him then, and there's certainly not anything she can do for him now.

"Doc, is there any kind of medical magic where I can cause more pain to dead people?" He suddenly asks.

"N-no. Not unless they become simulacrum..." She trails off, unsure if he will find that offensive. He draws into the cigarette again. It's almost gone already.

"Shame. Those fuckers deserved worse." He exhales a plume of smoke, and immediately takes a massive draw, finishing off the cigarette. He exhales enough smoke to practically fill the whole width of the alleyway, then flicks the butt onto the ground and stomps it out. "You almost done?"

"Y-yeah, I'm done." The nurse does the same to her less-finished cigarette, not willing to have Revenant wait on her. It's awkward enough to have her would-be murderer taking a smoke break with her, let alone having him wait on her to finish her smoke.

She swipes her ID card on the back door, which opens with a successful chime. She walks in and hovers near a bathroom door, waiting to see if Revenant will follow her. He's staying behind her.

"I need to clean up before going back to work. If you plan on coming into the surgical room too, you'll want to get the ash and smoke off of you." She points to a similar door across the hall. "You can use that one."

"Fine, I guess I wouldn't want the little one to have a harder time healing because I got nicotine in her guts." He mumbles. "Hurry it up."

She slips behind the door, knowing full well he will wait for her. He's not letting her go anywhere without him, at least for now.

• • • •

"So what's next?" Revenant asks as he follows behind the nurse, entering the surgery room once again.

"Well, as mentioned we're going to kit her. She's on dialysis and stabilizing from the bullet removals, but now we're going to have to put the new synthetic organs in her." She stops for a moment, looking at the synthetics laid out on a cart near her body. "Which... does this mean her lungs need to be replaced?"

"Yeah, Hammond put some spyware garbage in her chest and called it a 'lung'. I need you to put something proper in there instead." Revenant inspects the wounds on the body, lifting the surgical paper to check on his little rescue case. The wounds are cleaned, sewn up, and bandaged to stuff the holes with gauze.

"So only one lung needs to be replaced? You gave me both of yours." The nurse questions, trying to get a grasp on the situation before the surgeon returns.

"Yeah, I was only being thorough. I didn't want to cut it at the wrong spot." Revenant lets the paper fall again and begins pacing the room, visibly bothered.

"Fair enough... Are you sure you want to stay for this? You seem really stressed by it all." She asks, watching the simulacrum wander aimlessly. He stops for a moment.

"What's your name?" He asks.

"Ruth..." She immediately regrets telling the truth.

"Now I know your name. I know your work history. I know you smoke. I know what you look like. If you ask any more stupid questions, Ruth, I will revoke my mercy and eviscerate you like all of the other Hammond employees I get my hands on."

Ruth is pale, but nods silently and turns away to check on the dialysis and run a kit. Revenant returns to pacing. The room falls silent as Ruth runs around the room. Revenant waits until she eventually needs to leave the room to go to the labs, making a call to get a pickup on his eviscerated chassis, which is still sitting lifeless in the corner of the room.

• • • •

After a long while, she returns with the anesthesiologist and surgeon as before. Revenant is standing next to the table, arms crossed and waiting impatiently. His knight chassis is gone now, on it's way back to his room at the Apex facility.

"You're back?" The surgeon asks openly, clearly annoyed at Revenant's impatience and presence.

"Yeah, and don't expect me to leave. You better do a good job at this or I'll--"

"He's very invested in ensuring the organs are anchored properly!" Ruth cuts him off loudly, not allowing him to make the threats he wants to. "They're some of the older ones without the self-aligning anchors, but they're much sturdier. He used to work with me at Hammond in the Organ Research Center."

Revenant growls a little at the mere mention of Hammond Robotics, but recognizes that the lie is better than the truth in this case.

The anesthesiologist is wholly uncaring about the situation, already working new math for medicating the high-risk surgery and administering doses in front of Revenant's looming frame. He's either so deeply jaded by his job that the scariest simulacrum in existence doesn't even shake him, or he's just that hyper focused. Perhaps some combination of both. Revenant ignores him, choosing instead to watch as the surgeon preps some tools for opening the cavities.

Revenant eventually steps aside for the surgeon, Ruth, and a swarm of other nurses who enter the room to try to find a place around the table. His body language goes from annoyed to somewhat sullen, but Ruth is the only one who seems to notice.

The surgery begins as the first incision is made into the abdomen. It's going to be morning before this is anywhere close to finished, and no one is looking forward to the long night.

• • • •

It's been multiple hours. The abdomen was successfully opened, had the damaged kidney and liver removed and replaced, and has now been sewn shut. The muscle wall will take a long time to heal, and the organs had to be tediously anchored to them. The old synthetics are nothing like their modern equivalents that go in with relative ease. These were difficult, risky, and required extra work to get placed and the veins to interface with the new silicone. The dialysis machines stay for now, just in case the new organs don't work as intended while the chest has one lung replaced. All the staff is fighting off exhaustion at this point. Revenant has been disturbingly silent, letting Ruth push the surgeons to correctly work with the vintage organ replacements. He's shifted between brooding in a corner and pacing back and forth, but has refused to let anyone in on his thoughts.

The surgeon finishes connecting the new lung to the correct split windpipe, intentionally jostling it a little to ensure it's anchored properly. The surgery is almost done, but the hard part is putting the chest back together. Some of the ribcage had to be carefully removed due to the severity of the replacement, and getting each piece back in and aligned properly can be tedious.

"I need ten minutes alone." Revenant suddenly demands.

"I'm fucking sorry, wha--" The surgeon starts stomping over to Revenant with a finger pointed at him, before Ruth grabs her and holds her back.

"Please trust me when I say we need to just leave them alone. Please." Ruth pleads with the surgeon. She sighs, pulling Ruth's arms off of her. The other nurses look on with silent curiosity.

"Fine. Fuck it. Take a break everyone!" She turns to Revenant as the nurses scatter, emptying out of the doors. "You have ten minutes. She's stable, try not to kill her, freak."

"I just might, and there's not a damn thing you can do about it." Revenant growls as he walks right up to her, towering over her with a mortifying glare.

The surgeon scoffs, likely bitter from years of dealing with low pay and bad hours, and walks off to the door, slamming it behind her even though it will shut on its own. Ruth remains for a moment, looking to Revenant with a fearful worry before skittering off after the surgeon.

Revenant walks over to the open chest cavity, newly outfitted with a synthetic lung. The sternum is missing, allowing Revenant to see through to a surprisingly small, slowly-beating heart. If he could smile, he would, but it would be a smile somewhere between bloodlust and genuine reverence. He gently reaches into the cavity, wrapping his fingers around the heart, which beats against his hands with a power impossible to fully describe. It reminds him of a newborn prowler--so small and squirmy, but already unmistakably muscular and strong. It has one goal--life--and it never relents in fighting for it.

"So, little skinsuit, you wanted to die, right?" He wraps his sharpened thumb around the aorta and the vein branches that flow up from it to the brain. "I could give you your wish, right now. Exactly what you wanted. Exactly what I asked for. You die with me, painlessly, and I'm the one to do it. You could be free from this hell." He slowly sounds saddened. "But... I'd never see you again. Even if I did ever escape this hellhole and manage to delete my source code, no God would ever let me into the same place you're going." His thumb slips out from around the branches carefully.

He takes a long pause, trying to decide what he should do. He feels that damned pain in his chest again as his code runs hot. His stature slouches as he considers everything that's happened in the past few days. If this creature lives, he'll be stuck trying to keep her alive until he inevitably fails. If this creature dies right here and now, he--

He doesn't want that.

He sighs, feeling the heart pump in his palms. It doesn't even stutter at his presence. It doesn't even care. It's much like his cycle of life, although this one is doomed to eventually end. God put that guarantee in there, ensuring no living being ever had to suffer forever, but that was taken from him. How selfish can one be?

Finally, he speaks to his unconscious audience, charisma suddenly returning to his stance.

"I've embraced every dark part of your so-called humanity, including being very, very selfish. So you're going to stay here with me, as long as I can force you to." He revels, almost as if to whisper to the heart itself. It doesn't respond any differently. It just agrees with his plan, beating away.

He holds the beating heart for a few more minutes, squeezing it a little to feel its muscular form push back against his grip. It's the strongest thing inside her, and he's always loved feeling hearts. Normally the sensation only lasts mere moments, as his intent is to kill, but this is the first one he doesn't fully intend to impale or crush it in his hand. He loves the feeling of power over life, and he loves feeling the surprisingly forceful and dominant hold life has on his victims. He could tear that hold away, but right now he's just revelling in the pervasiveness of it, loving its insistent presence in his little companion. He slips his hand out from around the heart, letting it rest on the pillows of the biological and synthetic lungs. His hand is dripping a slick and viscous blood, which he brings up to his face to wipe on his mask. He's enamored by the smell of blood--always has been--but this blood is particularly intoxicating.

He slips back into the darkness, away from the lights over the surgical table and into the darkness, eventually leaning up against the wall and sliding down it until he's on the floor, keeping his blood-soaked hand against his face. It smells so sweet and metallic, he's fighting the desire to put a finger on the tasting chip in his mouth, worried he might love it too much. Although, he cannot quite shake the knowledge that the blood itself is not a drug, it's who it comes from and the intimacy of holding her heart in his hands. He relents, opening up his synthetic jaw and sticking a single finger in to touch a chip in the back of his jaw.

Copper, just like his mask, but sweeter somehow. His hand shakes a little at the sensation. His bloodlust and lust seem to make a horrific team, and an even better high. He wishes he could stay here like this as long as possible, but time marches on just to spite him.

The door swings back open, the surgeon and Ruth peeking their heads through to see the simulacrum slouched in the corner and the patient still intact. They don't see the blood smeared on his hand that's lifted to his mask; he simply looks like he's trying to cry, or extremely distressed. The surgeon ignores him and swoops back over to the patient, followed by a line of nurses who begin helping her set the ribcage back together and close up the cavity.

Ruth takes a moment to walk over to Revenant in the corner, whispering under her breath to him.

"It's okay, she's got the best chance you could possibly give her." She whispers before quickly shuffling away to the table.

Revenant looks up as she walks away, his bright yellow eyes peeking out at her from between his blood-laced fingers. She has no idea that he got his claws into the toybox, or that the evidence is all over his claws, or that he's basking in the scent and taste of it all. He'd rather keep it that way. He lets her assume he's in distress, continuing to enjoy the blood and life smeared on his face. He will stay like this as long as it takes, keeping his hand hidden against his face and under his headscarf, waiting for the moment recovery--and his sobriety--must begin.

The night goes on, Revenant not making another sound or movement to interrupt the doctors and nurses.

Eventually, the surgery completes. The dialysis machine is carefully removed, allowing the new organs to begin their work. The patient is hooked up to more machines to help monitor and stabilize her, pictures are taken of the bite marks to send to the police department, and Revenant follows as she is wheeled off to a room to recover. Revenant keeps his hand at his visage, not removing it until he is left alone with his rescued companion again, well into the next day.

He sighs, staring at the comatose body in front of him and the blood on his hands, wondering if he made the right choice. He was given two opportunities to be selfish, but he only took the one that mattered most to him. Was that fair of him? He can't decide for himself. Perhaps he's committing the same sin committed against him, or perhaps he did the "right" thing, whatever that means in this world. He genuinely doesn't know anymore.

Whatever happens at this point is beyond his control. She might wake up, or maybe she won't. Now, it's up to whatever God there may be ruling over this hellscape of a universe. He secretly hopes this God doesn't care much for the negligible little skinsuit and leaves her with him. Revenant doesn't hold much hope; after all, God is allowed to be selfish, right? Revenant hates that thought, but relents: take it all, then.

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xtruss · 3 years

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I Won’t Take the Vaccine Because It Makes Liberals Mad

"My newly formed and well-developed opinion on vaccines is this: if those bastards want me to get the jab, I’m not going to do it, because it annoys them"

— Peter D\’Abrosca | April 30, 2021 | Anti-Empire.Com

“It is impossible to convince me that I am somehow abnormal for refusing the vaccine, and that the ranting pro-mask schizoids in the supermarket are the normal ones”

I will never allow myself to be injected with Big Pharma’s mass-produced mystery juice, in part because it was rushed out of the lab and into the manufacturing line like a replacement for a Honda Civic’s recalled airbags.

It just wouldn’t be prudent.

As a healthy 29-year-old, my likelihood of dying from the virus is practically nil, so why risk the blood clots? And before anyone accuses me of trying to murder granny, shouldn’t she be immune to the virus if she gets the vaccine? Whether that’s actually true seems to be the topic of some debate. We’ll have to follow The Science™, then parse through its legitimacy relative to its political value for Democrats (that’s a new step in the scientific method) before we can know for sure.

If it turns out that the vaccine doesn’t prevent infection, then there’s no point in getting it in the first place, and I suppose we’ll have to sew our masks to our faces for the rest of our natural lives.

Maybe It’s Petty

But in truth, I’m not really avoiding the vaccine due to potential medical complications, or because of the speed with which it was produced.

Personal liberty is not the reason I’m avoiding it, either. I’m not a member of the “don’t tread on me” club. Though I don’t think mandated “vaccine passports” are a brilliant idea, my refusal to take the vaccine is not related to some perceived or real government overreach. I’m not here to take a principled stand against the federal or state governments on this issue. In fact, I’m saving my principled stands against the federal or state governments for issues that really matter, like strengthening libel laws so that lying journalists can finally be shipped off to Guantanamo Bay where they belong.

My primary reason for refusing the vaccine is much simpler: I dislike the people who want me to take it, and it makes them mad when they hear about my refusal. That, in turn, makes me happy.

Maybe it’s petty, but the thought of the worst people on planet earth, those whom I like to call the Branch Covidians, literally shaking as I stroll into Target vaccine-free, makes me smile.

Allow me to emphasize my point.

Before this pandemic, I had a grand total of zero opinions on the issue of vaccines. I’ve never met an “anti-vaxxer” in my entire life, despite working in conservative politics, where, from my understanding, they can generally be found. Frankly, I don’t know a thing about their movement. I thought vaccines were what kids took periodically to eliminate the risk of ancient diseases like the mumps, which can only be found today in the illegal aliens we’re importing, and what people of a certain age took during autumn to avoid contracting the flu.

In fact, before the COVID-19 craze swept this nation, I devoted more attention to the liberal cause of preserving the Sea Turtle population than I did to thinking about vaccines. I like nature. (Tangentially related, an estimated 1.56 billion plastic masks ended up in the ocean in 2020 alone. Good work, liberals!)

Ain’t Nobody’s Business

It wasn’t until the sociopathic mediocrity that is the entrenched liberal political class in Washington began bullying normal people into wearing masks, staying home, standing six feet apart from others at all times, mobilizing even less impressive liberal stormtroopers to play the role of COVID-19 prevention Gestapo, and then finally propped up the vaccine as the Holy Grail that would lead us back to “normalcy,” that I finally began to have an opinion on vaccines. And though I don’t know much about the “anti-vaxxers,” I do know that I’m displeased with the way they have been portrayed by the aforementioned GITMO-bound media, simply for harboring opinions that are considered non-mainstream.

So I have decided that because the vile political Left, which I despise in the abstract, wants me to take their coveted vaccine, I simply will not. After the horrifying displeasure of meeting several of their militant COVID-19 restriction enforcers in person over the past year, I have become even more steadfast in my stance.

My newly formed and well-developed opinion on vaccines is this: if those bastards want me to get the jab, I’m not going to do it, because it annoys them.

Perhaps you think I’m being obtuse. I do not care.

I’ve seen too many videos of screaming ninnies losing their minds on people who didn’t buy into the mask hype. It is impossible to convince me that I am somehow abnormal for refusing the vaccine, and that the ranting pro-mask schizoids in the supermarket are the normal ones.

I also don’t care whether you decide to get the vaccine. It’s really none of my business.

Perhaps you’re not as committed to upsetting the enemy as I am. That is fine.

Perhaps you just want to go on a cruise vacation again. If so, call Bill Kristol or Jonah Goldberg and have your vaccine identification card ready. Godspeed.

— Source: American Greatness

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zuzuslastbraincell · 3 years

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tagged by the wonderful issy @outtamywayskinny (iconique url!) to answer these thirty delicious questions. yum!

name/nickname: sasha / alex / ash / sash, or some forbidden combination of those

gender: lmao

star sign: libra

height: 5′9″ or 175cm because I’m a bastard who believes in rounding up

time: 20:58 CET

birthday: 2nd october baby!

favorite band(s)/group(s): godspeed you! black emperor, liturgy, the soft moon, sonic youth, dinosaur jr, fugazi, system of a down (listen i’ve been jamming to toxicity a bunch recently... we love to hate george bush here), depeche mode, moss icon, a tribe called quest, public enemy, tom waits, mewithoutYou, mother mother, run the jewels, lightning bolt, fleet foxes, protomartyr, fuck buttons, radiohead (sorry)

favorite solo artist(s): chelsea wolfe, fiona apple, baths, mitski, patti smith, courtney love, noname, pj harvey, courtney barnett, steve albini (just anything he touches really), lingua ignota, MF DOOM, madvillain, kanye west’s early work only (again sorry but the college dropout is so good). i used to love grimes and azealia banks more than anything but time has proven me a fool on both fronts (more grimes than ab). i miss 2013 where i just listened to 212 and oblivion on repeat guilt-free.

song stuck in my head: ghost by gouge away. love to listen to a female vocalist scream her lungs out honestly.

last movie: bridget jones’ diary (2001) which is fascinating from a sociological point of view imo

last show: still watching adventure time season 7 with the hope of catching up to see obsidian and make my 2012 bubbline loving heart explode

when did i create this blog: august 2020

what do i post: rambling headcanons, occasional funny posts, takes that range from lukewarm to haute (coutre), other people’s cool art, links to my ao3 page (my writing is good), complaining (i love complaining)

last thing googled: “mace windu lightsaber.” i’m listening to A Civilised Age which is an EXCELLENT clone wars podcast and they were all discussing what lightsabers they’d have so i googled to check what designs they were talking about. so basically. nerd shit.

other blogs: @sashacore (art, politics, personal stuff), @profanetools (elder scrolls sideblog, lesbian dwarf zone)

do i get asks: yes but i dread every single one since i put on anon

why did i choose this url: it’s funny (to me, at least, i can’t tell if my jokes are good nine times out of ten)

following: 700 or something because i compulsively follow people back

followers: 398

average hours of sleep: ranges between 5 to 9 hours but regardless i’m always still tired

lucky number: 77

instruments: clarinet but i haven’t played it in years :(

what am i wearing: a new hope star wars t-shirt (i am visibly doing a shrug emoji but i’m too lazy to copy-paste so imagine it in your mind’s eye) a plaid shirt over that, poorly fitting mens jeans, chipped black nail varnish. very par for the course for sasha.

dream job: god just. someone pay me to write please.

dream trip: interrail around central europe OR i’d really like to do a tour of china, since i think it’s far more diverse and varied than most people give it credit for

favorite food: pizza, but specifically the 3,50€ takeaway pizza from the small southern italian town i lived in for a year in 2018 with the local style of fluffy crust / thin base. fucking divine. never again will i get that quality:price ratio. never again.

nationality: copying what issy says: “i’m from- 😐e- 😰 eng- 🤢 england 🤮” except i can’t say actually say i’m english since my mum is glaswegian it’d be death on sight, whoops! (i think she resents the fact that i’m english lol). but i am to my scottish family as james derry girls is to derry, if that makes sense. i refer to myself as bri’ish usually because it is accurate even if there are certain class connotations to calling yourself british vs. english (it’s a whole Thing).

favorite song: just one??? okay fine. fine. it’s chelsea wolfe’s flat lands.

last book read: i’m still reading beloved which is incredible but i’m also reading mort by terry pratchett which is a good read

three fictional universes you’d like to live in: 1. the one where i am mentally well 2. the one without capitalism 3. i think it’d be fun to airbend personally.

not tagging anyone but big love if you want to do this yourself!

#i am feeling very anxious this evening so this was a wonderful distraction thank you

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euaxel · 3 years

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heyyy, eonia. i’m reid, i’m twenty-three, still can’t read, and all i know about pjo is that it fucking rocks and the protag has the same learning disabilities that i do! also, i picked hypnos for this punk mainly to be mean to him and because in the hades game hypnos bullies me every time i die and i’m kiiiinda into it. hmu on discord one on one for the best plotting experience, but i’ll be around plenty to bug y’all in the gc too. you can read about bastard boy number one right here and under the cut we’ll get down to business.

⟨ ELLIOT FLETCHER. TRANS MALE. HE/HIM. ⟩ though the mist might prevent some from seeing it, AXEL EVERETT is actually a descendent of H Y P N O S. it’s still a question of whether or not the TWENTY-TWO year old VIDEO GAME DEVELOPMENT & COMBAT TACTICS MAJOR from BROOKLYN, USA has taken after their godly parent completely, but the demigod is still known to be quite WITTY & SELF-DEPRICATING.

be advised, axel’s a pretty heavy character. i’m gonna keep it brief for the bio & need-to-knows, tag around the parts with bold applicable triggers so you can skip around as needed, and tag this post accordingly, but just let me know if i miss anything and i’ll fix it & be safe reading. godspeed and i apologize in advance for bringing you all my personal punching bag as my first muse.

the main triggers that are gonna come up are: parental abuse, alcoholism * major, mentions of bullying, drowning * major, religious trauma, and drug abuse with some harder drugs ( particularly, weed, pills and cocaine / nothing with needles. )

general stats.

— full name , axel harley everett. — nicknames/alias , axe, ax, wolverine jr, tyler durden jr, trouble, Who? - every professor he’s ever had. — house, hypnos and mad about it. — age, 22, as of today. also mad about it. — gender, trans male. — pronouns, he/him. — sexual orientation, bisexual with a somewhat heavy masc lean. — d.o.b, january 1st, 1999. ( generally unknown to anyone but maybe siblings, he will probably lie and say Nobody Knows... I Just Am unless he really fucks with you. ) — hometown,

phys.

— height, 5′0ft even. furious about it. — eyes, brown. — hair, brown. — face claim, elliot fletcher.

misc.

— zodiac, capricorn. — alignment, chaotic good. — character inspo, lip gallagher, steve rogers ( young ), ellie from tlou1, logan howlett, stiles stilinski ( if anyone says shit i will scream ), probably someone from euphoria but i’m too scared to watch that, peter parker ( andrew garfield ), shinsou hitoshi, finn mertens, marceline the vampire queen, dipper pines, this is all over the place but it’s there. — most played spotify songs, passion for publication by anarbor, sober haha jk unless by hospital bracelet, nobody by mitski, class of 2013 by mitski, king princess’ cover of monster from adventure time, way too much phoebe bridgers, in love or whatever by future teens, and the entire front bottoms discography but especially in sickness & in flames with the hard way & bus beat well at the top of his loop. — aesthetics, bloody knuckles, left open and tipped over prescription bottles, walking on the carpet with socks to get that tingly feeling, skateboarding inside, dozing off at the bar, tangled legs in messy sheets, ten pillows on a twin sized mattress, laying down in the shower, brian sella’s cracky singing voice.

bio.

— axel was born and raised in brooklyn, new york, and he was claimed at thirteen, on his thirteenth birthday, by hypnos. — the day he was claimed, axel ceased contact with his human mother and his step-dad, and he attended a camp for half-bloods that wasn’t far from home. he spent his adolescence there year round for safety from monsters at home and abroad, then moved on to eonia. — ( parental abuse tw, drowning tw begin ) i don’t want to be too graphic here so i’m going to plainly say that axel’s mother was a very, very bad person, and the man she married was absent at his best, physically abusive at worst. axel’s powers ( hypnokinesis, namely ) were potent and difficult to control at a young age, and as a deeply religious catholic woman, this scared his mother and influenced most of the animosity in their relationship. she was convinced that the defensive visions he created and his ability to put her to sleep ( an attempt to help her, on his end; insomnia plagued her and later, it would him, too ) were of demonic origin, and tried to drown him more than once; cleansing, she claimed. the worst instance was the day he was claimed, actually — new years day, 2012; his life was saved by hypnos, and that was the last he saw of her. ( parental abuse tw, drowning tw end. ) — that said, he’s a little ( very ) hydrophobic. poseidon kids do NOT fucking interact ( i’m kidding. kind of. he Will avoid a little though ) — anyway! moving on. all of this aside, axel did his best to put his past behind him, and he was actually super stoked to learn that his powers came from somewhere good and that there was places out there for kids like him; to learn he wasn’t any kind of monster. ( still working on believing that, though.. marcelines monster.mp3 right here ) — he’s less stoked when he starts having trouble falling asleep, and really, it feels like a more cruel twist than any other fate has thrown at him ( his upbringing was chock full of mean twists, so that’s saying something ); and really, it’s more like insomnia just full on kicks in, but he can put other people to sleep. great, right? whatever, though — combat classes are kickass and he’s surrounded by babes that think he’s hilarious so things could be totally, way worse. — ( bullying tw (brief) ) for the most part, axel was pretty well liked among his peers. he was bullied as a young kid (pre-claim), but he bit back and he bit back hard, and sure, some of that followed him into his teen years but he’s more confident by then; less fun to poke at, and absolutely unhinged when provoked, so people learn better of it. the only real lasting effect was one instant that hit him a little too deep in the inferiority, when he was seventeen — he fell in love with a girl, told her that, and found himself at the end of a very mean spirited prank. he shook it off like he did anything else, or at least — he told himself he did, even if the hurt hit him somewhere a little too deep rooted ( ie. being god’s most unlovable son would naturally land him here, right? ) love’s kinda stupid anyways, so what the hell, right? (bullying tw end.)

— ( alcoholism tw, drug use tw begin ) this is already obscenely long so i’m just going to keep it to the point here and say he began drinking when he was sneaking booze in to camp at fifteen, and it just never stopped there. he’s also a massive stoner, which is all well, harmless and good for the most part; he’s always grinning, half-lidded, and has a room full of smoke at any given time. it’s the pills that do him in, and he did them at first just so he could get some shut eye, and... well. after that, because he’s dependent on them. but he keeps this part under wraps for the most part; it doesn’t have to be anyone’s problem but his, and it’s not a problem until it is one. partying’s fun, so is coke; so is taking a few too many xan’s, mdma. ( alcoholism tw, drug use tw end )

FUN FACTS!!!

— i swear he is not as doom and gloom as he sounds from the bio, and yeah, writing that made me so sad i feel like we absolutely must hone in on the fun and cute things about him!?! — he loves dnd. he can talk about it for HOURS and if you let him, he absolutely will. — adventure time makes him cry. he’s a baby don’t let him fool you. — very into cryptids, aliens, horror stories, conspiracy theories, in love with ryan from watcher, wanna be shane medej. — he loves to draw! the one thing he loves about his power is what it’s done for his imagination, and sure, he mostly draws horror things, but it’s why he went into video game development. he wants to be a concept artist. — his double major is in combat tactics because he loves fighting. he thinks it’s so fun. he’s a little nuts, actually — i mean, get hit in the face and come up grinning. all he’s ever wanted is to run a fight club and be the shortest, baddest little bitch on the planet. — he tends to nod off in weird places because he doesn’t sleep enough at night, which is sad, but; he can seriously fall asleep anywhere. standing up, in a tree, you name it. — he’s a hobby musician! he loves singing and playing guitar. — he’s a huge flirt. — loves to scare people. he’s harmless, though. like, honestly. he might make you think you’re seeing a walking toadstool but he’ll probably apologize later. — he’s very much a singing in the shower type? — clothes thief. friends and significant others beware. — actually, just kind of a thief? but of weird, little things. like, just the left shoe. puts them in a little corner in his room that he has set up like an exhibit. “things you thought you lost lol” is written on the whiteboard on the wall above it. he likes collecting rocks too. he’s a little freak!! — he’s better at the memory retrieval part of his power than the rest. naturally, as this mostly applies for other people.

WANTED CONNECTIONS. im literally so tired of hearing myself talk...

friends/squad. self explanatory!!! he’s friendly, a class clown, and a loyal friend through and through; he’s also adaptable, and his demeanor is very relaxed and inviting. he’s probably gonna have 2-3 people that he’s really close with, and he’d do quite literally anything for them. seriously, don’t tempt him. a best friend. so this is kind of vague but. i’d really love for him to have one person that is just a tier above the rest? they’d know things about him that are like pulling teeth to find out ( aka, anything deeper than his most recommended podcasts and loudmouth opinions on non important things ), someone who will call him on his shit, and maybe take care of his stupid little self when he gets too fucked up, because they’d be someone he trusts enough to let them. enemies? he probably gets along with most people until given a reason not to? but he is a loud mouth and if one of his friends gets into drama, he will stick his nose where it doesn’t belong and he will throw hands, so it could happen.

harmless rivalries. maybe even steamy ones. he’s a little shit and he likes banter so, so, so much? if given the opportunity and if someone rubs him a certain type of way, he’s so not above being a menace, although never super maliciously. just, you know, annoying the shit out of them on purpose, for fun. he’s also not above blowing a few kisses their way.

current hookups. self explanatory too. he’s a little harlot. HFBHVFNJ. it’s gonna be kinda hard to go beyond sex with him because he’s very deep in his own insecurity but he does catch feelings, he’s just mad about it when he does. i’m mostly gonna go off chem for that though! an ex. could be on friendly terms? but, it should be noted that he could’ve ghosted someone too; or pulled from the relationship when things got serious and he couldn’t choke out that ‘i love you’, even if he felt it. worse, if he did choke it out, but they didn’t feel the same way. siblings. hypnos kids he is gonna be so protective of all of u... family is hard for axel, i’m ngl, but he really wants one is the tragedy of it all, i guess? so he just really wants to be a good brother. he thinks hypnos is kind of a dick for making him but he tries not to fault him for his existence. fuck u dad i dont wanna be alive feels a little unfair. HDBHFDSJ. anyways he’s a good brother even if he is absolutely so reckless and terrifying in regards to himself but his siblings. his siblings he will do anything for. ALSO!!! FOUND FAMILY!!!! it would be kinda nice if he bonded with someone a little older maybe, could be outside of the hypnos house even, someone he’s kind of a bratty-little-brother type with.... or bratty older brother that takes your things and makes you laugh, y’know.

PERSONALITY. just tacking this part of the app on at the end too to highlight parts that i think are important for understanding who he is, and just so it’s all in one place!

toothy grins, half-lidded eyes, and keepin’ them laughing is what it’s all about, baby. axel walks with more confidence in his posture than he’s earned ( or claimed, for that matter ), and it’s the backbone of what gets him by. he’s a glowing example of the fake it ‘til you make it mentality, and he knows what he wants, usually how to get it, and doesn’t mind letting you know that. there’s an ever present mischievous glint in his eyes that says more about what to expect from him than he does, and that’s still not much? he likes to have fun, and there isn’t a whole lot of regard for righteousness or responsibility on his end, but hey! it’s usually only ever at his own expense, so what’s the damage? he’s an absolute clown and he knows it.

axel loves people. he does — you might not guess that with how elusive he is, but it’s true. there’s nothing he likes more than a good conversation with someone interesting, or maybe not even then; if there’s a sparkle in you, he’ll see it. ( might even draw it, not that you’d ever know. ) he’s warm, loyal, compassionate, relaxed, and understanding; and none of that is at the cost of being passive, or lacking passion.

as long as the vibes are right, he’s happy to just be; though, he’s known to have a fuse for certain provocations, and will jump readily at chance to fight in someone else’s honor. also, it’s not unlike him to spar for the sake of sparring; but that’s all in good fun, no worries.

there’s no way to sugarcoat it — axel has an inferiority complex. where that stems from is something he’s more self-aware of than he’s willing to admit, but he doesn’t have the patience or the will to dissect it; much less do anything about it, and he’s as bull-headed as they come — especially regarding anything related to the psyche. how much this impacts his demeanor and relationships with others varies on the situation, but one constant is that he’s going to retreat before things get bad; even if ‘things are getting bad’ exists only as his own paranoia-born hypothetical.

things can’t go bad if you don’t let them, and he’s content to keep it that way; even if it means being stuck in the stasis of missed opportunities. it’s when he’s retreating into himself that he can get irritable, anxious, jumpy; secretive, defensive, even. he’s personable until he isn’t, essentially.

#euintro #ik elliots like 5'7 but i've never let this kid be taller than me and i will not start now #parental abuse tw #bullying tw #drug use tw #alcoholism tw #drowning tw #religious trauma tw #jesus christ whats wrong with me #anyway who wants him #Because I Dont #anyway im not fucking proofreading it JBFGHBFJFBDJSKNMA im so sorry this is a monster in length

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toloveawarlord · 4 years

Text

Day 2: Sacrifice

You can find my masterlist in my bio!

Event: Spooktober

Trick: Shadows, Mask, Cemetery

Characters: Eden Bright & Finley Godspeed Ft. Sasha Hyde

Tagging: @christmaswarlock @plumpblueberry

A/N: Some angst for the lovely requester! I hope you enjoy this little bit of Finley and Eden! I aged them up just a little bit for this fic! Finley is 7, Eden is 6, and Sasha is 9.

[Spooktober Event is CLOSED]

Although peace had been brokered between the two territories, bias and anger still remained, even a year after the threats of war.

Jade eyes darted between the three masked figures towering around the two girls in a semi-circle. They wore mock army uniforms and crisp silver masks to hide their identity. “Please-please leave u-us alone,” Eden stammered, reaching a shaky hand out to clutch the back of the other girl’s dirt-stained shirt.

“Get the hell out of our territory, you red bastard!” The leader spat at the younger girl trembling behind Finley. His irritation clearly etched on his face as his brows creased.

The second one of them moved a step closer, Finley countered. It shouldn’t be so damn hard to fend off a seven-year-old, but they found it nearly impossible. She’d land pointed punches to the jaw, throat-- the slight girl having to be hauled off by both the other boys. They hadn’t the opportunity to attack their actual target.

“I won’t let you touch her.” Finley raised her fists again, defensive in her actions unless one of them moved first. They were familiar to her, but the moon cast a shadow across their mask, making it hard to remember.

Eden’s gaze flickered toward the town just beyond the trees. How long would it take for anyone to realize that they were missing? With the large crowd, perhaps they simply thought the children lost among it.

A decisive look between the three boys made the young Godspeed tense in anticipation. Their only real option would be attack all at once, but she wouldn’t allow that. She lunged, effectively toppling over the leader. The other two less likely to act without his guidance.

His arm thrust up, palm connecting with her chin to put distance between them. “They’re the enemy! You’re a traitor for protecting her!” He shouted, turning his head to avoid a direct connection of her knuckles to his cheek bone.

“You don’t deserve to have on that uniform! Hurting innocents isn’t what the Black Army stands for!” Amethyst eyes caught the movement to her right, and the girl reeled back with her elbow. The crunch of the other boy’s nose worth the pain that radiated through her arm.

It was her voice.

That sweet voice filled with absolute terror that Finley couldn’t ignore.

She’d only taken her eyes off her target for a split second, but it was enough. The leader shifted their weight, managing to plow is foot into her abdomen and throw her slight form off him...

right into a headstone.

The rough granite greeted her head with a sickening thud, not giving a single inch in the hard ground. The world blurred. It was distant. And yet, it hardly hurt in that moment.

Get up. You have to get up.

One had Eden securely in his arms, easily keeping her under control even as she struggled. Through the haze, Finley could see the tears spilling from her jade eyes. The pang in her chest, heart clenching at how despaired her love looked.

“Traitor!” The leader, enraged, struck his boot down into her rib cage. Twice. Three times. The fourth nearly caught with sluggish hands but managed to slip through once again. He observed her, cocking his head to the side before completely turning again. “We’ll rid Black Territory of all its enemies!”

“F-Finley!” Eden was desperate to escape but lacked any skills to do so. Her shaky cry for help drowned out by the disgusting cheers of the three boys.

The ache in her body begged her to rest, digging into her muscles to make every movement more painful than the last. Even her eyes betrayed her when she made a feeble attempt to stop their cruel game. Finley lurched forward but with little force.

“Why won’t you stay down!” The leader shouted, easily tearing her weak grip off his arm. One half-hearted shove sent the young Godspeed to the ground, knocking what little air she could get out of her lungs.

As much as she willed herself to stand back up, she couldn’t. Her fingers dug helplessly into the soil, clinging to it as if it could aid somehow. Her ears rang, registering the screams before Finley realized that it was her own voice echoing through the cemetery.

A calculative error.

The sword unsheathed not wooden as she’d believed but painfully real. It skewered her to the ground, glinting in the moonlight.

Darkness descended upon them. Shadows springing from the forest, silently slithering across the open space toward the group. Following like a wraith was an older girl. One with a reputation.

“That’s- That’s the one they say can summon demons!” One boy shouted, leading the retreat without the permission of the leader.

The leader shouted of cowards but the closer the shadows came, the more his legs trembled in terror. Without a second thought, he, too, sprinted away with screams of a demon.

Sasha gave a passing pat on the head to Eden before she knelt by Finley. Her accompanying shadows dispersing like the wind, like a question of whether they’d truly been there or not. “You’ll live.” Her fingers ghosted around the wound.

Amethyst eyes turned upward to her favorite person. “See? Nothin to worry about! I’m gonna be alright so no more cryin’, okay?” A grin pushed her lips up, happy that the tension seemed to leave Eden’s shoulders.

“I’ll- I’ll go get Fenrir.”

Finley let her cheek rest back against the dirt once she was out of sight. She squeezed her eyes shut and bit down onto her lip. “Sash, I-”

Sasha hummed in response, sitting on back on her heels beside her. “I know. The feeling here-” Her index finger tapped down her left leg and then back up her right. It was quiet. Nothing indicated flow to her lower half.

“It’s gone.”

#ikemen revolution #ikerev #ikerev next gen #ikemen revolution next gen #finley godspeed #eden bright #sasha hyde

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allyvampirelass29 · 4 years

Text

Chapter 8: Good Old Fashioned Nightmares

A HEROES Fanfiction Angel Before the Fall Series By: Allyssa J. Watkins

"You know how I love a good old fashioned nightmare...... Sorry to keep you all waiting but I promise I'm worth it. Such generous hosts. I hope you don't mind that I brought a plus one. The invitation was too tempting, I couldn't resist sharing the fun........"

CLAIRE!!!! CLAIRE!!!! IT'S PETER, WHERE ARE YOU!?!? CLAIRE, C'MON PLEASE, ANSWER ME!!!!"

Peter tore down one long hallway and then the next, yelling loud over Claire's terrified screams and Sylar's taunts, feeling sick, his chest hurting like he was having a heart attack. "CLAIRE!!!! CLAIRE!!! DAMN IT, SYLAR!!!!!! Around another corner, and then another, revealing endless empty hallways, and each time his stomach clenched, so sure he was going to find her laying in a pool of her own blood, Sylar standing over her, having his sick fun, finger raised, laughing murderously.

"CLAIRE!!! TELL ME WHERE YOU ARE!!!" He screamed, his heart pounding, slamming against his rib cage. This was all his fault. He had just talked to her an hour ago. He was the one that gave Noah the go ahead, convinced him Claire was safe in her dorm. He'd been so sure...... She sounded so happy and carefree on the phone. He hadn't been worried at all. He was a damn fool. This wouldn't be the first time he'd underestimated that psycho. If Sylar had gotten to Claire that could only mean one thing...... Renee was dead.

"CLAIRE!!!!"

"Oh will you BOTH shut up? You're ruining my entrance, my ambiance. Claire, Claire, Claire, she can't hear you!!! But I LOVE that you can hear her. Shall we go louder?"

A spark of electricity over the intercom and Claire's tearful agony intensified.

"Ohhhh just listen to your daughter scream, Noah. Nice set of lungs, your little college girl. If I rip them out, do you think they'll grow back? So many possibilities. I can't pick. Do you feel it? That horror, that dread gnawing at your soul? I know, I did. Thanks for the idea, Bennet. SUCKS doesn't it? Payback's a BITCH."

Peter clenched his jaw, still running. I can't wait until you're laid out in a drawer at the morgue, you disgusting CREEP, spike nine inches deep in your skull, about to be fried alive. Then I won't have to hear your annoying as hell voice for the rest of my life!!! Every hair on the back of Peter's neck stood on end, his skin feeling like pins and needles, his stomach writhing. He'd known he was here, lurking in the shadows. He didn't know how, he just knew...... he....... felt him. They were connected somehow, maybe it was from the gruesome mistake of absorbing Sylar's powers that one time, but he could sense it. Great. I'm a Sylar Detector.

Suddenly he heard movement, running footsteps that were hurrying his way, and before he rounded the next corner, he froze. As he stopped, so did the footsteps. Matt? Claire? Or much more likely....... Sylar? Claire's screaming had stopped, and although the red lights were still flashing danger in the darkness, the sirens did not resume. It was eerily silent. He could hear his own heavy breathing, and his heartbeat pulsed along with the red lights. Man, I wish I had a gun...... he thought tremulously, wishing he'd taken Matt up on his suggestion. You were right, Parkman. I would feel better. He heard the click of a pistol right then, and flattened himself against the wall, breathless. Sylar. Peter could only heal when Claire was around, and who knew how close he was to her. Sylar could kill him, right here, right now. The element of surprise was the only weapon in his arsenal, his last ditch effort to stay alive. You haven't shot yet...... you don't know who I am. He steadied his breathing. It was time to fly into the face of danger. Literally.

He heard one tentative footstep, and he inhaled deeply. Flight then fight. One shot....... This is for you, Claire. Peter felt himself take off like a bullet, just as a fired shot sped by his head, and he collided with someone full force, knocking him down, a sigh of relief as he heard the gun clatter across the concrete. He quickly punched the shadow in the gut, but the shadow moved swiftly, easily pinning him down, hand on his throat. He waited for the finger to rise, or for the gun to fly back into Sylar's hand, but instead, the red lights glinted off of a pair of horn rimmed glasses.

"What the HELL are you doing, Peter!?!? I could have killed you!!!"

"Noah!!! I heard the gun, I thought you were him I-"

"I thought you were Sylar too."

Sylar chuckled maliciously, his voice like silk. "Isn't that adorable? Sorry Boys, but I'm one of a kind. Oh too bad, Noah, just a little to the left, and you would have shot him right out of the air! That really would have made my night! The sight of the two of you trying to kill each other has amused me so much, I'm going to do you a little favour. Besides, the kill isn't worth it, if there's no chase........"

"What the hell does that mean!? What's he going to do!? Peter asked frantically, as Noah slammed a new clip into his magazine, his eyes lethal behind his glasses.

Claire's sobs returned, as if Sylar was moving the intercom microphone toward her. "Claire, don't you want to see your daddy? Yeah? Then run, rabbit........ run."

A loud screech as the microphone fell over, a door slammed, and Sylar laughed coldly. "Claire Bear's on her way, Bennet. Follow the breadcrumbs."

"Breadcrumbs? Wait, why would he let her go!?"

"Blood, Peter. He means the trail of blood."

Peter went to take off flying, but Noah caught him fast, and clenched onto his forearm. "Noah! What are you doing!? We HAVE to find Claire!!!"

"I have to find Claire," Noah said, his voice cracking, tears in his eyes, one leaving a trail on his cheek. "YOU have to find Sylar. He let her go, because she's........ She's not healing....... She's dying slowly- bleeding to death. He's buying himself time while he hunts for Ally. It's a long story, but he injected her with Mohinder's serum, and-"

Peter felt his own tears fall, as Noah's eyes spilled over, his throat too choked up to speak, and for the first time, highly trained, expertly skilled, special agent, Noah Bennet, looked completely helpless.

"Noah....... This is my fault. I-I did this to Claire, I was so STUPID!!!"

"Don't go there, Peter. I was convinced she was safe too, thought I was just being over protective, hyper paranoid. When you're a father, you'll learn there's no such thing. I did this........" Noah's hand shook as he drew another pistol from a hidden ankle holster, handing it to Peter. "And I'm going to stop it. That sick, sadistic bastard dies TONIGHT, but first I'm going to break every bone in his damn body."

"Let me come with you! We'll find Claire, and go after Sylar together!"

"There isn't time. You have to stop him NOW, or he'll get away. I need you to go to the control room. I set up a trap of my own, after his little shop of horrors in Texas, knowing how much he loves the sound of his own voice. The minute he pressed the intercom button, nearly every door and window in the room was sealed shut, and after about half an hour, the room was sucked of all the oxygen. It's not going to last long, and it's certainly not enough to kill him, but it will slow him down. He has about ten minutes of suffocation before his normal brain function returns and he figures out that turning off the intercom opens the door. That's your window."

"Go get our girl," Peter said cocking his own pistol.

Noah turned away, and then stopped. "Peter...... if you have to kill Ally....... do it. It's worth the risk, worth the loss, if it destroys his heart."

**********

Two shots fired at the panel, and the storm door in the foyer opened to complete and total darkness. Noah burst out into the oblivion, his eyes red and swollen, both hands grasping his weapon. He remembered the secret stairwell behind the door closest to the intercom, the one door he didn't seal off. It would have appeared at the time, to Sylar, to lead out into another hallway in the building, when it actually lead outside. That must have been the door he pushed Claire out of. Once closed however, it automatically locked from the other side. Sylar, having set his distraction loose would have tried the far door, and by then the suffocation would have started. Godspeed Peter.

He sprinted through the dirt, and it wasn't long until he came across the foyer guard, his throat slit.

"CLAIRE!!!! CLAIRE!!!!" Noah shouted to the moonless night. It was so overcast, he could barely see a thing, the wind forcing him back, merciless, and he coughed, breathing in the dusty air. He ran around the right side of the building, headed toward the stairwell, his gun raised, intermittently eying the ground for blood trails. If my girl dies, I'm going to kill yours, Gabriel, right in front of you. I'm going to make her suffer, until you're desolate, out of your mind, and then I'm going to make you suffer, torture you until you beg me to take your life. I'm going to make you ask for it, say it out loud.

Noah raced past one of his snipers, dead, fallen from the roof, a bullet imbedded in his forehead, sniper rifle and attached silencer still in his hands. Darren. He ran faster. Another and another, Jimmy, Anthony, Thomas, Adrian, all five of them, murdered, and Noah felt his fury stoked as he realized, sickened, that the bullets that killed them were from their own guns. Sylar had used his powers, and forced them to shoot each other.

"DADDY?" It was faint, still far away, but Noah's heart leapt at the sound of his daughter's voice. Still alive. She's still alive.

"CLAIRE!!!! Baby!!!! I'm right here!!! I'm coming!!!!"

Noah tore through the dirt, kicking up clouds, lowering his gun, tears of joy blurring his sight, as he saw a sudden flash of shoulder length blonde hair, and a petite form staggering toward him.

"CLAIRE!!!! CLAIRE YES, Baby, you're okay!!!! I see you, Sweetheart!!!!"

Noah practically flew to his daughter's rescue, he didn't even feel the ground beneath his feet he was running so fast, didn't even notice he'd dropped his gun. But the closer he got to her, the more paralyzed he felt, assaulted by Sylar's heinous handiwork.

"Daddy!!!! Daddy something's wrong...... I'm not- I'm not healing!!!!" Claire's terrified face was dirty, streaked with blood and tears, a jagged gash the length of her forehead still bleeding, her skin fighting desperately to knit itself back together, but failing. Her dark blue University of Arlington Sweatshirt was torn, and soaked with blood, another huge cut in a half circle on her stomach. A smaller cut on her bottom lip, a few on her chin and clavicle, and one knee completely ripped open, her jeans spattered with even more blood.

Claire couldn't run anymore and she got close enough to Noah to collapse in his outstretched arms. He wrapped them around her as tightly as he could, his legs giving out beneath him, as he clinged to her, and he couldn't fight it anymore....... he sobbed and sobbed, his chest heaving, holding her closer, wiping the blood away from her face with his hand.

"You're okay, Baby, you're going to be okay! I'm so sorry, Claire Bear, I'm so sorry he hurt you, oh my God. Baby, can you forgive me? I promise, I'll never let him hurt you or anyone else ever again."

Claire hugged him back, eyes scrunched, crying into his shirt. "I'm so scared, Dad! I don't understand! Why can't I heal? It never takes this long!"

"I know, I know, Baby. Shhh, Mohinder's working right now to reverse it."

"It hurts........." Claire sobbed harder, and Noah cradled the back of her head. "It hurts so bad! She looked up at him with stricken, glistening eyes. "Dad........ am I going to die?"

Noah felt fresh tears fall, his hand shaking as he smoothed her forehead, stroking her bloodied hair. "No, Claire Bear. I'm not going to let that happen. I love you. I love you so much!"

"I know I-I don't say it enough," Claire managed tearfully, grasping his arm. "But....... I love you too, Dad."

Noah cried harder, and went to pick her up like he used to when she was a little girl, as she started to tremble, her blood dripping, staining the dirt red. He didn't know what happened next. Her shrill scream was like an arrow to his heart, as she was yanked away, pulled from behind, out of his arms as if by an invisible string. Noah's whole body shook violently, hands frozen out in front of him, eyes wide, incredulous, yelling her name as she disappeared from view.

**********

"DAMN it, Renee, you better be DEAD!!!!" Noah hissed furiously into his phone as the line picked up, back inside the outpost. "You had ONE job, KEEP MY DAUGHTER safe from that KILL HAPPY LUNATIC!!! If he hasn't taken off your whole damn head yet, believe me, I WILL!!!!!"

What Noah heard next stopped his heart mid-beat. He thought for sure he was having some kind of traumatized, psychotic break from reality.

"Wow. Overreact much? Dad, he's not dead, just discovering his long dormant love for Nicholas Sparks. C'mon don't be mad, and please don't kill him, I'm fine."

Claire's voice, which not fifteen minutes ago had been rife with tortured sobs, sounded happy and light, as she munched on something.

"Cl-Claire?" He stammered, desperately confused.

"No, it's your other daughter," she joked, crunching in his ear. You, okay? You sound weird."

"Where are you.........?" He asked breathless, his eyes darting back and forth. This...... this wasn't possible.

"Ughhh for the thousandth time, I'm watching a movie, in my dorm, with my friends! There is no alcohol, there are no drugs, there are NO boys!!! Except Renee. And that's your fault. Don't believe me? Send Peter over for a fly by, I'll save him some popcorn."

Noah's hand began to shake with dark intention, the confusion becoming wounded fury, gritting his teeth. This wasn't Claire. But he knew exactly who it was.

"SCREW you, Sylar!!! How much of an idiot do you think I am!?"

A girly laugh, and Noah's blood ran cold, disturbed that Sylar could sound so much like her, know her laugh, her humour, her mannerisms.

"Are you really sure you want me to answer that question? Another laugh and then the voice on the phone got really quiet. WAIT, hold on, why did you just call me Sylar!?!?"

Cut the act, you sick, son of a BITCH, you think I can't tell when I'm talking to my own daughter!? Oh you've got some nerve!!! WHERE'S CLAIRE!? You better hope she's alive. Either way you're screwed, because even if she is, you've PISSED me off SO much, I'm still going to torture your little girlfriend. You killed your own girl the second you touched mine!!!! Deal's off."

"Dad, are you on crack? This is me, this is Claire! What the HELL is going on? Why do you keep calling me, Sylar!? Is he there? Oh my GOD!!! I could kill Peter, he told me Sylar got away, and that you guys were just hanging out!!! I'm an IDIOT!!! I should know by now when my father and uncle "hang out," it usually means the world is going to end!"

"STOP IT!!!!! You conniving, soulless BASTARD, I said STOP IT!!!!! I just watched my daughter nearly bleed to death in my arms, don't you DARE impersonate her now, DAMN IT!!!!!"

"Dad........ you're scaring me. What do you MEAN bleed in your arms? I've been- I've been here the whole night! What happened?"

"Did you talk to Peter?"

"Yeah, earlier, I don't understand."

"Peter thought he talked to Claire, and it was YOU all along. Nice one. Well I hope you've had your fun, because I'm about to have mine."

"DAD!!!! This IS CLAIRE!!!!"

"It's not funny, Sylar. Hang up the damned phone."

"Daddy....... I swear, it's me. I promise."

"Prove it."

"I-I starred in the school play as Cinderella when I was seven, and I asked you to be the prince."

"What, did you ransack her room before you took her?"

"You helped me make butterfly wings out of paper mache for my third grade art project, the first movie you took me to see was The Little Mermaid. For my sixteenth birthday, you got me my first pair of real diamond earrings, and when I had my heart broken by Jason Mays, Freshman Year, you called in sick, and we ate double fudge ice cream and watched old Audrey Hepburn movies all day long.

"Who coached your T-Ball Team?"

"You did."

"What did I tell you the night of your Junior Prom?"

"That I shined brighter than every star in the sky, and if you could have had anyone be your daughter, it would still be me. You said you'd never been proud of anything in your life, until you looked into my eyes that first time. That you felt....... overwhelmed and terrified. Because now you had something to lose.

"Noah?"

Noah grabbed his radio, more tears in his eyes. "Do you have him?"

"No. He's not here, Noah. The doors were still sealed, but the place was empty, I had to break the doorknob to get in. According to the surveillance tapes he was never in this room."

"That's not- That's not possible."

"There's something else."

Noah heard a muffled sound and then a click.

"Hello Boys. Now it's a party, huh? So nice of you to wait up for me."

Sylar, sounding exactly as he had earlier, word for word.

"Noah....... it's a recording. The whole thing. His voice, Claire's screams. It was set on a timer. Right up until our accidental run in, and then it was relayed through a live feed, and a phone taped to the intercom. He played us.

"Dad? Dad are you there? Dad, answer me! If you need me to come I will!"

Noah raised up the phone slowly, his fingers struggling to hold onto it. "That's right, Claire Bear, you got it exactly right......... It's really you, isn't it? Stay-" Noah shook his head, wiping his eyes, trying to remember to breathe again, as intense relief flooded through him. "Stay with Renee, Baby. Promise me. I need you to stay safe."

"But Dad! I can help!"

"Promise me, promise me right now you won't come here, Claire."

"I promise. Dad?"

"Yeah?"

"You stay safe too, okay. Take that conniving, soulless bastard out. For me."

"Language, Young Lady." Noah said, half laughing, half crying. "I'll do it Claire, for you......."

<3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

#sylar x oc #gabriel gray #sylar #claire bennet #noah bennet #peter petrelli #heroes #primatech #angel before the fall

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mentalmimosa · 5 years

Text

no place in the world left to go

They’re at a flophouse in Rome, a hotel so rundown that no fleas would set down their bags, and Tony’s tired, fuck, is he. The kind of tired that only scotch on the rocks, keep ‘em coming and an icy blonde with a nice rack can fix.

But there’s no blonde here. There’s only Bucky, a roughshod sergeant with dirt from the forests of France under his fingernails, still. They’ve been in Italy almost a week.

Which is why when the sergeant turns from the window and pulls off his shirt, the view is pretty but also rank.

“Need a bath,” Barnes grunts. “I saw taps down the hall.”

Tony waves his hand and doesn’t bother to raise his head from the bed. “Sally forth, then, soldier, and be clean.”

Bucky takes the view with him. But sadly not the smell: sweat and blood and something else, something even more pungent. Tony takes it in, lets it out, sticks it. Ah yes, he thinks, weary. That’s grief.

Steve Rogers, the Allies’ last great hope, had been dead for a fortnight, as the Brits say. 14 days, two weeks--whatever way you slice it, he’s dead and now Hitler’s winning the race. It was a propaganda boon. It still is. Tony’s gut says it might be enough to carry Germany to the finish line. There’s the Manhattan thing back at home, but the boys there have been too goddamn slow, and who’s fault is that, now? Not Tony’s. They’d booted him out of their secret club a few years before.

He isn’t bitter about that anymore. Mostly.

He’d loaned himself out to Churchill’s men and that had been a better fit for a while; they’d seen his value, the British, and given him money to play with and men, so many men eager to do what they could for Old Blighty and for Tony, eventually. They fell easy for him, those Englishmen, happy to spread their cheeks for the cause because they all wanted to be chosen as the world’s first Super Soldier: rich men and poor ones, Scottish and Irish and Welsh, each ready to pay for the privilege if necessary and oh, Tony was damn good at convincing them that it was.

But in the end, it hadn’t been his call after all. No, Winston had phoned his friend Franklin and the president had send his choice across the ocean and delivered him to Tony’s front door.

“Hi,” the kid had said, confident despite the skinny legs and big ears. “I’m Steve Rogers, sir. You must be Mr. Stark.”

“What the fuck,” Tony had said through a head full of hangover. “You’re Steve Rogers?”

That’d only made the guy stand up straighter. “Yep. Mr. Roosevelt sent me, sir. I was told you’d be expecting me.”

“Expecting, yes. You? Pffft.” Tony had turned his back and wandered back into the cool dark of his lab. “Fuck no.”

It had taken a lot of convincing and a flurry of all-caps coded telegraphs, but in the end, Tony had gone with it and strapped the kid into his machine and made--if he did say so himself--a hell of a man with a chip on his shoulder when it came to Tony a fucking mile wide. But Tony liked that about him, liked that he was mouthy when the brass wasn’t around, liked that Steve had a bit of temper that even after the serum a little well-placed whiskey could bring out.

“You,” Steve had hissed in his ear the first time Tony got fucked, bent over a workbench with screwdrivers biting his arms, “you are the bane of my existence, Stark.”

It was hard to sass with that thing in his ass, but he managed. “Then get the hell off me, asshole.”

Steve had laughed then, laughed and pulled Tony closer, squeezed his hips tighter. “No. I like screwing you too much.”

It was fun while it lasted, but then, of course, Steve had a job to do, didn’t he? To go and win a goddamn world war.

“You’ll miss me when I’m gone,” Steve murmured that last night, his mouth pressed to the back of Tony’s neck. “You’re gonna miss me so much.”

They were in Tony’s bed and Steve was fucking him through it and Tony was crazy to come, dying for it, but Steve’s fist around the base of his dick was a bitch .

Which was why he’d lied, whispered “I won’t” even though he knew that shit wouldn’t fly.

Steve nuzzled his throat and Steve slammed into him again and again and Steve didn’t make him take it back, didn’t call him on it, didn’t have to, so bald was the lie. And when Steve had come, he'd bitten the meat of Tony’s shoulder and howled and was still spurting when he'd open his fist and muttered “Come” and Tony'd gone firehose in the sheets and screamed for what felt like a week.

“Yeah,” Steve said when they were face to face again, when he was weaving his fingers through the mess on Tony’s stomach and Tony was panting like he’d just run the three-minute mile. “You will.”

*****

They hadn’t seen each other for years after that, not until 1944 when the Battle of the Bulge went south and with it, everybody knew, the Allies’ advantage. Russia had drained Hitler’s forces but the Bulge fiasco gave the Germans the victory they needed to get the homefront onboard with the war effort again.

Times were bad. Tony’s life, too. He hadn’t been able to get the serum to take in anyone after Steve and the Brits had taken his tech and booted him out. He was one wrong bottle of rum from sleeping on the goddamn street.

But then the telegram had come from a holdout area in France: SR WOUNDED. DOCTORS USELESS. COME. And then a set of coordinates, which he had chosen to ignore, because how the fuck was he going to zip across the channel while dodging Nazi arms? He'd comforted himself with bathtub gin and no ice. It was probably a prank, anyway.

In the morning, though, there’d been a knock--10 minutes worth, actually--delivered by a no-nonsense woman bearing Army boots and flak jacket.

“Put these on,” Captain Carter had said brusquely. “We’re crossing the channel in five hours. Tell me, do you have your own gun?”

“Do I--?” He’d blinked in the dusty sunlight she’d brought into his flat. “No.”

She crossed her arms and pointed at his pants, waited until he’d picked them up. “Well. You do know how to shoot at least, surely.”

“Not really.”

“Christ on a cracker. A word of advice, Mr. Stark: don’t repeat that to anyone. If asked, you’re a crack shot with your daddy’s pistol, which I shall provide, and you shall carry as if you know what the business end is for, hmm?”

It’d taken almost a full day to get from London to the middle of some fairytale forest in France where Steve Rogers, that bastard, was trying his damnedest to die. He was gray when Tony bent over him, gray and without that sharp, fuck you light in his eyes.

“Docs can’t do anything for him,” a dark-haired guy crouched by Steve’s head said. “They got the bullets out ok, but the wounds won’t close, even with real tight stitches.”

“Bucky threatened to nail ‘em shut,” Steve croaked.

“And I would have, too, if somebody hadn’t stolen my hammer.”

“Boys,” Tony’d said, easing back the blood-stained dressings. “Shut the fuck up.”

“Steve thought it might have something to do with the serum,” Captain Carter had said on the way over as the boat skipped silently through the waves. “He’s never been cut so deeply before, so he wasn’t sure if there’d been changes to his blood chemistry that might be interfering with the healing process.”

“Shouldn’t be,” he’d told her, repeated to himself again and again. “Not by design, anyway. But intent only gets you so far, huh?”

Now, staring down at the putrid mess that was Steve Rogers’ chest, all he could think of were the hours he’d spent with his head there after they’d worn each other out, after Steve’s steam had blown off and his own fuzzy, righteous anger at the universe had been temporarily pummeled away. For all the rough of their fucks, what followed was sweeter, more goddamn gentle, than Tony’d ever been with another man. Girls, they liked that sort of thing sometimes, to be coddled and cooed at before you booted them out, but the men in Tony’s life had always been of the fuck-and-run variety, and he’d been just peachy with that.

But Steve was a cuddler, a warm, overheated blanket once his balls were empty that wanted nothing more than for Tony to be tucked up in the lea of his arm, their mouths close. Sometimes, that kind of shit led to more sex, but a lot of times, it didn’t; there was just skin against skin and breath over breath and the soft slide of Tony’s fingers up and down the pretty valleys of Steve’s chest.

None of that was left; it’d all been blown to shit.

“Two bullets,” Barnes told him when they stepped away, leaving Captain Carter and the Commandos behind. “Point blank. Stevie never had a chance.”

“How the fuck did this happen?”

Bucky just blinked at him. “It’s war, Stark. Shit like this happens all the time. He turned his back, he got jumped, and now--”

“Now,” Tony said softly. “He’s dying.”

In the end, he figured it wasn’t the serum that was killing Steve, it was the only thing keeping him from dying, and wasn’t that the cruelest irony of them all, huh? The thing that’d made Steve a weapon in the first place had made him its last victim. It’d have been better if he was just a man, a mortal, whose heart wasn’t fueled to fight, whose body would have reached for peace and just let him die.

“It was a longshot, bringing you out here, Tone.” Steve’s fingers had been stiff and frozen in his. “I’m sorry you risked your life for nothing.”

“Pffft, nothing,” Tony said. He didn’t try to hide that he was crying. They all were. “Got to see your mug again, didn’t I?”

Steve had smiled at him, dry lips stretched. “You’ll miss me when I’m gone, won’t you?”

Tony kissed his forehead. “I have already, asshole. This whole fucking time.”

They’d buried him behind the barn where they’d been hiding. Barnes wouldn’t let them leave a cross, so Dugan and Happy built a bairn.

And then there was nothing left of Steve Rogers, of the Super Soldier Project, and the war was getting closer. Tony could hear the German firing line.

“Well, gentlemen,” Captain Carter had said. “That’s it then, eh? Good luck to you.”

“Yeah,” Falsworth said, repositioning his cap. “Godspeed and all that.”

“Hey,” Barnes had said at Tony’s elbow, his eyes dark and his mouth set. “You’re with me.”

Tony startled. “Why?”

A shrug. “Because. Steve would’ve wanted it that way.”

*****

Two weeks of running later and they're in fascist Italy, of all fucking places. It wasn’t much, but it was damn sure a step up from a country crawling with Nazis. Here, there was only an infestation and these were fat and happy, living it up on Il Duce’s hospitality.

“This is better,” Bucky had muttered as they crept through the night streets. “Believe me.”

“Does that mean you’ll let me sleep? for more than two hours at a stretch?"

Bucky’d chuckled and swept an arm around Tony’s waist, a counterweight to keep him upright. “We find an inn that’ll let us in, Joseph, and sure. Knock yourself out.”

But he isn’t sleeping, is he. He’s lying on a bed for the first time in what feels like a lifetime and he’s not asleep. No, he’s listening to the water run down the hall, the pipes creaking and banging, and imagining what Sergeant Barnes looks like with his clothes all stripped off.

He’s grieving and he’s exhausted and somehow, beyond all that, he can feel himself getting stiff.

He’s feeling too much, that’s all. The world is turning upside down and a man he might have loved, whose life he might have ruined, died right in front of him and there are flames flickering at the foundation of the person he was before and the promise of ashes doesn’t frighten him as much as it should. His body and his brain are just overwhelmed and they’re taking it out on his dick. If he just lies here still for a minute, just lies here and breathes, he won’t think about the fact that Steve’s eyes wouldn’t close or that he was still bleeding even after he stop bleeding or that no one beyond the circle who dug it will ever know the location of his grave. He won’t think about the fact that there’s only one bed in this hotbox, one bed and two bodies and how lovely Sergeant Barnes is, the way his voice sometimes hits the same notes as Steve’s. He won’t think about spreading his fingers over clean skin or about Bucky’s back bowing. He won’t think about how much he needs to be kissed. He won’t--

“Stark.” Bucky’s in the doorway down to his shorts. “Taps are free. You should use them.”

“Yeah?” Tony sits up. Too fast, it turns out. “Do I smell that bad?”

That almost-smile again. “Hell yes.”

He leaves his boots by the bed and strips fast in the bathroom. Bucky’s rinsed out his shirt and pants and hung them crooked on the towel bar. When Tony’s done, shivering in the draining tub, he drapes his over the side. There aren’t any towels. It doesn’t matter. They’re the only ones on the whole top floor.

Which means, he figure as he pads soggy down the hall, that if he can jimmy the lock, there’s no reason for them to share a room. No reason except, when he steps over the door jam, Bucky’s thrown back the sheets and opened the windows and is framed in one by the stars and flickering streetlights.

“Tony,” he says. “You should see this. C’mere.”

Outside, the streets are quiet. A few cars, a couple of horses, but if he looks out beyond, towards the horizon, Rome herself is dressed for high times. Victory. Il Duce can probably smell it. God knows Hitler can. Captain America’s disappeared from the scene and the jackboots are marching, marching, and soon, Britain will be in the Axis’s grip. As for the US, South America, the rest: it’s only a matter of time.

Bucky’s shoulder brushes his. “You think we can still pull this out?”

“No.” Tony tips his body until their skin touches again. “Fuck, no, kid. It’s all over now but the shouting.”

“That’s what I figured. I could see it Captain Carter’s face, you know? She never would have split us up otherwise.”

“You didn’t have to drag me along, you know. I’d, uh--I'd understand if you wanted to go your own way now that we’re out of France.”

Bucky turns his head. “Why would I do that?”

“Come on, Barnes. I have to be slowing you down.”

“You don’t get it, do you?”

“What?”

A hand on his face, worn and gentle. “Steve’s gone. I got no place in the world left to go.”

It’s only when Bucky’s lips meet his that Tony understands, like a kick to the gut: You, he thinks as Bucky’s thumb traces his jaw. You loved him, too.

In bed, Bucky’s slow, the kind of slow that makes Tony want to break apart, the kind that turns his body to sugar melted under the heat of Bucky’s mouth and his hands.

“Wish I could be inside you,” he mumbles as he straddles Tony’s hips and leans down to nuzzle his neck. “Wish I had some slick to get you stretched so I could feel you all around me, huh? I bet you get so tight when you come.”

Bucky's hair isn’t as long as Steve’s was back then. He's a lot skinnier--the war diet; his cock’s fatter and he moans so much sofer when he comes. But in the dark, in the growing chill of the coming dawn, it’s close enough that Tony’s heart blurs and then he opens his eyes and sees Bucky's grin, watches Bucky's eyes flutter when Tony's back arches and he gives it up and up and up and then Bucky's saying his name and kissing his face and it isn't ok that Steve's dead, fuck no, it isn't, but right then, as he kisses Bucky back, for the first time in a long time, it feels ok that he's alive.

“We’ll need to leave in the morning,” Bucky says. He’s strumming the lines of Tony’s ribs. “Not at first light or anything, but one night here is enough.”

Tony kisses the dip in Bucky’s chest. “Where we going? Got some place in mind?”

Dry lips on his cheek, the promise of something--what? “Nah. Some place different, hmm? That’s enough.”

#stony #stucky #winteriron #major character death #wwII AU

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narekashi · 5 years

Text

Smol MCs are great uwu

I can do all the guys but I'll split them apart by army and neutral characters, I hope you don't mind!

Guide to all smol MC headcanons

Red Army | Black Army | Neutral Characters

~~~~~~~

Ray Blackwell

• "I've only known you for one minute but if anyone dares hurt you, I will kill everyone and then myself"

• He absolutely adores your height since he's always surrounded by giants so being around someone so much shorter than him makes him feel so relieved.

• He loves to kiss your forehead since he can bend down easily to kiss it. If he feels like teasing you, he'll ask you if you want a kiss on the lips and if you say yes, he would kiss everywhere besides your lips before asking again.

• He hides you behind his cape when he wants to hide you away from the others. Everyone can obviously see that you're under his cape but he denies with a straight face.

• The easiest way to get out of the Cape Cage is to peek out from the cape and scream help before slowly going back into the cape like you're being dragged by a monster. Do that and Ray will end up bursting with laughter and give you a soft kiss before letting you go.

• Overprotective. I mean, super overprotective. You're so smol that he thinks if a strong wind comes, you'll be blown away with it. Seriously really overprotective.

• Hiding in places with just the two of you is easier though! He likes to give quick kisses hidden in small alleyways while running away from Sirius.

• If someone comments about your height in an unpleasant way, Ray's storming over to your side if he wasn't already there. Most of the time, they run off when they see Ray's face already but just in case they don't, he gives them a piece of his mind in a very very scary tone.

• Don't underestimate Ray.

Sirius Oswald

• Little lady takes on a whole new meaning now.

• He finds you absolutely adorable but the height difference the two of you might overwhelm him in the beginning but after a while, he becomes used to it and thinks up a bunch of ways to make things work between the both of you.

• He'll do anything that is hard for you because of your height since he is probably the tallest person in the entire army. Getting cups on the high shelf? No problem. However sometimes, he'll put things justtt out of reach and ask for a kiss before giving you the thing.

• He finds himself unconsciously petting your head like he does with Chutney. It's just that you're so short and he often times can't even see you if you're standing next to him, so he pats and touches your head as a way to reassure him that you're there.

• Sirius, that bastard. He likes to see you struggle to kiss him when the two of you are standing up. Even when he sits down and you stand up, chances are higher that he's still taller than you. If you somehow manage to surprise him with a kiss, he becomes very surprised before laughing and returning a kiss back.

• His clothes are so long that they can reach until your knees with no problem. He often offers you to wear his shirts or cloak when you're cold or when you have nothing to wear. When he sees you wear his clothes that are oversized on you, he can't help but feel a pang in his heart at how cute you are.

• Nothing is changing how cute he thinks you are. Nothing. Don't even try.

• If someone talks about your height in a unpleasant manner however, he politely tells them to stop and says that height does not define who you really are.

Luka Clemence

• Why are you so tiny??? How are you so tiny??? Did someone steal the calcium in your bones????

• Lots of confusion in his head but 99% of thoughts are thinking about how adorable that small of a height is.

• He likes to touch you but he's often too shy to grab your hand or kiss you so he often pats your head instead and since you're much shorter than him, patting becomes much easier.

• He also loves to cuddle you in his lap. He finds that you're just the right height to put his head on your head and bend down to kiss any part of your face. Also whispers some of "I love you"s while covering his face.

• He thinks that you're a fragile object and won't let you carry any bags or do anything dangerous anywhere. No way is he going to let carry anything he deems too heavy for you, even if it's just a small bag of vegetables. You'll have to ask him to stop before this gets out of hand.

• He can and will carry you every where is possible. If you get an injury or need to be carried somewhere, he won't hesitate to carry you up bridal style. Sometimes, he'll pick you up when you two are going to the bathroom when you get up for your morning routine. It's more fun that way and mornings like that are often filled with laughter.

• If there's someone who commenting badly about your height, he avoids confrontation and leaves the place with you. When you two are alone in a quiet place, he embraces you in his arms, telling you that you're great just the way you are and that you shouldn't listen to what they say to you.

Seth Hyde

• The moment he sees you, he's already in front of you and screaming about how adorable you are, perhaps even hugging you very tightly.

• Very eager to go shopping with you. He wants to see you dressed in a variety of clothes all chosen by him. You're his personal model for the day and he'll treat you back by buying all the clothes that look good on you and some of your favorite desserts or food later on when the two of you are done.

• He also loves to pick you up as a surprise! Any time when you least expect it, he'll pop up out of nowhere and start hugging you after he picks you up into his arms. You're so light to him and he can't help but want to see your surprise face when he gives a surprise hug!

• Also, he'll make sure that everything you need is within of your arm's reach. He'll make sure daily necessities or things you use regularly are always reachable for you. If they aren't, he often leaves a step stool behind so you can reach for it when he isn't there; but he forbids the use of the step stool when he is around because he wants to be the one you rely on the most.

• He's sometimes way too afraid in the same bed as you. He's afraid that he would accidentally crush you under his weight. You're as fragile as glass to him, there's no way he's going to hurt you!

•If someone is commenting something bad about your height, Seth goes full overprotective mode. He scolds them saying that's not a good thing to say to someone and that your height doesn't define who you are. You'll eventually have to stop him before he tries to starts to threaten them.

Fenrir Godspeed

• No matter how tall you are, he doesn't treat you any differently than he already does. Frankly, you being short isn't something that crosses his mind often anyways.

• Even so, he makes sure that he moves things around or change some things so that you can feel comfortable in your room and go as far as to change some things in his room since he knows that you'll be staying over in his room for quite a lot of times now.

• One of the things he likes to do is to pick you up onto his shoulders and start jumping up and down. Some may call this childish but it's great fun to him and he can tell that you like it too.

• He tries to make kisses fun for the both of you. He would ask you to go up 1 or 2 steps before kissing you, getting just the right height for the two of you to be comfortable. Some nights, he likes to lift you up onto tables and kiss you there. Sometimes when he's sitting on a chair while you're standing on, he asks for a kiss from you. There's a large variety of what you two can do.

• Remember when I said he likes to pick you up? Another reason he likes it is because you're in his arms and he can kiss you easily. It's a win win for both of you.

• Sometimes he accidentally puts his arm onto of your head thinking that it was a table. He quickly ruffles your hair pretending like that was what he wanted to do in the first place but his sudden awkward whistling tells other wise.

• If someone is commenting bad about your height, Fenrir isn't taking any of that. He points out that you have many other good points and that your height is perfect as it is. He'll even make a big show of kissing you and telling them how much he loves you.

#ikemen revolution #ikerev #ray blackwell #sirius oswald #luka clemence #seth hyde #fenrir godspeed #headcanons #i had to consult people who were actually 5 feet tall to get a grasp of what the guys would do #i'm sorry to all the people i asked who are reading this now ;;

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charlottedabookworm · 5 years

Text

So, this is that regisson au where absolutely nothing changes until Nyx puts the ring on that y’all convinced me to write. Hope you like it and tell me what you think

“Show yourselves, Kings of Lucis.”

The darkness lit up as, one by one, spectral kings appeared around him. He forced himself as upright as he could manage with a bullet in his chest and gods knew how many broken bones – refusing to have this conversation while flat on the ground.

This wasn’t exactly how he’d wanted to meet his ancestors, but he’d make do.

(Though, to be fair, Nyx would have preferred to have never have had to meet them at all. From what Nyx knew, the majority of his ancestors on both sides of the family were complete dicks)

He looked around curiously as the Lucii spoke, telling himself that he wasn’t looking for Regis – for the man who had been his king, who he had been forced to watch die, who had been his—

No, Nyx wasn’t looking for Regis.

“How long,” he gasped out. “How long will you do nothing whilst Insomnia burns?” Nyx tried to force himself to his feet – the Lucii might be spectral giants but Nyx had always felt better about arguing with powerful beings who could easily kill him when he could stand – but ended up doubled over in pain instead. Fucking bullet. Fucking Luche. Fucking traitors. “Old or new, or whatever it is. Summon your wall!” Because what sort of kings were they, that they refused to even defend their city as it was being destroyed, that they would prefer to watch their people die rather than help.

Nyx hated his ancestors.

“You do not command us. Yours is not royal blood.”

And, at that, Nyx blinked. Really. Really? Did they seriously still not know?

So much for being all-fucking-knowing. This entire situation was almost enough to make Nyx laugh, if he wasn’t in so much pain. He hated broken ribs.

“It does not fall to us to guard your city.” Another of the Lucii said and Nyx turned with a look that he hoped portrayed the depths of his scepticism.

Seriously?

“Man is a fool creature, clinging to his past and cowering from his future. Wasting his strength on bygone days.” Yet another of them said, and really what was with all of the leapfrogging? Couldn’t they see that he was dying here? It hurt to have to keep turning to look at whoever decided to speak.

Wow, he thought, staring up at the king with raised eyebrows, bitter much?

“And what future are you wards of?” Nyx forced an elbow beneath him to prop himself up, his voice echoing around him as he questioned these so-called kings who preferred to stand back and do nothing.

Nyx decided that he really fucking hated his ancestors.

“So short-sighted. And cursed to never rise above it.” That was the Mystic, he was sure of it, and it made him want to snarl.

Nyx didn’t need to listen to that from him of all people.

“Wait.” A new figure called out and Nyx froze at a voice that he knew well, the voice of a man that he’d watched die mere hours ago (was it hours, it had seemed like it but now Nyx wasn’t sure). “I have seen what this brave soul is prepared to do.” King Regis, Nyx’s—The King said. “He, too, seeks to safeguard the future.”

“Your Majesty,” he whispered, holding back everything else that he wanted to say by sheer force of will.

Here and now, having watched the man in front of him be murdered by someone who Nyx had trusted, Nyx regretted. He’d never spoken to the King because he didn’t know how, because he’d feared being rejected, because he’d tried to convince himself that he didn’t need or want a… He’d never spoken up because he’d thought he had more time.

Nyx laughed silently at himself. He always thought that he had more time than he actually did, and he never managed to say what he needed to to those that he cared for before it was too late. He was just cursed that way, he guessed.

“Very well, young king. We will weigh your warrior’s worth. But our boon does not come cheap. The cost is a life. His or hers.”

The world itself was still faded away, but Libs and the Princess both sharpened into focus – frozen in the same moment that Nyx had last seen them – and he refused.

“No.” He wanted to scream, but he was so tired. Nyx took a moment just to breathe, drawing on his reserves and pushing the pain from his mind – he was dying anyway, it wouldn’t matter in the long run. “To hell with your power!” He yelled. “I’m not here for it.” Nyx didn’t want the Lucii’s accursed power, wanted nothing to do with the abilities that had been granted to them by Bahamut.

Nyx would reveal himself to be what he was before he did that.

“I only came to tell you,” he said, starting to laugh, his eyes bright with mirth. “You are no kings.” And he laughed, and he laughed, and he laughed.

Nyx couldn’t breathe, and his ribs were killing him – or maybe that was the bullet – but he still couldn’t stop.

He didn’t even know what it was that he found so funny, just that right now it was either laugh or cry and he refused to cry in front of these kings.

“Your worth has been weighed and found wanting.” The Mystic thundered, but still, Nyx couldn’t stop.

Just, the sheer irony.

The irony of this man, who usurped his throne and murdered his own brother at another’s behest, calling him unworthy. Nyx couldn’t even be offended, the mere idea of it was hilarious.

“Now, burn.” Somnus Lucis Caelum ordered, and pain flooded through him like a tidal wave, yet still, he continued to laugh.

Rolling onto his back, Nyx tipped his head back and laughed even as his hand burned. “Unworthy, am I?” He asked between gasps for breath. “Not of royal blood, am I?”

Nyx shook his head, tilting his body so that he could look directly up at the supposed Founder King of Lucis. “Are you really so unable to recognise one of your own line, Great-Grandfather?”

Silence.

His hand stopped burning, the flames gone, and Nyx continued laughing.

“What?”

“I asked you, o’ false king, if you were really so senile so as to not notice one of your own blood.” He gasped out between laughs.

“You mean to barter for your life.”

“No,” he shook his head again, his laughter finally silencing. “No, old man, my life is my own. If and how I die matters not, at this point. I merely wish to speak with the man who sired me.”

And, with that, Nyx let his magic – already boiling under his skin, begging to be used – rise to the surface and stain his eyes green, proclaiming his heritage to all who could sense it.

“Sir Ulric. Nyx…”

He turned his head to look at the figure who spoke, propping himself up once more with what little energy he had left. “King Regis.”

Father, Nyx didn’t say, because his use of that title depended fully on the other man’s decision. Nyx had known of Regis his entire life, had always known of his heritage – even if he’d sworn off of it entirely for a short period of time while young, after learning the truth of the Mystic, and even if he had done his best to keep it hidden from the Lucians – but Regis had just had a second child dumped on him, shortly after his own death, and one that he might not even want in any case.

This, any of it, all of it, was up to Regis.

“Why did you not say anything?” Regis seemed almost sad, or maybe Nyx was just imagining things that he wanted to see.

Nyx shrugged. “It wasn’t my place, your majesty.” He said with a small, sad smile, trying to meet his sires’ eyes behind the new helm. “Besides, I’m just a bastard-”

“You are my son.” The king interjected vehemently. “The circumstances of your birth change nothing.”

He paused, stunned, and blinked slowly. That- that was actually a far better reaction then he had ever dared hope, and even if it was only due to the fact that the man had died, Nyx still couldn’t help but wish…

Shaking his head to dislodge thoughts of could-have-beens, Nyx smiled again, brighter this time but still sad. “I think, your majesty, that I would have liked you as a father.” He dropped his eyes. “I’m sorry…” He trailed off, not quite certain what he was apologising for.

Not trusting the man enough to tell him years ago, maybe. Or not giving them the opportunity to have a relationship as father and son, instead of a King and his glaive.

Or even letting him die, doing nothing but watching as Glauca killed him.

Or maybe it was all of that and more. Maybe it was everything – every missed opportunity, every never-had conversation, every lost chance.

Yeah. Yeah, everything – that seemed about right.

Nyx was just. He was sorry.

Wasn’t all that different from his ancestors in the end, after all, was he?

Regis shook his head, attracting his attention and drawing him out of his thoughts. “No, Nyx, it is I who is sorry. I am sorry that you never felt as though you could tell me.” Nyx went to interrupt, only to fall silent at the look that the King gave him. “Know that I love you and that I am proud of you, Nyx. And tell Noctis that the same is true of him, when you see him once more.”

“Good luck and Godspeed, my son.”

And then, before Nyx could say anything in response, the world flared back into focus and Nyx reacted – tossing Drau-Glauca aside with lightning that came as much from his own magic as it did from that of the ring.

He glanced down at the ring that twinkled on his finger and pulled it off, rolling it in the palm of his hand. “Thank you, father.” He said quietly, clenching his fist around the ring momentarily.

“Nyx?” A familiar voice asked, and Nyx turned to look at his oldest friend and brother.

“Hey, hero, have I got a story for you…”

#my fic #ffxv #snippet #regisson au #nyx is regis' son #nyx ulric #regis lucis caelum #not sure if this is sad or not tbh

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