#honeykiids

[daily-prompts]

Prompt 1902

This is a submission from honeykiid!

The Noble and Epic Hero vs. The narrator who just doesn't care

[transatos]

My fic (@jrwi-art-exchange) for @honeykiid !

The Sun, the Stars, the Moon: Apotheosis and Its Sky

Peter missed the sun.

Back when he had a job, he'd wake every morning, greet Lizard, and feel the sun's warm rays rising as he walked to work. In the evening, he'd exit the stone-sorting building, and watch the sun set through his own apartment windows, Lizard by his side.

When Prevarus' sky was plunged into inky darkness, that all disappeared. Now, with the sky gone, so was his earlier routine. Now, he woke in the dark, greeted Lizard and Rumi and Thanatos, and they would begin traveling. Some time after wandering through woods and streams and valleys, they would become too exhausted to walk further. That, or Peter would stumble a few too many times, or Thanatos would start shutting down.

And so Peter would sit down, wish Lizard and Rumi and Thanatos a good night, and promptly fall asleep. Gone were sunrises and sunsets. Now, cold wind and darkness surrounded him.

It was just so cold, too. With the sun gone, wind whipped faster, and temperatures had significantly dropped. Ludite or some other strange magic kept Prevarus from freezing over, but some moments got uncomfortably close to it.

Peter had managed to keep his old travelling cloak from his possessions in Raans, but he hadn't salvaged much else. Before he met Rumi and Thanatos, he'd scavenged a tattered coat with a furred hood and sleeves. Despite the mud it was caked in and the various rips all over it, Peter felt it'd served him well.

Even with the coat, though, Peter couldn't hide his frustration. His routine job was no longer a constant, and he was close to freezing on the daily. He endlessly shivered, and his teeth never stopped chattering. The closest he had felt to the warmth of sun's rays in the past few months had been the piercing, burning power of Exandroth merging with his body.

---

Rumi and Thanatos notice, because of course they do. At first, Rumi takes every opportunity to bundle Peter up in his cloak, and stays close to him to provide some companionship. The coat helps with the wind and Rumi's presence definitely warms Peter's cheeks, but Thanatos… Thanatos takes more direct action.

Thanatos hunts. Every bear, every fox, most mammals they come across, there is a very good chance Thanatos jumps on it. He skins the bodies for pelts every night until he shuts down, until Peter is buried in mounds of patchwork furs. At some point, Thanatos takes Peter's coat from him. Ignoring his protests, and using a sewing kit Peter recognizes as definitely Rumi's, Thanatos sets to work sewing pelts into the inner layers and repairing the tears. When it's done, the warmth in Peter's chest is more than just from the coat.

He sobs uncontrollably, managing to hug Thanatos through the tears. And as Thanatos pats him surprisingly gently on the back, Peter feels as though the sun may not have entirely disappeared.

He sets to work painting stones, and soon Thanatos' pouch is full of painted rocks equal in number to the furs Peter was buried in. Thanatos pockets every rock gently, with surprising precision, as if each one is a fragile piece of glass.

---

As well as Rumi hides it, they find a different part of the sky to miss, Peter discovers.

"I wish we still had the stars." Rumi says one night. It's quiet, and she tells it like a forbidden secret, a rare moment of openness. She's leaning against a tree, watching a small fire Thanatos built for them. All three are sitting around it. "My coat just mimics constellations, but I miss the real ones. The moon, too. She was a comfort." A moment of consideration. "Did you ever have favorite constellations, Peter?"

Peter thinks deeply before answering. "There was one I found… it looked sort of like Lizard. I used to try to show him it every night, but he, uh, wouldn't really look up. It was alright though. I knew he knew."

As if to prove a point, Lizard looks up from Peter's bag and curls up at his side.

"I once had fond memories of the stars. They were considered a welcome sight where I was raised." Thanatos' eyes flash. "They used to say it was the gods' many eyes watching us. If that was true, I am glad to see them gone."

"I think they were ludite. When the sky turned all dark, the stars rained down… as ludite. And we got magic." Peter reasons.

Rumi considers this. "I used to think of them as light from a place even above the gods. If the stars were the gods, ludite may have been the only good thing they did."

"The only good thing a god could do is die." Thanatos says. From him, like so many of his conversations, it is stated as fact first, opinion second.

Exandroth surges in Peter's brain, and he barely holds him back from takeover. He manages a nod instead.

"Right you are, Thanatos." Rumi leans back up against the tree, arms behind her head.

Peter turns to her. "We'll see the stars again. I believe in us." It's earnest, almost necessarily so - they have to cling to something out in these woods.

"Thank you, Peter. That is a comfort to hear." Rumi smiles softly. "I'll take first watch."

"Thanks. Goodnight, Rumi. Goodnight Thanatos." Peter says.

"Goodnight." Thanatos rumbles.

"Sleep tight, Peter, Thanatos." Rumi nods at them each, and turns to rest his sword on his lap.

And the quiet moment passes, and their travel continues.

---

A few more periods of darkness later, Peter musters up the courage to ask Thanatos his own feelings about the sun. The question was already posed to Rumi, who gave a story of an adventurer in a desert and not much else - but Peter's curious about what Thanatos thinks.

He can practically hear gears turn inside Thanatos' skull as he mulls over the question. Peter waits.

After due consideration, Thanatos answers him. "Peter, one of the greatest crimes of the gods is stealing our sun. That is not an item anyone can or should possess. The grief that it has caused you is understandable."

"Oh. Thank you."

"We have talked often of the sky," He continues. "I do have fond memories of it, also. Particularly of the moon. She was a constant, even when I couldn't see her. She is the closest thing to a god I could now think to appreciate." Thanatos tilts his head, examining Peter. "Why do you ask?"

Peter smiles up at him, and makes a mental note to paint another rock with a moon. "I was mostly curious. The sun and the sky have a lot of meaning to people, so I wanted to ask you too. I hope we'll get to see it return together, Thanatos."

He nods. "I hold this hope as well."

---

Conversations about the sky's predicament and history move on, and apart from those two rare moments, Thanatos and Rumi don't let on much more.

But when Zuen is defeated, Peter adds Thanatos' memory to the stars. Rumi adds a mark for him on the moon. And when a new day arrives, Peter can't help but think of Thanatos when the sun's rays refract across the clouds.

Far away, a metal man looks up from his book and begins to paint a sunrise on a stone wall.

[un-bean-lievable]

Thank you so much for commissioning me @honeykiid-main! I really enjoyed working on this, your character is really cute!

If you're interested in commissioning me you can find my information here;

[heartofg0re]

sorry to bother but what happened to your honeykiid blog?

hi! i password locked it because im no longer into jrwi or using tumblr at all really :/ i dont think ill ever come back to it but i didnt want to delete it so this is my way of retiring the blog

[unsonge]

met these beautiful girls on the Emerald Isle 

[astraleulogy]

farmers market peaches 🍑✨ // ig: anmarable

[kwiecie]

26.05.2018

[snailobituaries]

reeeeeeally old photos from my trip to Toronto! This was the Tom Thomson exhibit at the Art Gallery of Ontario.

[de-i-ji]

adventures with friends 🗺

[honeykiids]

[gracefulbee]

sunset in maine 🌸

[curlyrena]

🌼☀️🌻✨🐞🍂 ig: curlyrena

[transatos]

Here's my spook for @honeykiid! (@jrwi-secret-spooks):

This was a terrible idea. Lizzie had voiced as much when Chip suggested it, wiggling his eyebrows and nudging her shoulder at least five times.

But Jay had overheard him and gotten far too excited, and here Elizabeth Lafayette, Captain of the Grandberry Pirates, leader of the anti-Navy war effort was: Standing in front of a dilapidated building labeled in large, bold letters as "The Harrowing Halls of Haunting Horrors". The alliteration didn't make it very intimidating, but -- and here she sighed, and looked over at her girlfriend next to her -- Jay looked positively ecstatic.

Chip was lucky he'd managed to find some excuse to meet them at the end of the whole thing. She really wanted to kick his ass right about now.

Instead, rolling her eyes, she nudged Jay's shoulder and attempted to start some conversation. "Why do you even like haunted houses? Don't we see way scarier shit all the time?"

Jay stopped in her tracks, turning to glare at her. "Okay-- first of all, I'm going to take that as a genuine question and not a diss at what is literally one of the best forms of entertainment. Secondly; yeah? So? It's fun! People jump out around you, and you don't even have to worry about getting hurt!"

Lizzie shrugged. "I'd much rather just get to punch them."

"If you do that we'll get kicked out, so don't, actually. Look, if you're scared, we can--"

"I'm not scared!"

Jay stared at her. Lizzie stared back, defiant.

A slow grin spread across Jay's face. "Awesome. So let's go!"

Before Lizzie could process any of the next few seconds, Jay grabbed her hand, tossed a security guard a few silvers, and pulled her through the door and into the building.

And here was where the trouble started. For one, Jay didn't let go of her hand, and Lizzie was fighting not to either crush it in terror at the first zombie that jumped out -- she decidedly did not like dealing with creatures that literally fell apart at the seams -- or let go of her hand and bolt the other direction. Jay was also giggling the whole way, and absolutely not defending Lizzie in any capacity.

A few minutes in, Jay started commentating on the whole experience. "And this one makes a run! He swings! He misses! Huge loss for the bloodied gnome with no left arm!"

Lizzie, for her part, took it upon herself to add additional theories. "And where the fuck might he have lost that arm? I personally think a previous guest might have taken it! Damn intruders!"

Jay laughed, knocking into her and stumbling.

It was getting better. The headless creatures and the mummies running at them weren't as terrifying. They'd both seen worse.

She wouldn't have usually signed up to be scared, jumped out at, or see bloody body parts hanging around, but as she fought down too many screams to count, she heard Jay laughing with her, yelling, and talking over the noise. She let herself enjoy the chaos just a bit. The whole "suspension of disbelief" stuff was growing on her.

And despite herself, despite the growling and yelling of the things in the house... Lizzie found herself smiling. It was going well, really. Jay was enjoying herself, the flickering lights had calmed a bit, and they were halfway through, stepping out of the first building. It could only get better!

…At least, until Lizzie looked up at the label on the next portion. It included a bunch of vines and branches angling over one another in an arch, yellow leaves spelling out "Clown Clearing".

Lizzie was absolutely, 100%, not afraid of clowns. At all. They did not frighten, terrify, or cause her to panic in any way. And she was not frozen right outside of the entrance of "Clown Clearing" -- the alliteration was not helping -- trying to convince herself to go in.

Jay, unfortunately, caught on pretty quickly. "Hey, what's the stop? Need to-- oh, hey, hello?" She waved her hand in Lizzie's face.

Lizzie shook out of her trance. "My bad. Yeah, just... catching my breath." She snuck a few glances at the sign again. Chip was waiting for them at the exit of it all. She thought of what he would say if he found out she hadn't gone into the damn clown zone.

Jay caught on. "Right. Sure. Hey, if you're tired we can go grab some cotton candy or something, or--"

Lizzie shook her head, violently. She stood up. She marched forward. She was going to get through this. (Chip was not going to hear about this). She was going to face her fears, and save her pride. She could face this one house.

Jay ran after her, catching up quickly. "You sure about this?"

Lizzie nodded, silently.

"Oookay. Let's fucking do this, then! Man, this brings back memories." Refusing to elaborate, Jay walked through the arch. Lizzie walked at her side, tossing an additional silver to the next guard.

A clown immediately jumped out at them. Jay politely ignored Lizzie's scream.

After three other clowns also decided to jump out, Lizzie went running. She sprinted between the trees as painted faces yelled, waved, and grabbed at the trail, one even giving chase for a few dozen meters.

Jay sighed and resolved to run after her, catching up after a minute. "Hey!" She yelled. "This is literally the opposite of how this works! Do you want to slow down for just a second? Holy shit!"

Lizzie slowed her pace slightly to jump over a decapitated clown head. "The faster I run the less clowns I see! It's a win-win situation!"

"This is meant to be fun, dude!" Jay called, dodging a tree covered in blood.

Lizzie nodded, whipping through the underbrush and around a bend. "It is! We're racing!"

"Are we really going to do this the whole fucking way?!"

"Hey, why the fuck not!" Lizzie bolted ahead, ducking under a clown wig on a pike.

Jay slowed slightly, trying to catch her breath. "Okay. Sure, yeah, why the fuck not?"

A clown jumped out. She waved at it, then sprinted forward again.

By the end of the path, and with only about five additional screams from up ahead, Jay caught up with Lizzie. Lights around the area suddenly flickered on and strobed. They exchanged a glance before simultaneously losing any fear they had, laughing as they ran. They both tumbled over one another through the final arch, gleeful.

After a brief respite, they both became quiet, Jay dropping to the ground.

"So, while I hesitate to ask…" Jay rolled onto her side, gazing up at the starry skies. "What'd you think? First impressions of a haunted house?"

"Holy shit," Lizzie gasped, doubled over and trying to get air into her lungs. "We have to do that again next year."

[indhyca-blog]

i miss spring :((

[tmmyhug]

This is a s2 ctommy song https://open.spotify.com/track/3mCZeIMdiKNaJMPEewGXjU?si=F2Gz6nLhTzaXKbXb7_mWmg

YESSSS SO TRUE i like the original sia version better though but yeah. yeah.

[unsonge]

Oh deer