#i think ive posted a snippet of this before .... maybe or of this arc re: how it relates to kendis

[sechsviciado]

when doves cry

reaperken/touka ; written circa nov/dec 2022

no warnings or ratings really?

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so after my slight reaperken/touka rambling yesterday i figured that i really have nothing to lose from posting this small snippet of a fic (oneshot??) thats been sitting in my google drafts for nearly the past two years; if this is crappy i can always just delete it but ive wanted to contribute a bit more to keep tokyo ghoul tumblr alive so i figure why not?

i felt so smart when i came up with the title since ken was a dove during that entire reaper arc until the events of cochlea. i didnt really pay attention to prince's lyrics in the song but looking back at it now i guess some apply? not really any inspiration was gained from it though, i just grew up with music from the 60s-90s so the title kind of came to my mind and it happened to be a prince reference. not really any ratings or warnings yet?? its nowhere near finished and im not sure if ill even finish it because i feel my writing heavily lacks.

anyway, without further ado

how many months had it been?

it had been months — years — since he recalled feeling this exact way. of course, haise had felt this way too, but it would never compare to the feelings he had for her before that brief period of time where he had lost recognition of everything and everyone who once meant something to him. ironically, it's when he felt most at peace with the butterflies in his stomach, beating against his rib cage and the cage surrounding the longing which could never be released. he’s regained his memories now, but he knew something was different within him even when he laid his glassy eyes on her again on that first visit to :re as sasaki haise. why did he feel so entrapped and yet so wrongly distant even when he had no recollection of her prior on that first visit to the cafe?

it would never be the same.

it would never compare to the feeling of falling in love with her and the realization that came with it. the realization that left him in a state of both a mix of surprise and agitation for days and with a feeling that could only be described as his heart skipping a beat and yet crumbling at the same time. it would never happen, would it? he had chosen to face that reality when he was still his old self, naive and too ashamed of his actions to actually face her after all the pain he caused her as a result of the pain which engulfed his entire life, too. too ashamed to accept his new reality, hiding behind his eyepatch — too ashamed to admit he had fallen in love so easily. he wasn't any different now.

haise may have fallen in love with her through the lens of a reborn figure with a fresh start and no boundaries to stand behind (apart from his obvious shyness and the weird sense of familiarity), but it just occurred by fate. the same fate that had snatched him from her years prior had found a way to bring him back into her arms and make him belong to her once again. he can't help but believe that maybe there was some future destined between them; the embittered part of his heart and soul makes him realize even that destiny would probably be cursed or filled with further strife.

though he supposed that didn't matter now.

not when he was even more distant from her than when he was an amnesiac with no recollection of her apart from the same old feeling of confusing comfort and longing. it's humorous and yet painful to think about how low he'd fallen in this aspect, not even being able to face her once again. despite his older age, he was still just a boy when it came to this same ancient rush, wasn't he? it doesn't matter. she surely didn't want anything to do with him anyways, especially not after everything that he's done. he's betrayed her and everyone who was once a part of him once again, and he’s chosen to accept that painful reality ever since he vowed to stop dreaming and flung tsukiyama off that building. facades all break down eventually.

though he supposed that didn't matter now, either.

he’d be disposed of soon enough before any of this could matter at all — before hinami was to be the one to disappear from the purgatory that was life as a ghoul. there was no heaven and there was no hell; there was no afterlife. heaven was bliss and safety on earth while hell was anguish and pain.

it was selfish of him to hope touka would feel any sort of pain after all of the grief and rage he's put her through time and time again, but he hoped he'd at least be remembered by the person he felt he loved most in this lifetime — the one who hadn't thrown him aside but who had instead built a nest for him as if though her life depended on it. he can't help but wonder… he’s had everyone he's ever known and cared for snatched from his hands by the same twisted fate that led him to await his upcoming death, he doesn't know if the puddle of both coldness and warmth in his stomach is either fear or love.

he'd truly cherish any memory he had of her before he’d be killed.

he vaguely remembers telling her, years ago, that he'd be sad if she died; he just hopes she would be saddened at his death, too.

[grapecaseschoices]

find the word tag 🔍

@laufire-writes tagged me .,... idk when lmao. with the words:  COSTUME, DECAY, MAGNETIC, FAVO(U)R.

COSTUME

Kendis’ lips curved into another grin; this a pale manifestation to the sudden, bright bubble of excitement that threatened to burst through her. “Right!! Like, all right, the whole waking up with someone else’s memories is like some deep shit. But come on! You also wake up a whole superhero! Think about the things you could do! The people you could save? I know this is kind of out there, or maybe it’s not. I mean. Like, come on.” As they’d been saying ‘out there’ was re-defined. Why couldn’t people go and redefine what it meant to put good back in the world? “People could get costumes! Secret identities and like alla that.” 

from an old thread in 2019 where (og) kendis and a heart sibling talk about the sudden influx of past lives & powers.

DECAY

She took a careful step closer, and cocked her head like a bird inspecting the scavenged sight left before it; clinical --- displeased. She huffed out a little laugh, a disparaging sound. “That little bitch.” She closed her eyes slowly and breathed in just as carefully. “Crafty.” Lupe murmured, curious. Crafty yet disrespectful. She supposed that summarized who and what the town had been dealing with for months. “The body isn’t decaying.”

Lupe turned to the group -- she almost looked impressed, still very much displeased, yet impressed.

She mulled her words for a moment before she continued to explain: Even a body set to be preserved by human means was set to decay, eventually. But the means preserving Cass were far from human. It was almost as if magic was holding her death hostage.

another old thing, about last year; a mini-narrative. one of my characters Lupe - whose abilities involve death - is analyzing a body of someone she knows that’s been fucked with magically.

MAGNETIC

She hesitated before her gaze moved toward his, dark eyes met brown, as if unbidden. Even though it had been lured toward his like the attractive sound of 'psspss' to a cat. He asked and she felt compelled to answer; not like a puppet on a string, not like metal to magnet -- but rather a faced tugged close by a warm hand. There was the choice to pull away but was it really a choice when the best option felt like saying yes? 

Their breath caught as something warm filled their chest -- he still smelled like citrus, like sharpness and brightness was at the core of him and couldn't be washed away by the grime of 2023. Something warm tried to fill their chest but panic drowned it over. 

Kendis tried to swallow but took, stumbled, a step back. He had such pretty eyes. And maybe it was because they were smarter now, because Kendis a few years ago would've thought their eyes were open and fallen into their own hubris -- as they had with Dove. 

This time they were -- This was... No.

"I need to go.  So I'm gonna ... leave. Bye." They turned abruptly and began walking away.

listen, this is the best i got. at least this one’s THIS YEAR. formerly titled: ‘The Ugly Meet Cute. Or is it The Cute Meet Ugly?’; originally Fitz and Kendis’ first meeting but we tweaked it, and they ran into each other two times before this (at Pride!) lmao

FAVOR

"I did not know!! Delilah, I swear it upon your mother, I did not know. I am not to blame. I could not lead them anywhere, it was all by chance. It is the gods, it is the gods!!"

"You would not.

"Delilah, please."

"Do not whisper your begging, bitch. Let your gods hear it, let them know, and understand that I will grant their "righteous" rebellion the same leniency that they placed upon my family. Beg me for the mercy that they did not grant Kyrios or our children -- in all the fucking lands, in all the fucking homes, they chose mine to rebel in. My husband may have been ambitious and arrogant, but his connections to the praetor were no stronger than any other man seeking favor. They could have struck any other family. Yet they came to my city. How odd, how odd, indeed."

funnily i have a lot of threads/narratives with the word favor, most of them involving kendis -- and i think a majority of THOSE involving their various past lives. this one centers around one of the most recent ones delilah and is a snippet from a narrative that showed her downward spiral to ‘villainy’ (i mean yes she killed a lot of people - and some of the “wrong” ones - but they killed her family first, so is that BAD?)

tagging i have too many writers (not ACTUALLY complaining) 234rew umm @equusgirl-writes  @writerray @wayhavenots @shady-saint @thelittlestspider @lizzybeth1986 @impossible-rat-babies and really and TRULY whoever wants to (also ignore if you want <33) !!

your words are CRACKED, FAUNA, IMAGE, FREEDOM