#it sees eclipse as its child

[ask-the-celestial-family]

(Oh. Oh- Uh oh. I can only imagine how well Eclipse and everyone else is going to react to Moon's KillCode gaining sentience... And it won't be fun..) Do you really think that'll work? That is basically doing the same thing that one Sun and Moon did in one universe- and one ended up braindead and the other living through a glitched backup. You can't just remove a core part of your 'brain' without consequence. -🐟 Anon

Yes I can. I will destroy. That piece of code will be the first, that quivering whore's baby second, then the blue one's son. Kill their children first, leave them vulnerable. -Eclipse🔥

[socksandbuttons]

Question, is Bean Bloodmoon even allowed near the kids inside the daycare?

So far it seems:

Bean Lunar is adorable...

Bean Eclipse is a menace...

Bean Bloodmoon is a whopping Holy #@$&

You know you pose a good question. Something tells me he's probably not allowed in the daycare when its OPEN. Just a safety precaution, more or less. Sun would like it if he wasn't at all but also I wanna take these two. and Make them unlikely friends. But later maybe. Please do NOT have Eclipse and Bloodmoon at the same time in the daycare while its open. It's not good for anyone. Killcode learns the hard way.

[animationismycomfort]

would y’all be mad at me if I was and have been working on a fankid sth AU project

[spacedace]

Had a dc x dp brain worm, feel free to use as a prompt <3

Sidenote, I decided to get fancy with the Ancients titles because of course I did lol

Shifting Where = Space (Danny)

Eternal When = Time (Clockwork)

Ever Onward = Speedforce (Ellie)

---

Bruce watched the footage again.

And again.

Again.

It didn’t make sense.

A week ago every television, radio, computer, phone - even the LED billboards - had been taken over to deliver a message. Across the United States. In every territory it held. Every military base. Down in the depths of the oceans where American submarines tried to creep past Atlantian patrols. In the endless cold white of Antarctica. Even far above in the International Space Station. Any place the United States Government had control over, any place one of its citizens found themselves. There was the message.

The face of an entity, human in shape but not in form. Hair as gleaming white as starlight, eyes bright as the twisting dance of the Aurora Borealis, skin as cold and blue as the tail of a comet. The entity wore armor as black as the depths of space with a crown to match, the later glinting and shifting with the twisting birth and death of galaxies. A cloak of nebulae danced down his shoulders, eclipsing the world beyond the entity entirely.

He named himself, jaw tight, expression serious.

High King Phantom of the Infinite Realms.

The Shifting Where. Son of the Eternal When. Father of the Ever Onward. His Epitaphs many and ever growing. The True Balance. The Bridge Between. The Devourer of Dark. The Last Child of Between. The Great One.

King of the Dead. King of the Infinite Worlds. King of so much more than Bruce had ever even known was possible.

King who had declared war. Who marshaled his endless armies. Who spoke of warnings, of efforts to reach a peace, of trying again and again and again to find a way to not plunge into violence and bloodshed. All things living come to call him King in time, he had no want or need to go out and hurry that along. But there were no options left to him now. He had tried for peace. He had been denied.

He would not see his people suffer any longer. Would not see those he’d sworn to lead and protect imprisoned by fools who had sworn themselves enemies to all the afterlives. Would no longer permit the vicious cruelty to continue.

The message was a final warning.

A final offer.

Three days, Phantom said. The United States government would have three days to release their prisoners, to begin the process of dismantling the laws that made death itself an illegal act.

If they refused, he would lead his endless armies personally in the war to come.

It had not been an idle threat.

Three days after the message, after Bruce and the rest of the Justice League scrambled to try and figure out just what it was it was all about, after Justice League Dark’s members shakily took turns explaining just how powerful the being that had gave that message was and how much danger the world was in should he and his armies march upon their world, war came.

Of all places, it began in a town in Illinois.

The sky shattered like broken glass above, Lazarus Green beyond, and the Dead poured out.

It started in Illinois.

It did not end there.

Bruce watched the footage of it all, eyes burning as he watched every second of CCTV footage, every shaky phone camera video, every news broadcast.

Most of them looked human enough. Changed in death, but recognizably human once. A pair of glowing teenagers on a motorcycle, a writhing shadow twisting about at their command sweeping chaos upon the battlefield. A young woman dressed to perform with hair a literal flame, burning bright blue and snapping furiously as she played devastation upon her enemies with her guitar. A child with corpse gray skin and luminescent green hair, flickering in and out of Bruce’s ability to see as if fighting against a law of existence to be visible, screaming orders to a skeleton crew from his place on deck of a 1700s ship that sailed through the sky, disappearing into clouds before raining down attacks from above.

There was more. Glowing skeletons dressed in the fashions of war spanning every culture going back millennia. Robots with weapons far beyond the technology they had even in the League. Creatures of myth and legend. Things of nightmares.

Leading them all, as he had promised, was Phantom.

He looked younger, smaller. Just a boy, really, a gangly teenager that hadn’t quite finished growing into himself. One holding power beyond anything Bruce could ever imagine, but still just a child as far as he could see, no older than Tim who’d just graduated high school. Frantic research found Phantom appearing as far back as human history, but those sightings had to have been after his death. Bruce can’t help but wonder how young the boy had been when he died, how much of that youth still clung to him through all these eons.

It wasn’t something he’d let him self consider normally, not with something like this.

A dangerous unknown appearing without warning and attacking with unimaginable power and seemingly endless forces. It was something that would normally eclipse everything else. Something that would make Bruce put aside the ache at seeing a face so young twisted in rage.

But.

He watched all the footage.

Civilians were put in the crossfire. Were shot at and endangered. Were left terrified and scrambling for safety in buildings that were rapidly being torn away by stray artillery.

But never by Phantom or his armies.

The dead, in fact, went very far out of their way to ensure civilians weren’t harmed. Sweeping people up out of the way of falling debris. Shielding them from attacks that would have most certainly killed a normal human. Some dead even helped evacuate, ushering a frightened and panicked populous to safety as gently as they were capable of. Some of the less human creatures - giant bear-like beings with horns and fangs and ice edging their burly frames - even rushed forward to offer medical aid.

When the sky shattered open and the armies of the dead swept in, they ignored the town below. They focused instead on what was discovered later to be the base of a secretive government agency. The dead’s fight focused on those individuals in sharp white suits, bearing weapons capable of actually injuring King Phantom’s people.

It was these agents that brought the fight to the streets to Amity Park. That fired recklessly and without thought or care to the casualties they could inflict. That didn’t seem to care if they killed a hundred civilians if it meant hurting just one of Phantom’s soldiers.

Bruce watched all the footage.

And again.

Again.

Phantom had declared war.

Phantom spoke in his message of being out of options, of attempting peace. Phantom gave three days time for the release of captives. Phantom lead armies who fought viciously but never once willingly harmed civilians.

Phantom declared war, but he didn’t want it.

“Amanda Waller has reached out.”

Bruce didn’t turn his attention from the screens before him, eyes burning as he followed Phantom as the King dove away from the middle of locked combat to shield a child from a pulse of green energy from something like a grenade another agent in white had carelessly thrown. The child was crying but unharmed. The left pauldron of Phantom’s armor cracked and shattered from a direct shot from the enemy he’d just been fighting that he’d turned his back on, a glowing green liquid uncomfortably like Lazarus Water dripped down from a smoldering wound.

Clark stepped up to stand beside him as he watched, face worn and tired. The League had missed the first battle, but they’d been quick to appear at the rest. Phantom and his army ignored them unless they put themselves purposefully in the way of the fight. They were, as Justice League Dark had warned, vastly out powered by the entities fighting. A hulking giant knight made of shadow riding a nightmarish steed had driven Clark six feet down into the dirt when he’d attempted to make his way to Phantom directly to try and talk to the king.

The depth Clark had ended up felt like a warning of what would happen if he tried to get close to the king again.

It probably was.

“She said they have intel for us.” A faint twitch of fingers, jaw clenching, voice flat in that way that told Bruce his old friend was fighting back anger with everything he had. “That she has options for how to deal with the insurgence.”

Bruce shut off the monitors.

He’d seen enough.

Now was time to get answers to just what, exactly, Amanda Waller and the US government had done to cause the Dead to rise and rage.

---

Part Two Part Three Part Four

[derpy-dogs-n-cats]

Courtship Misunderstanding.

Main Masterlist

Avatar Masterlist

Neteyam x Fem! Metkayina! Reader.

Warnings: Talks about mating, implied sexual themes.

Summary: Neteyam finds out that he's still unaware of some of the customs of your people.

W/C: 2.5k+

Neteyam slowly rises from the water to the shore of the village of Awa’atlu, water pouring out of his hair as he drags the giant eel from the cord he’d brought along and tied around the base of its jaw. Stepping out of the water properly and turning to his left, he rests the end of the long cord in his hand over his shoulder, feeling satisfied at the sound of the heavy drag of the massive weight of the eel leaving a deep wet path on the sand.

It’d taken him days of exploring every inch of the waters, starting with the reefs and opening to the deeper ocean but he’d finally found a catch that was worthy of being gifted to you; an eel larger than him and almost as wide as his torso that quite frankly had him struggling, though he tried not to show. Neteyam watches how the sand suddenly turns dark, having him looking up and seeing that eclipse had started with nighttime falling upon them, urging him to walk faster.

Once he reaches the docks, he crouches down and squeezes his arms under the eel and between the sand, lifting it with a small grunt and placing it on the elastic sheet that creates paths to the marui. Placing his hands next to the eel firmly, he hoists himself up and lands on his knees on the path with a light bounce, taking the eel back in his arms and standing back on his feet, carrying it much like a newborn to further impress you with his strength..

His legs start walking the path to your family’s marui, careful that the eel doesn’t somehow leap out of his arms with the light bounce of his feet. As he walks to his destination, he crosses paths with a few metkayina walking by him, all turning around and eyeing him and his catch as they walk away, having him feeling somewhat giddy; the same feeling you elicit on him whenever you so much as look at him, and when you smile upon noticing him already looking at you…

He feels as if though his heart could just about explode. You make him feel just as innocently happy as when he was a child, back before the sky people returned, back before his father laid more weight on his shoulders, before he had bigger responsibilities, all of which his brother noticed which led to him being called ‘whipped’. He had no idea what it meant, but if this is what being ‘whipped’ felt like, he didn’t want it to stop.

Finally, he reaches your family’s pod and peeks in, standing at the corner of the entrance and seeing you sitting on your calves in front of the firepit at the center, using the light to weave a choker with thin vines and watching as you meticulously add a small white pearl into it, following an intricate pattern which will no doubt match the white freckles that beautifully adorn your body, the ones he can’t wait to trace patterns on.

“Neteyam!” You greet with a smile, having looked over and caught him staring at you. Your voice snaps him out of his trance and has him returning the same smile as you stand to approach him, having set down your choker. “Wow, your parents must be proud.” You compliment, eyeing the eel. “No, this… this is for you.” He smiles softly. “Me? Are you trying to feed my whole family?” You ask jokingly to which his tail nearly thrashes around excitedly.

“Yes.” He sheepishly answers. He knew you’d understand that he’s courting you, gifting you a hunt large enough to feed your entire family to prove he can provide for you and more once you have a few little ones running around. “Thank you so much.” You thank in a soft tone before being interrupted. “Neteyam.” The sound of your father’s voice speaks his name, having them looking at each other followed by your father hand gesturing that he sees him with Neteyam bowing his head.

“I see you.” He says, suddenly very nervous on your father reacting to his eldest daughter being courted. “What is this?” Your father waves his hand to the eel, wondering what he was doing with it in his pod when his family’s marui was on the other side of the village. “Neteyam caught this for us.” You answer with a warm feeling in your chest while said hunter’s ears lightly flick back in confusion. Just the presence alone of a na’vi outside of the family with a large catch should let him know you were being courted.

Maybe your father just didn’t want to accept the courting, was his catch not impressive enough? Surely he could understand that anything bigger wouldn’t have been able to be delivered, it was hard enough to carry the one in his arms. “Very well then.” Your father nods and takes the eel in his own arms with more ease than Neteyam, the small insecurity blossoming in his stomach subsiding the strain in his biceps despite being understandably younger.

While the eel is set near the fire, ready to be cut and cooked, the sound of your mother’s voice speaking your name enters your ears. “Mother.” You greet and approach her and Aonung, receiving a half hug from her due to your baby brother being carried in her other arm. “Neteyam brought us something.” You continue to boast with a smile, briefly pointing at the eel by the fire before taking the baby in your own arms.

Ronal looks at the eel with slightly wide eyes, the impressed expression filling Neteyam with a sense of pride and mostly relief, though unbeknownst to him, her surprise was due to never having seen one of the reef eels so big, given that they’re usually no larger than a na’vi’s forearm. Your mother gestures that he sees him as a thanks to which he responds while your older brother looks away in annoyance, refusing to return the gesture.

Your mother gives a small pinch to his arm with a more than fear-inducing look on her eyes, forcing him to return the gesture. “Aonung, go bring your sister.” Your father’s voice says to which he follows after letting out an exasperated sigh, picking up his pace once he realizes Tsireya’s swimming with Lo’ak. “Come, eat with us.” Your mother invites Neteyam to the pod while your father cuts the eel as the younger male lets out a quiet relieved sigh at his offering being accepted.

You take his hand in yours and lead him in with a smile, pulling him down to sit next to you as he lets out a nervous breath through his smile, the flustered expression not going unnoticed by your parents who share a knowing look with each other, staying quiet to the matter. The rest of the night goes smoothly, your parents cooking the eel as they make small conversation about the village, your baby brother napping in your arms as you talk with your sister and occasionally share a few words and smiles with Neteyam…

The only one who looked unhappy was Aonung with the seemingly permanent annoyed look he bared on his face, though you suspected he was never happy and didn’t give him much importance in the time being. Though while the night felt soothing to you, Neteyam felt as if though he’d already had four heart attacks. The entire dinner he’d been anxiously waiting for the conversation to be had with your parents, about whether or not they approved of him.

He waited as patiently as he could for your parents to start the conversation on the matter, for them to voice their concerns if they had any, if they bestowed their blessing on the two of you becoming mates, make sure that you’d be taken care of properly, anything, but it never came. So as the end of the meal neared, he assumed that your parents simply trusted him enough that they felt as though nothing needed to be said on the matter.

“Ah.” You open your mouth in a way to encourage the baby in your lap to follow suit and open his own mouth, placing a small piece of meat in and smiling as he chews. Neteyam eyes you feeding your brother, a soft smile on his face at the sight of how you treat babies, unable to stop himself from thinking about how you would treat your own baby. Thoughts of him coming to your shared marui only to see his beautiful mate carrying his baby, your baby in your arms floods his mind, a warm feeling settling in his chest.

While you bring another piece of meat to your brother’s mouth, you remain sat unaware of how Neteyam’s, without much thought, tail slowly slides to the side behind you and reaches for your own, gently wrapping around it as best as he could. A gasp almost instantly leaves your mouth, accidentally dropping the meat in surprise with your eyes widening. The sound of the baby on your lap letting out a huff followed by crying snaps you out of your shock with your eyes opening even wider.

“Oh, I’m so sorry tìyawn.” You apologize as you pick up the meat from your lap, readjusting his back to your stomach and trying to feed it to him again only for him to sloppily grab it and throw it away, your parents now having their full attention on you yet unable to find the cause of the disturbance. “Come, give him to me.” Your mother indicates, stopping your actions of lightly bouncing the baby on your leg while patting his back.

You hand him over to your mother and watch how she almost instantly gets him to stop crying while you push the slight insecurity away by remembering how she’s already had another three kids to practice with, of course she would’ve mastered it already. The sudden absence of the tail that was previously wrapped around yours has you thinking back to the recent incident while Neteyam’s stuck feeling somewhat embarrassed of the mess, not having meant to surprise you so much.

You think back to how his tail wrapped around yours and feel yourself getting flustered, not knowing what to think of the action. Metkayina didn’t wrap their tails with each other, in fact, you didn’t wrap them around anything, your tails not being thin enough to offer the flexibility to do so, but for some reason, despite not being familiar with said action and not knowing what it meant, it felt… intimate.

Your father clears his throat and breaks you out of your overanalyzing thoughts, making you look at him. “It’s gotten quite late, it would be best to leave.” He suggests to which Neteyam’s ear perk up to attention. “Yes.” He quickly agrees and stands, and while the action makes you think that he feels as though he overstayed his welcome, in reality, he’s quite eager for what’s to follow. “Sleep well.” You say to him.

His face contorts in confusion as he takes in the sight of your innocent eyes looking at him, remaining sat. “Is something wrong?” Your sister questions before you can, all eyes suddenly on him and his confused expression as he wonders what’s happening. Why weren’t you standing to leave with him? Why did your parents seem oblivious to what was happening? Why did everybody seem oblivious to it?

You should all know what follows next, having finished the meal from the catch that he’d brought for you, the only thing that was left to do was for you to leave with him to somewhere more private so you could mate with each other. Had you changed your mind after accepting his catch? Had he somehow overstepped when he wrapped his tail around yours? “Neteyam? What’s wrong?” You ask with genuine concern, confusing him even more.

“… Nothing- I…” He pauses. What was he supposed to say? Where would he even start? “Rest well.” He returns your words before leaving, you and your family sharing a look that lets each other know that no one understood what happened either. The walk to his family’s marui feels like a blur, hundreds of thoughts and questions unanswered in his head which feels as if though it's just about ready to start spinning in confusion.

“Neteyam, what is wrong?” He hears the concerning voice of his mother ask, realizing that he hasn't just reached his family's marui, but is now pacing in their pod, all eyes on him once again. “’I… I do not know.” He manages to get the words out of his mouth, his legs still pacing him around. “How can you not know?” Lo’ak asks while his pacing brother starts breathing faster. “Boy.” Jake almost shouts, finally managing to get him to stop pacing and look at his family.

“What’s going on?” He adds. “I… I show up to Y/N’s marui, I gift her a huge eel- bigger than me, she accepts it, I have dinner with her family… and they don’t say anything!” He explains with frustration, taking his family by surprise, seeing the usually calm and collected eldest starting to lose it. “It took me three days to find the right catch, and- and when I get up to leave, she doesn’t come with me and acts like she doesn’t know what’s happening.” He rushes the words out, breathing heavily by the time they’re out.

“Neteyam…” Neytiri speaks his name yet stares at the ground as if pondering about something, wondering where she should start to explain to her son what happened. “Sit.” She ushers him closer with a soft voice. After hesitating for a few seconds, he steps closer and kneels in front of her, watching as her mouth opens and closes a few times as if searching for the right words before answering the question he’s so desperately been searching an answer to.

“These are reef na’vi, different na’vi court in other ways.” She explains, the slow widening of his eyes showing the realization dawning on him. “… What?” He asks somewhat in disbelief. “You skxawng.” He hears Kiri insult him, making him shoot his head back at her. “You knew?” He asks, the tone in his voice showing how offended he feels that she didn’t tell him beforehand. “I didn’t know you were courting her!” She defends. “Neteyam is old enough to choose a woman.” Their mother interjects.

“Then what do I do?” He quickly redirects his gaze back at her. “I do not know.” She rushes out as if it were obvious she doesn’t know how metkayina court. “But you told me-” “I have told you everything that I know.” She interrupts her son who quickly looks at his other parent for answers. “Don’t look at me.” He raises his hands in defense, his eldest son continuing to look at his other family members for answers only to no avail, letting him know that if he wants to know how to court you; a metkayina, he’ll have to ask another metkayina.

[grandlinedreams]

|| set in Archeron sibling!reader setting || last installment [here]

|| suggested music: Unknown/Nth; Hozier

|| warnings: lil smidgen of angst, mention of Az's past, soft pining on both ends, I'm in my feelings abt this dynamic today

Azriel doesn't understand your fascination with his hands.

He wonders if he's unknowingly put a glamour on them, tricked you into perceiving them as something else ㅡ and by extension, turned himself into someone he is not.

He's a lot of things ㅡ Illyrian (bastard), Spymaster for Night Court, Shadowsinger. To you, however, he is just Azriel.

The first time you reach for his hand, he yanks it away ㅡ and though the hurt in your eyes makes him want to apologize, he doesn't. Instead, it's you who apologizes to him.

"I should have asked," you say, and he thinks maybe that will be the end of it ㅡ he's never been good with people that aren't the Inner Circle (though you are now part of that too) ㅡ but instead, you try again a couple days later.

"Can I see your hands?"

He doesn't know why you want to. They've seen so much death, destruction, bloodshed. Truth-teller has sang its lethal song in his hands so many times that he's lost count.

But you ask, and he can't truly find a good reason as to why he should deny you. Your own are so small compared to his as you turn his palms up first, settle your fingertips against his skin ㅡ and despite the slender taper of your fingers, he can feel the callouses. Proof of a life he's slowly learning of, now made timeless and immortal. (That too, is something he's trying to help you ease in to.)

You trace the crease of his palms, studying them ㅡ and then his heart stills as you turn them over.

He expects to see the reflexive horror of seeing the gnarled skin, scarred by his step-brothers, the aftermath of flame against his skin ㅡ and then perhaps pity, and a little disgust.

He sees none of it. There is no recoil, no sudden pull away ㅡ you simply study, then stroke your fingers against the scars.

He wonders if you can hear the hitch in his breath, too afraid to move, to speak ㅡ you have him under your spell, body and mind.

And then your lips are on his knuckles ㅡ the coaxed curl of his fingers over yours so you can bring his hand to your lips. The brush of your mouth is soft ㅡ the whisper of affection that's so sweet that Azriel thinks he might break for how gentle you are.

He's afraid that you may ruin him. That you are so wholly unaware of the effect you have on him, the way he would lay the world at your feet ㅡ all you would have to do is ask.

You ghost your kiss over his other hand and then lower them ㅡ but then it's Azriel who takes your hand, one into both of his. He straightens your fingers, brings your hand up to the soft skin of his cheek ㅡ leans into your palm as your fingers press in answer.

He isn't done though, greedy as he is for these moments ㅡ so often in the late hours of solitude from other people, he goes a step further and tips his head just enough to let his lips graze your palm.

He follows the soft press of your thumb, down ㅡ to your wrist, where your pulse jumps as his eyes ㅡ molten honey and sunlight ㅡ lock with yours.

The shadows that always accompany him wreathe down, dare to ghost against your neck ㅡ and you let them. Because even though you are Cauldron-born a child of starlight, you would happily let him eclipse you in your entirety.

All he would have to do is ask.

[ckret2]

Chapter 42 in human Bill Cipher's imprisonment in the Mystery Shack about to get a whole lot worse, featuring:

A history lesson on a second dimensional cult and its obnoxious child leader.

And Dipper making the mistake of asking Bill what "reality is an illusion" means.

And most importantly... The Eclipse: Prologue.

####

The source of light is a completely hypothetical phenomenon.

Just a couple of centuries ago, scientists postulated that perhaps light was a side-effect of magnetism generated by the poles of planets, and that someday the study of magnets might explain how light shifted over the course of a day.

But modern scientists theorized that light emanated from some force or object in a higher dimension, and that the unseen movements of this source-of-light explained how light ebbed and flowed around the perimeters of objects over the course of a day. Physics experiments backed up this hypothesis of a "third dimensional" origin of light.

Scientists adopted the term "sun" to describe this hypothetical light source. Experiments also suggested the third dimension might have a multitude of weaker light sources that provided much less illumination—perhaps spread across the third dimension like water droplets suspended in fog—which they dubbed "stars."

Roughly once a year, light (or rather, the "sun") was eclipsed. This was a very long time; a child born just after an eclipse might already be in school, have mastered measuring angles and reading, and begun learning multiplication and division by the time they saw their first eclipse. Some years were skipped, such that they wouldn't have an eclipse for two, three, sometimes even four or five years—it was possible to almost reach middle age without seeing an eclipse—with no discernible pattern to these gaps. Eclipses usually occurred around the new year—indeed, New Year's Day was fixed to the average date of the eclipse—but eclipse season ranged up to three months in either direction.

Experiments were being conducted to test ideas about the nature of eclipses—the two most prominent theories were that the sun naturally flickered off and on like a lamp, in a rolling pattern that accounted for how eclipses didn't affect the whole plain simultaneously but had been proven to move; or that the sun was obscured by some object in the third dimension, like a ball thrown in front of a lamp. There were solid arguments in favor of either theory, and thus far the data on hand couldn't disprove either.

But where science petered out, religion took up the baton.

A new religious movement called the Higher Dimensional Gate was picking up steam in the northwest. The cult (as some watchdog organizations called it) had been started a few years ago by a married couple—line and trapezoid—who gave largely inoffensive New Age-flavored sermons about spiritual purity and enlightenment. Their shows would have been unremarkable if not for their inclusion of their child—a charismatic young equilateral triangle they claimed had an "inner eye" that granted him clairvoyance. Every show, they put him on stage for a few minutes, where he'd point out audience members and offer seemingly-psychic insights into their lives. As he approached adolescence, he was given more and more stage time, which he'd use to recite the same sort of rhetoric as his parents while tossing in some novel claims about the third dimension that reflected the public's modern scientific fascinations.

It wasn't until the line's death that they evolved from a traveling psychic sideshow with a few zealous supporters into a burgeoning religious movement. The trapezoid adopted a background role as the precocious triangle took over all their speaking engagements, which he used to spin a novel mythology describing the third dimension as a separate spiritual plane found in an unseeable direction "upward, but not northward" from the mundane mortal plane. It was at this time that they adopted the name Higher Dimensional Gate, and their young leader announced that his spiritual contacts in the third dimension had granted him the title Magister Mentium—teacher of minds (or, perhaps more ominously, master of minds).

Higher Dimensional Gate aggressively recruited new followers, with the Magister leaving school to support a frenetic pace of traveling speaking engagements. More and more devotees followed him from town to town, overfilling hotels wherever they went and flooding parking lots with a caravan of RVs and trailers. Fliers they left in their wake offered mail-order pamphlets, sermon recordings, and religious paraphernalia. But the cult didn't break into the national consciousness until a couple of theoretical astrophysicists published a paper debunking pop culture misinformation on the third dimension.

Along with referencing several sci-fi shows spreading the idea that the third dimension allowed time travel, the authors dove into the bizarre beliefs of several New Age authors, speakers, and religious movements. They particularly maligned the ideas put forth by Higher Dimensional Gate, calling their descriptions of angelic aliens and spirit guides "misleading fairy tales" with no scientific basis in reality. They said the Magister Mentium would have done better to finish a basic public education before making claims about the third dimension.

The paper didn't receive much notice outside popular science magazines—until the Magister Mentium released a vicious public rebuttal that made national news for its absurdity.

Soundbites from his twenty-minute rant were broadcast in news segments about fringe religious movements and scientific literacy. Talk shows played quotes as fodder for jokes. Editorialists predicted that the young triangle was the sort of crooked cult leader who'd be on trial in a decade for cheating his worshipers out of their life savings. Only a few programs played even as much as a full minute from his speech:

"These scientists want you to think that the third dimension is some dead realm hidden behind a door you'll never see—and I'm telling you it's not! It's the dream realm! It's the realm of spirits and positive energy! It stretches into all possible futures, and if you could peer into it, you'd see the road to your own best possible future!

"And I know this. Because unlike these pessimistic brainiacs who mock what they don't understand, I can see the third dimension. I can witness the 'sun' in all its glory—a blazing white circle, more dazzling than anything you've ever seen, so bright it burns like fire to stare at it! I can see it pass through the pinpoint white lights of the 'stars'!

"And I can prove it.

"The most 'educated' minds in the scientific community can't predict an eclipse. They look at their historical records and they do a little math, hope they'll get lucky, and shrug if they're wrong—what do they know? All they can do is guess! 

"But with my own all-seeing eye, I've personally witnessed a phenomenon that scientists can't even imagine. I know what passes between the sun and our plane—and I know when it's coming.

"I note all my detractors are in the camp that thinks the sun flickers.

"So let's run a scientific experiment. I challenge the scientific community to predict the next eclipse more accurately than me. I'll give it to you within the minute. In fact—I'll sweeten the deal! I'll give a million dollars to any nerd who can guess more accurately than me! I will personally hand you the prize money!"

"But if you want the prize, you'd better guess soon. Because the eclipse will be here in two weeks. I can already see it on the horizon."

It was nearly seven months until New Year's.

Sources close to the Magister's family claimed he was a spendthrift with nowhere near a million dollars on hand.

When asked to comment on the public ridicule his challenge had inspired, the Magister snidely replied, "We'll see who's laughing after the eclipse."

####

Gideon approached the Mystery Shack disguised in a pair of sunglasses and a camo jacket from his father's closet. The jacket was as long as a dress on him. It was hot.

He kept outside the tree line as he circled the shack, passing the gift shop, the house door, and finally the long side of the house where tourists never parked and the residents rarely ventured.

Gideon peered anxiously at each window for witnesses. He looked up at the attic dormer which once held the window of Bill's face; he caught a flash of bright golden curls pulling out of sight, and flinched. No, that was fine. That was who he was here for. Weren't any other blondes in the house.

When he was sure the coast was clear, he ran across the open ground from the trees to the side door, heart threatening to beat out of his chest. By the time he reached the door, Bill was already downstairs in the floor room, hands and grinning face pressed to the window like a child awaiting a special delivery. He waved excitedly at Gideon.

Gideon hissed, "Shh!" and immediately felt stupid about it.

He partially unzipped his jacket, pulled a manila envelope out of an inner pocket, knelt, and shoved it under the door. As Bill had promised, the door had poor weatherstripping and the envelope slid in easily.

A napkin covered in faint dry marker writing slid out. Gideon picked it up and read it. "Nice work ☆ Boy! I'll pass you the next message at Town Hall. Get yourself something nice, my treat. ◡̈" Inside the napkin's fold was a $5 coupon to the hardware store. It was expired. 

Looking at the coupon, Gideon asked himself what a powerless imprisoned demon could really do to help his father's business.

Inside the shack, Bill checked the doorway to ensure no humans were coming for a few minutes, flopped onto the flat old sofa, and pulled several sheets of notebook paper out of the envelope: the answers to all the questions he'd told Gideon to ask his worshiper. He skimmed past her name to the second question: how had they located Bill?

At the sight of a familiar name, his heart leaped into his throat, then slowly sank into its cage again as he read the rest. "Someone calling himself Stanford Pines reached out, claiming to be an ex-cultist wanting to help other victims of the cult. He said the cult's 'founder' was incarcerated. He sounded like an enemy, but they thought he might know something about your disappearance and sent Sue."

Until the last moment, Bill had held onto a sliver of hope. As much as Ford said he couldn't stand Bill, somebody had had to contact his artists, and who else...?

But there it was. It had been Ford; but he hadn't been trying to save Bill. He'd just been trying to rip the nails out of one more thing Bill had built.

Fine. Bill wasn't wasting time on lost causes. He'd never really seen Ford as a friend, anyway. If Ford was stupid enough to throw away a god's favor, that was his loss. Bill could kill him with the rest when he had his power back. He didn't care. He'd just... really thought he could win him back over.

He crumpled up the pages, tossed them on the floor, and hunched forward to rub his eyelid with his hand.

Well, trying to get Ford back on his side had just been a way to pass the time. He hadn't taken it seriously. Not really.

He leaned back, flopped his head on the backrest cushion, and sighed; and then he fished the pages off the floor and smoothed them back out.

He read through the rest of the information Gideon had obtained. His girls in Death Valley had indeed been awaiting his arrival "as Bill requested"; and when he didn't show up on schedule, they'd taken to waiting for him in shifts for half a year before giving up. The way Bill had "requested" was to stack themselves into a human throne for him—he imagined Sue hadn't wanted to mention that detail on the phone with a kid. And they'd kept that up for six months? In shifts? That was hysterical. What a bunch of lunatics. He couldn't wait to meet the gals in person, he was just going to love them. Sue was set up at an inn a few towns west—not a lot of motels in this lonely part of Oregon—and there were a couple more girls in Portland who could be here in an hour.

They'd also made contact with a few devotees of Bill's teachings in Washington, but hadn't told them his exact location. Unsurprising—if they were the devotees he was thinking of, they were less "hardy New Age hippie spiritualists looking forward to the creation of a bright new world" and more "paranoid doomsday preppers anticipating being the last survivors of the doomed old world." The Death Valley group probably didn't trust them. Just about all of Bill's "students" were freaks of one sort or another—if not when he met them, then by the time he was done with them—but different varieties of freaks usually clashed. He had to keep them safely corralled into separate sects to maintain the harmony and their loyalty.

They were all so, so close—all these humans just waiting for an opportunity to meet him, touch him, save him, serve him, love him. They were so close he could almost reach out and grab them.

But "almost" wouldn't get them into his hands.

Something would come up soon. He was sure. He could feel it.

####

Sometimes, stairs just weren't worth the effort.

Bill understood, intellectually, that stair steps had a "top" surface and a "side" surface. He also understood that, given how gravity worked in this dimension, you could only step on their top surfaces. He knew this. He was smart. He'd personally worked out the equations to calculate how gravity worked in this dimension ages before an apple beaned Newton.

It was just that, when he looked at a staircase, he couldn't shake the impression that someone had simply taken a 2D plane and artistically folded it into a zigzag. And on a folded 2D plane, there wasn't a "top" surface and a "side" surface; there was just the surface, and a 3D body could stand anywhere atop the surface with no problem.

So he would try to get from the attic to the kitchen, subconsciously decide that rather than walking "down" the stairs standing vertically he wanted to walk "up" the stairs standing horizontally, and he'd try to lean forward to put his foot on the side of a step—and then his face was on the floor again.

And even when he kept his ups up and his sides sideways, sometimes over-concentrating on where to step distracted him into tripping anyway.

The stairs in the Quadrangle of Qonfusion never gave him trouble. They worked fine both vertically and horizontally, he'd designed them that way. And also he didn't need to use them. He could float. They were mainly there for the outerplanar Henchmaniacs and because Bill liked the zigzag motif. He was much less fond of stairs these days. When he got home, he was ripping them all out and replacing them with ladders and slides.

He was better with stairs than he'd been when he first occupied this body. But when he didn't focus on every single step, he still tended to slip up. He often got to the stairs and saw his body crumpled on the landing fifteen seconds in the future. If the damage wasn't too severe, sometimes he just resigned himself to the bruises and stepped off the ledge. Had to get downstairs somehow, after all.

But sometimes the future held a broken leg, or an unconscious heap, or a lot of blood. When that happened, sometimes he'd shuffle his footing a bit until the future looked less painful and then try descending. Sometimes he'd creep down to the last safe step and then look for a less fatal route the rest of the way down.

And sometimes he got halfway down the stairs, saw looming disaster, couldn't for the life of him figure out how to avoid it, and thought forget it and just sat down in the middle of the staircase. If he waited there long enough, eventually whatever he'd been about to instinctively do would change, and he could safely finish his journey.

Stairs were, by far, the most frequent and most stupid of his inconveniences as a human.

He never thought to bring something to read in case he hit unexpected delays on the stairs. There was nothing interesting to do, and he didn't so much as have a window to look out of. He got bored. He was constantly sleep-deprived. Sometimes he fell asleep, leaning against the wall.

He'd overheard the humans speculating on why he liked to nap on the stairs. The leading theory was that it had been normal in his home dimension, followed closely by runner-up theory "just to annoy us." None had asked him directly. They usually just left him alone on the stairs. But not today.

Bill flinched out of sleep as his leg was kicked. A fizzling field of white pinpricks filled his vision and faded as he opened his eyes. "Mruh?"

"You're blocking the stairs," Dipper said. This time Bill had fallen asleep on the stairs below the landing, slouched down with his shoulders and head against the wall, legs stretched across two stair steps and knees raised.

"And you're disturbing my sleep." Bill yawned and glanced downstairs. Coast was clear. He could get to the living room with nothing but a fumble on the next to bottom step now.

"Get out of the way." Dipper kicked his leg again.

Well, now Bill didn't want to get up. He kicked Dipper back. "No. Your ancestors lived in trees, act like it."

"What?"

"Climb, monkey boy."

Dipper grumbled, but surveyed his roadblock thoughtfully. He experimentally lifted a foot over Bill's abdomen, considered how far down it was to the next step, and scooted down to Bill's feet instead. Bill watched with a smirk as Dipper clung to the railing and gingerly stepped over one foot to the edge of the stair step, and then the next. Bill briefly considered tripping him, decided it wasn't worth getting in trouble, and instead twitched a foot up as Dipper passed over and laughed when he jumped.

"Jerk," Dipper muttered. "This is why you only have one friend."

The jab ripped at a raw sore in his chest. Ex-cultist. "Whatever!" He laughed loudly. "My real friends are all one little interdimensional rift away, I didn't come here to make pals with humans." He jerked his hood down over his eyes and slouched lower, arms crossed tight. "I don't even care. This entire universe is a hologram and nothing's real anyway."

There was silence. Bill congratulated himself on getting the last word in; and then Dipper said, "What does that mean?"

"What kind of stupid—it means I don't care about you, what do you think it means? You're made from the exhaust belched out of a star's tailpipe—"

"I meant, the hologram thing. You're always saying stuff about the universe not being real, what are you talking about."

Bill thumbed the hem of his hood up and glanced down at Dipper. He was standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking up determinedly. He'd pulled out his journal and pen. He was serious. He was all ready to learn about the secrets of the universe.

Ford's little wanna-be protégé with his little knock-off Journal, wasn't he adorable. He wanted so much to be just like his great uncle. And in many ways, he was like a younger Ford. The ignorant, arrogant, insecure, naïve, easily-flattered, easily-exploited younger Ford, back before he grew a personality. Except even back at his most boring, Ford had found the strange beautiful where this kid only found it interesting. You don't have what it takes to be Ford.

Bill was already filling this brat's head with gunk—bogus conspiracy theories, wild goose chases after lucid dreaming, nightmares about whole dimensions that existed only as parables for somebody else. What was a little bit more? He could give this kid something to talk to his therapist about. Something that—in his darkest, lowest, loneliest moments—would come back to mind, and remind him that nothing he did would ever matter.

Plus, he hoped Ford would look in on the living room and seethe about not being his student anymore.

"All right kid, sure! Fine. You just so happened to catch me on a day when I've got nothing to do." Bill stood, stretched, and sauntered down the stairs. He fumbled on the next to bottom step. "You wanna know about the universe? You wanna know the big secret?"

"Uh..." Dipper eagerly flipped through his journal, looking for a blank page. Apparently he hadn't expected Bill to actually indulge his curiosity. "'Secret'?" He trailed after Bill into the living room.

"Okay, okay, maybe it's not a 'secret'—a secret suggests somebody's trying to hide it. It's just that nobody thinks you're important enough to tell and you're too primitive to see it for yourself."

Bill turned around, a lecturer on a stage. Dipper sat on the couch and tried to position his journal on his knees to take notes. He looked so attentive. He thought he was going to enjoy this.

"So you remember what I told you about the second dimension. That from the third dimension's perspective, it's nothing but shadows cast on a wall."

"Plato's cave. Yeah."

"Your dimension is a lot like that. There are higher dimensions than this, and your entire universe is being projected down from one of them. If being in the second dimension and seeing into the third is like being a shadow looking at the entrance to the cave, then being in the third and seeing into the fourth is like a character on a movie screen looking out at the film projector. While you're distracted by the movie, I'm studying the film reel and watching the frames coming up. It's how I tell the future—and you can't even tell yourself I'm lying about that, because you've seen me do it."

Dipper grumbled, "You've spoiled the killer on Duck-tective."

"I've spoiled the killer on Duck-tective! Twice!"

Dipper was furiously taking notes. "Wait—so, the fourth dimension really is time? Mabel and I kinda visited the fourth dimension once, but I wasn't sure if it being 'time' was, like, some kind of metaphor..."

"Ha! Listen to you! That's like asking if the third dimension is light. No. Time isn't the fourth dimension. It's just in the fourth dimension," Bill said. "And for the record you didn't really visit the fourth dimension. The glowing blue tunnel with floating clocks and calendars? That was a metaphor."

"Aw man," Dipper muttered, disappointed.

"So when you say you can see the future, you mean—you literally see it? With your eyeballs?"

"All-seeing eye," Bill said smugly.

"Can... you teach me?"

"No. It's not a learnable skill. You're either born with an inner—what's the human phrase?—a third eye, or you aren't."

Dipper processed that. "How do I find out if I have—?"

"You don't."

"Aw."

Bill waited for Dipper to scribble down a couple more lines before he casually dropped the next bombshell: "In fact, not only have you never been 'in' the fourth dimension—your universe isn't really even third dimensional."

Dipper's pen gouged into the page. "What do you mean, it's not third dimensional!"

"I mean you've got two dimensions and the third's an illusion. Hologram, remember?"

"What are you—" Dipper waved a hand around in the air. "I'm moving my arm through the third dimension right now!"

"No you're not."

Dipper threw his pen on the ground. "Okay, you're messing with me!"

"Not this time. Listen. Got a little riddle for you: what do Plato's cave and a movie theater have in common?"

Dipper pursed his lips angrily, but he'd been issued a riddle and couldn't resist trying to solve it. "Sitting in the dark, staring at shapes?"

"Ha! Look at it, it still thinks it's part of the audience!" Bill wagged a finger disapprovingly. "In both cases, everyone and everything in the show is an illusion—just light and shadows projected on a flat wall."

"But—! The world would look flat if it was 2D—"

"It does look flat. 2D is all you've ever seen," Bill said. He held his hands out, thumbs and forefingers forming a rectangle like a picture frame, his exposed eye staring through it at Dipper.  "Your eyes only see a pair of two-dimensional images that your brain interprets as 3D because it's been trained to. Depth perception is an optical illusion! You can't actually witness the depth of an object—your brain uses context clues to guess it! And the context clues are lying to you."

Dipper scowled. "But." He paused. "It's different."

"Uh-huh." Bill leaned against a wall, feigning a yawn. "Okay, wow me with your philosophy."

"Pictures on paper are 2D, and they don't look 3D, so since the real world does look 3D..."

"Hey, you know that autostereogram art your sister's friend likes so much? Magic Vision Posters?" Bill asked. "Cross your eyes a little and a 3D illusion pops out of the page?"

Dipper's frown deepened.

Bill's smile widened. "And those are just manmade pictures. The projectors I'm talking about are cosmically complex. If it's so easy to trick your brain into seeing something three dimensional in a flat image, then how do you know, really know, that everything around you is 3D rather than an infinitely complex 2D hologram?"

"Be... cause..." Dipper looked around, grasping for another defense of reality as he knew it. He picked his pen off the floor. "Because I can touch an object and feel it's 3D! Even if my eyes can be fooled, I can... look, I can feel the curve of the barrel and everything."

"And?" Bill asked. "If your laundry comes out of the dryer unexpectedly cool, you think it's damp because your species didn't evolve wetness-sensing nerves. And you still trust your sense of touch?"

"Wait, that's why that happens?"

"Uh-huh. Water is wet, your t-shirts aren't, and your third dimension's an optical illusion."

Dipper slouched back on the couch, arms crossed, chewing his pen, brows drawn and eyes unfocused. Bill watched with a smirk as Dipper's faith in an objective observable reality slowly eroded before his very eye. For someone so eager to burrow into the strange, Dipper wanted so much for the world to make sense. That was why he was burrowing into the strange in the first place: to shine a flashlight on the things that go bump in the dark.

Maybe that was what rubbed Bill so wrong about this kid. Bill was sure that, deep in his heart, Dipper didn't really know how to celebrate the weird; he only wanted to expand the boundaries of normal. Disgusting.

Finally, Dipper mumbled, "How did you find this out?"

"This little shadow peeled itself off the wall and flew out of the cave—do you think I stopped there? I've seen further! What looks like an inescapable labyrinth to a two-dimensional Minotaur is nothing but a fun maze in a puzzle book when you can see over the walls from the third dimension's perspective. And once you can see the fourth dimension, your so-called 'third' dimension looks no different! I can see through walls, into boxes, past barriers; and I can see just how flat your world really is. Like taking a photo and looking at it from the edge."

"Hm." Dipper was still staring into space.

Bill's smug smile drooped into a frown. Dipper didn't look like he'd absorbed anything Bill just said. He hated an inattentive audience.

He crossed the room, planting a hand on the couch backrest by Dipper's head to lean over him, and waited until Dipper looked up into his eye. Bill said, "And I can tell you, beyond a shadow of a doubt: you're no more real to the things projecting your universe than the shadows in Plato's cave are to you. This. Entire. Universe. Doesn't. Exist. And nothing that happens here matters."

That little look of doubt edging into dread was so, so satisfying.

Bill pushed himself upright and sauntered to the door, his hex cast, ready to leave Dipper alone with his budding existential crisis. "So that's why I try to have fun with it! Your whole dimension is like an amusement park. Why hang out in a cave unless you're leaving cave paintings, who cares what the shadows think about the graffiti?"

"What's in those higher dimensions?"

Bill paused, glancing over his shoulder. "'Scuse me?"

"Something's gotta be running the 'projector' or whatever, right?" He asked it with an edge of desperation, like if Dipper could just make it that far, the world would make sense again. "Movies have audiences. Who're they?"

Bill stared at Dipper—and then slowly grinned again. What a glutton for misery. Feed him a bitter spoonful of poisonous knowledge and he asks for the bowl. But of course—tell him that reality isn't real and the next thing he wants to know is where to find reality.

Okay, fine, Bill would keep playing—this was almost fun. "Higher dimensional beings! Duh."

"What are they like?"

"Wretched incomprehensible shapeshifting contortions of flesh and bone that appear to gorily mutate as their vast bodies pass through the dimensions your limited eyes are capable of viewing. Seeing them will drive you mad."

"Ah. Great," Dipper said. "But what are they like as people?"

"From your perspective, all-knowing and unknowable. Talking to them will also drive you mad."

"I'm detecting a theme here," Dipper grumbled.

Bill gave him a polite golf clap. "Another win for human pattern-detection instincts! Give 'im a hand." (Oh, Bill wished he had his powers. It would be so funny to give Dipper a giant disembodied hand.)

In spite of his visible irritation, Dipper was still taking notes. "Is it possible for a human to meet one?"

"You've got more pattern-detection instincts than self-preservation instincts," Bill said wryly. "But sure, of course it's possible. In fact, I think you already met one."

That got him looking up from his journal. "I did?"

"Sure! Not here, but in a parallel universe that doesn't exist anymore. No clue what you talked about, I steer away from that guy when I can. But hey, maybe you'll remember it someday."

"How can I remember it if it happened to a parallel me in another universe?"

"When things like him speak, they leave vast echoes. Even across timelines."

Dipper considered that. "Could I meet him again?"

"Maybe if he takes an interest in you. Pray he doesn't. Prayers won't actually help, but it's something to keep your mind occupied!"

"Is it possible to be more proactive about meeting one of them?"

Bill laughed. "Kid, you're stupid. And that makes you very entertaining."

"Great?"

"But if you wanna break into some cosmic horror's living room, sure! If they don't come down here, all you need to do is go up there."

And back to taking notes Dipper went. "You gonna elaborate, orrr..."

"Ha, fine. The issue is you're not built for higher dimensions. Like I said, you might seem real to yourself here, but there you'd just be a light on a wall." He made a circle between his forefinger and thumb, turned his hand upside down, and peered through the circle like a monocle. "If you want to ascend, you need an aperture to translate between dimensions—something through which fourth-dimensional spacetime can be compacted enough to appear three-dimensional, or pseudo three-dimensional spacetime can be augmented with a fourth dimension. With an aperture like that, you can climb up and down the dimensional ladder to visit anywhere level of reality you want—from the zeroth dimension to the billionth."

"Including wherever our universe's projector is?"

"Bingo. Unfortunately for your suicidal ambitions, inventing an aperture capable of manipulating spacetime like that needs a lot of science humanity is nowhere near mastering; but with the materials humanity currently knows how to manufacture, I bet building one would be pretty simple if you got instructions from a species that's already done it." Bill arched his brows mockingly. "Hey, might even make a fun little summer project, if you don't mind going insane. Something to take to the science fair next year, huh?"

"Shut up," Dipper said. "And—if you got out of your dimension—do you know about species that can give those instructions?"

"Suuure! Heck, give me a couple pieces of paper and a pen and I could probably whip up the blueprints myself."

Dipper nodded. Dipper processed that. Dipper glared at Bill. "Wait a minute. Are you trying to get me to build another portal for you?!"

Bill cackled, doubling over. Voice shrill, he said, "I was wondering how long it'd take you!"

"Oh my god."

He groped for an arm chair and dropped down, still laughing. "I was this close to saying 'why don't you ask your uncle for the blueprints' to see if you'd get it!" He wheezed, "Can you imagine the look on his face!"

Dipper chucked his pen at Bill. "I hate you."

"Hook, line, and sinker! You idiot!" He slid halfway out of his seat, covering his face with his hands.

Dipper groaned. "So you made up all that stuff about the third dimension being fake and the universe being a hologram?"

Bill struggled to control his laughter enough to catch his breath. "No—no, all that was true. A hundred percent scientifically verifiable!"

"Shut up, man." Dipper got off the couch, kicked the back of Bill's armchair as he passed, and trudged into the gift shop.

####

"Hey Grunkle Ford? Is the third dimension actually an illusion being projected out of the fourth?"

"Been talking to Bill again, have you?"

Dipper winced. "I mean. Well. But he's not telling the truth, is he?"

"Mmm..." Ford waggled a hand uncertainly.

"What."

"Based on our current knowledge of quantum mechanics, it's not impossible," Ford admitted. "And it would explain some things about black holes."

"Ugh. That's the worst thing I've ever heard." Dipper rubbed his eyes. "How do you live with that?"

"With what?"

"Thinking the entire universe might be, just... some kind of projection? Like a movie?" Dipper said. "I mean... what's the point of doing anything if everything's fake. That's awful."

Ford pressed his lips together.

####

1981

"The universe is what?" Ford asked.

His muse shrugged apologetically. "Sorry to break it to ya, kid! I figured you'd rather hear it from me than—"

"But—but that's amazing!" Ford started pacing across the dreamscape's translucent grid floor. "The implications for physics, for faster-than-light travel, for, for—for religion?" He looked at Bill. "Is the projection a natural phenomenon or someone's creation."

"Uh," Bill said. "Creation?"

"Then who made it? Descartes' 'evil genius'? A demiurge? God?"

Bill laughed. "Kid, depending on your interdimensional political opinions, those are three names for the same guy."

"He's real?"

"Define 'real'," Bill said. "And 'he.' And 'is.'"

"I... I cannot do that!" Ford resumed pacing, muttering again about the implications.

Eye crinkled in amusement, Bill said, "I've gotta say, Stanford, you're taking this pretty well. Most humans don't like hearing they're secretly flat."

Ford barked a laugh. "'Most humans' didn't like hearing that the Earth isn't the center of the solar system. I'm a man of science! If we could prove this, it would be the biggest leap forward in physics since special relativity!" He beamed at Bill. "Do you realize what this means?"

Bill pointed at their portal calculations. "It means if you want to get this working, you need to zero out all the depth values."

"Ah." Ford's shoulders sagged. "Yes. That too."

"Wish you'd taken that fourth semester of Fifth-Dimensional Calculus now?"

"Hush," Ford said sourly, and was immediately mortified at himself for being so disrespectful to his muse; but Bill laughed with what sounded like genuine delight.

####

2013

"Right," Ford said self-consciously. "Awful."

####

At three a.m., Dipper lay in bed, gnawing at his shirt collar, staring at the ceiling.

Yeah. Oh yeah. He could feel it. Wondering whether reality was real would haunt him the rest of his life.

####

Bill slept like a baby.

Nothing like bullying a child to improve a miserable day.

####

Bill woke the next morning from a nightmare about—what had it been about. Being trapped in the bathroom as a metaphor for... something or other. Being trapped in general, probably. Great, had that incident given him trauma? Was he gonna start having recurring nightmares? Would this be a thing he had to deal with? What a miserable malfunctioning species humans were.

He could see the beforeimage of Mabel coming upstairs; not enough time to pull out his dream diary. He'd just have to remember it to write down later. He sat up, cracked his sore neck, and shuffled to the stairs in search of breakfast.

His foot missed the first step and landed on empty air, his stomach lurched, and he braced for a rough landing. In the split second he hung in the air, he thought that he wasn't supposed to fall, he'd looked. Hadn't he looked? He was sure he had—he didn't remember looking, but he could always see, if there'd been an injury in his imminent future he would have subconsciously noticed it and stopped to evaluate, the fact that he'd just walked meant there was nothing for him to notice—right? Idiot, why hadn't he double checked before he just walked off half-asleep—

It occurred to him that this split second was lasting a lot longer than it was supposed to.

He caught the handrail. His fall stopped as he gently bumped into the wall.

"Huh." He straightened up, gave the stairs a puzzled look; and then, experimentally, did a little hop. He went higher than he'd meant to, and hung in the air longer than he should have. He repeated the experiment a couple of times; and then, took a bigger jump forward, aiming for a couple of steps down. He seemed to float in the air for a moment before his feet gently settled on the wooden board. "Oo-oo-ooh." He looked around the stairwell, baffled; and then he looked up, eye burning as he stared through the roof and into the sky.

A chill ran up his spine. "Uh-oh."

####

Dipper frowned at his syrup bottle as the syrup painstakingly oozed out. When he let up his squeezing even a little bit, the syrup sucked back in.

"Come on." He squeezed again and shook the bottle over his pancakes. Like morning dew on the fruits hanging above the head of Tantalus, a round drop of syrup glistened under the skin-softening kitchen light, but never fell. "What's the problem?" Dipper wiped the drop onto his finger and wiped his finger on his pancakes.

Mabel slammed the door open and pounded into the kitchen. "Dipper! Come outside, I need to show you something!" They ran out.

Mabel stood on the edge of the porch, held up an orange glitter-filled super bounce ball the size of a walnut, and said, "Watch this!" She flung the ball down on the porch step as hard as she could.

It rocketed up into the sky, arcing away from the Mystery Shack toward the forest. Dipper's jaw dropped. "Whoa!"

"I just lost four balls that way!" Mabel planted her hands on her hips, watching with satisfaction as the pinprick point of the latest ball soared upward until it disappointed. "I'm gonna get some more!" She ran inside and bolted up the stairs.

Ford passed from the gift shop into the living room, frowning. He picked up a magazine left on the dinosaur skull, flipped through it, and observed how slowly the pages fluttered. "Hmm."

From the entryway, he could hear Stan down the hall on the office phone: "Hello? Doctor? This is Stan Pines. Yeah, I got a medical question. I stepped on the scale this morning, and it says I lost twenty percent of my weight overnight. Do I have cancer?" There was a pause. "Eighth call this morning?! What is this, some kinda bug going around town?"

Dipper closed the door as he came back inside. "Hey, Grunkle Ford? I think there's something..."

"Something strange going on? Yes, I've noticed," he said. "It seems that gravity is about twenty percent lower than usual." He pulled his sparkly birthday pen out of his coat pocket and dropped it from several feet up into his other hand. It fell just a bit slower than normal—not enough that it looked like it was on the moon, but enough that the motion looked uncanny.

"What's going on?"

"I don't..." Ford trailed off as a flash of bright yellow appeared in his peripheral vision. He turned toward the stairs.

Bill had stepped onto the landing. He looked at the bottom half of the staircase with a critical, calculating gaze; and then jumped off the top step. In a single smooth, slow arc, he leaped over all the stairs and descended, slow as a feather, to land lightly on the floor.

"Whoa." Under his breath, Dipper said, "That's a lot more than twenty percent lower."

It just figured he had something to do with this. "Bill," Ford snapped. "What's going on?"

He wasn't expecting Bill to give him such a solemn look.

"There's an eclipse coming," Bill said. "I'd give it three days."

####

(Be honest how long did it take you to figure out Bill was just seeing if he could get Dipper hyped about building a portal. Anyway, hope you enjoyed!! We're heading into the biggest storyline so far—plotwise, lengthwise, and emotionwise—so I'd love to hear what you're thinking and expecting so far!)

[mysunshinetemptress]

Luch

(Lil McCabe Universe)

Katie McCabe x Lil McCabe

Warnings: Part of the unseen series this part focuses more on Katie, it’s got angst and is like a little background and a way to go forward with Katie and Lil McCabes relationship

Katie didn't quite know when you fell through the cracks and faded into the back. She could still remember you being born, though. She was seven, a whirlwind of freckles and laughter, so excited to have a new baby in the family. It had become a tradition in their house, this older sibling adoption. The eldest would take the youngest, showering them with attention, teaching them everything they knew. A miniature mentorship program, filled with scraped knees, shared secrets, and an unwavering bond.

For Katie, it was her turn. She was going to be the best big sister ever. A boy or a girl, it didn’t matter. She’d teach them everything, from the best hiding spots in the garden to the correct way to tackle a football. She’d introduce them to her friends, share her toys, and protect them from the world.

She remembered the day you arrived, a tiny, wrinkled bundle. You fit perfectly in the palm of her hand. She was careful, so careful, as she held you, her heart pounding with a mixture of love and responsibility. She’d named you ‘Squishy’ that day, a name that stuck for a few weeks before you graduated to something more...permanent.

What was it, why can't she remeber it now, its the only thing she called you, the only thing SHE called you.

There are gaps in her memory now, like pieces of a puzzle missing. You were there, a constant in the chaotic tapestry of her childhood, and then you weren’t. It’s as if someone had gently peeled you away, leaving an indistinct shape where you once were.

She remembers your laughter, a clear bell-like sound that would fill the house. She remembers the way your eyes would light up when she read you stories. And she remembers the day you took your first steps, holding onto her finger for dear life.

She dressed you in tiny football jerseys, her favorite team’s colors blazing against your soft skin. She taught you the alphabet with the help of her toy animals, her patience endless as you struggled to pronounce the letters. Weekends were spent at the park, Katie pushing you on the swings, her laughter mingling with yours as you soared through the air.

But then, the memories start to blur. There are fragments, snapshots, like a photo album with missing pages. You’re there, but you’re also not. You morph into Ella and Lauryn, She starts being unable to tell what memories are with you and what memories are with them.

Cheeky, no thats what she called Ella

Sometimes, late at night, when the house is quiet, Katie will close her eyes and try to remember you. She’ll see a small figure, a blur of color, a sound. But then, the image fades, and she’s left with an aching emptiness.

Munchkin, no thats what she called Lauryn

The name was on the tip of her tongue, a phantom word dancing just beyond her grasp. It was a small thing, a trivial detail, but in the grand scheme of her fading memories, it was a cornerstone. Squishy was a placeholder, a temporary label for a child who had become an integral part of her life. The real name, the one that fit perfectly, was buried beneath layers of time and confusion.

It was a name whispered in countless bedtime stories, shouted in shared laughter, and softly murmured in moments of comfort. A name that held the weight of a world, a universe contained within a single syllable. Now, it was a ghost, haunting the corridors of her mind.

The blurring of memories was a cruel thief, stealing the clarity of childhood. Ella and Lauryn, the subsequent additions to the family, had cast long shadows, their presences eclipsing you. Yet, there was a part of Katie that refused to accept this erasure.

The name was a whisper in the wind, a phantom echo in the chambers of her mind. Katie clutched at the edges of her memory, desperate to grasp the elusive word. It was a puzzle piece, missing from the grand tapestry of her childhood, a void that gnawed at her with an insistent hunger.

Days turned into weeks as she delved deeper into the recesses of her mind. She revisited old photo albums, the glossy pages filled with smiling faces. There you were, standing at the back sometimes only the top of your head only visible, a tiny speck in a sea of laughter, your eyes holding a spark of mischief that mirrored her own. But the name remained out of reach, a tantalizing mirage in the desert of her recollection.

She tried talk to your parents, hoping they might remember. But your mam still refusued to talk to her and your da was no help not even remembering if her himself had given you a nickname like he had the rest of his kids. She tried your siblings but they were no use each either shouting out random names or asking "Wait Y/n had a nickname, i thought it was just Ella and Lauren." It was as if it had been erased from the family history, a forgotten chapter in a well-loved story.

Desperation crept into her heart. She was losing you, she had lost you. Katie remembered, the fearless, protective big sister role she used to proudly play, but your part was fading if not already gone.

One evening, as she sat alone in the quiet of her living room, a flicker of memory ignited within her. She closed her eyes, focusing on the sensation of warmth, the smell of baby powder, the sound of soft giggles. And then, it came to her, as clear as day.

"Luch."

The word slipped out of her lips, a whisper in the still air. It was perfect, simple, and utterly fitting. Luch it was mouse in Irish something she had just learned in school and it fit you perfectly you were as quite as a mouse even as a baby and she used to laugh at the way you scrunched your nose just before you cried. It was the name she had given you, the name that had defined your place in her heart.

You were her baby sister. Her first responsibility, her first love. And somewhere along the way she had failed to even notice you slip through the cracks, she had turned into the person she had sworn to protect you from at just seven years old and she didn't know how to fix it.

[targaryen-dynasty]

DEPRAVITIES.

Prince Regent!Aemond Targaryen x female!Reader

When your husband feels overwhelmed reining in the stead of the severely wounded King, it is your duty as his wife to comfort him.

WARNINGS: SEXUAL CONTENT–MINORS DNI; profanity, lactation kink, lactating, pregnant reader, p in v, cuckolding, degrading, humiliating, tiddy slapping hehe, blink and you'll miss the size kink, very brief breeding kink, female Reader, Prince Regent Aemond

WORDS: 1.8 K

NOTES: Re-posting something I really enjoyed writing before going on hiatus.

Credit for the center piece goes to @justkwordme on twitter.

When the Great Hall slowly cleared, it was your turn to approach your husband, still seated on the large Iron Throne and the Conqueror‘s Crown atop his silver-blonde mane. 

His shoulders and head dropped slightly with the heavy doors falling shut behind the last person leaving, clearly displaying all the pressure that rested on them. Your lips had dropped as well, into a pout that showed the pity you held for him. 

You approached him with slow, careful steps not to startle him as if you were a hunter stalking towards its prey, not making a sound to strike in an ambush.

And when your hand eventually brushed his shoulder, he released a long sigh. 

Without either of you saying anything, you positioned yourself onto his lap, straddling his thighs with your arms wrapped around his neck and the skirts of your dress rucked up around your hips.

Ever since you got pregnant, you hadn’t touched any of your normal dresses–the fabric either too heavy or too tight for your changing body. Lighter dresses with much less embroideries and other decorations filled your closets, a new one being fitted to your growing bump and breasts at least every fortnight. 

Much to your husband’s delight, since he was utterly infatuated seeing your body swell because of him–or much more his seed.

Aemond fully embraced your advances and the position, head tipping forwards to rest his forehead against your swollen bosom, enjoying the simple proximity and comfort you brought. 

Your marriage with him hadn’t always been like that, starting cold and with him showing no emotions other than the sense of duty for your arranged marriage. 

Only after you both had learned Aemond had put a child into you, something primal in him set itself free, making him protective of you… but also obsessed. 

Your pregnancy was nearing the seventh moon, and your breasts were swollen enough for your back to ache from the weight and for your feet to hurt with each step. It was rare you even left your marital chambers, mostly laying in bed with your feet positioned atop a few pillows. 

The dowager queen had told you it was normal for a woman carrying a Targaryen offspring to experience such terrible side-effects during their pregnancy, as both she and her daughter had shared the same fate many times before. 

You believed her–but only because you didn’t have another choice. 

Your breasts were hot and tender to the touch and already swollen to the point one easily overfilled Aemond’s large hands. And just like now, they always tended to strain against the low cut necklines of your dresses, the fabric cutting into the skin and making your flesh appear to spill over it. That had earned you the curious glances of more than one man of court, much to your husband’s dismay.

The swell of your belly put some distance between your bodies, and Aemond had his hands planted on either side of it–a habit he had picked up rather quickly with your unborn babe starting to kick just mere nights ago.

When he pressed his chiseled lips to the exposed and flushed skin over your breasts in a soft kiss, the familiar warmth spread throughout your body, settling at the apex between your legs. It was a subtle movement as you ground your hips down on his, but still enough for Aemond to groan against your body. 

A dark-blown pupil gazed up at you with his eye widened slightly, the lilac almost completely eclipsed by black, not having to say anything for you to know what he wanted. 

You gave him a reassuring nod, and in no time, he had pushed the neckline of your dress down enough to free not one, but both your breasts out of their confines. 

From the heavy sigh you released it was clear you felt relieved already, more so when his lips wrapped around one of your hardened buds. But the familiar stimulation of his fingers around the other one was missing–until you eventually felt his hand eagerly undoing the laces in the front of his breeches. 

It was difficult for him to do so with you sitting on top, so you slightly raised your hips, allowing him to pull out his hard and throbbing cock. 

You were surprised he went that far, especially because you were in the Throne Room with the possibility of someone barging into the room–but you also were excited. 

“Aemond,” you spoke softly. “We cannot.”

Though your words were a weak attempt to protest, there did not really come any objection from you as he fisted himself between your bodies, yours already craving what your mind still needed to process. 

He pulled back from you with a lewd pop, just a bit of your milk resting in the corners of his mouth. It was obscene, but in your eyes he had never looked so good. “We can,” he all but barked. “I will have the head of anyone that chooses to interrupt us right now–regardless of who it is.”

With that, he tugged the center of your smallclothes aside enough for his digits to tease your entrance, positively surprised you were already soaked for him and whining at the contact. 

“I did not know I have married a whore,” he teased shamelessly, bringing the fingers covered with your arousal up to smear it around the areola of your right breast. “Are you certain my brother did not fetch you from the Street of Silk or Flea Bottom even? Or is everyone in the Reach just as depraved as you are, sweet wife?”

The profanity of his words sent a shiver down your spine, and if there even was a sense of restraint still left in your body, it vanished with your hand entangling into his silver mane to tug his head towards your bosom, clearly wanting to silence him.

“Enough,” you scolded teasingly, biting the tip of your tongue to suppress a smirk from taking over your features. 

When you eventually sank down on his throbbing length in one swift movement, you shuddered, and Aemond and you both released a contented moan. 

His lips locked around the bud that was covered in your arousal, sucking it in the rhythm your core clenched around him. There was no need for you to move–no, you didn’t even want to–fully satisfied with the way his member was just buried inside of you. 

Your head tipped back in pleasure, and you tried your best to stifle your moans, only quiet whines and whimpers leaving your lips at the stimulation. 

As the pressure in your breast slowly subsided, you were finally able to feel him suckle, and when you looked down, you were blessed with a sight that was truly created by the Seven. 

Aemond’s chiseled lips were wrapped around your little bud, his eye half closed and his cheeks dimpled from the suction, amplified each time he swallowed the bits of your milk. 

His tongue flickered over your hardened bud, eliciting a soft moan from the depths of your chest. You were able to feel him throbbing inside of you at the sound, followed by a growl that vibrated through your whole body. 

You not-so-gently tugged on his hair again, seeming to spur him on even more, and whined a ‘you will have to do the other as well.’ 

As he pulled back once again, you couldn’t stop yourself from pouting, which was mended by the sight of him licking over your bud to gather the remnants of your milk–all while he kept his eye locked with yours. No matter how badly you wanted not to moan, you couldn’t stop the sound from spilling past your lips. It was certainly getting a reaction out of you. The possibility of being caught long forgotten.

“Stop being greedy,” Aemond panted, and you just bowed your head in submission and nodded. “You should be grateful.” As if it was not him asking for permission to suck your breasts in the first place. 

“Y-Yes,” you mumbled in feigned humility, choosing to play into his game.

“Yes, what?” Aemond asked, serving a slap to your sensitive breast that had you wincing. 

“Yes, Your Grace.”

“Better.” 

And with that, he locked his lips around your other bud, but not without groping your rear to pull you closer towards him and deeper onto his cock–at least as close as possible with your swollen belly between your bodies. 

You sat just right with the hem of his tunic rubbing against your pearl, every lap of his tongue and squeeze of his fingers around your other breast sending a bolt of pleasure straight down between your legs. 

But then your hips started to move on their own accord, grinding down on him, riding him while he sucked every last drop of milk from you. 

The aching of your back and breasts was long forgotten as you chased your pleasure. 

A couple of moments passed until you felt Aemond’s breathing growing labored, his chest almost heaving with more and more muffled grunts and groans escaping his throat. He was loud–much to your surprise–but your body seemed to keen at that, the knot in the pit of your belly tightening at a rapid pace.

And then, you toppled over the edge of your peak with a loud cry of his name. 

Your body crouched forward while both arms just wrapped around the back of his neck to pull him closer into your bosom, the coldness of the crown pushing against your collar bone a stark contrast to the heat soaring within your body. 

You were trembling astride him, whining when you felt how your peak’s contractions were practically forcing the spend out of your husband’s cock. 

Just like he was sucking you dry, you were milking him for every last drop of his spill, too. 

And as he spilled inside of you, he released your breast to curse your name and bury his face between your now soft and tender breasts. 

There was silence between you safe for your heavy breathing, before you leaned back enough to look down at Aemond. His lips were red and swollen, a soft flush covered his cheeks and neck, and the lilac of his eye was still completely drowned out by black. 

Your head bowed forwards to capture his lips in a kiss that was shy of gentleness, the remnants of your milk on his tongue and lips spreading over to yours. 

When he pulled back, a sly smirk was draped over his lips–a smirk that couldn’t mean any good. 

“Let us retreat to our chambers, wife. I am not yet full.”

Aemond was insatiable, you had learned that very early into your marriage. And that meant you were in for yet another sleepless night, preparing you for what was to come once the babe was born.

[goodnightmemes]

HOUSE OF THE DRAGON SEASON TWO SENTENCE STARTERS

❛ Duty is sacrifice. It eclipses all things, even blood. All men of honor must pay its price.

❛ War is coming, to the whole of the realm.❜

❛ I am indebted to you. ❜

❛ I'm afraid. ❜

❛ We should've just killed her when we had the chance. ❜

❛ When the king speaks, Your Grace, all hear it. ❜

❛ I find myself wondering...do we pursue the same end? ❜

❛ You must accept that the path to victory now is one of violence. ❜

❛ Did you think I would wither in your absence? ❜

❛ You only blame me because your true enemies are out of reach. ❜

❛ She holds love for our enemy. That makes her a fool. ❜

❛ I promise you, you will have all the vengeance that you seek, but you must keep a grip on your impulses. ❜

❛ Do anything but what I ask, and I'll bleed the whole lot of ya. ❜

❛ The gods punish us. They punish me. ❜

❛ This is not the time for blind accusations. We'll know who did this soon enough. ❜

❛ I will not be seen as weak. ❜

❛ Sometimes, we have to pretend. ❜

❛ I cannot trust you. I've never trusted you, wholly, much though I wished to, willed myself to. But now I have seen that your heart belongs only to you. ❜

❛ You think me some kind of monster. ❜

❛ You're pathetic. ❜

❛ We can afford no further mistakes. ❜

❛ You are mad. Mad! You cannot think that I did this! ❜

❛ You would send me to my death. ❜

❛ I would remind you only that when princes lose their temper, it is often others who suffer. ❜

❛ I see all your great adventures have done nothing for your looks. ❜

❛ For too long, I made it my aim to be of consequence. But now, I see that was the wish of a child. ❜

❛ I wish to spill blood, not ink! ❜

❛ Instead of judgment, you display impetuousness, and diminish us in the eyes of our enemy! ❜

❛ Fuck dignity! I want revenge. ❜

❛ They wish now not for the good of the realm, but for the petty satisfaction of vengeance. ❜

❛ Soon they will not even remember what it was that began the war in the first place. ❜

❛ There is no war so hateful to the gods as a war between kin. ❜

❛ I'm as fearsome as any of them. ❜

❛ You showed me grace when you could have withheld it. I'm not often surprised. ❜

❛ I cannot promise to make you happy. But I ask you: make this sacrifice willingly, for all of us. ❜

❛ If you've not yet surmised, you are welcome here. ❜

❛ Sin begets sin begets sin. ❜

❛ If dragons begin fighting dragons, we invite our own destruction. ❜

❛ Do not coddle me. Grant me at least that dignity. ❜

❛ Sadness is a condition of motherhood. ❜

❛ You have as much claim to grief as anyone. ❜

❛ Tales take on a life of their own, like weeds. Unless they are tended. ❜

❛ Always coming and going, aren't you? And I have to clean up afterwards. ❜

❛ You will die in this place. ❜

❛ I have been, at times, unkind, but never untrue. ❜

❛ You must go before you are discovered. ❜

❛ Your mother must've been very beautiful. ❜

❛ You should've burned them when you had the chance. ❜

❛ Is there no honor left in this world? ❜

❛ This is a better death than a traitor deserves. You should thank me for it. ❜

❛ I will not be made to look a fool in front of my allies and enemies. ❜

❛ I believe it is a sin to deny your appetites. They are what make us fully alive as mortal men. ❜

❛ If I may be so bold, you have not seemed yourself of late. ❜

❛ I've barely had the hours to grieve one tragedy before suffering the next. ❜

❛ I've come to know the face of tortured rest well enough. ❜

❛ Do you think simply wearing the crown imbues you with wisdom? ❜

❛ You have no idea the sacrifices that were made to put you on that throne. ❜

❛ What would you have me do? ❜

❛ Do simply what is needed of you: nothing. ❜

❛ Where have you been, these last days? You vanished without so much as a word.❜

❛ There are those who have mistaken my caution for weakness. Let that be their undoing. ❜

❛ If you die, all is lost. ❜

❛ The horrors I have just loosed cannot be for a crown alone. ❜

❛ Do you take issue with me? ❜

❛ I can sit still no longer. I must act. ❜

❛ I did not think they would be so eager to die. ❜

❛ I need them alive. I came here to raise swords, not corpses. ❜

❛ Will you goad me? When your bread and shelter now depend on my pleasure? ❜

❛ I mislike feeling powerless. ❜

❛ I do not know my part. The path I walk has never been trod. ❜

❛ What you cannot do, let others do for you. ❜

❛ There is more than one way to fight a war. ❜

❛ I do not wish to stand alone. ❜

❛ Has your loyalty faded? Or does it flourish only at night and flee the sunrise like a moth? ❜

❛ What we must do now is... terrible. ❜

❛ This is not war. These are crimes against the innocent, that any upright man would repudiate. ❜

❛ And once again, in the name of power, it's the weak and the women who must endure. ❜

❛ Was it worth the price? ❜

❛ I caution you, boldness is one thing, but overconfidence… ❜

❛ You have the impetuousness of youth, and its arrogance, neither of which is to be desired in a king. ❜

❛ Have the indignities of your childhood not yet sufficiently been avenged? ❜

❛ To claim a dragon, you must also be prepared to die. ❜

❛ You can't possibly still be angry about this. ❜

❛ You weren't going to bid me farewell? ❜

❛ It is your way, is it not? When something does not please you, you run. ❜

❛ There are older things in this world than you or I, or living memory. ❜

❛ You are not the player, but a piece on the board. As am I, for that matter. ❜

❛ It is my fault, I think, that you have forgotten to fear me. ❜

❛ It was worth the risk, no matter the outcome. ❜

❛ The enemy without may be fought with swords. The enemy within is more insidious. ❜

❛ Do you take me for a fool? ❜

❛ Oh, you make an art of provoking me. ❜

❛ Stop wasting your life waiting for something that'll never come. ❜

❛ I'm sure you did your best. ❜

❛ They will underestimate you, and this will be your advantage. ❜

❛ If the gods call me to greater things, who am I to refuse them? ❜

❛ Nothing is clean here. ❜

❛ The order of things has changed. Why not embrace it? ❜

❛ It does seem to me that you've made rather a mess here. ❜

❛ I don't need their love. I need their swords. ❜

❛ Mind your tongue. ❜

❛ I mislike all of this. ❜

❛ It seems you need us more than we need you. ❜

❛ So, what was the fucking point in all this then? ❜

❛ It's best to live, I think. However you do it. ❜

❛ You are not alone. ❜

❛ Will you prepare to face such an enemy? Or will you stay here and make yourself easy? ❜

❛ If you hinder our efforts through sloth or unreadiness, I will see you hanged, and your body fed to the dogs in the street. ❜

❛ You've arrived just in time to see my new army. What do you think of it? ❜

❛ This place will have you barking at the moon. ❜

❛ We must all make our sacrifices. ❜

❛ 'Tis no longer our rule that is threatened, our very lives. ❜

❛ Perhaps all men are corrupt and true honor is a mist that melts in the morning. ❜

❛ The dragons dance, and men are like dust under their feet. ❜

❛ We march now toward our annihilation. ❜

❛ There will be time enough to see which one of us is a coward. ❜

❛ There are omens here for those who seek them. ❜

❛ It's all a story and you are but one part in it. You know your part. ❜

❛ I am meant to serve you, and all of these with me, until death or the end of our story. ❜

❛ Be strong. You know you are just. ❜

❛ History will paint you a villain. ❜

❛ I am at last myself, with no ambition greater than to walk where I please and to breathe the open air. To die unremarked and unnoticed and be free. ❜

❛ You speak as if from a distant dream. ❜

❛ Come with me. ❜

❛ My part is here, whether I will or no. It was decided for me long ago. ❜

[apoemaday]

Facts About the Moon

by Dorianne Laux

The moon is backing away from us an inch and a half each year. That means if you’re like me and were born around fifty years ago the moon was a full six feet closer to the earth. What’s a person supposed to do? I feel the gray cloud of consternation travel across my face. I begin thinking about the moon-lit past, how if you go back far enough you can imagine the breathtaking hugeness of the moon, prehistoric solar eclipses when the moon covered the sun so completely there was no corona, only a darkness we had no word for. And future eclipses will look like this: the moon a small black pupil in the eye of the sun. But these are bald facts. What bothers me most is that someday the moon will spiral right out of orbit and all land-based life will die. The moon keeps the oceans from swallowing the shores, keeps the electromagnetic fields in check at the polar ends of the earth. And please don’t tell me what I already know, that it won’t happen for a long time. I don’t care. I’m afraid of what will happen to the moon. Forget us. We don’t deserve the moon. Maybe we once did but not now after all we’ve done. These nights I harbor a secret pity for the moon, rolling around alone in space without her milky planet, her only child, a mother who’s lost a child, a bad child, a greedy child or maybe a grown boy who’s murdered and raped, a mother can’t help it, she loves that boy anyway, and in spite of herself she misses him, and if you sit beside her on the padded hospital bench outside the door to his room you can’t not take her hand, listen to her while she weeps, telling you how sweet he was, how blue his eyes, and you know she’s only romanticizing, that she’s conveniently forgotten the bruises and booze, the stolen car, the day he ripped the phones from the walls, and you want to slap her back to sanity, remind her of the truth: he was a leech, a fuckup, a little shit, and you almost do until she lifts her pale puffy face, her eyes two craters and then you can’t help it either, you know love when you see it, you can feel its lunar strength, its brutal pull.

[aklaustaleteller]

We'll Meet Again, Beloved

Klaus is in trouble again and his lover, who is soon to become the goddess that the wolves would get to worship, comes to his rescue, again. And it's painful to come with the knowledge that she's always leaving in the end. But at last, this'd be the last time she'd ever have to leave.

Warnings - mentions of blood and inflicted pain. Word Count - 1.8k

This is actually a rewritten version of this fic that I'd posted in 2021! I'm quite proud to say that I think it's much better than it had originally been, so I hope you like it as well! I'd be rewriting a couple more fics before I post the new work I've written, so yay! Enjoy <3

Fury burned Klaus’ eyes with such extreme rage that they began to shine a golden ring inside, the one that made it look like there was a solar eclipse inside his once beautifully green orbs. Aguish encapsulated all of his bones as if he were turning into his wolf form, his blood beginning to boil inside him and pour out of the corners of his mouth that had twisted into a dangerous snarl.

“You’re a monster!” The witch shouted at him, blood slipping out her own nose as she threw hateful insults at him, her voice growing louder in order to maintain the effect of the spell as she herself grew weaker by spending her magic such carelessly. 

Her hands shook and yet she kept them faced towards Klaus, who kneeled due to the force, writhing in pain in front of her, screaming at her the death threats that she knew weren’t empty. Her eyes clenched shut as she yelled, her voice shaking similarly to Klaus’ hands that he held his head with. 

“Stop it!” Klaus shouted at her, denying himself from crouching in the agonising pain that she’d been inflicting on him for so long that she’d fallen to her knees as well. Klaus knew that she knew were she to fail this attempt of ending him, she won’t live to even see him get off his knees – seeing as she refused to back down despite the fact that she might end herself with him. 

His body shook as if he’d been given wolfsbane and his forearms dug further deep into the ground. 

Looking up at her with her death flashing in his eyes, Klaus screamed at her once again. “Stop this or I will make sure your death is as painful as I can make it!” 

He raised his arm in order to reach her, noticing the indent he had caused in the soil as he struggled to raise his head. And in that moment he decided that this would be the very place he would leave her dead for the animals to feast upon. 

“Stop,” Klaus growled as her magic finally began to weaken, losing its grip on him as the witch lay on the ground, chanting the spell with as much power as her wilting body could muster up.

“Burn in hell,” the witch dared to stop herself and grit her teeth at him, now muttering the spell under her breath. She shut her eyes to stop herself from witnessing the smirk on Klaus’ mouth that was curling to show his sharp canines that would be tearing her apart into shreds. 

“And where, little witch, do you think he’s come from, then?” A soft voice mumbled tauntingly, causing Klaus to lift his gaze up from the witch’s trembling body to look at the woman leaning over her, whispering something under her breath that stopped the witch’s heart and tore it to pieces inside her chest – Klaus could hear that, or perhaps, he was persuaded to hear that.

The pain coursing through his body stopped and he felt his insides healing within a matter of seconds as he stood up from the ground, covered in blood and dirt. Still, he managed to smile graciously at the woman.

She wasn’t just any woman, no. She was a child to the gods, soon to become one herself as her turning year turned into the turning month, creeping up on her faster than she’d anticipated becoming Y/n, a goddess for all the wolves to worship. 

“My one and only,” she smiled back at him, a smile that could kill and bring one back from death’s hand itself. Her head lulled to the side as she looked at him adoringly, her soft plush lips calling out to him to come to her. Her hair flying behind her, making her seem all the more mystical and alluring than she already was. 

From where her hands had been hanging beside her, she offered them for Klaus to hold. Following his gaze to her right hand, she noticed some blood smeared on it and a corner of her mouth lifted. She shifted her weight on her right leg, freeing her left leg to relax a little. 

Which then made Klaus’ attention to catch on the bottom of her dress. It seemed as if it had been scraped and torn, the tearing marks seeming sharp, almost ready to dagger whatever lay beneath. The skirt flowed with the wind, allowing Klaus to see dirt crawling up her legs, telling him that there’d again been a struggle when she’d tried to come to him. 

“It was the god that the Vampires worship. He put up a rather annoying tantrum and tried to stop me from coming to you, my love,” she shrugged, complaining innocently and answering his question before he’d even asked it, all at once.  “You know I had to,” she grinned, a little cunningly. 

And then, her ears caught up with his ragged breathing. “Go,” she whispered, watching Klaus turn in front of her as she rid him of the pain he would’ve felt had she not been here.  

And as Klaus ran off into the woods, hunting down all that came in his way from camping humans to newly turned vampires looking to feed themselves, Y/n stood near the witch’s body and shut her eyes, trying to catch a word with the Witch’s god. He, who was already rather annoyed that another one of his had died because of defying the one rule he’d set. 

“I told you, anyone who’d hurt him would die,” Y/n muttered under her breath.

“I apologise, dear Y/n. I’ll make sure this doesn’t happen again” he sighed, and he must’ve opened his eyes because the connection had seemingly broken. 

So she opened her eyes, looking at the neverending sky, full of stars that witnessed such evil too frequently for her comfort.

This hadn’t been the first time she’d helped Klaus, nor was it the first time a tear had slipped out of her eyes because of the restrictions that prevented her from confessing to him until she’d turned herself into a goddess, a trap that had been set by the gods themselves – they’d known her yearn to be a human and walk the Earth and yet, they’d put up the condition over her so she’d turn, a trap. And she was willing to step into it just so that she’d never have to leave Klaus again. And she was going to, soon. 

She’d coffessed such to him before, which was the reason that he mostly tried to stay away from her – to prevent inflicting pain on her already beaten heart. To wait until she could safely be his, without her heart breaking into a million pieces over the reminder that it was going to take a long time before she could let herself fold in his arms. 

Wiping the lone tear, she sat up focusing her attention on his movement to see if he was going to come back anytime soon. She waited for him, for her favourite wolf, to come and ask her to turn him back so that he could touch her with just as much vulnerability as she did him.

Her mind lulled her to think about his state when he’d return. His soft shiny fur would be wet with blood and sweat, paws as soft as feathers after running at the speed of light, ears flopped down in search of comfort and searching for her heartbeat. She jerked a little when she heard twigs breaking and leaving rustling, crunching and crushing under his paws as he neared her. His nose sniffing and his fur brushing against trees. 

She moves to catch sight of him, instead feeling his paw on her back. She turned to take him in her arms, to lay back with him on top of her, so that his heart would calm down listening to hers. But when she did do that, instead of putting his head in the crook of her neck, Klaus looked into her eyes – searching them for something while the one thing Y/n saw in his eyes was a raw seek for comfort.

Showing him all the love that he needed to be reassured, she felt as he melted in her arms right then and there. His snout reached her exposed neck while he remained lying on top of her with his head on her chest, looking up at her with the truest loving eyes. 

But then she felt a tear slip down her skin and she brought her hands to scratch his fur, holding him a little closer. “It’s alright, little wolf. You’ll be alright,” she whispered. “You’re in safe hands, lay to rest for a little,” she assured him, knowing that all his senses must be heightened right now. 

Tears collected on the rim of her eyes as she thought of the times she almost lost him, lost her grasp on him because of the very consequences of his own actions, had witnessed him crying to himself because of the number of times he had been betrayed. But she blinked them away when she heard him purr lightly, coming to the realisation that he was safe and in her arms, and that was all that mattered in the moment. 

He got off of her when the moon began to hide away behind drifting clouds, making her sit up as well. 

“Let’s get you back to your disguise, shall we, little wolf?” She asked him, a whisper of her soft giggle following behind. 

Klaus wagged his tail twice, indicating that he was indeed ready. He felt his heart swell with love when she ruffled his fur while moving to stand up, scratching behind his ear a couple times before asking him to follow her. 

Coming to halt under direct moonlight, she closed her eyes before mumbling a spell, so softly that even Klaus would have taken that as the mere sound of wind during nightfall. He kept looking at her until a tear slipped past her shut eyes, which made him look down and brush up against her feet for the last time, for a long while. 

When he looked up again, she’d already been gazing at him. Leaning down, she pressed a kiss between his eyes and walked back a couple steps. 

“We’ll meet again soon, beloved,” Y/n whispered, another tear escaping her eyes as a gust of wind carried her away with it, leaving no trace of her other than the tingling beneath Klaus’ skin. 

Klaus looked up at the sky then and swore to her that he’d be waiting for her right here the next time she’d come down to meet him, to finally let herself go in his arms. And his eyes glossed over as he felt another gush of wind, this time changing him from his wolf form, and back to his hybrid physique. 

[minty-drop]

“Collector! Hey buddy, you ok?”

“Collector?”

Colourful stars, sparking with shine scattered across the walls. Searching, looking and digging there corners into the slits between the ivory. Worry swallowed the collector whole, nagging into his gut like a piercing blade.

“King!”

The star child shouted, turning to face the canine like creature, a titan who’s yet to fully grow, something they both had in common.

“I can’t find them. I don’t want to play this game anymore!”

He didn’t like how long this was taking, they were impatient, and did not like loosing games. But at this moment, he didn’t care if he lost.

He just wanted his ‘parent’ beside them again.

“M-maybe there back in our room? They could have switch spots”

“That’s cheating!!”

Rattling the walls like a earthquake, the force of the shout bouncing off the wall.

But he was right? Maybe they did go back?

Swiftly the child’s hand waved across, a motion to quick for the titan to catch before he as-well was thrown on top of its flat surface, the hum buzzing from the star present with the patter of feet next to him.

A game of hide n seek, a classic, a game where one would seek and the other would hide. A simple yet challenging game of who can stay hidden until the end.

And you were quite good at it.

It felt like hours ago you had watch the collectors feet drop off the bed, the counting of numbers stoping that erupted into giggles. The collector was good at hide n seek, and from what you’ve seen, was very good to the point you could only assume he had found king in under afew minutes when the star child had began to run around with an extra pair of feet right next to him.

They teamed up on you. Little sneakers…..

But at this point you didn’t really care, you were having fun with the children who you were to constantly accompany in every waking minute, sure it was tiring but it was fun. And in these moment you got to see them interact, giggling and planing there next ideas that were childish yet entertaining to hear. It was perfectly normal because after all,they were children. Maybes it’s because you were no longer a small child, the childish nature still living in you but as time passed by, you have matured by much and by the time you had met king and later met the collector through the events of the eclipse, you had began to become much like the parental figure of the group. You missed the others, and you wanted them here with you, for the collector to see what he is doing is wrong, but there was only so much you could do. The kid was young with immense power, but as time went on, you’ve come to see them as a young child you could look after and maybe then, all of you would be able to thrive.

But who am I kidding, nothing like that is easy to get.

You first heard the hum of the star like transportation, then the mumbling of the two children. The collectors feet hopped off the star along with the fluffy paws of king. From all you could see, the collector made his way to the bed you were currently under, inspecting the tossed blankets that you made previously made to look like someone was underneath the warm fabric. It was a risky move.

But his ankles were just in reach of your hands.

With a small snicker, you reached out and snatched onto the small godlike child’s ankles, causing the said child to jump up in surprise, hoping all the way over to the other side of the room like a scarred bunny.

“WHAT IS THAT WHAT IS THAT KINGGGGG”

“I DONT KNOW WHAT WAS THAT”

Curiously the collector had slowly walked back over to the bed, creeping up before lifting the whole bed up with his hand effortlessly.Laying there defenceless you could only do one thing.

“SURPRISE???”

Waving your hands like a mad man.

It took the collector a minute before he began to laugh, flying up in the air up and around before landing back down on the soft carpet.

“OHHH THAT WAS SO FUN. WE SHOULD PLAY THAT SO MANY MORE TIME! 1000 MORE TIMES!!!”

You chuckled.

“Anytime collector”

[partially-controlled-chaos]

New Life Shall Prosper, ch. 3

Pairing: Halsin x Reader (as gender neutral as possible, given the context)

Rating: T? (not really smut, but there are some little spicy moments later on)

Warnings: Little spicy moments, but nothing extreme. Pregnancy complications, birthing process that isn't graphic, so much dialogue

Summary: Months after the fall of the Absolute, you and Halsin have carved a happy life for yourselves within Thaniel's Realm, making a safe haven for all. A life full of hope and prosperity, only enhanced once you discover the very real possibility that you are with child.

Word Count: 10.9K

an: Finally had time to finish this chapter up after a very long work week. I've got one more chapter planned for this fic and it'll be complete! Thank you so much to everyone that had interacted with this series and enjoyed it!!

Follow up to this post.

Read on AO3 here if you prefer!

Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 4

Masterlist

Supper by the campfire always brought back fond memories of your days on the road and you admittedly missed the nights of fun and story telling that would follow a long day of battle. Although the tadpoles were certainly a looming threat, the laughter that would erupt from the camp always made things a bit lighter. That’s not to say you didn’t enjoy the suppers you shared now under Thaniel’s Realm. Even though your small army of children listen to stories more than they shared their own, you adored the excitement that would show when a long tale was about to begin. They certainly preferred Halsin’s stories, but were quickly adapting to yours.

They’d had plenty of time to grow accustomed to your stories. What was meant to be a journey lasting only a ten-day had quickly surpassed the mark. A ten-day turned to a fortnight. A fortnight stretched into a full month. And the full month stretched into the beginning of a second. And now time was about to eclipse the end of the second month and Halsin still had not returned home with the scouting party. Because they had yet to return and you hadn’t received so much as a bird with a notice, you were unsure of how everything was. They could be lost, dead, fighting more, or possibly worse, but you had no way of knowing. You tried not to let this bother you in front of the children, not wanting them to worry either, so you always made it a point to tell the most exciting stories and perform with the enthusiasm of a bard reciting an epic tale. But deep down, you were worried. You wanted them all to return home safely, but you were mostly worried about your lover.

The children were huddled at your feet, seated on the ground before you after filling their bellies with the nightly supper. You had gathered them around the fire for their nightly tale, struggling to come up with one for the evening; your mind more focused on the lack of a druid than an engaging tale. You seated yourself on a log stump, sighing at the relief that came with no longer having to stand. By this point, you were in the last stages of your pregnancy and were mere days away from giving birth. Your belly had grown to as large as it would, making most movement difficult and uncomfortable. Not to mention the swelling and aches that accompanied the later stages. 

“Will you tell us another story? Please, please! About an adventure!” Begged a child from the middle of the group, bouncing with excitement in their seat.

“No, no a battle!” Shouted another. The questions from the children broke your mind of its thoughts, pulling you back to the present quickly.

“Let me think,” you said while lightly tapping your chin with a finger with a playful grin, “have you been told the story of the frog of the bog?” You were greeted by a series of giggles and whispers. You couldn’t help but smile at the enjoyment in the children’s faces as they eagerly awaited your story; after seeing so many displaced children around the city that were scared and alone, it brought a great joy to your heart to see them enjoying the smaller things life could offer.

“I thought you said this was going to be a story about a battle?” Asked a child in the front of the group.

“Oh, but it is!” You said enthusiastically, “One of my greatest and most difficult.” As serious as you were, you couldn’t help but giggle at the look on the children’s faces. It was obvious that they didn’t believe that someone who had saved them from tentacle-faced monsters struggled to fight a tiny little frog.

“Frogs aren’t tough. They’re small and don’t even have teeth!” Shouted a younger tiefling, “Do they?”

“This one was fierce, my doves! Small and unassuming, but quite the challenge. Let me explain, little ones.” The children huddled tighter around at your feet, their excitement almost humming in the atmosphere as they eagerly awaited your tale. 

You told the children the story of the addled frog you and your companions had stumbled across in the swamps near Ethel’s lair; the poor creature having been driven to the brink of madness from the hag. With kindness being in your nature, you had wanted to help the frog in any way you could, knowing what monsters lurked deep in the swamps only fueling the desire. But, given the confusion of the poor creature and your inability to speak with animals, what had initially started out as something close to a rescue mission, resulted in one of the genuinely tougher battles you had faced while playing host to a tadpole.

The ferocity and strength of the frog had caught you off guard, giving you a disadvantage when the small creature suddenly turned hostile against you and your party. You remember the stings of the poison released from the creature, the faintest of scars still on your body from the encounter. You expressed to the children the intensity of the battle and how one unsuspecting amphibian had downed three of your companions and had almost taken yourself in the process. The children gasped and squealed with excitement as you told your story, trying your best to move around and almost animate the fight for them, given the weight of your pregnancy.

As the children murmured amongst themselves about what you had shared of your story so far, your breath hitched. A sharp, unfamiliar sensation shot across your lower abdomen; not exactly painful but surprising enough to catch you off guard. It wasn’t a movement from the child or a rumble from something you had eaten, but something else you couldn’t quite place. You lightly pressed your fingers against the source of the discomfort and adjusted yourself in your seat, hoping the change in position would take away the feeling. The pressure and seating changed helped for a few moments, allowing you to recompose yourself, but when another wave made its way across again, you realized what you were experiencing; a contraction.

“Please, little one,” you whispered, “just wait a little longer. Just a few more days, please, my little love.” Your hand rested along the tender spot of your belly as you pleaded with your child, begging them to wait until Halsin’s return. Another mild contraction rippled across, seemingly lighter this time. You prayed to the Oak Father that this was simply false labor and could still be allotted a few more days to wait for Halsin. He had been gone much longer than the promised ten-day and your faith in him returning in time for the birth was dwindling rapidly. 

You also offered a quick, silent prayer to Silvanus that Halsin would return and soon. He needed to be here; he deserved it. Halsin had expressed his excitement about the child to you in the months prior, the smile on his face had never been so big as he spoke of wanting to hold the baby in his arms with you by his side. He had also confided that he never realized just how badly he wanted a child of his own until he had figured out that you were pregnant. Centuries of duty and responsibility had barred him from starting his own little family, and given that he was the only surviving member of his family, he had come to terms with being the last of his line. But now that you were expecting, he was overjoyed with the idea of his very own little one running around.

And this excitement was present in everything he had done in the months since. Halsin put in a labor of love to hand craft a crib from the finest wood of the area, carving and engraving as if it would be his lasting masterpiece to this world. He had whittled toys for the child from similar wood and you always found him carving away when there was downtime and had started nesting almost immediately. There was a newfound youth and spring in his step that had only increased the closer you came to your delivery date. He no longer treated every day as if he was an old man pining for missed opportunities. Now, he was a young man bursting at the seams with anticipation. 

Along with this, he made sure that you wanted for nothing, until now at least. Right now, you wanted him home. Halsin deserved the chance to witness the birth of the child and be the first one to hold them in a loving embrace. You knew that was what he wanted as well. You both had been adamant that when the time came for your labor to begin, he would be there by your side to help in any capacity, but also be the one to deliver the child into the world. He was an accomplished healer so anything that could threaten either of your lives could be remedied by him, but also for the simple fact that he wanted to be there for every step. 

To see nature in action in welcoming the first bit of new life into this once barren wasteland would be euphoric to him; added satisfaction because it was his child that would break the curse of death in the lands. But, more selfishly, you wanted him home because you were terrified to give birth alone. However, given the circumstances and the new pain shooting across your abdomen, it was becoming more and more likely that your greatest fear would become a reality. 

**********************************************************************************************************

With a huff and more effort than you’d like to admit, you seated yourself on one of the old stumps by the market, your basket of collected produce dropping to the ground. Your fingers rubbed against the side of your belly, trying to coax whatever limb was sitting in your ribcage to move to a more comfortable position, your eyes closing at the momentary reprieve. Much to your relief and praise, the pains you had felt the night prior were merely symptoms of false labor and not the actual act, although the discomfort you’d felt since was never ceasing. By this point, your belly had dropped and you had a much harder time moving around, signaling that you were rapidly nearing the end of your pregnancy. And as much as you wanted Halsin home for the birth, you were also ready for the experience to be over. Movement was difficult and mostly unpleasant and you had become reliant on others for usually simple tasks; something you were not overly fond of.

What was supposed to be a quick trip to the market for food ended up taking much longer than expected. Frequent breaks and rests were needed just to get through the sizable market and by the time you had finished, you were exhausted. With the evening sun now low in the sky, you were ready for a warm bath and the comfort of your bed. Reluctantly, you’d decided to skip the communal dinner and story time with the children to simply retire early. Nesting had taken root in the past weeks, urging you to have everything ready and perfect for the arrival of your little one. Now that you were there and satisfied with the state of everything in your home, the only thing you wanted now was to rest and wait. However, the peacefulness of the late afternoon was quickly interrupted by stirring sounds in the distance.

Your eyes shot open and head turned as you heard the increasingly encroaching sounds of commotion coming from the edge of town. You felt fear grip your heart, unsure if the sounds were of the people you now considered your family or an another onslaught of Absolutists assaulting your home. Your eyes darted around, scanning anything and anyone that moved in an attempt to get a feel for the situation. You saw people, children included, rushing towards the entrance to your home, but fear was not an emotion present. The sense of urgency in the crowd wasn’t from the need to escape, but the need to embrace. It wasn’t until you saw familiar faces filtering in past the people of the realm that you realized why there was such a fuss at the gates.

The scouting party had returned.

You felt your heartbeat quicken as you tried to lift yourself from the tree stump, cursing yourself for the amount of time it took recently for you to come to your feet after sitting for too long. You groaned softly when you finally managed to get up, leaving your basket of procured produce at the base of the stump as you made your way towards the gates as quickly as you body would allow. Due to the size of your belly, your speed was anything but swift and your walk was more of a waddle, but nevertheless you hastened your steps the closer you came to the gate. You held your breath, pausing to both rest and scan the crowd for Halsin. Given his height, he would be easy to see standing a head and shoulders taller than anyone else nearby.

Your held breath released when your eyes finally landed on Halsin, who had already been swarmed by every child that now dwelled in these lands. You laughed as he was surrounded by dozens upon dozens of excited children, some going to far as to latch onto his limbs in an attempt to pull him to the ground. Nothing was malicious, of course. You had frequently seen the children swarm Halsin while in bear form and after almost two months of being gone, they had certainly missed their favorite shapeshifting druid. You watched as the elf tried his best to greet each child or give them a pat to their head, but also noticed he kept looking around him, searching for someone particular in the crowd of people beginning to form around the returned scouting party. 

“You’re quite popular for someone who came to supper so late.” You teased as you waddled your way to him, weaving through half the children of the realm in the process. Your voice instantly grabbed his attention, his head whipping around to where you stood, the biggest smile you’d seen from him quickly gracing his features as he drank your from in. Halsin attempted to make his way through the onslaught of children, but had to yield until he’d said hello to each and every one. You didn’t mind waiting; just seeing him in front of you after so long was enough to sate your worries. When the final child had departed and scampered off with the rest, Halsin held out his hand to you and pulled you to him, the feeling of your hand in his taking his breath away.

“Look at you,” Halsin said breathily as he cupped your cheeks with his hands, “By Silvanus, you’re more beautiful each time I set my eyes upon you. Are you certain you’re not a deity disguised as a mortal? Sent from the heavens themselves? Kiss me, my heart, and let me know that you are real.” His lips were on yours in an instant and the feel of them sent your mind spinning. Your heart threatened to beat out of your chest, excitement, relief, and a dozen other sensations were swirling in your mind as you finally felt the kiss of your lover on you after so long. 

You finally pulled from Halsin’s lips when the last bit of remaining air had been sucked from your lungs, leaving them burning, but you gaze never faltered. You felt hot tears begin to prickle the corners of your eyes as your lip quivered, your words sticking in your throat as you voice threatened to crack. Happy tears, of course, but with the amount of hormones swirling through your bloodstream, you soon found yourself sobbing with a wide smile spread across your face. 

You forcefully pulled the druid into a hug before he had time to soothe your tears. Your arms firmly wrapped around his neck as you stood on you the tips of your toes to embrace him. His size being one factor that made hugging difficult, but the swell of your pregnant belly almost keeping you at arms length. You felt Halsin’s hand snake along your back as the other wormed its way into your hair; holding the back of your head as he pressed your frame to his as best as possible. His lips made contact with the top of your head and you melted into his embrace. 

“Are you all right, my heart?” He asked with a slight chuckle, finding your surge of emotions amusing. You felt his nose nuzzle against the crown of your head, taking in your distinct scent that he had so greatly missed.

“Gods yes,” you said through a few remaining sniffles, “now that you’re back. I was so afraid you wouldn’t come home.”

“I’m here,” he said against your hair as his hand slowly ran along your backside, “I’m here.” 

You stood together in each others embrace for a long while, simply enjoying the feel of each other after months apart. Your head settled to his chest, your ear pressed against him so you could hear the steady thumping of his heart beneath you. It was something tangible and real to keep you grounded and reminded you that this was real and not simply a luxurious daydream you were having while napping in the summer sun. Despite the seemingly slim odds and your own reservations, Halsin had proven you wrong and returned home before the birth of your child. And with this, you had never been so happy to be wrong in your life.

“How lucky I am,” Halsin said proudly, “to have the most beautiful creation of nature in my arms again. I’ve longed to set my eyes on you again, my heart.” He took a step back, still clutching your hand in his, and took his time in observing you. You felt a slight flush begin to rush to your cheeks, but quickly pool in your abdomen at his lingering stare. The slightest of smirks settled along his lips as his gaze washed over your heavily extended belly and you felt chill bumps form along your arms and the back of your neck as his fingers grazed over the swell. It wasn’t long before he pulled you to him again, his eyes ever so slightly darker as his eyes settled on the plushness of your lips.

“You must be starving.” You said after you’d heard a rumble from deep within his chest. Although you weren’t entirely sure if he was ravished for a bite to eat or something a bit more pleasurable. 

“Famished,” Halsin panted as his lips caught your cheek, “although the only thing I have an appetite for is standing here in front of me.” Halsin’s voice was low as he spoke against your ear, his lips quickly descending upon your neck, leaving wet kisses in his wake. Your skin prickled again at his words, filling you with excitement. 

“There are others watching.” You whispered as you glanced around the crowd. You didn’t catch the first glance your way, but you would have preferred more intimate touches to be in the comfort of your home or even in a secluded section of nature.

“I don’t think it’s much of a secret as to what we’ve been up to.” He chuckled as he ran his palm along the expanse of your abdomen and settle along your hips.

“Behave.” You whispered playfully before Halsin’s lips were on yours once again, heated and hungry. Soft growls escaped his lips as he deepened the kiss, lovingly assaulting your lips with tongue and teeth, the intensity behind it mirroring the passion displayed the first night you spent together while on the road to Baldur’s Gate. Your kiss was short lived and broken when the dull ache that had been present in your lower back for the better part of a week flared up again, causing you to grimace and groan as you attempted to stretch out the cramp. 

“Are you truly all right?” He asked after you had parted, “Anything I can do, please, tell me.”

“I am,” you said as you stretched your back a final time to alleviate the ache, “just a bit sore is all.”

“Then let’s head for home, my heart.” He said as the grip on your hips tightened ever so slightly, “I do believe I have a remedy for such matters.”

“Are you sure?” you asked as you felt Halsin gently begin to walk to you backwards in the direction of your home, “I’m sure there are others who would wish to welcome you back and there is still supper over the fire. I can’t hog you all to myself, as nice as that sounds.” 

“Festivities and greetings can wait.” He said before stealing another kiss from your lips, “There will be plenty of time to enjoy the company of everyone later. But right now the center of my world needs attending to.” 

**********************************************************************************************************

“More?” Halsin’s voice was low in your ear and you could feel the smirk on his lips as he kissed along your jawline. 

“In a moment, my love,” you said between heavy breaths, “certain activities are a bit more labor intensive for someone with my condition.” Your head rested on his broad chest as you slowly came down from your peak, your body trembling slightly at the exertion you weren’t used to.

You both sat together in your bed, clothes having been discarded the moment you entered the room, with your limbs and bodies tangled together to feel as much of the other against yourselves as you could. Given the size of your belly, you sat beside Halsin, but faced him as best you could. Your legs were draped over his lap, legs intertwined with each other as he held you close to him. His arms were wrapped around you securely, both occupied with separate motions. One of his large arms focused solely on holding you close to him. His hand pressed lightly on your upper back while his fingers toyed with the hair along the nape of your neck, causing chills at the softest of touches.

  The other, which had previously been focused on your pleasure, had begun to run along the swell of your hip and down your leg until reaching the knee and returning again. He applied pressure as his fingers slowly traced along your skin, relieving some of the tension your muscles held from carrying the weight of your child. His lips remained at your neck, kissing ever so slowly along the column of your throat and down to your shoulder before returning. His touch was soft and intimate, a contrast to the fast and almost feral movements from earlier, but both were filled with nothing but love and admiration for the moment you could finally share after his long absence. 

You bit your lower lip softly to suppress a moan as his fingers found a particularly tight muscle on the underside of your thigh, your sounds causing his fingers to stay and work out the knot. Halsin pulled his lips away from the earlobe he’d been nibbling on and worked his way along your jaw until his lips met yours, kissing them tenderly before coaxing you to part your lips.

“Let me hear you, my heart,” Halsin whispered to you, “I’ve gone far too long without hearing the sound of your voice. I want to hear every melodious whimper and cry that comes from your lips.”

“You’ll hear it in due time, don’t worry about that.” You said as you relaxed more into his embrace, your head resting by his shoulder, “Gods, how I’ve missed you.” Your fingers lightly traced along the muscles of his abdomen, noting that they had become slightly leaner in his time away.

“You won’t have to worry about us parting for long again, my heart. That I can assure you.” His hand made its way to the lower half of your legs, repeating the same motions as before in the expanse that rested between your knee and ankle.

“Mmm good. Tell me everything,” you said as you lightly pecked at his chest with your lips, your fingers still ghosting across his abdomen, “the children aren’t the only ones who have missed your stories.” 

In the excitement of his return and the time taken to make up for lost kisses and sensual embraces, you hadn’t had the chance to ask what had taken the trip much longer than expected. And as much as you’d rather sit and continue becoming reacquainted with each other, the survivor in you wanted to ensure that everything was indeed safe. You knew Halsin wouldn’t have returned if a threat still remained, but you wanted to hear it from his lips; you wanted the confirmation. Curiosity was also getting the better of you when trying to determine how Halsin felt about the trip. As you knew, Halsin was partial to roaming instead of staying in one area for too long. Of course he’d stayed in the Grove for well over a century, but it was out of duty and he admitted himself that he left as often as he could to explore the expanse of nature.

Since the fall of the Absolute and the settlement of the realm you now called home, neither of you had been away for a single day; the one exception being the small reunion with your companions that had been organized by Withers not too long ago. So, now that Halsin had the chance to be on the road again and step away from the duties of your home, you were wondering if he maybe would like to indulge in more travels once your little one was born. You weren’t opposed to the idea of traveling again, but admittedly you had grown rather fond of your little settlement and traveling with a newborn was less than ideal.

“We found the camp of goblins the scouts had discovered before we left,” Halsin’s voice snapped you from your thoughts, “it was small, not well defended, easily taken care of. If that had been the only problem I could have turned to you in less than a week.” With your head still resting on his chest, you turned to catch his glance, the story piquing your interest.

“I take it you found more.” You said softly, your question being answered simply by the look of exhaustion hiding behind his eyes.

“Dozens of other encampments spanning far across the area,” he pulled his hand from your leg to wave it in the air as he spoke, “they varied in size, but none were too large. Never had any serious injuries, Oak Father be praised. Well, no serious injuries for us; I can’t say the same about any cultists we found.” He chuckled softly with his statement, his hand returning to caress your legs still seated in his lap.

“I wanted to return,” he continued, “more than anything, but it was too large a threat. Of course they didn’t pose the threat that the Absolute did, but they still held the viciousness that the infected once had. There was always the possibility that more would return to us, like the ones that made the foolhardy attempt and lost their lives because of it. Or these fanatics could threaten other people, other communities even. They may have been small in number, but left unchecked it could have easily grown.”

“You did the right thing, love.” You murmured before reaching up to place a soft kiss to his cheek. You could sense the guilt weighing on him, the look on his face giving it away. As much as you selfishly would have wanted him to stay home with you, you knew in your gut that by sacrificing a few months apart would be worth the cost if it meant protecting your home and those around it. 

“I know, and I don’t regret it, but that doesn’t mean I don’t feel some sense of guilt in leaving you.” You felt him you pull you closer as if you could slip away if he didn’t keep a firm grip to your frame.

“I’ll have you know that I defeated an entire Netherbrain not that long ago. I think I’m capable of taking care of myself.” You teased as you wrapped your arms around Halsin’s neck, your hands finding purchase in his hair.

“Oh I know you are, my heart, but you also weren’t close to delivering a child when you did so.” You felt his touch softly travel along your stomach, almost tickling with the faintness of his touch, “I kept track of the days as best I could. A few days got lost with travel, but I was able to keep track of them well. I grew more anxious the longer we stayed. I had practically convinced myself that by the time I returned you would have already given birth. I’ve never been more thankful to Silvanus than I was when I saw that you hadn’t.” 

“Admittedly, there were a few close calls.” Your voice was quiet, “I was sure that just last night would be the time.” Halsin caught your gaze, the idea of him missing the birth by a few hours had briefly shaken him, but quickly dissipated as he spoke again.

“Although the cultists aren’t the only reason you don’t have to fret about me departing.” Your brows came together when you realized what he meant, the idea novel to your perception of him.

“You didn’t enjoy your journey otherwise? I would have thought you would enjoy seeing nature outside of our little realm.” You said with a slight tilt to your head.

“Oh I did, and I always will, of course, but the journey was abysmal. I found myself longing for this place we call home the moment I stepped foot out of the realm. My heart ached to return here; to return to you. You were my first waking thought every morning and the last image my mind would settle on before resting for the evening. I may have been away from you, but in my dreams we were here together, with our little one, truly living.” Halsin’s forehead quickly came into contact with yours and you quickly felt him nuzzle into your touch. You both closed your eyes, simply enjoying the touch of the other. 

“I thought roaming was…in your nature?” You said with a wave of your hands, struggling to remember just how he had phrased it to you long ago.

“It is,” he said with a chuckle at your attempts to use his own words against him, “but lately I’ve craved it less and less. Roam our lands, yes, but to venture much farther out of it, not so much. It’s still there, buried deep, but I would much rather stay here. Stay with the life we’ve built, with the people we’ve bonded with and the children of course, but I want to be here by your side.”

“Why the change?” You were surprised by his answer. For as long as you’d known the druid, you knew he was always partial to roaming. Staying in one place for very long was out of the ordinary for him. You’d always considered him to be restless, but now you were beginning to think there was more to the behavior.

“Straying showed me just how deep my roots have settled. I’ve never really had them take hold like this, but it’s a welcomed thought. Emerald Grove was my place of dwelling for a long while, but it never truly felt like home. There was always the looming weight of responsibility and leadership. I’d never truly felt wanted or like I belonged. I don’t feel that here, however. Here, I feel like I am where I’m meant to be.” 

With a gentle tug, Halsin urged you to change your seating. You untangled your legs from his and let him move you to where he wanted you. You found yourself now fully seated in his lap, legs straddling the expanse of his hips as your belly pressed against the muscles of his abdomen. He gently tucked a stray strand of hair behind your ear, allowing himself a clear view of your face. You knew him well enough by now to know when he was on the verge of something deeply sentimental and even vulnerable; always wanting to look you intimately in the eyes as he laid his heart bare for you. He gripped your chin lightly with his thumb and forefinger, bringing his lips to yours in a gentle kiss before speaking.

“I was lost before you came bounding into my life.” Halsin said softly, “Lost, miserable, lonely. The burdens of the everything had gotten to me, started eating away at my spirit. I had resigned myself to my fate while in the goblin camp. I was certain I would die there, although it wouldn’t be without a fight. I knew no one was coming for me. No one from the grove would dare step foot in that encampment. But then here you come. Without a sliver of doubt in your voice you defended a lone, blood thirsty bear in a cage. You cut down the goblins and their leaders and granted me my freedom.”

“You defended the grove I called home, despite the politics festering in its heart having nothing to do with you. You didn’t have to protect the tieflings or show the corruption of Kagha, but you did. From the goodness of your heart you did what was right.” Halsin pressed a finger to the center of your chest, tapping your skin lightly as he continued.  

“Not only that, but by letting me journey with you from that moment on you saved me from a fruitless leadership what was eating away at my soul. I’ve said this before, but I was losing myself. Forgetting who I was or why I fought for the things I did. But you lifted the veil from my eyes and showed me compassion. Kindness. Understanding. You never questioned my beliefs or personal politics. And you never have. You’ve been nothing but accepting and open minded. Especially after the mishap with the beast.” The ghost of embarrassment quickly crossed his features and you soothed the feelings away with the touch of your hand.

You smiled at the thought, your mind instantly going back to the first night you shared together. In the heat of the moment, Halsin had lost control of the bear inside him, wild shaping at an inopportune time. You recalled the moment that immediately followed once he had shifted back, your mind focusing on the embarrassment and shame that had come over him for losing control. He had apologized profusely and had fully expected you to turn him away or even be angry with him. But you understood that he meant no harm in the act; it was purely accidental. If anything, you felt more flattered that he had gotten worked up enough simply by looking at your naked form that he temporarily lost control of himself. You had reassured him that everything was all right in that moment. Your mind then shifted to the look of happiness and relief that had come across him when you did so; a look very similar to the one he was giving you now.

“You were willing to sacrifice yourself countless times to save Thaniel and lift the curse that once plagued these lands. You went out of your way to help me do something I was unable to do in a century. You saved these lands, my heart. You brought the light back to this place we now come home. Then at the end of it all, you turned down a life of fame and glory and chose me. Of all the people who are in your life, you chose me. That is still baffling, but I bask in your choice every day. There’s not a day that goes by where I don’t thank the Oak Father for sending you to me. You are a gift. You are a blessing.” Halsin kissed you again, still lovingly running his hands along your body. 

Gods, how you loved this man. And his love for you was ever present and seemed to grow with each passing day. You were rendered speechless, unsure how to respond at such a confession. Your lips continued to meet, slow and deep, as you whispered your feelings of love between each touch of the lips. Eventually, you came to a stop and Halsin spoke again.

“I was terrified that we wouldn’t return in time,” Halsin said after a period of silence, his voice soft and gentle, “That I wouldn’t return to you in time when you needed me most. After everything you have done for me since I’ve know you, I was so afraid that I would fail you when you needed me.”

“So was I,” you admitted as you took his hand in yours and placed it atop your belly, “but don’t dwell on it anymore, my love. You’re home and safe. And any day now we can welcome this darling little one into this world we’ve created. Together.”

“I’m sorry, my heart.” Halsin pressed his lips to the crown of your belly as if seeking forgiveness. 

“Don’t apologize,” you said as you pulled his head from your abdomen and softly stroked his cheek with the back of your hand, “You did what was necessary. You kept our home safe; I should be thanking you instead of you apologizing to me. But we can discuss niceties later. After all, we have plenty of other things we could be doing now that we’re together again.”

“Tell me.” He said simply. You felt his hand knead along the soft expanse of your hips, increasing in intensity the more you lingered with your response.

“For starters, we have a chance to steal a few more moments like this for ourselves,” you said softly while slowly dragging the tip of your finger along his ear, “we have a lot to catch up on.” You felt Halsin’s skin prickle along his neck at your ministrations, the sensitivity of his ears always being a weak spot, and you heard a low growl come from deep within his chest and caught the faintest glow of gold sparkle in his eyes.

**********************************************************************************************************

“Easy now, love,” Halsin said in an attempt to calm your nerves, “you’ve got this. Focus on me, all right?” You tried to make sense of what he was telling you, but you could only focus on the pain tearing through your body. Your grip on his hands threatened to break his bones, but he held on firmly without wavering. He was knelt in front of you, his hands grasped firmly in yours as you reclined as best you could in your pile of pillows and blankets, gritting through your teeth as you endured another contraction. You had been laboring for hours, enduring steadily increasing contractions and labor pains with no actual progress being made. You were exhausted and weak; walking the fine line between enduring and giving up.

Sweat poured from your brow and ran down your temples and neck, settling on your heaving chest. It burned against the heat of your skin, adding yet another layer of discomfort to your current state of being. The night was unusually warm, the slight breeze occasionally blowing through the open window provided no relief; just another wave of warm air against your body. The faintest dribble of tears fell from your clenched eyes, mingling with the sweat covering your face.

When your current wave of pain subsided, you released your grip on Halsin’s hands and flopped back onto your mound of pillows, an exasperated sigh coming from your lips. Your limbs were shaking from exertion and pain and your mind was foggy. Taking the opportunity to tend to you during a brief period of reprieve, Halsin dipped a cloth in a bowl of cool water, wringing it out before wiping it across your brow gently. Your forehead, upper lip, neck, chest, or anything that was saturated with sweat and tears were cleaned gently, the coolness of cloth providing a few seconds of relief.

“Almost two days of this and nothing to show.” You said between pants, your eyes transfixed on the ceiling as you tried to regain some control of your breathing, “This is more difficult than that damned frog.”

“You’ll have to elaborate, my love.” Halsin said as his head raised to meet you, finding your thoughts to be a bit questionable, given the circumstances. Your mind had suddenly focused to the story you told the children only a few days ago; the one that detailed the perilous battle between yourself and the swamp frog. You focused on how you felt after the battle and how difficult it had been, being unsure if you would see it to the end. You had questioned if you would live to see another day after watching your companions fall one by one to something that seemed so simple.

Instead of being comforted by the knowledge of knowing you had survived a difficult battle, you couldn’t help but focus on the feeling of hopelessness and defeat that came with both the frog and the current status of your labor. Child birth had seemed so simple when you first discovered you were with child; too overwhelmed by the thoughts of being able to hold your little one in your arms and being impatient to do so. But now you felt the weight of your labor settle upon you and the doubts it caused in your mind. Much like your experience with the frog, you truly weren’t sure if you or your child would see things through to the end. After all, the frog ultimately died by your hand. You were tired. So, so tired. Hours had come and gone and nothing had changed. Instead, you were dancing precariously close to the edge of not having the strength to continue.

“I’ll tell you the story later.” You said after a period of silence. “I don’t know if I can…” Your voice tapered off, beginning to crack as tears threatened to fall from your eyes again.

“You can, my heart.” Halsin said firmly, “You’re stronger than you think. The savior of Baldur’s Gate didn’t fall to the might of a netherbrain and will not fall to this.” Despite the firmness in his voice, you could sense his own fears. As experienced as he was in healing, he knew that you were not faring well. Your child should have long been delivered by now and the complications you were facing were greater than either of you had anticipated. You could see the slight tremble to his usually sturdy hands whenever he brought the cool cloth to your head or to brush a sweat slicked lock of hair from your cheeks. There was genuine fear behind his eyes; a fear for you as well as your unborn little one that was refusing to come into the world.

“And if I can’t? What then?” You asked as your eyes left their spot on the ceiling and looked to the druid. His answer was cut short as another shooting pain coursed through you, causing a pained yell to escape your lips as your tears finally fell from your eyes. Halsin’s hands found yours once again as you writhed through your pain. He clung to you tightly, desperate to anchor you back to reality. The overwhelming urge to push surged through you once again and you complied, mustering all of your strength in an effort to finally make the child begin to crest. Your eyes clenched shut as a ragged cry spilled from your throat, your nails digging into Halsin’s hands hard enough to break skin.

“We can focus on that when the times comes, if it does, my heart. But for now, do not let your mind linger on the darkness. You can do this. I will be here with you for every second, love. Let that ease your mind.” Halsin said softly after you had relaxed again, hands still shaking within his own. As Halsin released your grip and returned to his previous seat in front of you, his hands lightly squeezing along your calves and up your thighs, coaxing your body to relax when it could.

“Relax yourself when things are calm,” he continued as he kept massaging your taught muscles, “it’ll help save your strength.” You nodded in response, inhaling deeply before slowly releasing the breath along with the grip you had on the lower half of your body.

“Stubborn little cub, aren’t they?” You huffed with a quick laugh, running your fingers through your sweat soaked hair. 

“Already taking after you, I see.” Halsin teased as he dipped a cloth in the cool water again and you knocked him playfully with your knee at the comment. He left his place between your parted legs and joined you by your side, lightly dabbing the cloth across your flushed skin again. You leaned into his touch, taking a moment to breathe deeply and exhale slowly again as you relished the moment of reprieve from the labor pains.

“You’ve assisted births before, haven’t you?” You asked after a moment, your breath still shaky and uneven.

“Plenty,” he said calmly as he continued to wipe your skin of sweat, “I witnessed the birth of nearly half the children of Emerald Grove. Why do you ask?”

“I’m just curious,” you said as you felt the beginning twinges of another wave of contractions begin to cluster on one side, “as to how I’m doing in comparison to those you’ve seen. 

“Don’t compare yourself to others, my heart. All birthing stories will be different and there’s no point in comparing. You’re doing well for now. There have been smoother births, I will admit, but I’ve also seen much worse. Focus on the now and don’t bother with the past.” Halsin pressed his lips to your temple, lingering momentarily until he felt you tense once again. 

The contractions were stronger and more frequent now, seemingly coming every minute. Each minute that passed and each pain-filled wave that coursed through your body made you weaker. You were exhausted. With Halsin still by your side, you desperately gripped his arm for something to brace with. Your fingers dug into his skin, surely to bruise by the following morning, but you would take time to apologize later. Right now, your head was pounding and your vision blurred from agony as your body writhed in its place. You felt the air almost sucked out of your lungs at a new sensation. Not necessarily pain, although it wasn’t the most comfortable of feelings, but an unmoving weight you now felt in your groin.

“Please tell me something happened,” you groaned as a new and intense pressure sat on the lowest part of your abdomen, “this feels different.” Your voice shook as did your hands, your breath coming in quick, short pants. Halsin left your side after prying your fingers from his arm, gently placing your own appendage beside you as he once again came to the foot of the bed. He settled between your legs, parting your trembling legs slightly so he could get a better look at the state of your birth. You watched him intensely, hoping to see any sign of change on his features. You were rewarded with a look of surprise as his eyes widened ever so slightly and a smile tugged at the corner of his lips.

“Focus, my heart,” he said quickly, “you’re almost there.” Halsin blindly fumbled his hand along the bed, his fingers desperate to grab a clean towel or blanket, his eyes never leaving your body in the process. The sudden lack of dexterity from him betrayed his feelings. His exterior was his usual calm self, soothing voice and all, but the frantic movements and the slight tremble to his hands indicated either excitement or fear for what was happening. Although you couldn’t be sure as to which.

“A good change, then?” You asked cautiously, almost afraid to hear his answer.

“Oh yes, very good indeed. For now, just focus on what your body tells you. A few more pushes and you’ll be done.” He offered you one hand to hold onto, the other needed for assistance below your waist. You gripped the offered hand as firmly as your weakened body would allow, holding on until you felt another wave of pain wash through you. With gritted teeth and clenched eyes, you felt your body contract and restrict, desperately trying to push your child from your body. You felt another shift in the new pressure, still present, but not as heavy. In your pain driven haze, you weren’t quite sure what you were feeling, but it felt like the progress you’d been hoping to see for nearly a day.

You loosened your hand around his as your body slumped back into the pillows behind you, your breath even more ragged and exhausted. Sweat poured down your face and body, mixing with a fresh set of tears as you skin flushed from exertion. You needed to rest. To gather your strength for the last leg of your labor, but your body wouldn’t allow it. Almost immediately you felt the rising waters of pain sweeping across your stomach, your head shaking as you begged and pleaded with Halsin for relief. Unfortunately, any sort of assisted magic or pain relief would have to wait until after the birth, the impacts of such treatments on a baby being detrimental, so you had been forced to endure two days of pain in waiting for the arrival of your child. 

“Look at me, love.” His grip on your hand tightening to grab your attention, “You need just one more. One big push and I can get you something to ease the pain. Can you do that for me?” Your tired eyes met his, your lids half closed and filled with tears. Reluctantly, you nodded. 

With a deep breath and adjusting your hand within Halsin’s, you pushed once again, giving every bit of remain strength into the movement. Your other hand reached up to claw into Halsin’s forearm, your body almost lifting from the bed at the force behind your movements. As your legs and body began to tremble, you felt another change. A welcomed relief from the hours of agony you’d faced recently. The pressure was gone, the cramping had subsided, and you were utterly spent. You released yourself from his arm as you once again fell back into your pillows, your legs going slack from their bent position.

“No more,” you sobbed, “I can’t do anymore.” Your chest heaved with your cries, tears now streaming freely from your eyes as you continued to beg your lover. You were met with silence, something that made your nerves tighten.

“Halsin.” His name softly fell from your lips as you searched for reassurance, “Halsin, I can’t-” Your statements was cut short, but not with the response you expected. Instead of the deep, booming voice of your lover, you were instead met with a tiny, unfamiliar cry. Your head craned upwards to find the source of the cry, only to fall back as Halsin’s frame suddenly came over you. You watched in disbelief as he quickly opened the laces to your tunic, pulling them back to expose your chest to the warm air. Before you could utter another word, the druid placed a small, crying baby against your chest. Your baby.

“Well done, my heart.” He beamed as he covered the still wet and connected child with a warm blanket, “You’ve done so well, but let me take over for now.” He took your hand in his and placed it along the back of your child, sensing the slight shock you were still in before quickly leaving you with your baby to attend to your wounds.

“By the gods.” You whispered as your senses finally returned to you. Parental nature quickly snapping into place as you bundled the child in the blanket even more, covering their exposed head and tucking their arms under the warmth. You soothed them softly as they continued to cry, happiness coursing through you as they continued to take deep lungfuls of air. With the edge of the blanket, you gently cleaned their face of afterbirth, gently shushing with each stroke. Tears streamed down your face, but the meaning behind them had changed. What were tears of agony and bargaining had turned to tears of unconfined happiness. 

Despite the pain and agony you’d endured for days, you felt almost none of it as you cradled your child in your arms. The feeling of holding this small, tiny newborn against you had made the labor worth it. You were overjoyed, if not still in shock, as you softly pressed your lips to the forehead of your still crying baby. A feeling of unimaginable love washed over you, soothing your aches and pains and replaced those feelings with bliss.

**********************************************************************************************************

When the excitement from the birth had calmed and you had gotten settled in your bed, you finally felt the exhaustion from the previous days settle in your bones. Despite the immediate healing potions you’d consumed and spells that had been conjured offered you temporary relief and mending, your body would still need time to heal and adjust; magic could only do so much. Although that was admittedly a thought you’d pushed to the back of your mind for now as your mind was consumed by nothing but the small bundle nestled closely to your chest. 

You yawned deeply, trying your best to stay awake to take in every sweet moment you could with your newly delivered little one. They were pressed against you, taking their first feeding from you since the delivery, as you observed every little detail they offered. Admittedly, you were surprised with just how small they were, considering the sheer looming size Halsin presented and just how hard you had labored, you’d anticipated a rather large baby. Instead, your child was remarkably tiny, but perfectly healthy. The labor had been agonizing and painful, but you found that the reward that came from your efforts was far greater than any amount of discomfort or pain you had tolerated. In this moment, everything was perfect and you wanted nothing more than to spend eternity cradling your child.

“Hello there, little one.” You whispered as their eyes opened briefly, placing a soft kiss to the forehead. A beautiful mixture of green and gold swirled in their eyes, a coloring that was distinctly Halsin’s, and were framed by unusually long lashes. For a moment, you felt as if you were gazing into his own, a pleasant warmth spreading across your chest. You gently ran your finger along the short distance from their forehead to the tip of their nose, marveling at just how soft their skin was, before brushing a few strands of hair to the side. Tiny ears came to the most perfect of points and twitched slightly at the warm breeze lazily coming through the window. 

Once they had their fill, you gently wiped their mouth with the edge of the blanket before settling them back high on your chest and surrounding them in warmth. Tears prickled the corners of your eyes as you heard the tiny grunts and mewls coming from your newborn, already finding it to be your favorite sound in the world. You felt their small hand grasp at your skin and you quickly offered a finger to the baby, smiling when you saw the tiny fingers barely wrap around your slender digit. You adored the tiny fingers in your grasp, softly placing another kiss to them before returning them under the blanket. Euphoria and bliss were the only words you could use to describe how you felt, but they paled in comparison to the true feelings swirling in your chest.

Halsin’s fingers gently lifting your chin broke you from your trance-like staring, bringing you back to the present. You offered him a tired smile as you met his gaze, longing for him to join the two of you for a long rest. Moments after you had given birth and had a crying newborn pressed against your chest, Halsin made healing you a priority. The anguish that had firmly gripped his heart as he could do nothing but watch as you struggled with the birth set the healer in him ablaze. He couldn’t help you in the moment, but he would go to the ends of Faerún to help you now. 

Healing incantations and prayers spilled from his lips as soon as possible, desperately trying to alleviate your pain and close your wounds. His hands were steady once again as he hovered them over your spent body, swirling tendrils of blue and gold washing over you and filling you with a soothing warmth. He wasted no time in pressing the mouth of a healing potion bottle to your lips, slowly tipping the contents into your mouth as you started to shake the cloudiness from your mind. He praised you with every sentence that left his lips, not only telling you how well you had done and how strong you were, but also thanking you for everything you had done for him and your newly born baby. 

Once the color had returned to your face and the dark circles from around your eyes had finally subsided, you heard him breath a sigh of relief before continuing on. He quickly turned to cleaning both you and the baby as best as he could for the time being, delicately running a cloth of warm water across the child’s skin and hair until they were clean before wrapping them in a blanket that had been warmed by a fire. Before you could preotest to his doting, he did the same to you. Gently cleaning the sweat from your face and chest as well as any birthing mess from the rest of you, still praising your efforts with each swipe of the cloth. 

When he had expended as many spells as he could and was certain you were leagues away from danger and comfortable in your bed, he had offered you a slow kiss to your forehead as he left briefly to brew a tea for you; something to ease any aches as well as provide some nourishment to your tired body until he could put a soup over the fire. And now he had returned, a steaming cup of a sweet smelling tea in his grasp and a contented smile on his lips. 

“Join me,” you said softly as he placed the cup on the bedside table, “come say hello.” Without needing further encouragement, the druid climbed in on your opposite side, trying to be as gentle as possible to avoid waking the baby as well as avoid jostling your still sore body more than what was necessary. 

“You should rest, my heart.” Halsin murmured in your ear, his arm wrapping around your shoulders as his fingers lazily scratched at your scalp, offering the lightest of kisses to your temple, “And the tea should help. I hope it does.” You nodded in agreement, the idea of a long rest sounded heavenly.

“I do believe it’s your turn for a cuddle, my love,” you said after Halsin had finally settled, “a little bit of bonding while things are still calm.” You adjusted your position, sitting up slowly to avoid agitating your freshly made wounds. 

“I’m almost afraid to,” he confessed, “I wasn’t expecting such a tiny little cub.” You chuckled at the comment, taking note that Halsin’s hands were almost large enough to engulf the child, but knew that his hands were the safest place they could be. 

“Neither was I,” you admitted as you gently supported the baby’s head with your hand, “but you know I trust you.” You slowly pulled the child from your chest, leaning forward a bit to help with the process, so you could easily pass the baby to your lover.

With a delicate touch, Halsin took the sleeping child from your grasp as if he was holding the most fragile of flowers, and gently eased them towards him. He stopped briefly before placing the child on his chest, taking a moment to admire their features and softly kiss their plump cheek. Halsin had been the first one to touch the infant at delivery and had helped you with cleaning them, but this was the first moment where he could take his time and cradle the baby to his frame, bare skin to bare skin. Your child gave the tiniest of whimpers at the movement, but quickly quieted down again once Halsin pressed their chest to his. 

“You look content, my love.” You said as you took your tea from the table, sipping slowly to avoid burning your mouth before returning it to the table. You couldn’t help but be mesmerized by the look of absolute joy and bliss spread across Halsin’s face, your own heart melting at the sight. His eyes had grown soft and ever so slightly wet, the lightest traces of tears forming on his waterline. Once the child had adjusted to the new position, Halsin rested his back along the headboard and allowed his body to relax. With one hand still on the child, he wrapped his other arm around you again, pulling you close to this warm frame and coaxed your heavy head to rest on his chest. You gently touched the tip of your finger to the tiny nose in front of you before pulling a blanket snugly around your shoulders. 

“Words cannot describe how I feel,” he said softly, “but, nevertheless, I will try.” You felt his nose nuzzle against the crown of your head, delivering a series of soft kisses into your hair as he pulled you closer to him.

“In the grand scheme of things, I’ve only know you but for a flicker of time, but in that time you have gifted me so many new and wonderful things. You alone have turned my life so much towards the better I couldn’t have ever imagined being here not all that long ago.” His voice was soft as he spoke, his lips still resting along your head.

“On top of everything you’ve done to get us to this moment and the life we live now, you have given us both the gift of this beautiful child here with us now. You brought the first new life into these lands in over a century. And knowing that you chose to bring that life to this world with me by your side? That’s a feeling I can’t describe. Selflessly, you have given me everything and yet I feel as if I haven’t even begun to return the favor. I am eternally indebted to you, my heart.”

“You don’t owe me anything, Halsin. I did everything because I wanted to and out of love. You have given me the gift of happiness and a life worth living. You have no debt, my love.” You said softly as you looked to him, he gaze soft and full of emotion.

“Oh, but I do. You have given me the world and I can only hope I can do the same for you tenfold. You truly do not understand how much of a gift you are, my heart. I don’t know what I’ve done in my life to warrant Silvanus blessing me with you.” His lips were against yours in an instance, but instead of being fueled by lust and longing, they were driven purely by love, adorations, and genuine thankfulness. From his kiss alone, you could feel the love he had for you roaring deep in his chest and it was mirrored by your own.

“You praise me too much, my love.” You said when you parted from his lips, your heart fluttering and your cheeks burning at his words of praise.

“Far from it.” He whispered against your mouth before giving you another gentle kiss.

Halsin pressed his forehead to yours as he lightly tugged you closer, nuzzling against you with a contented sigh. Your eyes closed at his touch, finally allowing yourself a moment of rest while buried in the embrace of your lover. In that moment, you wanted for nothing. Halsin was not only home and safe, but any threat posed by rogue cultists had been eradicated and the place you called home truly was safe. Your prayers had been answered and Halsin had returned in one piece, but returned in time to witness and deliver the child you shared. And here you both sat, wrapped in each other embrace and cradling the small infant you both had so eagerly been waiting to meet. Your heart and mind were practically floating on clouds and nothing you’d ever experienced in life could surpass this moment as you rested your head against Halsin’s chest once again. With a final kiss to your temple and another mewl from the baby, you allowed yourself to drift off to a peaceful sleep, listening to the strong, steady heartbeat of your beloved druid. 

Tag List: @incrediblethirst @reignydeys @thoughts-of-bear @im-eating-rn @beardedladyqueen @simplysaying @emorylovescats @distelsterncat @cryingoverpixelsetc @knightofmight01 @seawingqueenconch

[sunandsstars]

YAWNETU

CHAPTER 5

Jake x Neytiri x Na’vi!Reader

Summary: One other mate was enough, but two? Unneeded. ___ was the outcast, the unwanted woman. Jake and Neytiri wouldn’t ever see her..right? Warnings: Childbirth, Angst Word count: 3.6k A/N: ok so, I had to repost this chapter to be able to make edits since it didn’t let me before :’) enjoy, again

Taglist: @itsyoboysparkel @dumb-fawkin-bitch @drinking-tea-and-be-obsessed @fanboyluvr @mooniequeen @berrybluez @bajadotcom @alwaysinwritersblock @pandoragalora @perfectprofessorloverapricot @lvrcpid @answer-the-sirens @phantomalex14 @neteyamforlife @bat1212 @sadforeversblog @ducks118 @cleverzonkwombatsludge @1800imgay @soushswag @honeybxes @lola-bunn1 @alldaysdreamers @doggodorime @theesexystallion @scarlettwch @annamarieisbae @wallpaintt @zatarias-pandora @daoyus @ambria @simp-erformarvelwomen @simpliheavenli @tojidilfs @automaticwizardnerd @lexasaurs634 @symptoms-of-moonlight @avtprint

@deviismynamewritingismygame @sunrays404 @tsireyassgurl @xx-kaitlyn-trixx-xx @that-one-daydreamer @yeosxxx @noname2246 @ok-boke @rubyrubyruuu @diosmilkymommers @annaleesworld @jiminsthickthighs @holysaladapricothero @peaches-peach-peach @enochi @thispussyshouldcomew @ihonestlydontknowwhattonamethis @kirisimpster @pompompomegranate @stevebuckysdoll @midhito @any-maybe @nyylovestowrite @omnimaki @blueberryfailureclinic @degenweeb @tejas-kris

___’s heartbeat thumped harshly against her chest, her breathing was ragged with shaky inhales and exhales. One hand rested upon her stomach while another leant on the ground behind her, supporting her body as she tipped back slightly. 

She needed to get back to camp, the healers there would be able to use the appropriate oils and salves to sooth her pains, they also would be able to safely deliver her baby. She could not do it alone after all, even if her skills were exceedingly good. 

The Na’vi grunted as she turned to stand up, getting into a squad to heave herself onto two feet. But as she did more water ran down her shaky legs and she huffed out, sitting back down onto the moss. She could not do it. Her birthing had to be done here. 

Alone. 

___ placed both hands behind her and scooted herself against the trunk of vitrautral, hopefully the great mother will guide her. The grass below her glowed a soft blue hue, even in the afternoon light she was able to make out the intricate glow. 

A sharp pain in her abdomen made her screech out, leaning forward and deeply breathing. She was no stranger to the stories of childbirth, her sa’nok, along with the other mothers of the village told her stories of their labours. The wetness, the pain, the screaming, then it was the bliss, holding their child for the first time in their arms. At the time she could not wait for it to happen to herself, but now she regretted everything, she wanted them out. 

More shouts left her plush lips as she moved to a squat, facing and leaning against the tree for support. One hand left the trunk to undo her tweng and feel her entrance, she was dilated. If she felt further she would of been able to make out the smoothness of a head. 

When the contractions started coming closer in time, ___ knew she had to push. She cried, tears leaking from her flushed face as she wailed prayers to Eywa for a safe delivery, for Sylwanin and her ancestors to look out for her. 

Time passed by fast and eclipse was nearing, the sun slowly backing into the shadows to make way for the night.

A hand was placed onto ___’s warm shoulder and the woman’s ears twitched, head swivelling around and her eyes widened as she was faced with Mo’at. 

“___, ‘evi…” the Tsahìk reached a hand down to feel her daughter, the head was almost out already, it was no doubt she has been in labour for a while. “They are close” she smiled, reaching her head out to kiss her daughter in law’s wet cheek, “push ‘ite” 

A scream was released into the air as ___ forced herself to squeeze, her opening stretching to accommodate the life that was coming out of her. Mo’at sang comforting prayers to their deity, hand under the baby to get ready to catch them when they fell, she moved ___ to arch her back more, watching as the child slipped out with ease. 

The Tsahìk caught them, making sure to use her knife to cut the cord, “‘aw evengan, ma ‘ite” she grinned. The new mother turned her head and laughed, her lash line being coated with happy tears. Mo’at quickly moved to connect the boy’s queue to his mothers, tsaheylu was important for them to establish a mother-child bond. She moved him into his sa’nok’s arms as she weeped, he was beautiful. “What are you naming him?” 

“Sylwaì” ___’s lip wobbled, ‘‘Sylwanin was a good name after all…’’. Before Mo’at could say anything else, another pained shout echoed through the cliffs that surrounded them. The elder was quick to asses the woman, checking her for any injuries until she felt her belly. 

It was still large. 

Immediately she felt ___’s entrance once again and gasped when another head had appeared. Another baby. This was never seen in the Na’vi, it was an enigma, something that may be caused by Jake’s human genes.

Without time to dwell, the Tsahìk coaxed the still squatting woman to squeeze once again, giving her praises and going back to singing hymns. ___ held her son close to her chest as he pawed at her chest beads, feeling her mothers distress through the bond. 

But it was easier the second time around, the next baby came out without much of a hitch. After another push they slipped out and their mother collapsed after Mo’at cut the cord once again, “another boy, mune ‘itan, you have truly been blessed, Eywa has seen to you that you get the family you deserve”

“Sylwaì ulte Syatxì. My sons. My beautiful children” ___ grinned at the chubby boys as she formed the bond, connecting her second born to the tsaheylu that was already connected with his brother. The three bonded and all ___ felt was ‘onglawn, the exhilaration feeling the bond take place. She felt their calm breaths, their slow beating hearts and happy thoughts. Her happy babies. 

“They are small, you have given birth too early ‘ite” The Tsahìk made sure the new mother was rested against the tree, looking around the dark horizon and back to the small family, smiling “but they are healthy, the great mother says they will be strong” she placed a hand on the others head, sending thanks to Eywa for the safe delivery. If she had not made it in time, she would not know how this would have turned out. 

“How did you know I was in labour?” ___ looked up, still panting slightly. Her yellow eyes twinkled in the light of the tree of souls and her face glowed like any other new mother. 

Mo’at tapped her own nose once, then tapped the other woman’s “a Tsahìk sees all” was the only words she said. But it was enough. Interpreting the will of Eywa was not something anyone could do, her mother in law holds a special bond with Pandora.

___ looked down at the boys who cooed sleepily “I did all the work to bring you here, and yet you are the ones who are tired?” the two women chuckled. The na’vi looked back up and sighed heavily, only one thought emerging from the back of her mind, making itself prominent in the way it pangs painfully. 

Her mates. What would they say about this?

When the sun emerged from the giant planet, Polyphemus, and bathed Pandora with light once again, ___ awoke with her children resting safely in her arms. Mo’at a few feet away with some fruit cut up in front of her.

She sat up slowly and looked down to see her loincloth put back into place, her mother in law must have cleaned her when she was resting. A whine caught her attention and her ears swivelled, eyes landing on the boys stretching their little legs. ___ grinned brightly and brought them up to her chest, letting them suckle her for milk. 

“Come, have some food. You should be hungry, like your boys” her mother beckoned her over, handing her slices of yovo. “We must get you back to the clan soon, their family must meet them” 

At the mention of her mates, ___ turned her ears down. She did not want for her sons to be treated with unfair cruelty just like she had, and she knew that the couple would not hold back just because she gave birth to their sons. “I do not want to” 

“What?” Mo’at looked at her like she grew two heads, she had an idea what has been happening with her children and tried to stop any wrongdoings. But she could not prevent what they did behind closed curtains in the privacy of their home. She felt helpless, and only wished for the great mother to guide them all to a better future. 

“I do not want to go back. You know what will happen if I do. I cannot deal with this mistreatment on myself and I cannot allow it to happen to my sons” ___ kisses each boy on the back of their head, rubbing her thumbs on their backs as comfort. “I want to leave” 

The elder’s eyes softened at the display of affection, pupils dilating in understanding. “If that is what you wish, I will help you ‘ite. But I hesitate, when you leave, I will no longer be able to watch you” 

“But you are Tsahìk, I thought you see all” ___ jested, gaining a smile in return. “I leave tonight. But I do not know where to go, Pandora is too big and too dangerous” 

“The Metkayina are reef Na’vi. If you travel beyond the sea you will be able to reach them, they will take you in. But the journey is long, you will need to be prepared for it” Mo’at stood up and helped ___ in the process, holding a hand on the young Na’vi’s back as they walked in the direction of camp. Speaking hushed whispers of where she would go, who she would meet, what to expect and what to take for her boys. 

Sylwaì and Syatxì wriggled in their mothers hold, ears twitching and small tails wrapping around her wrists as they entered their home. Na’vi gasped at the family, having not seen their Tsahìk and her daughter in law for hours, they were starting to grow worried. But now they were back, bringing two small babies with them. 

Some approached her to get a closer look, offering smiles and their congratulations. ___ grinned back, happy at the love her people saw for the babies. They both cooed when the women of the clan stroked their little hands and small noses. 

“We give our thanks to Eywa, who has brought safe delivery to our new members, and your Olo’eyktan’s first borns” Mo’at lifted her hands to the sky while the clan cheered and whooped. 

At the sound of loud shouting, Jake and Neytiri both turned to eachother, worried that something has happened while they were in their home. The woman dropped her basket weaving and rushed to grab her bow, Jake quickly doing the same for his gun while they slid down to the forest floor. “What’s going on?” he approached the large group, ready to attack. 

The clan parted for their leaders to see and it was a sight that was most unexpected. ___ stood in the centre, looking tired but glowing all the same, holding two Na’vi babies in her arms. Neytiri’s eyes widened, looking from the babes to the mother’s now flat stomach, putting two and two together, “those children…” she whispered, mind wondering off. ___ gave birth without their knowledge, to two nonetheless and much earlier than anticipated. 

Jake dropped his gun, staring at the boys. They were twins, both looking the exact same with three fingers and small tufts of hair on their head. They were cute, especially when they tried to open their eyes and reach their small hands to grasp whatever they could, making the sweetest sounds to their mama.

His babies. His boys. 

He tried to walk closer to the group, taking careful steps but saw the way ___ clutched them closer, to the naked eye it would just look like she wanted a better hold on them. But to Jake’s, he saw the fear in her yellow orbs, the way she stared at him with anticipation, waiting for his next move. He stopped and his ears went down slightly. 

“Omaticaya, we leave the family to rest” Mo’at, ever the observant, shooed the people away while her children and grandsons got acquainted, making sure to keep a close eye on them if anything were to happen. She will not allow her grandchildren to also suffer.

Once the clan parted and went back to their chores, Neytiri walked next to her husband, a sadness coating her face. “When…when did you do it” she looked into the eyes of the new mother and saw a sight she has become all to familiar with, it filled her with grief. Has she caused this? Deep down she knew she had, everything leading up to this moment was her fault. 

___ stepped back slightly, eyes never leaving the couple, “last night…” she softly whimpered when Syatxì’s tail tightened on her wounded wrist, it has been treated, but still hurts and will take time to heal. The sound caused the two Na’vi in front of her to instinctively perk up, their eyes looking over her for any injuries and Neytiri’s breath hitched when landing on her wrist.

___ saw the change in her expression and decided to leave, she did not want to dwell with them for longer than she had to. She excused herself and walked away towards their home, climbing the tree to the best of her ability and settling down once she was inside the hut. She did not want to hear what they had to say. Not ever again.

___ strolled towards Hellsgate, after the hassle the clan made of her coming back she decided to pay the humans a visit, including Spider. Her twins were strapped in their carrier, one on the front and one on the back, both squealing happily at the atokirina that flew down and tickled them. Eywa was watching.

The Na’vi stepped over roots and rocks, finally seeing the entrance to the building a few ways ahead. Slowly walking down the hill and going towards it, hoping that they would not be alarmed by her sudden presence. “Kaltxì” the woman called once she was close enough, knocking on the door and grinning at the small man who opened it, Max. 

“Hi ___! Come inside - oh! Congrats on the babies!” he cheerfully waved at her little ones, the babies stared at him, sucking their thumbs and most likely trying to see who he was through their growing eye sight. The Na’vi walked into the air lock, waiting for the next door to open so they could finally be where the rest of the tawtute were. Max strolled in front of her, pointing out where Norm was most likely at and she thanked him in English, some of these humans do not understand Na’vi so she made sure to adapt for them. “Hey ___” Norm grinned at her tiredly, noting the two babies strapped to her he blinked, surprised, “they are early” he stated, getting up from his seat and walking towards her. The taller woman kneeled down to introduce them, offering Norm to hold one, after their constant get togethers she grew to trust him. “No, I would rather not, Spider has been acting up like crazy and I think I’ve had my fill of kids for now…No offence!” He quickly added, not wanting to come off as rude.

___ smiled at him, understanding, sometimes the children she took care of can be a bit much “it is okay Norm, where is Spider though?”. The man pointed to a hallway just across from them, telling her that the boy was in the first room to the left. He quickly grabbed a breathing mask for her, noting that she had none on and urged her to take it before sending her off.

___ looped the device around her neck, understanding his concern but she will not need it, she is not staying long.

Little Miles was in a colourful room, playing with some wooden toys she have carved out a couple of weeks ago, in his left hand he held a figure of Toruk and in the right a Na’vi. He squealed when he saw her walk through the too small door, standing up on little legs and rushing towards her. “Hi! Hi!” he bellowed cutely, hugging her calf and rubbing his cheek on it.

The woman grinned brightly and sat down so they could be closer, untying her babies to introduce them to each other. “‘evi, this is Sylwaì and Syatxì” she observed as the human boy looked between the two and pointed to ___’s tummy in question. “Srane, I have gave birth to them last night” she stoked the boys blonde curls and watched as he poked one of the babies arms, he was as big as them. It made her giggle.

Her laughter mellowed at why she came to him in the first place, she had to tell him the news. Spider may not understand properly, but she loves the child, he deserves to be made aware. “Spider. Please look at me” she lifted his head to stare into his brown eyes softly “I am leaving Omaticaya” her voice cracked.

The toddler looked at her with confusion, only really understanding the word ‘leave’ after having heard it plenty when saying goodbye, but seeing the tears in the woman’s eyes he knew this was much more serious, “Leave?”

“Srane. I am leaving forever”

The English processed in his head and the boy felt his eyes well up, lip quivering. “Kehe! Stay! Sa’nok!”

___’s heart broke. Mother. He called her mother. She picked him up and placed him with her twins, kissing his head and wiping his tears. “Ma ‘itan. I have to. I do not feel safe here” he dulled down and whimpered, nodding his head. Smart boy, her smart boy. “I can not take you with me either, yawnetu. It is not safe for a tawtute, you can get hurt”

Spider nodded again slowly, coming to terms with their departure. Small tears dropped down his chubby cheeks, he was scared to lose her. But if she did not want to be here he can not stop her. “Sa’nok…” he cuddled into her large blue body, sniffling. ___ cooed and tried her best to comfort him, feeling her own sadness drip down her face.

“My child. We will see each other again. Become strong. Eywa will guide you, I promise” she took of the thin choker she wore around her neck, the beads shined in pretty blues and browns. ___ wrapped it around little Miles’s arm, touching her forehead to his. “‘itan, I will always love you”

The tree of souls glistened in the night of Pandora, ___ wanted the ceremony done now before she were to leave for good, who knows when her boys would ever get the chance to connect to a sacred space again? The reefs journey was long and there was no vitrautral for miles.

Mo’at chanted prayers into the air, the Omaticaya swayed in the back, humming songs of support, the floor glowed with their connection, a bright teal pulsed into the darkness. Syatxì and Sylwaì’s kurus linked with one of the hanging branches, it glowing with the newfound connection.

The two babies smiled gummy smiles to their parents, feeling the warmth of their great mother and the love that she holds for her children. Sylwaì gurgled happily at ___, her pupils dilated in pure bliss in return. Her sons were now connected to Pandora, they will grow with a strong connection to their deity and all living things.

Jake held Syatxì in his strong arms, as was custom for an Olo’eyktan and a father of almost three. He stared into his boys yellow eyes as he cooed, a small smile graced the man’s face as the baby made sweet sounds. How could he ever be deprived of them? How did he ever have the nerve to do this to their mother?

He glanced towards his left where ___ kissed Sylwaì’s forehead, heart beating just a tad faster. She was beautiful, she has always been beautiful. He just couldn’t believe it took so long to see it. To see her.

Mo’at nodded towards Jake curtly as she passed him, ending the ceremony with chirps and loud words of thanks. She was happy for her daughter in law, but not happy with her son. He did not deserve to hold that baby, but she could not protest, as is the way.

“My sweet babies” ___ whispered, nuzzling into the boy she held, pride overtaking her every being. Out of the corner of her eye she noticed Neytiri grinning at her, also proud of her old friend and mate for achieving something so great. ___’s mood instantly mellowed, she does not get to be proud.

Not after all she has done.

Her ikran landed onto the branch just a couple of minutes away from the clan, squawking at the sight of her rider and new offspring’s. “Kaltxì Tìlor” ___ stroked the nose of the creature, laughing quietly as she was smothered. “We must go. Far away” she connected queues and instantly Tìlor understood, wings flapping and pupils dilating. She must get her rider to safety.

___’s sons were in their carrier on either side of their mother once more, but this time swabbed in blankets just to make sure they will stay warm. It was an eight hour journey to the reefs, there she will find a clan that can take her in.

She has had enough of her mates mistreatment, it was about time she left. With the birth of her twins it motivated her to keep them safe from the hands of Jake and Neytiri who still slept soundly in their bed.

The Na’vi left the home she shared earlier that night, packing essentials such as food, water, warm clothes and memorabilia. She took Sylwanins beads and some of Mo’at’s jewellery, items to remember her home and loved ones here. She does not know if or when she will come back.

___ jumped softly up onto Tìlor’s back, urging her to lift up into the sky and away from Omaticaya. She looked back in sadness, high enough to see Hellsgate just past the tree line.

She prays that Jake and Neytiri will never find her.

previous | next

[yawneneteyam]

・゜゜・．mawey, oeyä yawne — ( neteyam )

summary: neteyam returns from his duties and is shocked to find out his young daughter has found her 'mate' [1.2k]

pairings: dad!neteyam x fem!omaticaya!reader

notes: "sorry im obsessed w the idea of baby daddy neteyam😭😭‼️what if,,, he meets his 9 yo daughter's first boyfriend" was the request. translations are at the end of the piece.

Ni'awtu was Neteyam's atan. His littlest love that Eywa had blessed him with. She was perfect and from the moment she was born, she filled Neteyam's heart with more love than he could have ever imagined.

Giving birth to Ni'awtu only made Neteyam fall more and more in love with you. You were strong, a warrior. Neteyam made tsaheylu with you during your labour period, he could only imagine the pain you were in through the small slither he was able to save you from. You were enchanting, his mate, mother of his child.

It seemed that time slipped away quicker than Neteyam ever thought possible. Ni'awtu was eight, she could no longer fit in the palm of his hand. She was strong and mighty, she would make an excellent Olo'ektan when the time was right, but she was still his baby.

"Oeyä txe’lan you need to stop running through the tent with mud!" You shouted, "Your father will not be happy". Ni'awtu ran through your home, filling the canopy with laughter and light, another pair of little feet padding along after her.

Ateyo had become Ni'awtu's closest friend over their years of knowing each other. He was a good boy, clever and funny. You enjoyed seeing the bond that they shared with each other so young. You often found yourself laughing alongside Ateyo's parents at the thought of them growing up together.

Neteyam had only been able to meet Ateyo a handful of times, his duties as Olo'ektan kept him busy. When he found time for his family, it was peaceful and quaint- just the three of you. It wasn't that Neteyam disliked Ateyo, Neteyam disliked any boys who went near his Ni'awtu. She was his baby, too young to belong to another man. 'You are a warrior, oeyä tsawke. No boy will ever change that, so do not let them' he would tell her.

Ni'awtu and Ateyo quickly stumbled over small apologies before running back outside of the tent, their laughter was contagious. You couldn't help yourself but smile.

Eclipse was coming soon, you knew that Neteyam would be home to help you cook dinner for your small family. You tried your best to brush the mud outside that sat on your floor. Neteyam pulled back the curtain of your home, letting himself back into his safe space, ready to finish his day with his two favourite people.

"Mmh," Neteyam snaked his arms around your waist, holding you close to his chest. You felt his heart beat against your back. His tail playfully wrapped itself around your leg. "I missed you, yawne" He almost purred in your ear, his chest softly vibrating at the comfort you radiated.

"I missed you too," You turned your head to the side, so Neteyam could kiss your cheek. "You will need to go roundup the children for dinner, I will start cooking soon,"

"Children?" You felt Neteyam's tail loosen its grip in confusion.

"Yes," You chuckled, "Children, we have Ateyo joining us for dinner tonight,"

You felt Neteyam tense in your embrace. "Ateyo? As in Ateyo te Nafyu Ratsay'itan"

"Don't go all serious on me and use his full name, you know who he is, 'Teyam" You rolled your eyes, lightly pulling yourself from his embrace.

"She is too young to be hanging around boys," Neteyam followed you with fire in his step. "Boys are bad influences at this age," He argued, "I should know,"

"You weren't" You turned around to face him with a pointed look.

"Yes but-" He huffed, trying to find the words, "Argh!" He hissed, turning away quickly. "I don't like him, yawne" Neteyam shook his head.

"He's a child, Neteyam!" You tried to find it in yourself to not laugh, but you couldn't help it. "Ni'awtu is allowed to have friends,"

"She has many friends! So why does she need him?" He began to raise his voice in panic. You chuckled at his reaction.

"You are threatened by a child," You rested a hand on his chest, feeling it puffing underneath your touch, "Don't be a baby,"

"I am not a baby," He turned away quickly, a scowl on his face. You heard Neteyam mumble, "I am a mighty warrior".

"Yes, yes you are" You reminded him, "So start acting like one,"

"Daddy!" Ni'awtu's voice broke Neteyam out of his anger, for she was the cure for all impurities in his world.

"Syulang," He crouched down, engulfing her in his warm embrace, "I missed you,"

"I missed you too," Ni'awtu smiled, you watched as Neteyam held her closely. Your eyes shifting to the shy boy slowly trailing behind Ni'awtu.

"Ateyo, how are you?" You smiled at the young boy, reminding Neteyam that you were in the presence of guests. Ateyo looked down, bringing his hand from his forehead downwards.

"Oel ngati kameie," He said softly. You looked to Neteyam with a wide grin on your face, "Thank you for welcoming me into your home for the night Tsahik and Olo'eyktan"

"You are welcome whenever," You told him with a smile. You watched Neteyam's hard exterior soften at the respect he was shown by the young boy. Neteyam was raised to treat people the best that he could, a small part of him saw his younger self in that moment. Maybe he could grow to tolerate Ateyo.

"Mama, today Ateyo asked to be my mate!" Ni'awtu beamed.

"WHAT?!"

..Or maybe he wouldn't.

"What do you mean he is your mate?" Neteyam pulled Ni'awtu away from Ateyo. "You are too young to even think about things like that, do you understand?" He lectured her.

"Ateyo, you do know that Ni'awtu is not your mate right?" You crouched down to his level, bringing his hand into yours. "You both are babies, you are not ready- or old enough to even be talking about that,"

"Well, my Mother said that your mate is someone you like spending all your time with," Ateyo sheepishly looked from you to your husband, nervous by the Olo'eyktan's reaction. You let go of a breath you didn't know you were holding in. Relief filled your chest at the little ones misinterpretation, "And I enjoy spending my time with Ni'awtu, if that is okay with you,"

"No!" Neteyam, hid Ni'awtu behind his legs, " No, it is not-"

"Mawey, oeyä yawne," You glared at Neteyam. "Ateyo, let me tell you something" You looked back at the child with a soft gaze, "A mate is a lot more than someone you enjoy spending time with," You smiled softly, "You will learn that one day, but you and Ni'awtu are not mates," Ateyo began to nod slowly, "But for now, you are great friends- that is what you are and that is what matters,"

"Okay," He smiled softly, shuffling his feet "I am sorry to have made you both upset,"

You let out a breathy laugh from your nose, "You have not upset us, Ateyo. You just didn't know what it meant to be mates, it was a mistake, but you have not upset us," You tried your best to reassure the younger boy, a warm smile on your face.

"Then why does daddy have those big lines on his forehead?" Ni'awtu held her dad's hand, looking up at him confused.

"He's getting old," You whispered with a smirk.

"Excuse me," Neteyam interjected, "I am leader of this clan," He picked Ni'awtu up and threw her over his shoulder, "And I will have respect!" He began to tickle her. Ni'awtu's laughter filled the tent once again, Ateyo's too.

Over the years, the two of them laughing together in your home would become a familiar sound- much to Neteyam's dismay.

© 2023 yawneneteyam

translations (atan / light) (oeyä txe’lan / my heart) (oeyä tsawke / my sunshine) (yawne / beloved) (syulang / flower) (oel ngati kameie / i see you) (mawey, oeyä yawne / calm, my beloved)