#maybe the storm can be reunited with its child too...

[riptidesblog]

When you have a fic idea but not the writing skills

[helion-ism]

I’m here to talk about lucien and his nameless mother today 🥲

first of all: she deserves better, she deserves to survive beron and this series. and she deserves to be with the man she still loves. ☀️

now, what I think is terribly sad is the fact that in the entire series so far, lucien has not talked about his mother at all. he talked about beron, he talked about his brothers, but not about his mother. I can’t even imagine how lonely and sad he must feel to not be able to see her, talk to her, ask her for advice, to help her …

he hasn’t seen her or been able to speak to her in gods know how long. rhys says:

Little Lucien. You certainly gave them something to talk about when you switched to Spring. Such a sad thing, to see your lovely mother in perpetual mourning over losing you.

(“switched to spring” he says as if he had much of a choice) what we get from this is the obvious: the lady of autumn loves and misses her son — to this day (which is not surprising). under the mountain, the lady of autumn proves that by placing herself in danger by helping feyre (“For giving her your name in place of my son’s life,” she said, her voice as sweet as sun-warmed apples.)

then rhys threatens lucien’s mother:

Rhysand’s venom-coated smile grew. “You draw blood from me, Lucien, and you’ll learn how quickly Amarantha’s whore can make the entire Autumn Court bleed. Especially its darling Lady.”

lucien's reaction:

The color leached from Lucien’s face, but he held his ground.

I don’t know what was going on in his mind at that point. he regarded rhys as a villain at the beginning of the series, saw him as somebody who could fulfill the promises he made easily and without guilt or remorse. lucien has not been talking about his mother, but in this scene, it’s clear he loves her and he is protective of her.

growing up, he must have had a close relationship to his mother, being the youngest child but also the secrets that came with his birth. whether beron knows or doesn’t, the lady of autumn must have always kept him close to her to ensure that nothing happens to him — maybe even with the help of eris. it is likely that his mother pushed him to do a lot of the things he tells feyre about in acowar: studying mroe than his brothers and educating himself thoroughly, training as long as he wanted, learning about the land and the people.

my own little theory is that the lady of autumn encouraged him to do all that because she had hope that one day, she could tell lucien and helion about their relation and in her own way, she could help prepare her son for the role of heir of the day court and help him develop into an intelligent, kind, skillful, and caring man.

it’s awful that lucien never speaks of her, but it might be too painful for him. especially knowing she is still imprisoned at the autumn court. in acomaf, rhys says:

“Little Lucien,” Rhys purred. “Didn’t the Lady of the Autumn Court ever tell you that when a woman says no, she means it?”

“Prick,” Lucien snarled, storming past his sentinels, but not daring to touch his weapons. “You filthy, whoring prick.“

lucien knows exactly what kind of man beron is. he knows him because he was raised by him. he knows him because it is very likely his mother often protected and shielded little lucien from beron and took the punishment for him. given rhys’s remark about saying no, I think some of us might imagine what rhys is referring to exactly — and understand why lucien reacts the way he does. and even helion says:

“They say the lady was all brightness and smiles before that. And after Beron was through with her … You saw what she is.”

in the end, they never reunite — at least not until this point in the story. and I really really hope we get to see lucien finally hug his mother and see her happy — maybe just once.

The Lady of Autumn’s favorite son—not only from Lucien’s goodness. But because he was the child she’d dreamed of having … with the male she undoubtedly loved.

I don’t know how awful life must be for her, how much pain she has had to endure because of the man she is married to. but I think we all do know that if there was one thing she could wish for, it would be to either talk to lucien and find out how he is doing, who his friends are, what is happening with his mate, and so on. or she would simply wish him to be in safety forever. she is definitely the kind of woman (and mother) who always puts her children first. feyre says lucien is her favourite son. it may be true. but I think she loves all of her children, no matter how vile they are. she did end up choosing to stay with beron even though she knew lucien and her would have a better life with beron. but she didn’t — maybe to avoid a war, but probably because of her other children who were still at the autumn court. I don’t know, but I hope we’ll find out more about her, I hope we get to see a wholesome reunion scene with her and lucien, and I hope we’ll finally find out her name.

[captainlevisteacup]

Oooh, an idea has struck. The brothers reacting to Dom Male!MC reuniting with his childhood bestfriend in the Devildom, only their bestfriend is now a high ranking/powerful incubus who has a fuck ton of influence & money. (Not nearly as powerful as any of the brothers or Diavolo, of course, but you get the point)

And while normally a simple childhood friend wouldn’t be enough to bother the brothers, DM!MC’s Femboy CH!Bestfriend is the optimum of gorgeous, with a lithe & toned body and an “innocent” charm to him.

Spoiler Alert, CH!Bestfriend has been in love with DM!MC since they were kids (though it was just puppy love back then) and is determined to never let him get away from him again, resulting in him being extra clingy and needy.

Another Spoiler Alert, DM!MC’s childhood bestfriend may or may not be a mix of a “Worship” & “Self Sacrifice” Yandere.. (Look up “The Dere Types Wiki” if your confused)

You have some very interesting ideas😂 im so sorry this took so long, I didn't want to post it until I was back up to my full working capacity after getting injured and after breaking up with someone😁

Anyways, without further ado, here ya go😘

The Brother's Reactions to M! MC'S Yandere Childhood Incubus! Friend

Warnings: Violence, Language, Blood, VERY SLIGHT sexual themes, some non-consentual touching in Levi's section, brief mention of drugging in Beel's

Lucifer

At first, didn't think twice of MC having a childhood friend

But when he heard the word incubus

He got the smile on his face

You know the one

Lucifer "innocently" is around whenever the incubus is around

Its starts off small

Little poisoned glances from the incubus here and there

But eventually it escalated and turned into him putting a possessive arm around MC's waist

Lucifer snapped

The second the Incubus was alone, Lucifer followed him down an alley

Slammed that fucker against the wall and held him there by the throat

The incubus started laughing, even when Lucifer tightened his grip

"You'll never get rid of me. I have connections to everyone, Fallen Angel. I've loved him since before you even knew he existed, and a prissy peacock like you isnt gonna stop me from making him mine, even if I have to drug and kidnap him"

Lucifer only smiled and released him

The incubus smirked, daintily dusting off his lithe figure

Thinking he won, he shouldered his way past Lucifer

Only to stop short in horror

Deep growls greeted him

Lucifer didn't even bother hiding the screams of the incubus as Cerberus ripped into him

After a while, he signaled Cerberus to stop

As the incubus lies on the ground whimpering, Lucifer calmly says:

"Now that I've shown you just what I'm willing to do to protect MC, I'll make you a deal. MC cares about you, as a FRIEND. But his heart belongs to me and me alone, and mine belongs to him. If you can understand and respect that, I'll allow you near him. But one wrong word, one wrong placement of a hand, and I won't hesitate to finish you off myself. And believe me," he says with a dark chuckle "I won't be as gentle as Cerberus."

Mammon

This man immediately is on high alert

Someone trying to take what's HIS?

The incubus makes him more greedy than ever

Decides not to leave MC's side for a second

Even when he's sleeping

When Mammon can't help the incu-bitch (his nickname for the childhood friend) being around, he acts sort of like a child, which makes him look like a dick in comparison to the incubus's calm and innocent facade

Mammon tries to tell MC there's something up, but he just chalks it up to Mammon being Mammon

One day, MC randomly receives news from the human world that his mother contracted something contagious and was placed in ICU

The incu-bitch was, of course, right there when MC started tearing up, letting him cry into his shoulder

Mammon sees this and starts to protest

This leads MC to snap and tell Mammon he's being a child

Mammon leaves them be and thinks hard

Comes to the conclusion that maybe MC is right, and he begrudgingly decides to apologize to the incubus

As he approaches him, Mammon catches a glimpse of the Incubus's *expensive* phone

Unable to resist, he throws a coin against the wall in the opposite direction.

When he turns to look at the noise, Mammon snatches the phone and yeets off to his room

When he gets there, he opens the phone- no lock- and is startled by what he sees

A fake texting app, along with the messages telling MC his mother was sick

Mammon was about to run to find MC, when he heard a slight chuckle

Looking up, he saw the incubus...holding a knife

"You just couldn't stay away, could you? You've been a pain in the ass ever since I got here. But no matter, once MC sees how *cruel* you are to his defenseless childhood friend, he'll want nothing to do with you. And he'll be mine to fuck and own as I please."

Mammon gritted his teeth and ground out "Making MC think his mother was gravely ill just to get close to him when he's vulnerable? You're disgusting. I actually care about MC, and I respect them more than you ever will."

The incubus snorted, and raised the knife.

"Oi! What do ya think you're doing with that?" Mammon yelled

He raised the knife....and slashed it across his own arm

He then threw the knife towards Mammon, threw himself to the ground, and yelled out in pain

Suddenly, MC burst into the room

Mammon sputtered out a panicked explanation, but MC cut him off with a stare

He kneeled down next to his friend, who reached up with a bloody hand to cup MC'S face

MC put his hand over the incubus's....and sharply bent it backwards

He leaned down and whispered into his ear: "I heard everything, you little shit. Now, get the FUCK out of my house and away from my boyfriend, and don't even THINK of defiling my life with your presence ever again"

After he left, Mammon cautiously said "boyfriend, huh..?"

"Shut up mammon"

Levi

Oh, this won't do

Immediately feels threatened and triggered

He is the avatar of Envy, after all

His response?

Prove to MC nobody can know him as well as he can

He does this every single time the incubus is near

"MC, I got you your favorite drink!"

"MC, I ordered you some food. Don't worry, I already know what you like"

Flinches whenever the incu-bitch touches MC. It literally makes him cringe

His suspicions are confirmed when the incubus shoots Levi a malicious glance next time he touches MC

Levi snaps

Challenges the incubus to a video game duel

He surprisingly accepts

He cheats like hell and beats Levi

Levi goes into his demon form and rages

But MC thinks he's just being a sore loser

He tells Levi to back off and to go cool down

Once Levi storms off, the incu-bitch thanks MC for standing up for him

Then, he promptly tries to make a move on MC

He reaches out a hand to unbutton MC'S shirt

MC slaps his hand away, but not before noticing writing on the Incubus's hand

Before he can pull away, MC snatches his hand and sees cheat codes written on them

Gets super upset and tries to get up to apologize to Levi

The incubus pulls him back down by his wrist and pins them to the couch

"MC, don't you realize? You're all I want, all I need. I WORSHIP you, MC. And you're going to be mine. Nobody else can have you. And you're going to love me, whether you realize it right now or not. You'll learn with time to need me just as desperately as I need you"

Starts to take off MC'S clothes in spite of their fighting and protests, the incubus shushing him

"Shhhh, I know you don't see it, but this will make you see."

Levi slams open the door, tail lashing and face white with rage

"Get your normie hands the fuck off of my human. Now."

The incubus nopes the fuck out. He may be a high ranking incubus, but he still isn't as strong as one of the seven demon brothers.

Levi holds MC tightly as they fumble over an apology

"Shhh MC, its okay. I'm here now. Let's watch some anime and calm down together, yea?"

Satan

Do I even have to explain this one?

Is hostile as soon as MC even MENTIONS a childhood male friend, let alone an INCUBUS

Honestly, the Incubus is a bit scared of Satan

But, he decides he wants MC more than he fears Satan

So, he swallows his fear and patronizes Satan in tiny, unremarkable ways

Ways that would only be noticed by Satan

A stray hand here and there that lingers a LITTLE too long

Wiping a crumb from MC'S lips during a meal

Tucking a stray hair behind MC'S ear

Every last one of these actions makes his blood boil

It gets so bad that Satan is just in a perpetual state of rage, never leaving his demon form

Satan starts passive aggressively insulting the incubus's intelligence

"Oh, you mean you don't know how disestablishmentarianism impacted the overall congruence of Midwest society? Thats odd, its fairly simple. Practically common sense."

Is shocked when MC got livid at him, because he was being condescending for seemingly no reason

Starts to get angry at MC

"Can't you see? He's trying to turn you against me. Just LISTEN, DAMNIT!" He says as he grabs MC'S shoulders

The incubus barges in and shoves Satan away from MC

"Are you ok, MC? Did he hurt you?"

The amount of white hot rage in the room was tangible

He can't do it anymore

Slams the incubus against the wall

Knocks him to the ground

But when he falls down

A bunch of photos fall out of his jacket

Not normal photos

Horrifying ones

One of MC while he showers

One of MC sleeping

One of MC changing

Even one of MC and Satan having a steamy moment

MC goes still...and then SLAPS the shit out of the incubus.

He wordlessly turns to Satan, eyes pleading

"It would be my pleasure, MC" *evil grin*

Cue Satan dragging the incubus off by his hair

Asmo

P A S S I V E A G R E S S I V E

He sees this lovely incubus with NEARLY perfect hair, a lithe and toned body, and a seemingly innocent attitude, and he just wants him gone

He's been with plenty of Incubi, so he knows what they're like

Because of this, he doesn't want this one anywhere NEAR his darling MC

Comes up with a plan to use all his fashion design connections to outdress the incubus

He knows they're vain by nature, so he comes to the conclusion that this is the best course of action

But there's a problem

"Is that a statement piece from Priya Lacroix? She hasn't even released her collection yet"

Asmo.exe is not responding

He knows that HE is the only one Priya would ever give an early release to

So why does THE INCUBUS have her statement piece?

And WHERE is his phone?

Complains to MC, but MC doesn't take him seriously because he's too busy catching up with his friend

Asmo gets jealous and storms off to do a stress relieving skin routine

As MC and the incubus hang out, the incubus's phone goes off

Only...the ringtone is sinful indulgence

Mammon storms into the room

"AHA! I FOUND YA ASMO, YOU ANNOYING LITTLE- huh?"

"I/N? Why do you have Asmo's phone?"

"MC, you have to understand, I just want you to realize I'm the only right one for you. You NEED to realize you can't be with anyone else. Because you're mine, MC. You always have been."

Screeching could be heard in the distance, then footsteps quickly getting closer and closer

"THE FUCK DID YOU JUST SAY" Asmo yells as he slams open the door

"As if MC would choose a crusty, obsessive, STEALING, lying, probably STD having Incubus like you over me! Now give me my phone back and get out of here. And while you're at it, take off that Priya piece. There's a reason I'm the only one allowed early access."

Beel

Honestly doesn't think that much of it at first

He thinks its nice MC reunited with one of his childhood friends, and an Incubus at that

But when he meets the friend, something just feels off

He gets a weird sensation, and its not hunger

Its like his senses are on red alert

The incubus was nice enough to Beel, seemingly charming and genuine

But Beel couldn't help but feel rubbed the wrong way, with a sensation similar to seaweed against legs in the ocean

He doesn't want to mention this to MC, because he's convinced he's just overreacting

He feels a little sad that MC is too busy for him, but he does his best to give them time together

One night, he had made some food in the kitchen and decided to bring MC and I/N some

When he neared the door, he almost dropped the plate

He heard a loud thud, and MC saying "Hey, I said no, okay?"

He gently opened the door and looked at MC, who immediately forced a smile to his face

"Hey MC, I brought you guys some food. Is everything ok?"

"Thanks Beel, that's sweet of you. Everything's fine, I promise"

Beel relaxed a bit, although he still knew something was off.

The incubus excused himself to use the restroom, encouraging MC to eat without him

Beel and MC sat down, and Beel scarfed down his portion

Chuckling, MC offered his plate to Beel, who gladly accepted

The incubus opened the door shortly after with an expectant look on his face, as well as rope and a gag in his hands

Upon laying eyes on MC, a shocked expression came onto his face as his eyes darted between MC and the empty plate

"How are you still conscious?" He blurted

Confusion flashed across MC'S face. "What do you mean, I/N?"

"You drugged it, didn't you?" Beel spoke up.

"I thought it tasted odd," Beel continued "but I never would have guessed you would actually drug MC. I'm guessing you couldn't handle that MC rejected your advances, so you drugged the food while MC was distracted talking to me. Am I right?"

The incubus chuckled. "Guess I was wrong about you. You are more of a threat than you seem. Heh, I guess you're not just a talking stomach after all."

A loud smack could be heard shortly thereafter.

But the devastating blow didn't come from Beel

It came from an enraged MC

"Trying to drug me I could keep my cool over. If thats all you did I would have just told you to stay the hell away from me. But the SECOND you spoke to Beel like that, you signed your own death warrant."

Before he could react, MC summoned the brothers one by one, Beel explaining the situation.

"Well, MC, perfect timing as always. I was just beginning to get bored" Satan drawled

*screams*

Belphie

It takes a yandere to know one

Belphie doesn't want to alarm MC though, so he decides to outmaneuver the incubus without him noticing

It starts small, with I/N reaching out to put an arm over MC'S shoulder, and Belphie's arm already being there

Eventually, they start glaring daggers at each other the second MC looks away

After a while, Belphie decides to up the ante

Religiously falls asleep on MC when I/N is trying to spend time with him

Goads the incubus so much that he corners Belphie when he snaps and can't take any more

"Listen, I know exactly what you're doing. But if you think that YOU can take him away from me, you're sorely mistaken. MC is mine whether he likes it or not. And if it turns out to be the latter, well, let's just say he won't have much of a choice in the matter, nor will you have any control over it. Got that?"

Belphie does the one thing he knows will get the outcome he had painstakingly built up to the past couple weeks: he laughs

"Ah, you have a good sense of humor, know that? Funny stuff. All kidding aside, MC already belongs to me. So your child's play isn't gonna cut it. Got THAT?"

With a choked cry of fury, the incubus pulls out a knife and stabs Belphie

Belphie, having planned this, falls to the floor just as the door opens to reveal a shocked MC.

"BELPHIE! Shit, please be okay! What the FUCK is wrong with you, I/N?"

The stunned Incubus could only stammer out a couple words

"I- he...was gonna...tried to take what was mine. Tried to take you..."

MC laughed bitterly and shoved him to the floor.

"I don't know what sick world you're living in, but I belong to Belphie. I love him. And I hate YOU. Now I'll leave you be so you can deal with THAT. Ta ta." He says as he scoops up Belphie and heads out the door

"Deal with what?" I/N nervously asks after him, backing up warily

The incubus stops when his back hits something hard.

Gulping, he looks up...

"Hello, I/N, I'm Beel."

"Nice to...meet you? I imagine you're one of the brothers?" He replies shakily

Beel smiles. The light doesn't reach his eyes.

"Yes, I'm one of the brothers. You see, I'm Belphie's twin."

Across the house, Belphie smiles at the faint screams, MC curled up next to him after patching him up.

He succeeded in protecting what was his. He deserves a good nap. Holding MC tighter, he goes back to sleep.

[clonewarslover55]

I'm so sorry but can I request some more Boba love? Perhaps him reuniting with his Riduur after all those years?? Maybe some sweet fluff and then them getting back to their usual activities? 😏

Headcanons or blurb, whatever you're up for!! I'm just happy to see all the Thicc Boba™ love!!

Yes!!!! I loved this request!!! Have a drabble lol 

An old lover  Boba Fett X GN!Reader 

Notes: It isn’t exactly like that scene in chapter 14 because I tried to be creative. So don’t expect too much. 

Warnings: Canon violence, sadness, fluff, mentions of smut but no smut sorry, 

Have a gif because he’s hot 

You worked with Din temporarily, till you could get back on your feet as a bounty hunter again. You used to be one of the best, but when Boba Fett died you went downhill very fast. Din helped you get a roof over your head after a few years of being homeless and broken hearted. 

Din didn’t need to know that you used to be in a relationship with the galaxy's most famous bounty hunter.

+++++++

When the ship came in through orbit you gasped loudly, Din looking at you. “Do you know that ship?” He spoke while looking back at the kid nervously. “I-I.” You felt years and years of memories rushing back to you. Slave I was Boba’s ship. If she was here…..does that mean??

No it couldn’t be. You had his armor…...which was probably the only thing that survived the Sarlacc. But Boba Fett was hard to kill…….so maybe? You felt tears in your eyes, kriff you missed him.

Din yelled your name and you jumped, “We need to move!” You shook your head, “Watch the kid! I’ll go check it out!” You ran down the hill, pulling out your blaster. Din watched, looking nervously between you and the kid on the rock. 

You froze when you saw the ship, Slave I looked the same as always. Her paint was peeling and she was older than Boba’s late father, but damn she was beautiful.  Your eyes weren’t open for long when the butt of a rifle hit you in the temple. 

The last thing you saw was a Storm Trooper, then everything went black. 

When you woke up you were in the middle of a fucking blaster fight. Din was practically standing on you, shooting down storm troopers. You screamed and sat up, screaming even louder when you saw someone very familiar. Thankfully you were behind Din, so you didn’t get shot. 

Boba Fett was fucking fighting the Storm Troopers along side Din Djarin. You scrambled to your feet, hardly registering anything but the fact that Boba was alive. He had put on the armor, and was beating the shit out of some Storm Troopers with a Tusken Raider staff. 

When the last few fled Boba walked after them, watching the ships take off. Boba Fett didn’t like to leave survivors. He shot one ship, which blew up and crashed into the other. “Nice shot.” You heard Din speak, Boba’s reply nearly making you sob. “I was aiming for the other one.” 

The child was gone, which broke your heart. You couldn’t really feel that pain though, the past coming back and hurting much worse. You put a hand over your mouth, tears threatening to spill. 

After the Razor Crest blew up you couldn’t even feel anything else but shock.The explosion was the last thing on your mind, Boba being alive was far more important than a piece of shit ship.  Din had walked to the rubble, which gave you the perfect time to talk to Fett. 

You walked over, “B-Boba?” Your voice was shaky, but your past lover heard you anyway. His head whipped around and he froze for a moment, “You-.......You’re alive!” You ran to him, Boba catching you and hugging you tightly. 

You cried into his cloth covered neck, “You survived.” You whispered. Boba stroked your back and sighed through his helmet. You sobbed, but you didn’t exactly know for what reason. 

Din and Fennec watched, both having no idea that you and Boba were close. 

You stepped back and cupped the cheeks of his helmet. Before you could pull it off he put his hands over yours, “Wait. I was in the Sarlacc for two days…..I don’t look the same.” You shrugged and rubbed some of the chipped paint off with your thumb, “Boba I don’t care. I just want to see you.” 

He let you remove his helmet, and he was just as handsome as he was the day you lost him. “You’re still a handsome man Fett.” You smiled, kissing him deeply. His lips were the same as they used to be, rough and chapped but perfect. 

Din walked over, his voice sounding shaky from the loss of the child. “Care to explain?” Boba gave him the usual bemused Fett look, clearly not giving enough fucks to tell him. “Boba and I used to be an item. We worked together and all that.” You smiled like an idiot. 

“When I was swallowed by a Sarlacc everyone thought I died. My recovery took me so long that I hadn’t found them yet.” Boba speaks, his fingers entangling with yours. You felt tears well up in your eyes at the thought of him alone. 

~The next day~ 

Slave I was on autopilot, making its way to the next destination that Din had told Boba. You sat in the cockpit with Boba, watching him repaint his armor. You held the small tins of old paint as he worked silently, his strokes steady. 

“You’re staring.” He muttered, not looking up from the Fett family farm mark on the chest plate. “Oh I’m not allowed to stare?” Boba narrowed his eyes, his lips twitching a little. “I missed you Boba, I think I’m allowed to stare.” 

Boba glanced at you and smiled, “I suppose.” He said sarcastically. You rolled your eyes and took the finished chest plate from his hands, setting it by the others to dry. He was working on his knee plates now, the last pieces to do. 

You were nearly asleep in the seat when Boba put the last piece down with the others, “All done.” He muttered, pressing a kiss to your forehead. 

He sat back down in the pilots seat, pulling you into his lap. “I missed you.” You kissed him deeply, Boba happily kissing you back. You ran your hands down his arms and grinned, “You somehow got even sexier you know.” You muttered against his lips as you straddled him. 

Boba rolled his eyes and kissed you again, he was never one for accepting compliments. “Too bad we’ll never be alone on this ship again.” You sighed. “When we stop he’s getting off to find a friend, we’ll be able to do some things then.”

Boba kissed your neck, the feeling sending lightning bolts down your spine. “Then I’ll show you just how much I missed you.” 

Tags: @leias-left-hair-bun @iamassbuttkingofhell @catsnkooks @mxndalorians @colorfulloverbatturkey @ahsokatano-thetogruta @jedi-mando @peacefulwizardfox @julyzaa @feathersforclones @chr0nicbackpain @strangebroadwaykinks @jedi-nila-rhyn @fyrepen33 @valkyrieofthehighfae @commanderrivercc-3628 @my-awakened-ghost

[fanfoolishness]

five denials and a truth (The Mandalorian)

Written for @fake-starwars-fan, who suggested this idea.  Five times Din Djarin denies he is a father, and one time he doesn’t.  Canon-compliant, spoilers for seasons 1 and 2, and gets angsty as hell. I’m so sorry, Din.  Featuring Din, Grogu, Omera, the Armorer, Peli Motto, Ahsoka Tano, Boba Fett, and Cara Dune.  3800 words.

***

i.

The sun fell beneath the crowns of the trees, leaving them awash in blues and golds, and the insects sang their chorus in the growing shadows.  Din Djarin sat at the edge of the fire, watching the child play with the other children.  Wariness hummed in the back of his mind, long years of training deeply entrenched despite the seeming peace of Sorgan.  Still, though, it was hard to remain battle-ready here, as the children laughed and played their silly games.

Omera sat on the log beside him, waving a hand to her daughter.  The girl took off eagerly to join the others.  Pinpoint flashes of light sparkled around the children as they played, the evening lightning-beetles taking wing.

“The children love your son,” she said, turning back to Din, her eyes aglow in the firelight.  “I’ve never seen a youngling like him, but they’ve truly taken to him.  My daughter’s quite envious of his frog-catching skills.”  She chuckled, voice sweet and warm.

“He’s not my son,” said Din in polite, careful tones.  He shifted slightly on the log.

Omera tilted her head.  He found her direct eye contact discomfiting, but he did not look away.  “Because he isn’t human?”

He shook his head slightly.  “No.  That has nothing to do with it.”

“Then what?  I see the way you watch out for him.  You’re watching him now, making sure he isn’t getting into trouble,” she said lightly.  “Every parent does it.”

“There are terrible people after him,” said Din, feeling uneasy in a way he couldn’t pin down.  Imps, bounty hunters, who knew what else?  The less said about it, the better.  “I’m just trying to protect him until I can find a safe place for him, that’s all.”

She arched an eyebrow as the child toddled over to them, holding a squirming lightning-beetle in his small hands, its green-gold light pulsing between his fingertips.  “Looks like he has something to show you.”

Din bent down, reaching out to take the child’s hands.  “You, uh, you caught this?” he asked gruffly.  “Huh.”  He’d seen the other children trying to do the same and failing, the agile beetles getting the better of them.  Despite himself, he was impressed.  

“Good for you.  Just don’t  -- no!  Drop it!”  He pulled the squirming beetle out of the child’s mouth and tossed it aside, watching it flash up into the sky.  The child looked at him with big eyes, ears sinking down to his shoulders.

“Oh, they’re perfectly safe to eat,” said Omera, laughing.  “We eat them now and then if things are lean.”

“Oh,” said Din.  He felt his mouth form into a smile, a reflexive action beneath the helmet.  “Uh, sorry,” he said to the child.  “Maybe next time.”

The child took another step forward, then leaned against Din’s leg, small arms curling around his shin.  Then he was off again, toddling back to the children and the waiting lightning-beetles.

“If you aren’t his father,” asked Omera, “what’s stopping you?”  She gazed at him, her face kind, her eyes questioning.  

“I’m not what he needs,” Din said.  He turned away from her, staring off into the forest, where the bandits waited.  “That’s all.”

***

ii.

The Armorer watched Din Djarin carefully, grateful that another member of the Tribe had survived.  Of course, he and his actions were the reason so many had fallen, but the Creed was unflinchingly clear.  Death in the service of protecting another Mandalorian or a foundling was the noblest end to a warrior’s life.  The price had been paid, and paid again, and she bore him no anger for it.

She asked to see the child, to see the one whose protection had merited the fragmentation and destruction of the Tribe.  The creature stared up at her, clearly tired and frail, but its eyes held a spirit she understood.  This one had seen suffering.  It was always written in the eyes of those who did not hide their faces.

She saw, too, the way Djarin angled himself toward the child.  She had heard of how he had protected it, blaster, body and beskar, against the storm that drove him from the planet.  And she remembered the tale of the enemy that had helped him defeat the mudhorn.  She began to understand.

She explained to Djarin what he must do, what the Creed demanded.  No matter that the child was linked to the Jedi, nor that Djarin knew not where to find them.  He was a resourceful man.  She had faith that he would fulfill the Creed.

The others pressed him to leave, their urgency clear.  The Imperials were coming, as they had come upon them before in the night, and she understood their fear.  They knew not the Way of the Mandalore, the honor of a warrior’s death.

Djarin dissented.  “I’m staying.  I need to help her, and I need to heal.”

His desire to assist was welcome, but she knew that this was not his path.  His path was clear. It lay in the child’s wide eyes, in his small hands, in the way Djarin spoke of the foundling with a measured distance she knew he did not keep.  The truth could not be hidden.  A Mandalorian could fool an outsider, but she was the Armorer, and the depth of his feelings toward the child was laid bare in voice and stance.

“You must go,” she said firmly.  “A foundling is in your care.  By Creed, until it is of age or reunited with its own kind, you are as its father.”

You already are, she wished to say, but she did not.  He was not ready.  Not yet.  Denial showed plain in the set of his shoulders.

“This is the Way,” she said instead, voice brisk.  “You have earned your Signet.”  Her hands were swift and precise upon his pauldron, affixing the gleaming mudhorn to its rightful place.  

There it was, the emotion she knew lay deep within him.  “Thank you,” he said, and she saw the warrior’s heart within him gentled, humbled, made vulnerable.  “I will wear it with honor.”  

There were certain truths she had long known.  The best warriors did not harden their hearts.  Too hard, and they found their deaths too quickly, the potential glory of their sacrifice fading into a meaningless waste.  Yet those that succumbed to the pain of the world could be too soft, losing the will to fight and turning to the follies of pacifism.  

The finest warriors, the truest, walked wounded through the world.  It was their battles that burned brightest in the minds of their people, their struggles that most honored the Way of the Mandalore.  

She watched Djarin and the child leave with the others, and she waited, her hammer at the ready.  She would protect the beskar and buy time for those of her Tribe to escape.  She knew she would not fall this day.  

Beneath her helmet, she smiled.  For she believed Clan Mudhorn would earn their place in legend.

***

iii.

Din returned to Peli Motto’s shop, laden with supplies from the market.  Ammunition, food and water for himself and the kid, a few more packs of bacta patches.  Wouldn’t do to head out into the deep desert unprepared, and he wasn’t sure this mining town Peli was talking about really still existed.  He unloaded the supplies onto the ramp into the Crest, and turned to look for the kid.  He’s fine, he reminded himself, but he still hated how hard it was to leave the kid sometimes, how he always felt like something was missing when the kid wasn’t in his sight.

As expected, Peli was in her office, the kid in her lap.  She was having an animated discussion with him, judging by the way his ears quivered.  As Din drew near he picked up some of their conversation.

“So there I was, fighting an infestation of womp rats the size of banthas, and this no-good nerfherder shows up wanting to know why his ship’s not ready.  I tried telling him the droids were overrun and that I’d already busted one blaster trying to shoot the damn things, and he had the nerve to -- Mando!  Back from the market, huh?” Peli asked, looking up at him.  

The kid let out an excited squeal and reached towards him.  Reluctantly, Peli lifted him up, and Din took him into his arms.  The kid settled down in the crook of his elbow like he’d been there all his life, and Din finally relaxed.

“Not the best selection I’ve ever seen, but I got what we needed,” he said.  “Thanks for watching the kid.  He’s gotten me into trouble with more than one vendor.  Sticky fingers.”  And having the ability to move things with his mind, while impressive, wasn’t exactly a good recipe when combined with a youngling who was hungry all the time.  Din tilted his helmet down to look at the kid, his mouth tugging invisibly into a grin beneath the beskar.

“This angel?” Peli scoffed.  “I don’t believe it.”  Din simply looked at her, and she relented, “Okay, okay, he ate half my lunch when I wasn’t looking, and tried to eat a sand roach when I was.  I get your point.”

“I told you to be good for Peli,” scolded Din.  The kid let out a small, sad burble, and he sighed.  “I know, I know.  You didn’t mean it.”  He reached up, fingers cuffing gently against the kid’s cheek.

“You guys should do more business on Tatooine,” said Peli, leaning back in her chair and taking a long drink of caf.  “Always a pleasure.  It warms my sandblasted heart, seeing you two.”

Din nearly choked.  “Excuse me?”

“You know what I mean!” she said, waving her hands.  “Mos Eisley’s got some pretty nasty dealings in the back alleys.  Orphaned younglings, drunks, slavers looking for easy marks…   It’s just nice to see a dad actually taking care of his kid for once.”

Din was still.  The kid grabbed his thumb with one small hand, holding it tight, and reflexively he curled his hand closer to the little one.  He didn’t speak.

Peli raised her brows, looking concerned.  “Did I say something wrong?”

“I…”  He swallowed.  “I’m not his father.”

“Well, I don’t know what exactly you look like under that armor, but no shit, Mando,” she said.  “But dads aren’t just a blood thing.  I thought -- I mean, the way you take care of him, and all.  You’d do anything for this kid, or I don’t know a damn thing.”

“I would,” he said slowly.  “Do anything for him.”  The kid brushed his hand against his cuirass, his claws making tiny ting noises against the beskar.  

“But you’re not his dad.”

If you aren’t his father, what’s stopping you?

You are as its father.

“He’s a foundling,” said Din, and he fought to keep his voice steady.  “I would die for him.  This is the Way.”

Peli held out her hands skeptically, face shifting into clear confusion.  “And again, you’re not his dad?  I’m not getting the distinction here.”

He looked down at the kid, whose ears quivered with curiosity, his mouth slightly open as if asking a question.  

Red robes, blaster fire, the smell of smoke, the sound of screams --

Until it is reunited with its own kind --

“It’s complicated,” he said, turning away from her.  “Thanks again for watching him.  We’d better get a move on before it starts getting dark.”  

He headed back out toward the ship and the speeder, her indignant voice following him.  “It’s noon, but whatever you say, Mando!”

***

iv.

Mist lay heavy in the secluded forest, muffling the sounds of the grazing beasts in the distance, the township far away.  Din stared out at the falling darkness, his stomach twisting.  It was nearly time.  Time to fulfill his quest, to deliver the child.

Time to say goodbye to Grogu.

His feet felt heavy, so heavy, though the distance to the little sleeping area from the hold was only a few steps away.  He stood in the doorway, watching the child sleep in the small hammock.  He’d picked up the cloth in a small market on a forgotten world.  He remembered asking the shopkeeper if it was soft enough for a youngling, remembered taking his glove off to make sure the fabric wasn’t itchy.  He remembered the kid -- Grogu -- cooing to himself that first night in the hammock, remembered how well the kid had slept.  

He remembered how he’d laid awake half the night, missing the kid curled up on his chest.

Din raised his hands.  They trembled.  

This is what I came to do.  This is for him.

“Wake up, buddy,” he said, voice breaking.  “It’s time to say goodbye.”  He reached a hand into the hammock, brushing against Grogu’s chest.  The kid made a small, sleepy sigh, a sigh he’d heard dozens, hundreds of times now, a sigh that had become as familiar and homey as the engine’s hum.  He lifted him carefully out of the hammock, but Grogu just yawned, smacking his lips, and closed his eyes again.

Din sat down, leaning against the wall with Grogu on his knee.  He looked at him.  Really looked, though his vision blurred.  I have… I have to remember.    

He drank in the sight of those long, delicate ears, soft with thin white fuzz on the edges, the inner skin shell-pink rimmed with mossy green.  He memorized the curious ridges and bumps on his forehead, between his eyes, remembering how they crinkled when the kid was happy and flattened when the kid was being obstinate.  He looked at the mouth that had eaten a horrifying number of frogs and spiders, and nearly laughed despite himself.

Grogu’s hand twitched, curling over Din’s fingertip.  Din shifted his thumb to cover the back of his small hand, and the kid blinked sleepy eyes at him.  Those eyes, so wide, so curious, so expressive.  He would never forget them.  

“You’re gonna love being a Jedi,” Din whispered.  “You’ll learn how to use your powers.  You’ll get even stronger.  You’ll see.”  You won’t need me.

Grogu’s weight on his knee was so light.  

Funny, then, that Din felt so crushed.  

He bowed over the kid, arms curling around his small body.  Grogu leaned into him, and Din held him, and he told himself that it was time.

He was never sure, looking back, how he piloted the ship safely back to the town and landed it without a hitch.  He only remembered walking down the ramp, seeing the Jedi Ahsoka waiting for them, and going cold, cold, cold.

They regarded each other for a moment.  The Jedi’s eyes were sad and distant.  She gazed down at Grogu, nestled in Din’s arms.  

“You’re like a father to him,” she said finally.  “I cannot train him.”

His legs felt fuzzy and weak.  He straightened up, forcing himself to stand firm.  He had to try again, for the kid’s sake.  “You made me a promise, and I held up my end,” he accused.

The Jedi spoke.  Part of him held onto her words, kept them safe, directions to a planet, another option to find more Jedi.  He could do this.

The other part of him was dizzy, punchdrunk, even as he held the kid safely in his arms.  You’re like a father to him echoed, and somehow the words struck deeper than they ever had before.  He ached with them, ached for them to be real -- weren’t Jedi supposed to be noble?  Weren’t they supposed to tell the truth?

But he knew he couldn’t be that lucky.  

He thanked her politely for the information, and set a course for Tython.

***    

v.      

“We’re coming up on Nevarro,” came Fett’s voice in his ear, and Din jerked awake.

It took him a moment to get his bearings.  This wasn’t the Crest.  This was Slave I.  This was Boba Fett.  Fennec Shand was down below.  And Grogu was… gone.

His head reeled. Gone.  Not safe in the arms of a Jedi, no future secured and sheltered.  He’d been stolen, been lost.  Under his watch.

“You still asleep?” Fett asked, glancing back.  His helmet rested beside him, half-cleaned of its scorch marks and scars.  Fett had been busy while he was sleeping.

“No,” said Din, trying to clear his head.  He lapsed into silence.

“It’s a fair plan,” said Fett.  “I hope it works.  For the sake of the child.”

“You didn’t have to --” Din started.  They’d been through this already, though, and he knew it would be insulting to keep up his protests.  “I’m… grateful for the help.  Thank you.”

Fett shrugged. “We tracked you for a while, you know.  Before Tython.”

Din stared straight ahead.  He didn’t care about that.  But he realized in the waiting quiet that Fett expected an answer.  “I didn’t know.”  

There; the man should take it as a compliment.  Din knew he wasn’t easy to track.

“I saw how you were with the child.”  Fett’s scarred face was thoughtful.  There was something complicated there behind the older man’s eyes, but Din couldn’t read it, unsettled and numb as he was.

“I was to return him to the Jedi,” Din forced out.  “I failed him.”

“You took care of him,” Fett pointed out.  “I saw it.  That’s not nothing.”  

“He was a foundling,” he said mechanically.  “Any Mandalorian would have done the same.  The Creed demands --”

Fett sighed.  “You can keep your Creed.”  The words still sounded so wrong -- to view the Creed as a myth, it was sacrilege.  Still, though, he’d seen the chain code, and he knew Fett’s claim was valid.

Din watched the other man cautiously, but was taken aback by the next words Fett spoke.  “You were a father to him.  That much was clear.”

Din chuckled, a brittle, awful sound.  It hurt his throat.  “People keep telling me that.”

“Are they wrong?”

He thought of Grogu taken, held captive by droids’ arms harsh and cold.  He thought of him in a cell, thought of tests and needles and experiments, thought of the little youngling toddling after him and laughing sweetly about cookies.  He thought of standing there helplessly on the rocky slopes of Tython, watching the world end.

He was grateful, not for the first time, for the helmet shielding his face.  “Does it matter?” he gritted, and Nevarro loomed before them.

***

vi.

Cara Dune caught up to him, about six months later.

He’d been half-expecting her for some time.  Knew that rumors of his doings would reach certain ears.  Knew that she’d put two and two together.  Even if he no longer wore beskar, he knew the patterns would be noticed.

She found him in a scuzzy bar on an ocean moon, where the damp seeped into everything and the cold never faded.  She sat beside him, tossing a few credits onto the bar, and was rewarded with a sea-brewed ale.  She drank about half before she finally turned to face him.

“Hey, Mando.”

He didn’t look at her.  Didn’t want to see the pity in her face.  He could hear it well enough in her voice.

“I knew I’d see you again,” he said quietly.  “Galaxy’s never as big as it seems.”

“No,” she said.  “I guess it isn’t.”

In the silence, water dripped, dripped, dripped behind the bar, a constant rhythm.

“I know it was you,” she said presently.  “The Imperial bases on Corux and Raethe.  Two cruisers downed, the troops dead long before the ships crashed.  Imps dead in the streets of a dozen backwaters.  And a lot of high-ranking officers found in pieces.”

“A lot of people hate the Empire,” he said.  He took a drink of his ale.  He hated the taste, and hated the burn more.

“Not a lot of people hate them like you do.”  Lightning-fast, she twitched aside the cloak hanging over his hip, revealing the Darksaber hanging like an anchor at his side.  He ignored her, covering it again with his cloak.  “Let’s just say you have a signature style these days.”

Din glanced at her out of the corner of his eye.  She looked different, hair a little shorter, upgraded armor, a new insignia on her shoulder.  And sympathy etched in every line of her face.  He looked away, shaken.

“So what?” he asked.  “Don’t tell me the New Republic has a problem with fewer Imps running around.”

“They don’t.  They’d probably give you a medal, if they knew who was behind it,” said Cara.  She finished her drink.  “I have a problem with it.”

He nearly snorted into his foul ale.  “Really.  You’re worried about the Imps.”

“I’m worried about you, Din Djarin.”

He froze.  She’d never used his name before.  Slowly, he turned to stare at her, fully aware that his naked face was on display.  “Stop.”

Cara flushed.  “I was on the ground at that Maelstrom-class cruiser.  I saw what you did to them.  It wasn’t…”  Her mouth twisted.  “Killing Imps doesn’t bother me.  You know that.  But that was… brutal.”

“Again,” he said defensively, “you’re worried about them?”

“About what it’s doing to you,” she said, her voice flat.  “Mandalorians… I thought you were known for noble kills --”

“I’m not a Mandalorian,” he spat.

She pounded a fist into the table, a sharp crack that left a mark on the flimsy surface.  “You’re torturing yourself about letting him go.  This isn’t you, Mando.  And I think a part of you knows it.”

The weight of the last several months loomed.  It pressed.  It shattered, a shield failing, a dam breaking.  He saw the Darksaber flaring, scorching, searing, amputating, saw his bare hands on the hilt, saw the bodies piled.  He remembered enjoying it in a way that felt sick, felt dirty, an insult to the Way of the Mandalore, but he’d already burned that bridge, hadn’t he?  Already bared his face to the child, to the Jedi, to all of them; already desecrated his beskar; already severed his clan of two into one, alone --

“I know,” he said hoarsely, ashamed.  “I know it’s wrong.  I -- I broke the Creed --”

She reached up slowly, rested her hand on his shoulder.  She waited, her eyes soft.  

He bowed his head, shaking.  “And I gave him up,” he whispered, burying his damp face in his hands.  “I lost my son.”

My son.

The truth he’d hid from so long flared white-hot, burning through him.  Denial had done nothing for him; all it had done was rob him of the chance to tell Grogu how much he loved him before it was too late.  It hadn’t saved him from this agony at all.  The pain roared, a howling void opening up within him, a darkness he could never hope to see through.

“I was his father,” he choked.  “What am I now?”

Cara’s hand was firm on his shoulder, steady, kind; but she had no answers for him.  In the end, the only sounds were his broken breathing and the drip, drip, drip behind the bar.

[iatethepomegranate]

We are not alone in the dark with our demons, Chapter 10

In which Caleb buys a house in Rexxentrum with Beau and Yasha, becomes a professor, is showered in love and support, learns how to be a person again, and tries to protect those like him from going through what he did.

Content warnings: Panic attacks, vomiting, Caleb's backstory

Chapter summary: There's not a lot Caleb can do right now, but he can teach a hurting teenager a new spell and reunite him with his very much alive parents.

Chapter notes: I 100% believe that Astrid knows the Nein call Essek "Hot Boi." Chapter title is from Ghost by Jacob Lee.

****

Chapter 10: And I'm just a stranger who could be a friend

The first thing Caleb did was flip to the page in his spellbook where he had transcribed the Sending spell. It was far into the book. As he pulled out his copper wire, Felix made a sound of surprise.

“You learned this recently?” asked Felix.

“Ja, I travelled with a cleric friend for a long time who had the spell,” Caleb replied. “Not Caduceus; he was there too, though. Jester seemed to enjoy casting it at everyone, even mere acquaintances, so I never saw the need for it.”

“What made you learn it?”

“Jester insisted a few weeks ago, so I could talk to her while we were apart. I knew another wizard who could teach me, and we were spending a great deal of time alone together exploring Aeor, and exchanging theories.”

Felix, despite his distress, was absolutely smirking at Caleb and he was not about to deal with teasing from an actual child. “So… exchanging theories in Aeor? Is that what old people call it now?”

“Hush.” Caleb ran Felix through the basic somatic motions of the spell, before demonstrating it himself. “Hallo, Caduceus. I am teaching Felix the Sending spell. It will take a few hours. Let me know if anything happens.”

“Hey, Caleb. Beau has the monks looking for Nico. They’re playing nice with the Volstrucker, apparently. Don’t miss dinner.”

“Right, so you can have a single two-way exchange out of the one casting,” said Felix. “What’s the word limit again?”

“Twenty-five words. Now, this is a third-level spell. It will take some effort for you at the moment.”

“I’ve been to school, Bren. I know what spell levels are.”

“Call me Caleb. Or Professor Widogast, if you prefer. I do teach here now.”

“Fuck off.”

“Caleb’s fine.”

Felix rolled his eyes. “Whatever, Professor.”

This was better. Caleb could work with impetuous children. Most children he knew were like that. Caleb could tune his behaviour to whatever Felix seemed to find most calming. Or at least distracting.

Felix had great attention to detail, methodically copying out Caleb’s transcription of the spell and yet still finding excuses to make fun of Caleb along the way. It was comfortable, more than Caleb had expected. Felix only knew him by reputation, and one put forward by Trent, no less.

Maybe it was the shared trauma. Maybe it was the fact Caleb was teaching him something. Or because Caleb, despite being a professor here, wasn’t trying to inhabit a position of authority over him in the way Trent had.

Snacks were delivered to the room about halfway through the process. Felix paid it little mind, and that was painfully familiar.

“Felix.” Caleb could not believe he was enforcing a break. That he had become the kind of person who would pull a focused wizard away from study for mere human needs such as food. But he was responsible for Felix, at least for now, and that was a frightening pressure.

“Busy.”

Caleb closed his own spellbook, taking away Felix’s source for transcription. In its place, he put a bowl of fruit. “Eat.”

Felix paused, his pen hovering over the page, frowning. Then he slowly set it down and sullenly grabbed a plum. Caleb sat back against the wall, nibbling on a handful of grapes.

“Don’t forget to stretch before we get back to it.”

Felix rolled his eyes. “Why are you like this?”

“Listen, I’ve had many people do this for me in the last year alone. So I’m paying it forward, and you are going to accept that.” Caleb tried to throw a grape into his mouth, and missed. He grabbed it off the floor and popped it into his mouth. Chewed. Swallowed. “It’s good for you.” If any of the Nein had heard him say that, they probably would have fainted from shock. It was easier to give this advice than to follow it himself.

“I can see why Trent fucking hates you.”

Caleb snorted. “Oh, this does not scratch the surface of Trent’s problems with me.” He threw another grape, catching it in his mouth this time. “Did anyone tell you what my friends and I did to him?”

“No.”

“Well, he tried to ambush us at Caduceus’s family home. One of my friends may have ‘acquired’ evidence of his experiments from Vergesson, and he was upset that I refused to entertain his ego while busy with bigger problems. By the time we were done with him, Astrid and Wulf were on our side, my friends had permanently glued a silencing collar around his neck, and used the leftover glue to stick his hands together. And that glue was in the shape of a dick.”

“Bullshit.”

“Ask Astrid. She activated the collar. Or Beauregard. She put the thing on him.”

Felix had that look of a teenage boy who was trying not to look impressed, hiding it behind a veneer of sarcasm. “Okay. I will.”

They finished their break, stretched, and got back to it. Felix was clever, eager to learn. It brought back memories for Caleb. Good memories, as tainted as they now were. And as much as he was worried for Nico and grieved for what had happened, he was also indescribably relieved they had been able to stop Felix. If he could help Felix reclaim even the smallest amount of good from his stolen childhood, he would take that as a victory.

Astrid looked in on them as Felix practiced the somatic motions around his copper wire, his muscle memory already secure. With a few minor corrections, he would be ready to cast.

“Almost finished?” she asked.

“Almost,” said Caleb. “Felix, that was very good. Just watch that you fully complete the motion right at the end, and hold it until you finish speaking your message. With time, you can find your own method.”

“You learned this method from your special Aeor friend?”

Caleb sighed. “No, these somatic components are developed from watching several casters perform the spell. My colleague provided the basic framework to learn the spell, but his somatic components are more intricate than my own.”

“So he’s your fancy special Aeor friend.”

Astrid chuckled. “It’s not the silliest nickname he’s had. Now, focus. The Martinet is sticking his nose in our business and we need to get you out of here.”

Felix wordlessly practiced the gesture again, meticulously correcting his errors. He ran through the motion a few more times, becoming more confident each time.

“I think you are ready,” said Caleb. “Remember: twenty-five words. Consider them in advance. It may be worth telling Nico he can reply to you.”

Felix nodded and closed his eyes, counting on his fingers under his breath. And then he cast. “Hey, Nico. It’s Felix. I heard what happened. I’m okay. They stopped me. I hope you’re okay. You can reply to this message.” The barest pause. “Love you.” Felix held his breath, listening out for a reply.

Caleb let him have ten seconds, before breaking the news. “Felix. If he has not replied yet--”

“I know,” Felix muttered. He grabbed his spellbook, hugging it to his chest as he deflated, and Caleb’s heart broke. “Just… get me out of here.”

****

Astrid’s teleport brought the three of them back to Blumenthal. The path was muddy from yesterday’s storm. Felix gripped his spellbook tighter, raking his eyes over the buildings around them. The way he held himself, shoulders hunched, inches from bolting, reminded Caleb far too much of himself mere months ago.

“Felix,” he said. “We need to speak to your mother and father, but we will not put you in a situation you do not think you can handle.”

“I don’t know if I can do this.” And wasn’t that just painfully familiar. They had barely made it a few steps before he froze, closing his eyes against the vision of home.

Astrid looked to Caleb, silently begging for him to do something.

“Felix,” said Caleb, completely panicking on the inside, “we will not force you to do anything you don’t want to. Okay? Let’s walk for a bit. Take deep breaths. If we reach your house and you don’t want to go inside, I will stay with you and Astrid will talk to your parents. Is that all right?”

Felix nodded, and he took a step. Then another step. And another. They walked together down familiar but unfamiliar streets. They were in a different part of Blumenthal than they had been yesterday. Caleb blocked out most of it, concentrating on getting Felix through the next few minutes. His own shit did not matter right now.

Felix’s body language remained tense. His head stayed down, barely keeping an eye on where he was going. His fingers flexed around his spellbook. And Caleb was planning. A hundred different options.

Caleb refused to force this boy to face his parents before he was ready. If the time came, and he couldn’t do it, he would need somewhere else to go. Somewhere away from here. If Astrid allowed it, there were a few options. Veth in Nicodranas would take Felix if Caleb asked, but he wasn’t sure if Felix would feel comfortable being around a family like that, especially with a small child. Or Felix could stay at the Lavish Chateau, but Marion was a busy woman who had been through enough on Caleb’s account. There was the Gentleman’s hideout, but Caleb wouldn’t want to leave him alone there. He could take Felix to the Blooming Grove, where the Clays would willingly care for him, but taking a boy who almost killed his parents to a graveyard was possibly not the best option.

There was Reani, wherever she was, but he wasn’t so sure that Felix could handle her on his own, or that her rigid morality had shifted enough to take him in without killing him if she found out even a fraction of the shit he did while under Trent’s power. Taking Felix to Nila and her young family, who Caleb believed had returned to her clan, would bring up many of the similar issues as taking him to Veth. And the Guiatao clan had suffered greatly at the hands of the Iron Shepherds, including many deaths, so Caleb wasn’t sure that would be a good place for him to cope with nearly killing his own parents.

And Caleb was not putting Felix on a pirate ship, so that ruled out Fjord, Jester and Kingsley.

They could always bring Felix back to Rexxentrum and he could either stay on Astrid’s estate (possibly too traumatic) or with Caleb and the lesbians, but Ludinus was poking around and that could get messy. Not to mention the whole “harbouring a Drow fugitive” thing.

Caleb circled back to Veth. If Felix could handle it, he would feel most comfortable taking the boy to her if he wasn’t able to go home. Caleb hadn’t told her what happened yet; he was not looking forward to that conversation. Even if it would help him in the end.

Of course, this all depended on Felix. If he agreed to go home, this would be irrelevant. But Caleb felt better having come up with a plan.

They reached a quiet street. Felix headed to the house at the far end, partially concealed by a granary. Caleb thought, with faint nausea, that even the physical isolation of their parents’ homes could have been a factor for Trent.

Felix made it all the way to the small vegetable garden out the front of the house, but faltered between the carrots. He stared up at the modest house. A single-storey affair, small even for a family of three. The front door was painted cherry red. The boy’s lips parted; no sound came out. His eyes traced the features of the house - the red door, the two small windows, the thatched roof in need of maintenance.

A woman’s face appeared at the window. And the door flew open.

“Felix!” The woman ran out of the house, and Caleb was just barely able to take in her simple dress and heavy coat, blonde hair gathered in a loose bun. But as she got close, Felix stepped back, wide eyes fixed on her face, as she spoke in rapid Zemnian. “No one has heard from you in weeks. Where have you been? Are you okay?”

“I can’t do this.” And he was backing away. “I can’t.” He tore his eyes from her, and ran.

“Go after him,” Astrid told Caleb. He wasted no time chasing after the boy. Caleb had run from a great many things in the past few years, but he was not the fastest man alive. But he was fast enough.

Felix barely made it around the granary before he collapsed into the grass. Gasping for breath.

Caleb knelt beside him. “Felix, listen to me. You’re okay. Slow down, breathe. Let the air fill your lungs. Feel the grass beneath your hands.”

Felix dug his fingers into the dirt, gulping in air. He was listening, at least. Being on the other side of this was not especially familiar to Caleb, but he had coached Essek once or twice. He could do this. They could do this.

Of course, Felix barely knew him, so it wasn’t like Caleb could just hug him. That would probably make things worse. So he would have to use his words.

“Felix, you got this. How does the grass feel?” Caleb gave Felix a moment to process, and then he supplied options, taking a pause between each. “Is it dry? Wet? What colour is it?”

Felix coughed a little, sucking in a shaky breath. “Wet. Green.” His hand slid across the grass. “Short. Muddy.”

“Good.”

Felix leaned away and vomited onto the grass. Then he staggered to his feet, grabbing Caleb’s shoulder for support. They moved a little further from the house, and Felix leaned against the granary, knocking the back of his head against the wood. And he laughed, that kind of unhinged, hysterical laugh that was not funny at all. Caleb knew it well.

And then he was in tears. Caleb reached for his shoulder, carefully, and Felix didn’t shake him off.

“I was going to kill her,” Felix said quietly. “If you hadn’t… I almost murdered my parents. I love them. I love them… and it didn’t matter. I was going to… oh gods....”

“Felix,” Caleb said, and did a very poor job hiding the tremor in his voice. “I am so glad we found you.”

“What the fuck does it matter? I would’ve done it.”

“Felix, as somebody who did… it matters a great deal.”

Felix stared up at him, eyes wide and wild.

“I will not force you to go home if you’re not ready,” Caleb said, pulling his voice back under control. “All I will say is this: I would have given anything to see my mother and father again. I almost did. And I know it hurts to look at your mother, knowing that you were going to end her life because of a lie. But you didn’t. She is still here. So is your father. And you have time to heal, all three of you.”

Felix wiped his face on his sleeve, cleared his throat. “Okay. Danke.”

***

Astrid was seated at a small dining table with Felix’s mother and father. Nobody got up from the table when Caleb brought Felix in, though it took visible restraint from his parents. Felix took after his mother--blonde hair, blue eyes, soft features--but he was closer to his father’s build.

The father tore his eyes from Felix with visible effort, and when his gaze fell on Caleb, he froze. And Caleb recognised him, and his wife. Friedrich Schneider and Louise Fischer--probably Schneider now. They were a few years older than him, but he could recall playing together as children.

“I heard you were back,” said Friedrich. “You were helping Nico out yesterday, ja?”

“Ja, I was there,” Caleb said carefully. “As were Astrid and Wulf.”

Louise pulled out the chair next to her. “Felix, come here.”

Felix, still gripping his spellbook like a lifeline, shuffled over and fell into the seat. Caleb sat next to Astrid on the opposite side of the table to the family.

“I have given some details of Master Ikithon’s arrest,” Astrid told him. “We were just about to discuss options for support. If you would?”

“Ja, of course.” Caleb compartmentalised his old memories and focused on the task ahead of him. “We are organising a support group for Ikithon’s former students. We are still nailing down those details, but we will be sure to pass them on. I have also been appointed as a teacher at Soltryce Academy, and we are hoping to put the students back into school when they feel ready.”

Louise and Friedrich grasped at Felix, who curled in on himself but did not complain.

“We just got him home,” said Louise. “After everything Astrid has told us, why would we let him go back?”

“The students in Felix’s position are at a delicate stage of development,” Astrid said, with little inflection, and Caleb sensed she was compartmentalising as well. “They are quite skilled, but have lost the guidance they had. That is dangerous. Good or bad, Ikithon was…” She sighed, and the mask melted away a little. “He engineered this situation. We were dependent on him. Even those whose families still live. Bren, you have been out of his influence longer. Do you have thoughts?”

“Ja, I do.” Caleb had spent his fair share of time soul-searching in the past few weeks, as well as the past year as a whole. “Ikithon shaped each of his students in a very specific way: patriotic to a fault, willing to do anything to get the job done, and unfalteringly loyal to him. It is a gradual process. By the time you realize it is happening, you have already done terrible things at his command. For most, there was no way out. My situation is unique, because I was able to escape in a rather dramatic fashion, but it has taken years to shake off the influence he had on me. I was alone and homeless for most of that time, and let me tell you: almost every fragment of positive change in me happened in the past year, because I had a support network. I found people who cared about me, and they learned how to help me. It was a group effort. I am now in a position to offer that kind of support to others.”

“Say we let him go back,” said Friedrich. “Will he have to live in that place?”

“Not all the time,” said Astrid. “You are not far from Rexxentrum, so I do not see a problem if he wishes to come home regularly. Bren and I both live off-campus if he needs a break but cannot make it to Blumenthal.”

“You do not need to decide now,” said Caleb. “The seniors do not start for another few weeks.”

“We’ll think about it,” Friedrich said flatly. “What happened to Nico?”

“He did it,” Felix said quietly. “Had a breakdown. Ran the fuck away.”

“We have people searching for him,” said Astrid. “Bren taught Felix a spell to talk to him, if he likes.”

“He prefers Caleb,” Felix muttered.

“Danke, Felix.” Caleb had not expected Felix to speak up on his behalf, not when he had his own shit going on. “Astrid gets a pass and, well, your parents knew me when we were children. I go by Caleb Widogast these days, but I will answer to either name.”

“Why the change?” asked Friedrich, still in that flat tone of distrust.

“I went by many names after I escaped Master Ikithon,” said Caleb. “For safety. I gave that one to a woman who eventually became my best friend. Now, it’s my name. But, for you, I don’t mind.”

Both Friedrich and Louise did not look trusting. At all. A mere muscle twitch from openly glaring at Caleb and Astrid, really.

Louise sighed, and some of the hostility dropped. “Thank you for bringing Felix home.”

“We will check in regularly,” said Astrid.

“Felix can message either of us with the spell I taught him,” said Caleb. “If he so wishes.”

Things were too tense to continue much conversation. Caleb and Astrid said their goodbyes, and left. They did not speak, except for Astrid’s short incantation to teleport them back to Rexxentrum.

They landed on the outskirts of the Shimmer Ward. Astrid immediately combed her fingers through her hair, hands shaking.

“That was…” She groaned softly. “Thank you for coming. I will keep you updated on the search for Nicolaus.” She turned on her heel and marched deeper into the ward, pausing for a split second, before she continued onwards without looking back.

Caleb slowly worked his way back to and through the Tangles until he was home. He couldn’t fault Astrid for being distant right at the end. The last twenty-four hours had been intense for everyone involved.

It was close to dinnertime as he reached the house. He entered his side and shut the door, leaning against it as the strength left his body. He’d done it. Today had been two-thirds of a shitshow, and he had made it through.

Felix was home with his parents, and he had the means to contact Nico, and Caleb himself, if he wanted. That was a win.

Nico, however…

Caleb knew, intellectually, that it had been a freak occurrence. A series of imperfections had tangled together into a knot, and that knot had been Nico’s escape. Almost every wizard in that room had more than one try at countering Nico’s spell, but they had not been unable to unravel it. Nico, empowered by panic and grief, had thrown all he had into a powerful fireball, and had the adrenaline to power through what should have hurt him a great deal.

Caleb hoped he was okay. Physically, at least. Psychologically, Caleb knew he wasn’t.

He sat on the floor, resting his back against the door. And he tried something. Coil of wire in hand. “Hello, Nicolaus. This is Caleb Widogast. You may know me as Bren Ermendrud. I was with you today. I’m sorry we frightened you. Be safe.”

He didn’t expect a response, and he did not receive one. A small part of him feared Nico wasn’t responding because he was dead. It was all too likely. There was no way he hadn’t been injured in the blast. Once the adrenaline wore off, the pain could’ve taken over and left him vulnerable to any number of attackers.

Gods, if after all this, Nico had died on the side of a road…

Caleb was tired. But he forced his fingers to cooperate, and worked through another casting.

“Me again. I want you to know: Trent Ikithon is in prison for what he did to us. You’re welcome in my home, when ready.”

Again, no response.

“Caleb?” A form slid into view at the top of the stairs, blending into the dark, but Caleb knew Essek’s voice anywhere.

“Ja,” he said, with the remaining strength he had. “Felix is home. We have both tried to message Nico, with no response. I…” He didn’t want to speak it into existence, so he shifted the morbid statement on his tongue into something more positive. “I hope he’s alive.”

Essek floated down the stairs and sat beside him, squeezing into the remaining doorspace. “If he's anything like you, I would expect nothing less.”

“Danke.” Caleb dropped his head onto Essek’s shoulder, and let himself rest.

[beautifulterriblequeen]

Breaking and unmaking

I’m stretching my Druids -> Assassins headcanon a little further today. 

So far, I’m enjoying the epic angst that comes with assassins being blood-promise-bound to their duty for the last 1000 years, because the Oath of Féanor is one of my favorite disasters from the Silmarillion. But that means that even if Runaan is freed from his coin prison, he’s still bound to his duty. He’s not free enough yet.

S4 and S5 were hinted to contain some history to help give us a better look at exactly how everyone got to where they are in the present day. I know I’ve posted about hoping that Janai and Amaya work together to find out the Orphan Queen’s/Queen Aditi’s/Harrow’s ancestor’s secrets. I don’t have a strong opinion on how that all plays out, but I would love to watch them work together and learn stuff!

So, what if we get something like this for teaching us Moonshadow history: Rayla does find Runaan’s coin, but with his arm still bound, and him bound to his blood promise (maybe the same thing, maybe not), if he’s released, he’ll die. She can free Lain and Tiadrin--if she and Callum can learn how to--because her parents are not bound by a failed mission the way Runaan is, even if they are/were assassins and did give the Dragon Queen a blood promise, too. This will leave Runaan as the only elf trapped beyond reach.

Gosh, that seems familiar....

Okay, so this is Rayla we’re talking about. She just crossed half the continent to return a baby dragon during an actual war. If she realizes that Runaan is either going to 1) be trapped forever or 2) die if he’s freed, which will she want to pick?

Door #3. Runaan might be fatalistic enough to accept freedom just so he can die in Ethari’s arms, but Ethari wouldn’t want that if there were another way, and neither would Rayla. So: Rayla’s gonna rip up the 1000-year-old blood promise. And that means first learning the full history of the Moonshadow elves because someone didn’t pay attention in history class! which might be partly classified, partly lost, and partly hidden. Moonshadows be like. She’d quest as far as she needed to in order to save Runaan, but see... this quest isn’t just for him anymore. If all the assassins in the Moonshadow Forest are bound to this blood promise the way that he is, then none of them have ever truly been free. Maybe this is how Rayla saves her people, in a way Runaan never could.

She’s a hero, and that’s what heroes do. They save people. People.

But maybe she won’t be breaking that promise, exactly... maybe she can just unwrite it somehow. Balance it out. I’m not sure what that would look like, but it could take three very special components that were present during the initial oathmaking: 1) the blood of a Moonshadow assassin: Rayla. She keeps calling herself an assassin. Might be a clan thing, not a matter of actually taking a life?

2) the Moon Archdragon Luna Tenebris. Please let Rayla go on a dragon quest! lhfksdfhihfis That would be the coolest thing ever! Why haven’t we heard a peep out of Luna Tenebris, or even learned if she’s still alive or not? She’s definitely important somehow. Her reign lasted from the division of Xadia--aka the Merciful Compromise that split the land--until the Fallen Star. Those are some serious bookends.

3) a Moon primal stone. You’ve noticed that there are two different Moon primal staffs. The gathering from 1000 years ago, before the Border was carved, shows a Moonshadow elf holding a staff shaped like a shillelagh--a traditional druidic weapon.

But 300 years ago the leading Moonshadow elf has a different staff. Taller, more commanding, bearing a big stylized Moon rune, and looking a lot like Runaan’s chest marking, handle and all. Instead of a shillelagh, this staff resembles a sickle--another druidic handheld. Its larger cousin is a scythe.

Did they rework the staff? Possibly. If so, it’s probably to reflect the Moonshadow elves’ change in status, moving eastward and joining the Sunfire elves in active defense of Right Xadia,

But maybe that first primal stone is busy spinning some very big spells. I have two guesses what they might be, and there’s no reason they can’t both be going at the same time. ahaha Moonshadow duality Maybe it’s running the blood promise that binds all of the assassins to their word on pain of death. Maybe it’s running Aaravos’s ghost program on a dedicated primal server.

Maybe breaking the blood promise will break the mirror spell on Aaravos’s prison. Wouldn’t that be interesting! Rayla having to choose to free everyone, or no one.

tl;dr: Maybe the Moonshadow elves we see today aren’t quite the heartless monsters we’ve kinda been suspecting, insta-ghosting each other and hating humans and all. Maybe they’re victims of their ancestors’ oath, just in a different way than the humans the assassins take. And if the blood promise can be undone, then they can all be free again. No more assassins, no more killings.

And now for the angsty side:

Ir Rayla’s questing to make it safe for Runaan to return to the world of the living, that means Runaan’s gotta stay in the coin until it’s safe to come out. 

Ughhhh. If something like this has to happen, and if it does mean Runaan and Ethari can’t kiss and reunite properly, then I really hope they can talk somehow, and that Runaan can at least tell everyone what he knows and all his thoughts and anything important he wants to say. In fact, I would like it if he couldn’t shut up for a while. He can’t use his Moonshadow stealth language and just touch people from inside the coin, so he’s gotta use that lovely voice. Aww. Can you imagine Ethari curled up with his precious coin in his fingers and Runaan’s just spilling his heart to him? Fifteen or twenty years of words that he’s saved up, spilling out in case things don’t work out and they don’t get another chance? God. 

And some further angst that I realized had to go along with this headcanon: if Lain and Tiadrin swore the blood promise too, it makes a little more sense why they’d go to the Storm Spire to guard Zym’s egg. Devon said in the Deluxe Elf Interview that little Rayla couldn’t understand how parents would have a bigger priority than her, and yeah, that’s rough. But if it’s a sacred blood promise that’s holding them... they kinda can’t say no. And if the blood promise takes you out if you fail in your duty... well. That explains Runaan’s emotional lockdown, yeah?

He thought Lain and Tiadrin had run... and then perished. He thought they were dead. His dearest friends. Their honor and their lives, gone in one fell swoop. It caught him completely off guard because he trusted them so much. No wonder he got all eyeshimmery when he saw them in the coin. They were alive! Yay! And they were trapped! Boo! And they never broke their promise! Yay! And the village ghosted them for no reason! Boo!

Speaking of the village... if the assassins uphold the honor of the whole Moonshadow race by serving the dragons according to their oath--if the whole Moonshadow identity of stoic service is tied up in that blood promise--then of course the village ghosted Lain and Tiadrin. The sacred oath guides their entire culture, their values, it dominates their history. They’d yeet themselves as far away from such a breach of the ancient trust as they could. They all wanna be the Sworn, never the Forsworn.

They’d ghost Rayla too, not because she’d sworn the oath and then failed it--since she probably hasn’t made any blood oaths yet--but because not breaking the blood promise is so vital to who Moonshadows are, and Rayla ran away on a mission to take a dangerous human. That’s the entire purpose of the assassins according to the blood promise: Spare the humans’ lives, and then be responsible to correct every misstep they make from that point forward. An endless oath of guardianship that can outlive its usefulness and become downright dangerous and chaotic with changing times.

Dude, I’d really like to see Rayla unmake that promise somehow, save Runaan, and save her entire people from a good faith vow they made for the very best of reasons, far too long ago. And I’m loving the idea that she’d kill Viren, and then free Aaravos. Such a chaos child, I love her.

[inigofication]

Soleil Masterpost, Sessions 17.5-24

An INCREDIBLY long and detailed catch-up post with how Soleil has been doing!

Session 17.5 (one shot with 2/3 party members)

In the midst of some chaos, Soleil is taking care of the group’s spaceship when a priestess of Erathis shows herself to Soleil, knocking her off her feet and tells her “Your brother still lives. Head to the Far Reaches.” Until now, Soleil thought her brother was dead- clings onto the idea that the Far Reaches is around Pluto (because of what she learned in school as a space pilot). Her and her gang are currently on Mars.

Soleil and fellow pc Hazel hang out at their ship together, Hazel accidentally sets off the hyperdrive and sends them to a magic school made at the beginning of time. Eventually discover that the place is being ran by someone named “The Master”, who is a passed out, scrawny, 19 year old kid that looks interestingly like one of our friend NPCS- possibly his son? Also, we accidentally take a cosmic being back to the present with us and we discover a message from the Master asking for Hazel’s dad.

Session 18

Soleil and Hazel use a scrying orb together to find out that Soleil’s uncle (who she recently learned is a alive) hired a succubus to find Soleil for him, and now said succubus is accompanied with a cultist and a vampire while they track us

Fellow pc Lorelle and Soleil have a shared gay moment over Hazel 👍

Session 19

Soleil discovers that she can’t use Message on her uncle because his appearance has changed so heavily from when she last saw him that it doesn’t work

Soleil tries contacting her brother for the first time. Hears back, “Move to the Eastern flank! All squadrons down! [+ continuous laser fire]” However, all she gets from him is that same message, looping over and over again until the spell ends. Weird, but not confusing; Soleil realizes they might be too far for their Message radio to properly reach him

Soleil full name reveal! A space station that they head for asks for her name, rank, and affiliation: Soleil Aimee Mercier, Rank Pathfinder, Project Neudon

After landing, the AI asks Soleil if she’s heard anything from the Far Reaches Movement; it’s purpose was to seek out exoplanets, train for eventual colonization, etc. The station was told to stay radio silent unless FRM reached out to them first- the AI sent us a distress call regardless because the station was losing power

The AI has Lucas’ (her brother’s) information in it’s database, but Soleil didn’t have high enough clearance to access it

We go to a city called Becon, meet Hazel’s father, and Soleil befriends one of his agents named Dahlia, a character I played in a one-shot previously! :)

Big combat time, the priestess of Erathis shows herself again, Soleil asks if she knows anything else about Lucas and the priestess states that she knows nothing else, only that Erathis herself asked for the message from prior to be passed on

Soleil and Lorelle later get the confirmation that their NPC friend Tomas is in fact a time traveler! Explains how his son(?) the Master may have been able to get to the start of time

Tomas reveals that he knows NOTHING about Soleil in his timeline, so he worries that he’s responsible for what happened to Soleil’s ship and for trapping her here in this timeline instead of hers.

Session 20

Hazel talks a plan with Soleil; instead of running from the succubus tracking them, we could let her find us because she would tell us where Soleil’s uncle is, and we could reunite with him

Soleil and Lorelle are roped into spying on a “not-date” that Hazel and Tomas go on, Lorelle interrogates Sol about maybe having a crush on Hazel

Since they’re at a tavern, Soleil spends the rest of that night drinking with Hazel’s dad’s agents (Dahlia & co). One of them, Eleven, propositions her and Soleil leaves in a very drunk and flustered state

Sol has never been to Becon and of course, in her drunken stupor, gets very lost in the city on her way to the spaceship. She wanders aimlessly before stopping on a bridge, and Sinnafex shows himself to Soleil to talk; he’s getting restless, wants to do some CRIME! Soleil blabbers on about how their relationship is a two-way street and she can’t do everything he says, and in her state, even goes to far as to call them friends (he begrudgingly agrees). He also agrees to be patient with her and Soleil sees something she hasn’t seen in awhile- the manifestations of butterflies that are on her arms.

She follows the trail of them to an alley way with a young lady crying at the end of it. Doesn’t get her name, but learns that she ran away from home, and didn’t like all the expectations put upon her, so Soleil saw herself in her. When the city guards showed up, Sol asks her if she still wants to leave- Sol’s identity gets obscured as Sinnafex covers her body in webs as she scoops up the woman to make a break for it

SOLEIL ACCIDENTALLY STOLE AWAY THE CROWN PRINCESS OF BECON (which Sol had no idea of until Hazel and Lorelle told her)

Session 21

Soleil has a dream, set in a dead world by every definition- broken skyscrapers, burnt fields, and everything is frozen in time as a cosmos storms above her, and eyes of radiant light shine down. They speak to her, calling her a Child of Tlachtli, and ask if she’s ready for the end. When Sol says no, they say to prepare for it or else she’ll end with it; this is the destiny of all living things. She is told she can only stop it by stopping the sun from rising; it’s impossible. She “cannot cheat destiny. [She] is not [her] mother.” Soleil wakes up after, taking it all in and wondering what her mom could have done

Surprise! The succubus and vampire get the jump on Lorelle and Soleil at the ship! Meanwhile, the cultist causes havoc at a temple of Pelor with Hazel

Soleil in her frustration accidentally kills the succubus, so resorts to keeping the vampire alive to get information from him instead

Session 22

Soleil realizes Lorelle left and meets both of them at the temple to be met with a horrible scene; Lorelle and Hazel’s families frozen in time by the now dead cultist. She comforts Lorelle while she cries.

A few days later, while Lorelle and Hazel are HEAVILY bickering, Soleil sees a sign of one of their acquaintances- a golden canary lands on her shoulder. She lets it guide her away from the other two until they reach the bottom of one of the city’s mountains, arrive at what looks like more of a fortress than a temple

More canaries appear and they let her into the space; it’s empty, full of blue fire torches and suits of armor. Soleil feels the thrumming presence of Sinnafex still in the Silken Spite. The canaries land on Sol’s head and shoulders, leading her to a room with a pool. The canaries leave and Soleil notices the design of a silver dragon carved into the pool, with a glowing orb in its mouth

(This was the Platinum Dragon, revealing she accidentally got into a temple; she didn’t know this because, as she’s from a different timeline, she doesn’t know a lot about the religion here.)

She wades into the pool, and the Silken Spite immediately reacts, moving up from her side to curl around her neck like a choker, away from the water. Soleil’s “demon arm” (the one she uses to wield Silken Spite) also burns when the water touches the spider marks on her arm. Soleil could use her non-dominant hand, but wouldn’t be as successful, so she throws a quick “SORRY!” to Sinnafex before diving her demon arm into the (definitely) holy water. ITS VERY VERY PAINFUL 😀

Soleil gets a vision; sees herself as a little girl in the Chun Dunes, a desert filled with huge rainbow crystalline chunks scattered across the area. A sword is stabbed into a red gemstone, its light bleeding, letting darkness fester. Soleil feels the need to help before the vision ends. She yanks her hand from the water; up to her elbow is completely burned and scarred. The butterfly mark on her palm is faded, can’t see the webs on her forearm. A woman from the temple finds Soleil, freaking out, and gets Soleil on bed rest despite Sol’s protests.

While sleeping, Soleil rolls over onto her scarred arm and is woken by the sound of the dead skin flaking off (GROSS). She goes to a basin of water to start to wash it all away… the spiderweb markings on her arm have completely disappeared, as well as the butterflies. Instead, they are now replaced with lineart of shimmering, silver scales, all the way up to her shoulder. The butterfly on her palm is now replaced with a silver dragon with butterfly wings.

While the butterflies are gone from Soleil’s arm, she can now summon them whenever she pleases, and make their colors whatever she’d like. She tries blue and pink, colors that remind her of her friends, and Sinnafex appears again to complain about the colors on the lining of his suit changing with it. He reveals that the spiders were less to do with him and more to do with the Spider Queen, and also that when Soleil goes to the dreamverse, her soul temporarily leaves her body for the duration- to him, she becomes an aurora of colors. He tells Soleil of an artifact of the Spider Queen they could retrieve for helping their situation.

When Sol is eventually back at the ship, the princess reveals that she practices conjuring magic, and that with her books, she could supposedly summon Soleil’s uncle, who is now more demon than person. Discuss plans.

Later, a black butterfly flies from Hazel to Soleil; a memory offering itself for her. Soleil looks- learns that both the Elven woman she saw in her dreams once and the princess are both tied to Hazel and her family.

Session 23

Fairly chill session, mostly just deciding plans for getting families back. Get invites to the Fall Festival, Soleil disguises herself to sneak into the princess’ chambers in the castle, retrieve her spell books and GET OUTTA THERE. Mostly an errands session.

Hazel calls Soleil “Soli” and she sufficiently has some gay panic 👍

Soleil talks to Lorelle to make sure she’s okay, talk about Soleil and Hazel maybe dating since Hazel keeps taking Soleil places in private?? Sol assures her nothing has happened with herself and Hazel

Soleil goes off on her own to buy potions and quickly realizes she’s being trailed by someone they saw months ago, someone who was aboard an imperial ship- somehow, they can see Sinnafex with Soleil, even when he doesn’t show himself on purpose

Soleil manages to hide from him for a bit, buys polymorph poison from the apothecary and arms herself- she’s immediately attacked when she leaves the room. She uses her hivemind to tell Hazel and Lorelle what’s happened. The man calls Soleil a heretic and tries to forcefully arrest her, leading to combat. Soleil eventually uses the poison and turns him into a rat, making a dead break for their ship to get away from public eyes and to trap him in one of their rooms.

Soleil gets to the ship before her friends in a frenzy, making a move for the captain’s quarters where Dalm (the vampire!) stays. She gives him her keen dagger, explaining that in 10 minutes the polymorph will wear off, and when it does, she needs his help holding the man here to tie him up.

Lots of talking with the man; he’s a Drow elf named Dimitri. As we tend to his wounds in the medbay, Soleil asks Sinnafex why Dimitri called her a heretic. Sinnafex shifts into a woman’s form and explains Dimitri’s history with the Drow empire. Dimitri says to be from the imperial guard, who have license to arrest anyone they deem is practicing witchcraft (which is why he went after Sol and Sinnafex).

In a moment of panic, Soleil CLOCKS Dimitri because she remembers she can go into his memories if he’s unconscious- plans to try and make him forget that their encounter ever happened. For the entire duration of the dreamscape, Sol’s body is externally covered in shimmering, purple electric static. In addition to checking on Dimitri, Sol also goes into her uncle’s memories. Her uncle is now a monster; a robotic centaur, twice his stature as before

(cw violence) Hazel, upon hearing about what Soleil’s uncle now looks like, has a horrible memory: one of Soleil’s uncle in that centaur form trying to OBLITERATE her family. He sends Hazel’s dad off the balcony and EXTREMELY harms the Elven woman from before. Soleil and Lorelle see the memory at the same time. Afterward, everyone takes a moment to process what they just saw. Hazel insists on leaving for the dinner she and Soleil have with her godfather, no matter how much we insist she needs bed rest.

Session 24 (this one was 12 hours long, BUCKLE UP)

Sol and Hazel go to the dinner with her godfather to get festival invites, he has a very nice mansion and lets them have their own rooms to stay the night.

Before the night is over, Hazel tells her godfather and Sol and Lorelle are interested in each other and wants them to spend more time together at the festival. Soleil FREAKS and finds out that Hazel is genuinely seriously about setting them up.

Soleil and Hazel have a spa day the next morning! Comfy beds, huge baths all to themselves in their rooms. The bath picks up on Soleil’s stress as she mulls over her probable feelings for Lorelle, and bath bombs are added to the bath, as well as the shower to mimic rain. First bath in who knows how long!! :) (also it casted Calm Emotions on her LOL)

Soleil and Hazel get tailored for festival dresses. We later meet Lorelle and the others back at the ship to explain why we were out all night. Whole gang spends hours talking about plans going forward. Afterward, Soleil seeks out Lorelle to check on her again

(tw abuse, scars) Lorelle opens up to Soleil about her abusive ex boyfriend who has been messaging her a lot as of late. Soleil makes sure Lorelle knows how toxic he was and how she didn’t do anything wrong, and herself and the others will always be there for her. She asks Lorelle if her burn scars are because of him, and it’s confirmed. Soleil holds her wrist, and the scale markings flash with the color of Lorelle’s skin. At one point, Dalm and Enu interrupt to ask if there’s “romance happening.” They shoo them off, Lorelle talks about Hazel liking Soleil, Soleil disagrees and tells Lorelle how much she cares about her, they talk about Soleil’s uncle, and she finally heads to her own room at around 4 am.

Upon leaving, Soleil see’s Hazel’s raven familiar in the hall and says goodnight to him- in response, she hears her dead father say goodnight back. She immediately freezes and crouches in front of the raven VERY confused, and gets her eyebrow pecked for it.

While Soleil sleeps in the morning, the Imperial Guard arrive to collect Dimitri (who was sedated and still passed out). It goes off without a hitch, but very quickly after he’s gone, the group needs to decide if they flee or stay, in case Dimitri turns them in when he inevitably wakes up. We get Dalm out and hide Princess Enu under the floor plating.

Guards arrive on the claim that we harbored a vampire, we let them search the ship thinking we’re fine, but they find evidence of things we forgot to clean up (whoops). While we’re manacled, Lorelle’s ex, Lindon, shows up with a group of cultists and start attacking the guards; he came here with the intent of saving Lorelle

SOLEIL GETS BADASS COMBAT TIME! Hazel goes down and Lorelle is on one hit point; Soleil scoops up Hazel and urges Lorelle onto the ship, still trying to keep her away from her Lindon. He insists he can take them to a hideout that’s away from imperial reach. Soleil is pissed and hates his guts, but doesn’t have time for bickering and wants to use him to keep the guards off of us for as long as possible. With Lorelle’s permission, he and his gang get on the ship with us as we leave.

Some party drama with Hazel, leaving Soleil to be incredibly pissed at her for quite awhile. Soleil sticks with Lorelle at all times so she can never be alone with Lindon. Soleil takes the ship to sub-orbital until they all decide what to do. She takes Lorelle to the medbay to help patch her up.

Sinnafex tells Soleil they could vent the cultists and Lindon from the ship if they really want to; Soleil considers it. Soleil leaves to go secretly move Enu back to her room without the new company seeing. She returns to the medbay while Hazel and Lorelle talk

Soleil gets the hideout from Lindon, and passes on the message that he wants to talk with Lorelle one on one. Soleil offers to go with and Lorelle accepts. The talk goes nowhere with Sol there; she argues with Lindon until Lorelle holds her wrist. Soleil squeezes her hand very hard. They leave, and Sol asks if she wants company for the night. Lorelle says yes

While Soleil gets things ready for bed, she realizes Lorelle has been gone for awhile and finds Lorelle and Hazel hugging, Hazel’s huge void of a scar transferred to Lorelle. Soleil waits a whole hour there for them before they leave the vision; they saw Lorelle’s mom (who we thought was dead) working with Soleil’s uncle

Hazel and Lorelle cry themselves to exhaustion, passing out, and Soleil hauls them to the bridge, asking Dalm if he can help grab pillows and blankets from everyone’s room for a huge comfy pile in the bridge where no one has to be alone. Since Dalm is a vampire, Soleil asks him if he could stay up the night while they sleep so that the cultists don’t do anything; he agrees

Dalm grabs Soleil’s hand and tells her that she’s doing a great job, and it’s okay if she needs to cry too; Soleil says “we’ll see.” He gives her a kiss on the forehead and brushes his hand through Soleil’s hair while she sleeps with the other two

LEVEL UP!!! Soleil multiclasses into Hexblade Warlock (5 rogue levels, 1 warlock level)! She takes Eldritch Blast, Sword Burst, Hellish Rebuke and Hex. Flavor text moment, Soleil learned all of her warlock abilities from Sinnafex

(cw light implied nsfw) The next morning, Soleil wakes up first and feels a weight lift off of her; Sinnafex was laying on top of her and he “wakes up”, claiming that “last night was so fun~” (even though nothing happened). Soleil tells him he’s very funny and sits there unamused while he moves to straddle her instead

He says Lorelle is cute, he doesn’t mind sharing. Since him and Soleil are the only ones up, he proposes that they could just go kill the cultists right now- throwing in a “You’re so pretty in the morning… can we go kill that guy now?” Soleil refuses, saying as much as she wants to, it’s not her decision alone. He dramatically falls back, exasperated, and calls Soleil boring

Lorelle wakes up next and tells Soleil about what her and Hazel saw. Hazel wakes up after, immediately leaving the pile.

The space station from before messages the ship again, offering a place to stay if our ship is currently too small.

Soleil goes to get breakfast from the kitchen, Dalm is there cooking, as well as Enu who excitedly tells Soleil that she found the CANNABIS OPTION ON THE FOOD REPLICATOR. Soleil and Enu have an interesting talk about how to limit those snacks as well as energy drinks

Soleil puts a hand on Dalm’s arm and thanks him sincerely for the night prior; he turns the move into a hug and says it’s okay. He asks Enu to go grab his dagger from his room since he forgot it. When she leaves, Dalm pulls away from the hug but still keeps close; “I don’t know what you’re doing to me. I was sent here to assassinate you and now I’m here cooking for you and- and I like it? Did you put a curse on me or something?”

Soleil laughs, telling him they’re all just becoming better friends, and maybe he likes some sort of domestic life more than he thought. She grabs breakfast for everyone and he gives her arm a squeeze as she leaves

Lorelle asks how Soleil slept, Sinnafex makes a comment to Sol about “sleeping between two beautiful women.” She wants to strangle him. She tells Lorelle and Hazel about her earlier visit from Sinnafex but nothing else

Hazel leaves to “give the lovebirds space,” Soleil and Lorelle talk and Sinnafex keeps butting in, telling Soleil to “cut the bedroom eyes.” He gradually makes more teasing and inappropriate comments and Soleil gets more and more flustered, busying herself with the controls on the board- Lorelle knows Soleil is talking to Sinnafex because Soleil stops to respond telepathically.

Lorelle asks Soleil to accompany her on trying to talk to Lindon again, Soleil agrees. Sol takes a moment at the bridge to mentally scream at Sinnafex while Lorelle grabs some things. Lindon agrees to only talk business while Soleil is present, no personal talks. We talk plans with Lindon and then talk about all of our options with everyone

Soleil accompanies Lorelle for her talk with Lindon one more time. Lorelle squeezes Soleil’s hand and says it’ll be okay if Soleil just waits in the doorway, per Lindon’s request. Soleil begrudgingly goes with it. She listens to them catch up and discuss their past, gradually getting more irritated but keeping to herself. Lindon eventually calls Soleil back in when they finish talking.

Soleil and Lorelle leave, talk about it a little before Dalm comes over with slices of cake. He advises Lorelle to go get some sleep, then waits until she’s left to ask Soleil if she listened in; “Of course I did.” “Of course you did. I’m almost disappointed in you.” Dalm says that some people need to figure things out on their own, without their friends with them. Soleil argues that Lorelle wanted her there and that Sol wanted to make sure Lorelle didn’t get hurt. Dalm asks if Soleil thinks she ever cares ä bit too much, Soleil says maybe, and Dalm makes an offhand comment about Soleil being in love with Lorelle- Soleil shuts it down very quickly, flustered; she says no, no, no, and Dalm asks if that means he has a chance. Soleil, assuming he’s joking around, gives him a laugh before parting

Sinnafex tells her “Oh my… this is going to get interesting.” Soleil asks what he means, but he refuses to tell her unless she lets him take control of her just once; Soleil quickly shoots it down

(META GAME MOMENT: WE HAVE CONFIRMED DALM DEFINITELY HAS A CRUSH ON SOLEIL)

The gang goes ahead and makes it to the space station. Dalm asks Soleil if he can go walk along the moon, she agrees to let him out and watch him from the airlock. Before they go, he says they need to have a talk about “romance”, not between Soleil and Lorelle but someone else… HEAVILY hints to Princess Enu having a crush on Soleil- she keeps her diary a secret around Dalm and he once saw her draw a heart with initials in it around some runes. Soleil is STUNNED and thinks he’s got it wrong

(tw nsfw implication, slight manipulation?) While Dalm is gone, Soleil asks Sinnafex if the reveal about Enu was his “surprise,” Sinnafex says OBVIOUSLY not and calls Soleil boring. He shows himself again, this time standing in front of her, hand against the wall behind her and leaning close. He suggests hooking up, Soleil declines while assuring him that she’s fine. He holds her chin getting closer, insisting that it would be good for Soleil to get some “practice” to no longer be a virgin. Soleil mentions being interested in someone else, and he bugs her about it until Soleil confirms that it’s Lorelle. He says again that he doesn’t mind sharing, and asks if he can at least get a kiss. Soleil huffs, frustrated, and only gives him a kiss on the cheek before focusing back on letting Dalm back into the station. Dalm says she should go out there with him sometime.

Next day, Soleil tries her hand at an old Ancient One RPG on a game console that’s aboard! swag

Third day, Sinnafex bugs Soleil while she tries to sleep; “I’m trying to fucking SLEEP!” “And I’m trying to FUCKING!” Soleil later accidentally walks in on Hazel letting Dalm have some of her blood while trying to find the bathroom because he had been growing weak.

Fourth day, Enu approaches Soleil and asks if she’ll go with her to see the station’s fire elemental; Enu wants to learn from it since it’s her specialty, and Soleil understands the whole conversation. It goes on for a few hours before Enu starts to get tired, yawning and exhausted. Soleil says they should get her to bed, and Enu asks “Would you carry me?” While Soleil’s caught off guard, Enu panics saying it was a dumb thing to ask, DEAD SPRINTS back to her room

Soleil and Lorelle meet up while Soleil is heading back from her time with Enu. Lorelle asks how Soleil is and talks about a random dating sim game that the AI recommended for her- Soleil finds it funny and admits to having played that game ages ago back in her timeline. They walk and talk about everything, ending up in a small lounge/sitting area.

Out of nowhere, Sinnafex takes control of Soleil (failed wisdom save), making her grab Lorelle’s hands and tell her how lonely they looked. Soleil gets control again and immediately panics. Sinnafex bugs her while Soleil becomes a bumbling mess of apologies for how sudden it was, getting more flustered by the second.

(cw nsfw implication, manipulation kinda from Sinnafex again) Lorelle tucks Soleil’s hair behind her ear, asking if she’s okay. Sinnafex keeps pushing her and Soleil finally says “This might be… very inappropriate of me to ask. But can I… kiss you…?” Lorelle says yes, and they kiss. Sinnafex takes control again, meaning more kisses, having Soleil put her hand on Lorelle’s thigh and asking if she wants to go further; Lorelle declines

Soleil gets control back and FREAKS out because that’s absolutely NOT WHAT SHE WANTED TO DO. Lorelle tucks Soleil’s hair again, gives her a kiss on the forehead, and tells Soleil she needs better control over Sinnafex; Soleil VERY MUCH agrees. Lorelle suggests getting food, Soleil says she’ll meet her at the cafeteria and goes to her room.

Soleil full on screams into her pillow for a good minute and yells at Sinnafex who shows himself again, with celebratory wine and his tie undone. Soleil argues with him incessantly, he makes fun of her for only just having her first kiss, and abruptly moves in front of Soleil to hold her chin again and kiss her this time, pulls back saying “That’s what a kiss should be.”

Soleil finally leaves, incredibly frustrated (more so when he slaps her ass on the way out JFC), and eventually meets back up with Lorelle. Soleil doesn’t know, but the kiss from Sinnafex created a charming effect on Lorelle, making her even more infatuated with Soleil. For the rest of the night, they get food, talk, and only share kisses before calling it a night at one of their rooms.

SOLEIL GOES TO THE DREAMVERSE! Sinnafex visits Lorelle’s mind while Soleil is gone, telling Lorelle about how Soleil’s soul just disappears sometimes. They talk, and when Lorelle asks Sinnafex to step off with the relationship stuff, Sinnafex explains that he is with Soleil for everything she does; their traits rub off on each other and some bit of him will always be present. He takes the form of a woman again and tries to seduce Lorelle but to no avail. Sinnafex also saves Lorelle from her own shadow demon.

DREAMVERSE TIME!! Soleil feels nostalgic with all the talk of families, so she visits her dad’s memories- but it’s more like visiting his own personal heaven since he’s dead. Soleil watches her dad push her and Lucas on swings at a park, Soleil was a toddler at the time while Lucas was slightly older. He pushes them high on the swings, saying he always knew Soleil and Lucas would fly high. Soleil sees her mom with her dad too.

As Sol leaves the space, she’s presented with the option to go deeper into it. She does, and this time she’s on the swing and not watching herself. Instead of flying off the swing into the air, Soleil lands with a thud into the sand, and her dad immediately becomes confused, thinking he somehow broke the space, saying this isn’t how the memory is supposed to happen. Soleil turns towards him; “…Dad?” “Soleil?” They both realize it’s real, they’re really together, and her dad scrambles over to bring her into a hug. Soleil immediately breaks down, and he tells her how much he’s missed her, how he doesn’t understand what’s happening, and doesn’t know if Soleil died or not. Soleil explains it’s just a thing she can do, and they move to the swings to talk. He asks her what it was like visiting a new galaxy, and reveals that while he’s here, he can view parts of Soleil’s life as they happen, but he’s behind and viewing them in random order. He asks if Soleil has gotten with Tomas yet, that’s what he was banking on, and Soleil admits to have kissing Lorelle that night. Soleil asks him if he knows where Lucas is, and he doesn’t, but he knows about what happened to Soleil’s uncle. While we talk, an older version of Hazel shows up, a version of her where she became a champion of the Raven Queen. She tells Soleil that she can’t be there, has to leave before the others find out. Soleil hugs her dad tight, tells him she loves him, and he loves her too, telling her that she’ll always fly so, so high. The space fades as the sand falls away.

Soleil tries checking on her mother next. Her father told her that she was currently doing something in the North Pole, but not sure what. Soleil tries to see, but not strong enough to get in.

Soleil tries checking on Lucas, hoping to pry her way in to figure out what happened to him. She’s not strong enough here, either, but instead gets tossed into someone else’s mind- her brother’s significant other. She’s with him on a beach, holding his hand, and she asks to hear about Soleil again. He replies “You mean that greedy, self important little trouble maker? … She did always have a sense of humor.” He starts to cry and she comforts him, telling him she understands.

Soleil gets pushed out of the memory, but once again gets the option to go deeper in. She follows the path, and ends up at not the beach but instead a firey battlefield, scattered with ships Soleil doesn’t recognize. Soleil stands on the bow of a starship with a sword pointed at her by the same person, demanding to know who Soleil is. Soleil is still crying from before, and desperately explains that she’s Lucas’ sister. The figure is confused at first but eventually comes around, asking Soleil what happened to the St. Marianne. Soleil explains that the ship was destroyed, and that she ended up here and was found. She starts to tell Soleil that the Order has invaded, they’re at the Gateway, and Soleil needs to bring reinforcements. She struggles to think of the word, then says in French, “the many is one” so that Soleil can understand. Soleil mentions having been in cryosleep for 3,000 years, so she doesn’t understand the war, and the figure is confused on how that can be because the battle has only gone on for 15 minutes. Before Soleil can say anything, the setting resets- the figure moves back to pointing the blade at Soleil, repeating herself in demanding to know who Soleil is. Soleil realizes that they’re stuck in a TIME LOOP.

The memory fades away, and instead, Soleil sees the universe in front of her like she has before, it speaks to her again; “This is what will happen if you free him. Your brother. Freeing him from the gateway will cause cataclysm. The Nine will stand. They will not fall to foreign invaders. Your destiny… the reason you were the one who survived the St. Marianne was to prevent ragnarok. You are a soldier. You are ours. Prepare yourself.”

Soleil suddenly wakes up, alone in her room, Lorelle missing from the bed- instead there is only a trail of black ichor leading out of the room. Soleil quickly gets up, following the trail all the way to the airlock- where she sees Lorelle passed out on the floor, surrounded by the ichor at the brink of life, and her shadow demon pinned to the wall by Sinnafex’s webs.

End of session! If anyone reads all this, I hope you enjoy this LENGTHY summary and feel free to hand over any questions about Soleil or the campaign :)

[nastybuckybarnes]

I See Fire

Pairings: Geralt x Reader

Summary: Geralt reunites with a Mage he thought was nothing more than a distant memory, but their chemistry is hardly forgotten. When a new threat arrives in Cintra, you fight for a kingdom you do not know, and you fall for a man who you may not be able to have. You’re forced to decide between what you want and what you need.

Warnings: Fluff, Angst, Language, Violence, Injuries, Fluff

Word Count: 4K

A/n: So many posts guys! I’m feeling pretty good, I hope it lasts! Enjoy this little thing which is a sequel to my other fic By The Fire

~*~

You bound through the trees effortlessly, bouncing from branch to branch with the grace of, well, an elf.

Geralt simply watches from his seat upon Roach, smiling slightly to himself. Jaskier has taken it upon himself to find a comfortable position upon your own beautiful white mare, chattering away about his time away from Geralt.

"Where are we heading?" You ask, hanging onto a branch with one arm and smiling at the two men. Geralt huffs out a breath of air and smiles gently at you before shaking his head. "Cintra." You nod slowly, mulling over his words. "And what, might I ask, awaits us in Cintra?"

Jaskier looks between the two of you, brows drawn together.

"Ciri. Geralt's child of Surprise? He likes to visit her as often as possible. And I'm sure our impromptu visit to Cintra has nothing to do with the fact that a certain mage is said to be in the kingdom." You frown at his words and Geralt glares at him.

"A mage? Who? Why is she of importance to us?"

"To us? No, not us. To Geralt and his cock, yes." You nod slowly, looking at Geralt for confirmation. The way he avoids your eyes is confirmation enough and you pull yourself back into the trees. Geralt shoots Jaskier a glare then climbs off of Roach, following the soft whoosh of you climbing the trees.

"(Y/n). Come here." You watch as he looks around for you, pondering what you're going to do. You decide to hear him out, after all, it's not like the two of you are married.

You drop down from the trees, landing with a soft thud on the grass.

"Yes, Geralt?" He jumps slightly then shakes his head, "damn elves." You can't help but smile at that.

"Yennefer, the Mage, she's a part of my past. Jaskier knows not what he speaks about, this you already know." You nod. In the few months that you've been travelling with Geralt, you've learned that the Bard can't exactly be trusted to tell the truth. And when he joined the two of you only two weeks ago... you experienced his stretches of the truth firsthand.

"Yennefer is my past, and you are my future." You smile and take his hands in yours.

"I trust you, Geralt." He kisses the scarring on your left ear then sighs.

"We should continue if we want to get to Cintra by nightfall." You nod and press a soft kiss to his cheek before turning around and jumping into the nearest tree.

"Damn elves," he whispers again, shaking his head with a smile.

~*~

"Geralt!" A young girl exclaims, running towards the Witcher before he's even finished getting roach comfortable in the Palace stables.

He spins around, hugging the small girl tight to his chest. You watch from behind your horse, intrigued by Geralt's blatant display of affection.

"Ciri! I've missed you." She giggles and pulls away from him, her piercing eyes finding yours immediately.

"Who's she?" She asks, walking towards you. Geralt smiles softly, a look you don't see often enough, and follows Ciri towards you.

"This is (Y/n)." You bow your head to the princess, a small smile on your face.

"Your highness. I've heard nothing but good things about you." She smiles and looks over her shoulder at Geralt.

"She's an elf?" She asks, eyes glued to your ears. Geralt nods then crouches down in front of the young princess. "But we cannot go advertising her heritage. There are still many people who wish to do harm to the elves." Ciri nods, looking at you with curious wide eyes.

"Geralt!" You step backwards as an older man walks forwards, smiling at The Witcher.

"Mousesack. It's been too long," Geralt says, voice monotone as ever. The druid smiles and hugs his friend.

"Come to visit the princess, have we?" He nods, hand resting on Cirilla's shoulder. "I'm sure that's not your sole purpose for visiting, now is it? You've heard that Yennefer is here, haven't you?" There's that name again. You can't help the anger that bubbles in the pit of your stomach.

Flipping your hood up, you grab your small pack off of your mare's side and walk out of the stable, heading towards the gate to the city.

"(Y/n)!" Jaskier catches up to you in an instant, glancing at your face. "What's wrong?" You shake your head and flash him a smile. "I'm simply scoping the area. I've never been to Cintra before. Perhaps you'd be willing to show me all the great city has to offer?" He smiles brightly and begins talking about his many adventures in Cintra. As the two of you walk, Geralt stares after you with furrowed brows.

"What is it, Geralt?" Mousesack asks. Geralt simply shakes his head and walks with the druid and Cirilla into the Palace.

~*~

"(Y/n) there's to be a feast for the Queen's return! Are you not joining?" You snort at Jaskier, shaking your head as the two of you walk through the forest towards the Palace.

"And have any one of the knights in there behead me for the fun of it? I think I'll pass, Jaskier." He sighs heavily and shakes his head.

"Can you at least sulk in the Palace? Or somewhere close by? Maybe even just stand in the corner of the room and watch. I'm going to be singing. Don't you want to support your greatest friend?" You look at him with an amused glint in your eyes and he laughs, happy that he got you to smile genuinely.

"Maybe. But I don't want to be just standing alone in the corner all night." He shrugs, elbowing you in the ribs, "maybe Geralt will come and spend time with you?" You shake your head with a chuckle. "No, he has his mage. I wouldn't want to impose." Jaskier sighs and shakes his head. "You know Geralt is head over heels for you. He and Yennefer have a past, yes. But you and he... you have a future." You shake your head with a scoff. "Geralt and I could never have anything. I'm an elf, he's a Witcher. Do Witcher's even have feelings?"

"This one does. I can see it when he looks at you. He does care for you. He might not show it in the best way, but he does care for you. He's not good with feelings. He likes to play into the whole stereotype of Witcher's not having any feelings."

"Fine. I'll join you. But only for a short amount of time."

~*~

Joining the Bard, you decide, is the worst decision you've ever made.

You're standing awkwardly near the doors, hair framing your face and covering your ears and hand twitching the daggers strapped to your thigh.

Upon Jaskier's assistance, you're wearing a dark grey dress that falls to your feet and drags a tad when you walk. The waist is cinched by a thick silver belt, and a couple of small charms dangle from the waist. It's a beautiful gown, but far too impractical for your liking.

You watch as Jaskier performs for the knights, lords, and other noblemen in the room, all laughing drunkenly while they wait for the Queen's celebration to truly start.

You observe the crowd through skeptical eyes, watching for any hostile move.

One thing that quickly catches your attention is the striking purple eyes of a beautiful woman. Although her beauty is stunning, it's the arm around her waist that gets your attention. Geralt holds the woman close to his body, a half-smile on his face as she tells him something.

He looks at her with admiration in his eyes, something you've hardly ever seen in the amber eyes of the Witcher.

He leans down, nose brushing over the shell of her ear, then whispers something that has her eyes widening for a moment before a sly smile spreads on her face.

Deciding that you've seen plenty, you make your way out of the throne room without being spotted and head to Jaskier's bedroom to change back into your practical clothing.

You spend the rest of the evening in the stables with your horse and Roach, finding comfort in the presence of the animals.

The moon rises high above you and guests slowly trickle out of the Palace as the party dies down. You decide that you've sulked for long enough and square your shoulders, heading into the Palace to congratulate Jaskier on what was probably an incredible performance.

As you're heading down the long corridor where the guests are staying for the night, you pick up the familiar deep voice of Geralt.

Chancing a glance over your shoulder, you feel your heart fall into your stomach at the sight before you. Geralt and who you're assuming is Yennefer, locked in a tight intimate embrace, her body naked and pressed against his as he pushes the door shut. You pull in a shuddering breath then continue on your way, keeping feelings locked inside of yourself as you seek out your one true friend.

~*~

"We're under attack!" Someone shouts, rousing you from your light slumber. Jaskier bolts upright, looking around frantically as you grab your bow and a quiver of arrows, along with your sword.

"(Y/n) what's happening?!" He asks. You look over at him with your eyebrows raised. "Just how am I supposed to know?" He nods, lips pursed slightly. You roll your eyes and load your bow then swing open the door to the room. Your eyes pinpoint the dark colours of Nilfgaurd, an obvious enemy of Cintra, and you let the arrow fly from your bow.

It lodges itself in the neck of one of the knights and the surrounding men turn to you.

"Stay hidden, Jaskier," you whisper, loosing another arrow that finds its mark with ease. The Bard hides underneath the bed and you fight the urge to roll your eyes, Firing arrow after arrow at the men that storm the hallway.

A door further down flies open and Geralt and Yennefer come out, swords drawn and ready for the battle that awaits.

Anger boils your blood but you otherwise ignore the pair, aiming and firing and taking down man after man.

When you run out of arrows, you join the Witcher and the Mage in the hallway, sword held steady in your dominant hand. You fight and you fight hard, slitting throats and puncturing stomachs, fury fueling you as you catch another glimpse of Yennefer.

She and Geralt fight gracefully together, as if they've been doing this for centuries, and that's when it dawns on you that that may be the case. They've been doing this for years before you came along and they very well may be doing this years after you're gone. You're nothing more than a temporary fixation.

That idea is only solidified when Geralt grabs Yennefer by the arm and pulls her into a searing kiss, the intimacy fueling their power and amplifying it until it knocks down all the men in the hallway, leaving the three of you standing.

Jaskier hesitantly peaks out of the room, his eyes widening when he sees the two of them then softening when he turns to look at you. You spin on your heel and walk to the other end of the hallway, mind made up.

You're going to leave. And you never plan on seeing the Witcher again.

"(Y/n)!" Jaskier calls, running after you. You don't slow, in fact, you move faster, dashing through hallways and down a flight of stairs.

"(Y/n) Wait! At least let me give you a proper farewell!" You stop at the base of the stairs, chest heaving with the emotions fighting to escape.

"Why? Why lead me on the way he did?" You ask softly, eyes wet with tears as you look up at the Bard. He slows, the pain in your voice making his heart break.

"I don't know (Y/n). But maybe we should let him explain himself. He may have a very goo-" "No! I will not hear another word out of his mouth. He thinks himself above the humans when he really is no better. He's no less of a monster than they are," you spit, eyes locking onto a movement behind the Bard's shoulder. You meet the purple eyes of Yennefer, your rage only getting more intense. You turn on your heel and wipe a splotch of blood off of your forehead, heading towards the intense sound of fighting.

"(Y/n) please!" Jaskier shouts. You ignore him, so caught up in your racing thoughts that you don't notice the men hiding in the shadows until the three of them jump at you.

Your shoulder catches the swipe of a dagger and you gnash your teeth together, fighting harder against the three of them. You successfully get two of them to the ground, only for the third to kick you in the stomach. You collapse onto the floor, the wound in your shoulder gushing blood around the knife embedded there. The man towers over you, a sinister smirk on his face.

"Well well. An Elf. Thought you were extinct." You take a deep breath, rip the knife out of your shoulder, then swipe at the back of his ankles. He falls to the ground with a yell of pain and you flick your wrist, the dagger silencing his cries as it pierces his chest.

You push yourself to your knees, pain flaring through your whole body at the effort. You're suddenly overtaken by immense heat, your vision blurring as you force yourself to stand upright.

"Jaskier..." You stumble towards him, falling into his arms as everything starts to fade to black.

You collapse against the Bard and he starts to panic immediately.

"Geralt!" He cries, slowly lowering you to the floor to inspect your wound. You've gotten worse wounds and never been fazed, but the way you so quickly crumpled to the ground has his heart racing in his chest.

"Geralt!" He repeats, jumping when the Witcher appears beside him, his amber eyes widening when he sees the state of you on the ground.

"What happened?" He asks gruffly, two fingers pressed to your pulse point. It's weak but fast.

"She got... her shoulder. But..." Geralt pulls your tunic down and feels fear pierce his heart. The wound is gushing blood, but worse than that, a dark blackness is spreading through your veins from the gash.

"Poison," he whispers, eyes flashing up to your face. You're covered in a light sheen of sweat, eyelids fluttering rapidly.

"Yen!" Geralt calls, desperation in his voice. The mage presses two fingers to your forehead and closes her eyes, frowning for a moment before standing and walking to the man with the dagger in his chest. She pulls it from him and wipes the blood on his corpse before wrinkling her nose.

"This is dark magic. Not only poison but a curse as well. This is something even I cannot heal." Geralt grinds his teeth together.

"So we just let her die?!" Jaskier demands, looking between the Mage and the Witcher. Geralt flares his nostrils and shakes his head, scooping you up in his arms and hurrying out of the Palace.

"Geralt, there is no place you can go where they can heal her. Her fate has been sealed," Yennefer says sadly, following him towards the stables.

"No. There is one place. Although I cannot guarantee they'll accept us." Jaskier furrows his brows for a moment then shakes his head.

"No. If they don't kill us then she will for bringing her there." Geralt simply hums, carefully situating you on Roach's saddle before hoisting himself up then tugging you so your back is against his chest, legs straddling the horse.

"Get on her horse. We don't have much time."

"Where are you going?" Yennefer demands, looking up at the Witcher with an unreadable expression on her face.

"There is only one race who's magic is strong enough to eradicate dark magic." Realization sets in and Yennefer shakes her head.

"A banished Elf won't be helped." Geralt ignores the comment and with a light nudge to the ribs, Roach takes off running, Jaskier following close behind on your horse.

~*~

Your body is incredibly stiff. That's the very first thing you notice. The next thing you notice is the dry air that's burning your nose with every inhale.

You open your eyes slowly, wincing against the yellow light pouring into the room. You keep your breath steady as your eyes scan the room, the rocky walls familiar in the worst way. Your stomach does a flip and you glance to your left, every nerve in your body on edge as you see the man that stands there.

"You almost died. Poisoned and cursed with dark magic." You say nothing, instead, you push yourself into a seated position, a dull ache throbbing from your shoulder.

"Why am I here?" You ask softly, looking around.

"You got stabbed with a blade that was enchanted. You were brought here to be healed." You shake your head. "At what cost?"

The man cocks his head to the side in confusion.

You kick your legs over the side of the hard bed, ignoring the way your shoulder burns.

"You may have the Bard fooled, you might even have the Elves fooled, but you cannot fool me. What is it you want, Filavandrel?"

He pushes off the wall, arms crossed over his chest as his eyes linger on your scarred ear.

"When you left, I searched for you. I admit I was harsh in my words, but I never thought... I never truly thought you'd leave for as long as you did. You branded yourself as the 'Princess without a home', but you've always had a home. You could've come back." You scoff and shake your head, looking East of his eyes.

"You told me that if I left I would never be welcomed back. That I wouldn't have a place here anymore. What did you expect? You banished me, cut me off from my only family, my home." He sighs and steps towards you, his blue eyes glossy.

"I was harsh, I said things that I didn't mean and I pushed away my only family. But you're here now, you're back, and you will always have a place here, with your people. They need you and they've missed you. I've missed you. So if you'll accept my offer, you'll have a place here, with your people." You look down at the ground, memories of why you're here coming back to you.

Your eyes flash around the room again, more thoroughly this time, and Filavandrel smiles knowingly.

"He's waiting outside, along with the Bard. They've been bickering for the past two days." Your eyebrows raise. "Two days?" You question softly. He nods and heads towards the door.

"I do not wish to see him," you say suddenly. Your brother smiles sadly and looks down.

"He cares deeply about you, that much even I can see." You scoff and shake your head.

"I'd like to be alone, please. I need time to think." He nods and grants you your privacy. It's shattered moments later, however, by the door opening and a large figure entering.

"You're awake," is all he says.

"Yes, Geralt. I'm awake. Now that you've seen for yourself, you may leave." He shakes his head, eyes cast downwards.

"I'm aware of how my actions may have been perceived, but-" "No, Geralt! That's not how you apologize! You told me I had nothing to worry about when it came to Yennefer. I was told that she was nothing more than something of the past, and yet you went with her to the celebration, you were in her chambers, no doubt getting your cock wet. You should've told me, at the very least."

He squeezes his eyes shut and shakes his head, seeming frustrated.

"What Yennefer and I had... it was something like I never experienced before. Yennefer was a reminder of simpler times. Times when relationships were nothing more than physical touches. But you? You've complicated things. Because with you it's far more than simply physical intimacy. You've carved a place in my heart, as much as it pains me to admit. You've become a piece of me. One that is not easily replaced."

"It didn't seem that way," you whisper, flashes of him and Yennefer together plague your mind and you wince slightly.

He exhales and you can almost hear the internal battle before he finally speaks. "You... frighten me." This confession shocks you into looking at him. His eyes are trained on the floor, brows drawn together and hands clenched into fists at his sides as if it physically pains him to speak.

"You open me to being vulnerable, to... feeling things. It's terrifying and exhilarating and I hate you for it. But I cannot hate you for showing me love. You've shown me something that I haven't had. Something I've only ever dreamed of. An idea I gave up many decades ago. And yet here I am, pouring myself to you because hurting you is the last thing I want to do." His eyes meet yours and you see nothing but regret and truth in them.

"But you did, Geralt. Do you understand that? You say you don't want to be vulnerable because it's frightening. And it is. But the scariest part about giving your heart to someone is the fact that they have to power to break it. If you're so afraid of me doing that to you, why would you do that to me?" Your voice cracks and you curse yourself for getting so emotional.

He's silent and you sigh heavily.

"I cannot continue pretending that you are not hurting me when you are. I cannot trust you when you tell me that Yennefer is something of the past when she clearly remains a part of your present. You crave simpler times? We all do. That doesn't give us the right to hurt those that we care about."  He steps towards you, slow enough for you to move away or tell him to stop if you want to.

When he's right in front of you he lifts his hand, the rough tips of his fingers tracing over the bandage by your collarbone.

He shakes his head, hating himself for not being there to protect you, hating the fact that he hurt you.

"I may never be able to express how much I regret causing you pain, how much I wish I could go back and change it." He rests his hand on the gauze, the warmth of his skin warming you through the layer between your skin and his.

He lowers his head, forehead against yours as he lets out a shaky breath.

"I love you, (Y/n). I may not say it often, but I mean it. You mean the world to me. Yen... she represents something that was fleeting. Brief pleasure. But you? You're a deeper desire. I feel the effects of you deep in my veins, in every breath I take."

Your bottom lip trembles, silent tears dripping down your cheeks as your emotions overwhelm you.

"If you wish to stay here with your brother... your people... I will understand. I will not force you to follow me, especially after I've hurt you. But you should know that you will always have a place with me, beside me. And no one will ever take that place." He presses a gentle kiss to your lips, soft and comforting and far too short. He's pulling back and stepping away from you, his eyes on yours.

"I'll leave now, but I will always have you in my heart, no matter what you choose to do."

He leaves then, and you find yourself with a decision before you. A difficult and quite possibly impossible decision.

Go with Geralt, leave your brother and your people and face the dangers that await the Witcher, go on countless adventures and be with the man you love, even though he may hurt you again.

Or, be the leader your people need. Join your brother and build bonds with the elves that remain, help build up an army and create a force stronger than men. One strong enough to take back what is rightfully yours.

Your decision is between your responsibility and your heart, and you hate yourself for knowing what you need to do.

[serararku]

Dancing in the Sand Finale

The top of Valhaas Barrow boasted one of the best views in all of Thanalan. The clouds had followed the sun to the west, leaving naught but a gorgeous desert sky. The wind was soft and chilly, but steady, flowing across the territory to scrub this place clean of heat. Even though the sun was long gone, the moon and its countless twinkling servants showered Thanalan with a soothing grey light. It was the perfect place and time to reflect on what was, and what will never be. But Era wasn’t up here to think about the what-ifs and have-nots, no -- she was up here to lay a man to rest; everything else could wait.

She cradled Tage’s urn in her hands. He was cremated last year when her heart was still heavy for him before she was close with Zevi, when all she wanted was revenge against the strangers who took him from her. Her numbing confusion had boiled into blistering hatred, but now it had come full circle again; she still wanted revenge, true, but what she wanted most was answers. Killing him just a few days before his rescue meant someone knew she was -- no. She wouldn't go back down that road again.

Era’s gaze fell to his grey ashes when she lifted off the lid. There were no words to be said that weren’t said a hundred times before. She raised the urn out in front of her and waited for the whistling wind to change direction, and then she tipped the ceramic jar over. Tage slipped free from his mortal remains and drifted through the night sky -- ushered to eternity by the wind. She felt nothing for this stranger now, as uncomfortable as that realization came; he was the catalyst for everything that had happened to her in the last half-decade, all starting with that fateful encounter when he defeated her father, and all ending right here. A part of her wished she hadn’t seen Denoh tainting his supper the day before his challenge… but then she would likely be raising his child, confined to a life of breeding; she wouldn’t have left the tribe in search for a defeated Nunh, which means she wouldn’t have rescued Thalen from the brink of death, learned how to use the katana, and meet Zevi. There was a ping of regret for all the suffering she’s both endured and caused… but in the end it was all worth it for nothing else but the Tia in her dreams. Once the urn was empty, Era swung her arm with it for three full rotations before launching it into the air. She was so far up high she didn’t hear it shatter in the desert below, but she didn’t care; Tage was gone for good, and she had shed her final tears for him moons ago.

It was a mess in Valhaas Barrow. Bottles were emptied out and strewn all over the place, with the strong aroma of soap and mint filling every chamber and tunnel. Era descended the great labyrinth to find Mizuna asleep in the corner, her horns adorned in bone jewelry, her face covered in drawings, and halfway buried in a pile of purring kittens. Even in a deep slumber the woman was all smiles -- her fingers occasionally stroking the soft ears of children nuzzling against her palms. Era wanted to wake her up so they could get out of here, eager to reunite with Zevi to hear how his conversation with her mother went, but she couldn’t bring herself to stir Mizuna from her blissful sleep; she would simply have to wait until she woke up on her own.

Then it slowly dawned on her. "Where is Thalen…?" He was supposed to keep watch and help translate for her while she cured the kittens, but he wasn't here. Era briskly walked through the quiet barrow in search of him, but all she found were drowsy tribewives and empty chambers; a twinge of panic bit the back of her neck when her mind raced with the possibilities. "Oh no… did Vahli-?!"

She stumbled into his chambers to find him and her sister Umi entangled beneath their blankets, with a handful of candles clinging to life as they were reduced to puddles along the window. Given the scene and scents in this chamber, it was obvious they enjoyed their fateful evening; but Thalen wasn't here, so away she went.

"Wait." Vahli whispered, moving to pull himself away from his exhausted tribewife. Era froze mid-step and watched him approach, but she kept her eyes above his waist. “I wanted to thank you for doing so much for our tribe. I’ve talked with a few of my wives, and… they seem content with the scaleborn woman's medicines. Without your help… saving our children would be up to Azeyma -- and Azeyma alone. Thank you.”

Era gave him a gentle smile. “I told you I won’t abandon my family. Our tribe is suffering. I know how much you don’t trust outsiders… but if we don’t start trading with foreigners, we’re going to starve to death. You shouldn’t thank me for saving our kittens… and the scaleborn woman has a name. Mizuna Kusakari.”

He thought about trying to pronounce that mouthful of a name, but decided against it. “You’re right. I think with some time I can warm up to the idea of strangers on our lands. Maybe.” He took in a deep breath before glancing back at Umi, who was still sound asleep. “You have been teaching her how to be a better mate. Why?”

“Why?” Era repeated without thinking. “She wants to be the Favored Wife.”

He stared at her for a long moment before he reached up to caress her chin. “You are my favorite.” Era flattened her ears out of reflex and stiffened from his touch, provoking a frown to flash across his lips as he regarded her. “You disapprove?”

“I’ve grown a taste for violence.” She whispered, briefly looking away from him. “I don’t have the temperament to sit around and raise a child all day. The thrill of combat… that rush when I carve my enemies into pieces… it’s the warrior’s way. My place is in battle, not in bed.”

Vahli pursed his lips as he let his hand drop from her. “That’s why you’re so alluring. A wife who can slaughter my enemies by day and pleasure me by night sounds too good to be true.” Slowly he pushed her against the wall, as his hands began to wander. “To fight side by side with a woman like you would be… amazing.”

Era clenched her jaw as she stared at his chest. “We had a deal…” Slapping his hands away from her body would be a terrible idea, but she had nowhere to go; he had her trapped in the corner of his chamber. “You agreed not to touch me…”

A hunger flashed in his gaze when he lifted her chin with one hand. “I agreed not to get you pregnant…” Era closed her eyes when their lips met, her tail twitching rapidly behind her back when he pressed himself against her figure; despite his escapades with Umi he was hardening at an alarming rate -- she had to think of a good enough excuse to leave, but her mind was addled and she ran out of time a while ago. “Come on…” He whispered after breaking their kiss, gently placing his hands on her shoulders to ease her to her knees. “Do that thing I like with your mouth…”

“Stop it…!” Era held her breath and vanished in a puff of smoke, leaving Vahli coughing and confused.

He took a step back and blinked at the evanescent cloud. "Era…? What trickery is this…?" He reached out to touch her again, but all he felt was warm air and the stone wall. "An illusion…? Or a dream?" Defeatedly he turned to stir Umi awake to take care of him, but she was already sitting up, with a grim scowl plastered across her face. As soon as they made eye contact she shot up to her feet and stormed toward the exit without a single word.

"Wait! It's not like that-!" He called out, reaching for her arm; with a low hiss she ripped away from his grasp, and through her tears she briefly turned to glare hurtfully at Vahli before disappearing around the corner. He was alone now, with only his thoughts and ruminations keeping him company.

Era was panting by the time she ran to the mouth of the barrow. The last thing she wanted to do was use anything that could be labeled 'magick' to her people, but what choice did she have? She hurt Zevi once by laying with her Nunh, she wasn't about to hurt him again. Not if she could help it. Now all she wanted to do was grab Thalen and Mizuna and put some distance between her and Vahli. "He's still in heat, which means Thalen isn't laying face up in the sand somewhere…" Era thought to herself, looking around for any trace of him. "He's not in the barrow… so he's not risking his life with a tribewife, and he's not dead. That means he has to be with…?"

Phalo narrowed his eyes when he saw a stranger limping up the path. The boys were fast asleep and sore from today's drills, so he was free to leave them here in his domain if he chose to. He was in no condition to defend the Tia, but he grasped his spear anyway, and descended down the rope ladder to stop this outsider from getting any closer. "What do you want?!" He shouted, hobbling over to stand between the stranger and his clowder of boys.

Thalen noticed a flat boulder nearby and promptly approached it. "To talk. Sit with me, will you? And go easy with the yelling… my head feels ready to burst."

"I have no business with you, outsider!" Phalo snarled, bristling to make himself appear as big as he could; but the aging Miqo'te was a shell of his former self, which wasn't that impressive to begin with.

"Outsider?" Thalen repeated, wincing when he slowly descended onto the rock. "All Tia are outsiders in their tribe's eyes. I'll make you a deal, old man." He lifted his hand to reveal that Black Galleon whiskey -- or what was left of it. "Humor me for a few minutes of your time, and I'll let you finish this off. I promise this stuff is leagues better than the rotting milk you normally drink."

His eyes fixated on that bottle, and he licked his dry lips; he couldn't handle fermented milk like he used to. Every time he wanted to get drunk to take the edge off, it meant his stomach would punish him for days by turning his feces into liquid. It had been ages since he was able to get his hands on alcohol from beyond the borders without the warriors, huntresses, or Nunh taking it all for themselves. Unable to resist the allure of a foreigner's poison, Phalo cautiously sat down beside the stranger. "What do you want…?"

Thalen passed the bottle to him and gazed up at the stars above. "Answers. I've never seen a fellow Miqo'te as old as you. Well, not a male, I mean. How have you lived so long without your Nunh killing you over the years?"

Phalo popped off the weathered cork and took the first swig of many; the potion burned like fire down his throat, and filled him with that old familiar warmth. Yet it was almost as smooth as spring water, and easily the best drink he's ever had -- it certainly loosened him up and put him in the mood for conversation. "I was born with a twisted leg. My mother begged my father to spare my life… told him I could serve the tribe well. I could never become a Nunh myself… everyone knew that." His ears pinned to his head and his gaze fell to the sand. "There are ways to rid oneself of… temptation. Between that and a low death in the wilderness, it was an easy choice."

"Fuck…" Thalen took the bottle from him and took a small swig of his own. This man was dealt a terrible hand right out of the gate, but he played with the cards all the same. It was admirable, of course, to devote a lifetime doing his best to make sure all the Tia that came after him had the best chance they could get at survival, but if Thalen was given the same choice -- he wouldn't even hesitate; without his vices he wouldn't make it.

"The Tia deserve better than short lives filled with fear and misery. I can’t give them much… but a little is still better than nothing." Phalo winced when he took another gulp, the black liquor running down his silver beard. "Is that all you wanted?"

Thalen shifted uncomfortably on the rock, wishing he had a soft warm bed to help cope with this tingling ache. "I'm from the Hipparion Tribe. We uh… don't have someone like you looking out for the boys. No Tia Keeper at all, actually. When we get a new Nunh, all the Tia from the previous one are kicked out into the wilderness. Some are still infants… left to die alone and afraid." Slowly he turned to meet the old man's gaze. "I was in my sixth summer when my father was slain. If it weren't for my older brother taking me under his wing, I wouldn't have lasted till morning."

"Tia are forbidden from working together…" Phalo noted, hardening his gaze.

"All these years sending kids out into the desert wastes and you still don't know much about us, huh?" Thalen couldn't hide his smile; this old man didn't know a damn thing about the world beyond his tribe's territory. "There's strength in numbers. Tia know it's wrong but they don’t care -- they just want to live. Like you. Like us." He didn't know what to say. He simply twisted in his seat to glance up at the makeshift hut that housed seven sleeping Tia. "My brother's name was Nolas. Bravest bastard I've ever known, with a heart as grand as the sun. He… Rarku butchered him right in front of me, in the sands not too far from here. Twenty summers past."

"I'm sorry." Phalo flattened his ragged ears as he stared at him, the bottle now with only a few more gulps left. "He was… cruel.”

“I came here with Era to retrieve his bones and weapons.” The younger man admitted. “I’m told you would have them.”

"Your brother’s bones are gone. I’ve been cremating the remains of fallen Tia for sixty summers so their souls can return to Azeyma. He is with the Warden if he challenged Rarku.” explained Phalo. Thalen wasn't exactly on speaking terms with the Goddess, and hadn't been for many summers; he survived this long without her guidance and favor, what's a few more decades? “But I may have his weapons. What did he carry in his final moments?"

"He used a simple iron sword he found when we were still in the Shroud. It had a red bandana wrapped around the hilt. And a wooden shield, split down the center from that glaive." Just talking about it made Thalen feel nauseous -- one of his only regrets was not returning to this terrible place to kill Rarku himself.

The old Miqo'te rose from the boulder and turned toward his hut. "Wait here." He commanded, hobbling back to his domain to leave Thalen alone with his thoughts.

Only anger and regret swam in circles in his head. Yet the man who took the only family he had left from him was long dead. His only reprieve was knowing that sadistic monster was powerless to stop him when he bent his beloved daughter over every piece of furniture in his apartment, and now he had a taste of his Favored Wife too. "Hope you enjoyed the show, asshole." If only Tage was still alive -- he would buy that man a drink any day of the week for putting the Black Butcher into the ground. Even still, Thalen wished he was the one to finish him for good; he must have spent a few hundred bells replaying that scenario in his head to practice what he would tell Rarku. Before he filled him with holes, of course.

Thalen perked up at the sound of approaching footsteps from behind. His heart skipped a beat when his gaze fell upon his brother's old weapons. The blade was so worn down it would be a wonder if it could even cut butter, and the once crimson bandana had faded to pink from too much exposure to the sun. The shield was smaller than he remembered, but then again, it was a practice shield designed for Hyuran squires; the cleave halfway down the middle had been patched together with some spare lumber and nails, but the integrity of the shield remained compromised. "I used these to train Tia over the years… I hope you don't mind."

"Wasn't planning on using them to fight." He tried to hide it, but his flat ears and trembling voice gave it away; he missed his brother more than anything else in this world.

"You can cry here." Phalo assured him as he offered the shield and sword. "I won’t judge you."

Through sheer willpower alone Thalen managed to swallow back down his sorrow. "I'll cry when I'm dead." He slowly draped the shield over his back and tucked the sword into the leather sheath he brought along with him. "Thank you for keeping his things. I'm K’thalen, by the way."

"S'phalo." The old man bowed as gracefully as he could. "Find peace and happiness. Any Tia that survives as long as you have deserves nothing less."

"I know you're not supposed to do this, but…" Thalen paused before turning his back to the Tia Keeper. "If you want any of the boys to survive long enough to experience true happiness, send them my way. It goes against Her laws, and yaddah yaddah, but you know what awaits them once they're sent out into the wilderness." He didn't bother waiting for a retort -- he already knew what the old man would say. "Keep the bottle. I need to get rid of the evidence anyway." With a slight wave the Tia descended down the path, half-expecting Vahli to be waiting there to cleave him in half for touching one of his wives. Yet when he reached the barrow, neither the brute nor the harlot was around. "Seems a tribewife really can keep her word."

"There you are!" A familiar voice from a familiar woman barked at him. "Where have you… wha-? What happened to you?!"

"Damn you're loud, darlin'." Thalen retorted in Eorzean, and just like that, his thick drawl and accent returned. "Can a feller drink in peace without all this shoutin'?"

Era ushered a half-awake Mizuna onto the wagon and handed her the reins, but she turned back around to judge him. Loudly. "You look like you were attacked. Did you wander too close to the zu nests?"

Thalen ignored her at first to climb up alongside Mizuna. "Decided to spar with a few Tia." He lied as easily as he breathed. "Last time I go easy on some kids… knocked me on my ass, they did."

Satisfied with that answer, she climbed up to sit down beside him. "Did… did you talk to my brothers? How are they doing…?"

"Better than I was at their age." He rubbed the back of his neck before stretching out to drape his arms around their shoulders. Once everyone was settled in, Mizuna flicked the reins and the wagon began its slow return to Ul'dah -- but for the two Miqo'te, 'as soon as possible' would still not be soon enough. "How're your nights goin'? Good I hope?"

"I released S'tage's ashes, argued with Vahli for a few bells because you stepped up to him…" Era looked up at him with a disapproving side glance. "You could have been killed. You know that, right?"

"What was I supposed to do? Tuck my tail between my legs and grovel?" He scoffed, shrugging. "If that big bastard wants to dance, I say we play some music and get this party started."

"Ugh… if I bring you back, that just might happen…"

"Imagine it… S'thalen Nunh." He chortled. "Then you'd be answerin' to me, lass." The thought of sitting around in that sandbox all day was shockingly amusing, or maybe it was from the Black Galleon Whiskey in his system; when he glanced over to see her roll her eyes at him, she was instead staring at him intensely.

"That… would solve a lot of my problems…" Era hummed, drumming her fingers on the guard railing. "With you as my Nunh, I'd be able to come and go as I please…"

Thalen loudly cleared his throat before turning to glance down at Mizuna. "Anyroad… how were the kittens, Doc? Cute?"

"Cute?" She repeated, blinking slowly. "They were so soft, and warm, and cuddly." The brightest smile she's worn in over twenty six summers lit up her face, almost as if she was as tipsy as the Tia. "We sang songs for bells. I got them to dance with me. Then I told them some stories once everyone was tired… they didn't understand a word I said, but I think they just liked watching me talk. Cute? Yes, K'thalen… yes they were very cute."

"Well… glad two of us had a good time." He smiled, kicking his feet up. "Just a few more bells and we can rent some rooms in Lil'Ala Mhigo before we get ba-"

"When are you and R'zevi going to have a child of your own?" Mizuna asked, leaning forward so she could look at her. "You're both young and in love. What is taking so long?"

"D-doctor Kusakari! Nooo…!" Era began turning strawberry red while Thalen threw his head back and belly laughed.

---

Mentions: @rzevi-tia-ffxiv​

[fizzingwizard]

Episode 27! It’s a transitional episode and I have Thoughts but nothing major really happens until the very last second :P

Cap of the day!

You know what they saw about the megane shine... next season’s villain is Jou-senpai!!! you heard it here first!

More below!

GAWD I LOVE JOU

no but SERIOUSLY... so glad to have the rest of the team back. They really do make EVERYTHING better. Taichi and Yamato, yeah they’re cool, I love them, but they just don’t carry the show by themselves. And in a similar vein, the rest of the team needs Taichi and Yamato too. Otherwise they have no reason to be all dramatic and show off their cool sides.

(other than Koushirou of course who was just born Cool but it’s the kind of cool most people don’t recognize until you literally own the entire world Koushirou’s three steps from becoming Seto Kaiba except NICE)

ok back to business... last week we left off with the team finally reuniting and bringing Hikari along. For some reason the two groups both decide to stand in a straight line like two baseball teams about to shake hands. Leomon’s team still looks fricking ridiculous

Sooo jury’s out on how Taichi’s gonna react to Hikari! Yamato’s been so chill with having Takeru around, I started to wonder if we’re gonna see super over protective big bro Taichi instead this time! But for the most part he’s just surprised that she’s not surprised by the Digimon.

Hikari is creepy. lol. She’s very much the “cute little sister” type and this episode, at least, we didn’t see any kind of initiative from her, which is to be expected, I mean give the kid some time to adjust. We don’t see a lot of personality though either... I guess we can say she likes cute things, and she’s pretty darn calm... I don’t really like her voice though. It’s a perfectly fine little girl voice, but she always sounds like she’s about to doze off...

Obligatory “cutest couple” pic

The group then basically recaps what’s been happening in the human world recently. Which is all pretty important stuff. But for some reason Taichi and Yamato don’t fill them in on what they’ve gone through?? They have to explain Takeru and Patamon because well there’s a surprise but then they’re like “oh yeah Patamon’s the holy Digimon” and I’m like WHOA. DUDES. IT’S THE HOLY DIGIMON. THE THING Y’ALL RISKED YOUR NECKS FOR. Shouldn’t there be a little more interest, both in the telling and the hearing?? XD

Koushirou’s most excited to update their digivices.

Taichi: Why so blue, Agumon?

Agumon: I shouldn’t have had so many Hawaiian blue energy drinks... but how else did they expect me to fight non stop

Koushirou even has handy dandy charts and images to illustrate. He’s going to get hired somewhere and immediately promoted to CEO, by the CEO.

Patamon: “Hi! I’m the Holy Digimon! Bow before me!”

Jou introduces himself to Takeru and Hikari as the “leader” and tries to convert them to his religion (No-play-only-study-ism) to make them his first acolytes when he inevitably becomes the season’s true final villain. But Gomamon’s all over it.

Gomamon: “You can’t have acolytes until you master maniacal laughter, Jou, didn’t you read ‘Villainy for Dummies’ like I told you to??”

Agumon adorably walks right up to Hikari and asks her if she’s okay and if she feels scared. Hikari says “Agumon’s cute!” Taichi’s face is like “cute? cute?? he’s a dinosaur! dinosaurs are cool!” but he wisely says nothing because you cannot argue with girls about what we think is cute you just cannot

Then Hikari notices something even cuter! Patamon!

Hikari: So cute! I want ten!

Takeru: Sorry, he’s one of a kind and mine!

Hikari: *looks at him* So cute! I want ten!

Takeru: Wait... of me?

Hikari: (u3u)~♥ ﾁｭ

Takeru: (o///o)~♥

love at first sight???? lol

In a nod to the original series, we get a scene of Taichi asking Hikari if she has a Digivice and her being like “oh that thing, I filled it with catnip and gave it to Miko”

Taichi: No digivice! Well I guess this means there’s no way she’s a Chosen Child like us!

Agumon: Infallible logic

Meaning the Zurumon are on the move! this time to FREAKING NASA

Taichi: *most unimpressed voice possible NASA??

I thought hey, it’ll be fine, we’ll just have to fight some more... but

Nasa: *launches a rocket*

The internet:

it’s all just variations of people oh-no-ing in Japanese. A little further down someone just writes “Explosion” in English lol

Due to the weirdness in the digital world that is affecting the human world, a bunch of waterspouts appear in the ocean. Eldradimon’s like “oh bother”

he protec!

Mimi and Palmon rush to comfort each other with a hug.

Jou... immediately gets seasick.

Gomamon: So how’s that maniacal laughter coming along?

Jou: DON’T MAKE ME OPEN MY MOUTH

Awwwww. Point of interest.... Koushirou is barely larger than Hikari x’D

Leomon, for some reason, decides now we must part. He doesn’t think these kids can survive this storm and offers to protect them as they escape. The kids are powerful against evil monsters but weak to weather lol. I’m sure the actual logic in no way was “Now that the rest of the team is back from their pointless stint in the human world we no longer need Leomon to play back-up”

They don’t agree without an argument, but Leomon insists, because he believes the Chosen Children have other important things they are meant to do. We get a cool scene of everyone making their escapes. Sora takes Mimi with her

Taichi and Hikari join Koushirou

And Yamato and Takeru “join” Jou (but really Yamato’s the one calling the shots because Jou’s busy struggling not to pee his pants)

It’s just in the nick of time... before a giant whirlpool seemingly sucks Leomon and Eldradimon into the sea.

Taichi: Oh my god did they just DIE??

Kabuterimon: Don’t look back!

Taichi: I know... we have to respect their sacrifice...

Kabuterimon: Well, that and you might be scarred to see Leomon’s reenactment of Ariel at the bottom of Ursula’s whirlpool

Taichi: huh

(look I think I’m funny and that’s what counts)

Getting all split up like this made me think they were gonna end up split up for reals, but the team manages to stay together for now.

They arrive at a new continent covered in weird spikes! Yamato picks up his digivice like a walkie-talkie and says one word: “Taichi”

it amuses me that he could only bring himself to say “Yagami” for a good while in the beginning but then he finally started saying “Taichi” and now he just can’t stop!!

Anyway he’s alerting the others to the fact that some? of the spikes on the island are actually Tortomon about to attack them. Before going to join Greymon’s attack, Taichi flings Hikari at Koushirou “HERE PROTECT MY SISTER SINCE YOU HAVE NOTHING ELSE TO DO”

jk but seriously... why does Taichi need to be all up in the action? Until now I thought it was something they all had to do to help their partners, because they usually ride on them during battle, but this episode seemed to suggest that Taichi goes out of his way to do it even more than is maybe necessary. Which doesn’t exactly come as a surprise, but xD

Reason #1229345894 why the team is better when they’re all together: Mimi is hilarious and SORA HAS A GOSH DARN PERSONALITY. She DOES, folks. We hardly got to see it recently -____- this episode at least lets her react to the others. Ugggh. Irony of ironies, Sora needs more love.

It’s a stampede! Simba! NOOOOO!

Sooo... the battle with the Tortomon goes pretty well but then this guy called Groundramon or something appears and uh... starts to eat them... like it’s pretty visceral y’all o_o le eugh

Taichi is shocked and recalls last episode when he saw Seadramon power up and evolve after eating Ebidramon. He does not choose to mention the time he was eaten by Devimon. EH IT’LL BE FINE I’M SURE THAT WASN’T IMPORTANT ANYWAY

Greymon: Don’t get eaten.

Garurumon: lol same to you

The Agumon/Gabumon bromance is honestly one of the best things about this season. Not that we get a ton of it, but when we do we do I always feel like “yes, that’s Digimon, that’s it right there”

The Digimon rev up to face off with their cannibal and Groundramon quickly decides Ikakkakumon looks the most nutritious. He probably has lots of blubber and meat on him so I guess I’d go for Ikkakumon first too

Ikkakumon: Don’t eat me!

Jou: Wait don’t! He was teaching me how to be cool!!!

Taichi: Eat him! Eat him Groundramon! I can’t let Jou be the cool one!

Yamato: Are you two fighting to see who can reach peak villain status first?

Taichi/Jou: I’m naturally competitive

ka-boom!

Our heroes are blown back by. Takeru quickly runs to check on his big brother who seems to smack his head on a rock...

Yamato: It’s cool. I’m cool. The definition of cool. Ishida Yamato. That’s me.

Sora: Oh no, I think he’s got a concussion.

Takeru: No, that’s how oniichan is on a normal day.

The team starts to feel overwhelmed! That’s when a fire ignites in Taichi’s eyes and he announces the next siege!

Yamato: Taichi...

no but okay what even IS this moment. The episode goes out of its way to show us Yamato reacting to Taichi not giving up. This is a Thing. I don’t know what he’s feeling here - impressed? Happy that Taichi’s able to bring everyone together when they’re feeling defeated? Or is he also recalling how that same desire to never fail almost got him killed and his partner transformed into an evil evolution a few episodes ago?

So like I keep saying I don’t see why we had to split up the team for so long, and for now I stand by that. But one thing’s clear: the show wanted only Yamato around to witness what happened to Taichi. (I mean, Takeru was there too, but he’s a baby xP) And even Yamato doesn’t know everything - we don’t know how much he was actually conscious for. But I feel like, if there was any point to the separation at all, that was it. I hope so anyway. I like the idea of Yamato grappling with how to know when Taichi’s going too far while at the same time really valuing the way Taichi’s able to push them to victory.

Turns out Taichi’s new plan is... even bigger guns!

Pointed directly into Groundramon’s mouth!

Yamato: This is madness.

Taichi: No! This! Is! DIGIMON ADVENTURE:!!!!

Everyone attacks poor Groundramon in the mouth x’D im crying

The combined attacks seem to overload Groundramon and then MetalGreymon launches missiles down his throat, which cause these internal explosions. Uh, gross... like if there’s any time Jou should be puking it’s now

we won by being even more violent than normal! yay us!

Not that this means we get a break because Darknightmon chooses now to make his dramatic return!

They get blown back again

... but I love how adorably protective the big brothers are whenever it happens <3

Yamato and Taichi finally remember they never told the others much about what they’ve been up to recently, other than “we found the holy Digimon.” Now they add “and we found Darknightmon too.” Wow what a level of detail.

I honestly... expected Darknightmon to be interested in Hikari instead of Takeru xP It was a little too predictable so I was glad when he seems to go right for Takeru and Patamon after all.

Patamon, who’s recent hobby has been watching musicals, begins to sing:

Don’t ever kick a dog

because he’s just a pup!

You’d better run for cover

when the pup grows up!

Taichi: Uhh did he not see the part where Gavroche dies??

Yamato: He fell asleep before we got that far.

Angemon!!

Honestly... as a fan of 99 Adventure, Angemon there was SUCH a dramatic thing and... this isn’t. I know, I know, it’s a different show, we do things different in 2020... I just remember the excitement I felt about Angemon’s first apperance though. But, to be fair, although it takes a long time before his second appearance, once it happens Patamon always evolves to Angemon without all the fanfare and it’s just a normal evolution. So... yeah, this all makes sense xP

At least we end on a cliffhanger! What’s gonna happen?? Tune in next week!

So I guess I wasn’t that off about the team splitting up again, I was just wrong about when... next week it looks like they’ll be separated, which, although we just got everyone back together, I’m not upset about as long as each group gets focus. Now that they’re back in the digital world, there’s potential for stuff to happen. But it depends on the groups as well. I do sort of expect this is mainly a “put Taichi and Hikari” on their own maneuver.

Oh, was right about Darknightmon going for Hikari after all xP

My guess is... Angemon’s gonna fight but just not have recovered enough to stay in that form for long, and somehow that results in everyone separating... we’ll see. More importantly...

NANIMON!!!

My relationship with this guy is love-hate! I love to hate him x’D So I’m glad he’s back! Still want to see Piximon and Whamon the most but I’ll take it!

[iamallybee]

Because peeps on my dash are hooked on the Deltadi ship and have got me hooked too, here's a basic outline of how Delta Dawn and Dickory got together in the Gumdrop AU! It also calls back to my other Trolls headcanon posts so you might wanna read those before this one. Putting under the cut because this is looooong!

All his life, Dickory had been told that one day he’ll meet that special someone, he’ll experience certain feelings, of love and intimacy. But Dickory just...never felt it. He felt love for his family but romance? Sexual feelings? It never came to him. During his teenage years, he did feel like he was broken. He felt pressured to start his first relationship, telling himself feelings would come. It...did not end well. In fact, you could say it made him feel more broken than ever.

But then the avalanche happened. Due to the mass loss of yodellers, many of the young adults were pressured to marry and have children quickly to increase numbers and save their culture. In fact, it became a new tradition for yodellers to marry as soon as they turned 18. The only one to refuse this was an 18-year-old Dickory. He may have been shunned a little for his decision (which made him feel worse about his lack of sexuality) but he honestly didn’t have time to think about that anymore. His was still a kid who parents literally just died with a baby brother left behind to take care of. He had no time for marriage, he’d say to the other yodellers. His brother needed him and that is totally the only reason why he couldn’t marry. Throughout his life, Dickory would continue to feel stress and sadness, not knowing about being ace/aro and still believing there was something wrong with him. But at least he has Hickory and his new bounty hunting job to distract him.

Anyway, TWT happened and as soon as Delta found out that Hickory was really two trolls disguised as one country troll imposing on her beloved town, she had them arrested and put on community service for a unspecified amount of time. So she and Dickory did not have the best start in the slightest.

Hickory was soon made to do a report on Pop Trolls and left for Pop Village (and thus beginning his own romance with Poppy and Branch but that’s another story). Dickory was made to stay and do humiliating duties (like clean up after the livestock) while enduring the mockery of the locals and the ridiculously high heat. The only good/kind of less worse thing he saw in this was the fact that Delta’s niece, Clampers, was strangely drawn to him. She would nag and ask him questions about why he has two legs, what are those stumpy things on your hooves and can I bite them? Annoyed initially, he soon warmed up to her as she reminded him of Hickory when he was a child. Their friendship reached a point where they even started playing together. Delta witnessed this one day and maybe, just maybe, her heart may have melted. But only a little.

One day, after a restless sleep, Dickory decided to take a walk about town in the early hours of the morning. His was surprised when his keen ears picked up on a faint, mournful song from the cemetery. He found Delta singing with tears in her eyes to the grave of her sister. After awkward small talk, they both open up about the loved ones they've lost and how it changed them. They found their experiences to be remarkably similar (Delta lost her sister in a mining accident and was left to raise her daughter) and from that point on, they began to grow closer.

Over the next several weeks, Dickory began to actually care about the Lonesome Flats community and his service became a lot more voluntary and a lot less punishing. He would help the elderly, fix up anything that needed fixing, even learned how to herd up the livestock (although his first attempt was a complete hilarious disaster that Growley Pete just loves to tease him about). The locals soon began to think of him as one of their own and gained their respect, in turn gaining Delta's trust.

Delta and Dickory's friendship grew in that time too. In the beginning, she would order him to do certain task or else she would make him do something much more humiliating which used to tick him off. Now, she would ask him or else she would 'threaten' him to make him clean out Growley Pete's hooves, which he would respond with a sarcastic comment with a smile. They were pretty much very buddy-buddy. But the locals weren't blind to the underlying romantic tension between them.

Delta absolutely knew she was having romantic feelings for Dickory but she was at first hesitant. Country trolls are the type to take romance on head first and confidently but she was afraid of scaring him off so decided to bide her time for the right moment. Not exactly made easy when her parents totally shipped them and would try everything in their power to embarrass Delta enough into confessing.

Dickory, on the other hand, didn't know what to feel. Sure, he liked Delta now but she was just a good friend to have a drink and a laugh with, throw sarcastic comments at, arm wrestle with, share personal and past trauma history with, stare at and wish to touch her stupid big beautiful hair, want to hold close to-uh oh!

Suddenly it was like he was a teenager again but this time it was different. He liked her but it can't be THAT kind of love. It didn't exist for him, remember? He couldn't feel that love for anyone because he never did and it would never happen. She's a friend you care a lot about and that's it. Besides, even if there were feelings (which there weren't), it would be best if nothing happened because come on, she would never want someone who didn't like...well, y'know.

Basically, Dickory's in denial pretty hard.

Anyhow, the country trolls have a pretty big shindig one evening where there's plenty of dancing, laughing, drinking and fun. Both Delta and Dickory were having a great time but just as buddies, right? 

However, at one point in the early hours of the morning, they found themselves alone together and Delta, in a drunken stupor with all logic thrown out the window, confesses and boldly kisses Dickory. And then she passed out.

In the days following, things were very awkward. Delta remembered the kiss and was horribly embarrassed for being so careless. She decided it was best if they actually sat down and talked about it like adults. Only problem? Dickory was now deliberately avoiding Delta. He didn't want to ruin the friendship they already had but he also didn't want to have the conversation he knew was inevitably coming.

Finally, a frustrated Delta decided to f this and confront Dickory head on. A huge argument blew up between them (which temporarily cleared out the town) which culminated to Delta demanding to know why he doesn't want to be with her and Dickory yells back 'BECAUSE I'M BROKEN, DAMMIT!'

Silence.

After the shock, the pair of them calm down enough for Delta to gently encourage him to explain further. Dickory shakily and tearfully admits his unresolved negative feelings about his asexuality, the yodellers pressure on him to marry, how much its affected him and how wrong he's truly felt all these years and yet he somehow has feelings for Delta that he doesn't understand and how he can't be the man she wants him to be or give her what she would ultimately want.

Shocked, Delta tells him that she's sorry she ever made him feel this way but she only wants Dickory to be himself and if being himself means that he can't give her certain things then that's okay because she loves him just as he is.

But Dickory, still confused, emotional and a stubborn old goat, decides this is the best time to run off and return home.

Heartbroken, Delta writes to Hickory that his community service is up and he is free to return to his home. She tries her best to continue her duties as mayor but everyone can tell she greatly misses Dickory.

When the brothers reunite back to their homes, they also try to move on as normal but both of them have a lot to think about in terms of the things they went through recently (again, Hickory had his own romantic shenanigans going on as well). One night, the two of them talk about what they went up to in the past weeks and realise that the other has experienced love and are too stubborn to admit it. They even have a big sibling argument about it. I mean whose dumb enough to not look past their own insecurities and see that they are loved and they love them back and they shouldn't let the past hold them down in finding happiness and - oh, I see what's happening here!

Anyway, its agreed upon that Hickory and Dickory should return to Lonesome Flats and Pop Village to confess their feelings to their respective loved ones and not see each other until they do or someone's ass is getting beat (y'know, normal sibling pact stuff).

So

In true spaghetti western style, Dickory returns to Lonesome Flats. He stares Delta down from one side of town to the other, locals watching with baited breath. He yells to Delta for the whole town to hear, that he was an idiot for running away and that he wasn't sure how they were going to figure things out in the future. But he's here now, he's not running away anymore and he loves her too.

Delta, without saying a word, storms up to Dickory, picks up up from under the arms and gives him a great, big, long overdue smooch to the cheers of the townsfolk and the cries of 'FINALLY' from her parents and niece (meanwhile, Growley Pete starts collecting bets).

Anyhow, Dickory moves to Lonesome Flats, eventually marries Delta, adopts Clampers as his niece, is fully content with being demiromtic/asexual, yada yada, happy ending, mwah! (I am a master of storytelling)

[teenage-fanbitch]

you left me in this broken world

Fandom: Dream SMP

Word count: 2317

Please remember that this fanfic is about the characters of the SMP, it is not about the content creators and should not be interpreted as suh. There are no romantic relationships in this fanfic because 1. I don't know if the ccs are comfortable with that and 2. I wrote this about their character's friendship.

-----

It was awkward when they first met. At least, for her it was. Will never had issues with meeting new people, he'd just be talking and talking until eventually the person in question talked back.

Maybe it was the way Phil raised him, or maybe he was just born like that. It didn't matter to Niki, because her friend would always smile.

That was something she never seemed to grow tired off. Not back when they first met, not now, not ever.

Things were easier back then, though. Will would sing for her, and they'd dance and laugh their sorrows away.

They'd lost that, somewhere along the way, and she longs to get it back.

They've been through everything together, been through fire and rain for the other. Perhaps it's why she can't handle being away from Will, from the person she considers her brother.

It's not as if she doesn't want him to have this, to create a home for himself, to be free from the voices haunting him in his sleep.

"You deserve the world, Niki."

She remembers watching him softly play a beautiful tune, remembers him warming her frozen fingers, remembers that those hands were not made for war.

"So do you."

-----

They reunite, eventually. She joins the SMP and jumps into Will's arms the moment she sees him. There's a faint smell of battle lingering in his hair, but that doesn't matter, because at least he's still here.

It's fun, walking around L'Manberg with Tommy excitedly telling her the story behind every building.

She understands why Will thinks of him as his little brother, because while Tommy may be annoying, it's endearing to watch him flounder around.

It doesn't calm the raging storm in her, because Tommy's a child, and he just fought in a war, fought for everything he believed in, and he'd died for it.

He'd died for a home.

And Niki will do anything to give her friends one. It doesn't matter if she's known them for years or just met them, they all deserve a place to be happy.

L'Manberg is her everything. It's a place she can annoy Will, can ruffle Tommy's hair, can pass Tubbo a smile, can joke around with Fundy, and can talk for hours on end with Eret, because even they deserve a friend.

Everyone deserves a friend.

-----

Her home is gone the second Schlatt took place on the podium. She's seen bad people before, seen their smirks, the hunger in their eyes, their desire to get what they want.

She's never seen it directed at Will. Everyone loved the boy who played music at the park, who smiled at every person he came across, if only to make their day a tiny bit better. She's never met anyone who looked at him like he needed to be destroyed.

Her hope is gone the second Schlatt banishes her friend. She's seen Will scared before, seen him at his lowest point, but nothing could prepare her for this.

This is Will's home, he fought tooth and nail for it, fought with everything he had. And now it's gone. Her friend loses it all in just a split second, and she can't help but cry his tears.

L'Manberg is gone the second its flag burns. This isn't what L'Manberg was meant to be, was meant to become. This is corruption, and if there's one thing Niki refuses to let happen, it's her friends losing themselves because of it.

-----

There are times when she feels like it's better this way, like Schlatt is a better leader than Will ever could be. Manburg is thriving, and nothing too bad seems to have happened.

But then she hears Quackity scream at Schlatt, and she sees the bottles of alcohol scattered across the white house. She spots Tubbo sneaking away, hands shaking with fear. She sees the hardened eyes of Fundy as he looks at the flag.

She sees herself, sitting at the L'Mantree, looking at where the walls used to be. This is their tree. Except it isn't really theirs anymore, is it?

There were times when they'd come to the tree when she'd listen to Will rant about governing, when Will would sing her a song after a nightmare and she'd finally be able to rest. But Will is gone now, and she's all alone again.

She wants it back. She wants her friend back.

-----

People always tell her she's too kind for her own good, that she wouldn't see an absolute asshole if they'd be standing right in front of her.

But it's not that she doesn't see it, or purposely ignores it. Even the most hated people can have a heart.

The citizens of L'Manberg hate Eret, warned her for the king, but she didn't listen.

Because she knows that deep down, Eret still has loyalty, still has something to fight for, still has a heart.

Even the worst people can be saved. That's what she always thought. But not now, as she stands in front of Schlatt and all she sees is rotten.

Schlatt doesn't deserve her kindness. Not after everything he'd done to her, to everyone. The first punch was one of anger, the second one of hatred, the third one of sadness, and by the fourth one she's lost it.

She's crying and punching and she doesn't even notice when her punches only hit air, when she's dragged away and all that is left are tears as she stares at the bars of her jail cell.

-----

Nothing has ever mattered more to her than this. Not when Tubbo is covered in burn scars, when Tommy is no longer bouncing around, when Quackity is silently standing in a corner, and Fundy looks at her like he doesn't know if it was worth it.

She doesn't either. Will has lost it, he wears insanity in his eyes and once she thought she could fix that, could convince him that it was going to be fine.

But she can't, can she? She hadn't missed his coldness towards Tommy, his not caring about Tubbo, his distrust of Fundy. Even Technoblade was worried about him, even Technoblade thought he was too far gone.

Nothing has ever mattered more to her than this, because maybe getting L'Manberg back will get her her brother back, will save him from whatever is destroying him.

-----

They won. L'Manberg is back in their hands and there's still hope. They can make this place a home again.

And so they remove the decorations, remove everything that has something to do with Manburg, with that vile memory.

She's the first to spot the TNT. No one else noticed, and she doesn't want them to. They're finally laughing and she doesn't want to ruin that. So she covers it up, she pretends like it isn't there because they're safe, right?

Until Technoblade breaks. And then so does Tommy, and Tubbo, and all of her friends. They all break.

And so does she, once she realises Will isn't there, because that can only mean one thing. She wasn't able to save him.

-----

She knows Will was gone long before, knows this is probably what he wanted, but she can't help her aching heart the second Phil puts his sword through her friend's chest.

She loved her brother more than anything in the world, and now he's gone. Killed by his own father, by one of the few people that knew how much he was actually hurting.

There's a scream on her lips, and she doesn't care if it gets out, because Will was the one person that had always been there for her, that promised to never leave her. And now he's dead. He's gone and he's not coming back and that scares her.

So she screams and she cries it all out, she doesn't fight the withers, doesn't care if they'll kill her.

Her throat aches and her eyes burn, and it's all Phil's fault. He's the one who did this to her, the one who took her home.

And she screams a little louder.

-----

She finds herself sitting at the L'Mantree again, reminiscing about a past time. Back when Will was still in charge, and they'd be looking at their country, and everything would be okay.

Back when Will would lend her an old coat of his to keep her warm. Now she stole the coat herself, she'd grabbed it from his body, had ruffled his hair one last time, and ran away with tears in her eyes.

She doesn't care that the coat is covered in blood, because it still smells like Will, and it still makes her feel safe.

And safety is something she hasn't felt in a while. Tommy looks so lonely without Will, Tubbo looks too small to wear a presidential coat, Quackity looks so quilty walking around town, Fundy looks so broken and grown up, Phil looks so quilty every time he spots the cave.

And Niki looks at New L'Manberg, and she feels the need to run.

-----

The first sign is the flag. It's a nice flag, and it's good to have something to symbolise a change, that they're not the same.

But it still pains her to see a part of Will disappear. He didn't get a grave, didn't get a memorial, it's like his memory was stained, like he was never even there.

The second sign is when Tommy's exile. It's fair, in a way, but the boy doesn't deserve this. Nobody deserve to relive their trauma like that.

Tommy's irrational actions have hurt a lot of people, but this was still his home, and it wasn't fair of them to take it away from him.

The third sign is the butcher army. Sure, Technoblade isn't exactly innocent, but they'd treated him like he wasn't even human, like he was less than a beast.

And while she may not have liked Phil, may be unable to look the man in the eye, they'd clipped him from his wings and chained him to his house.

L'Manberg was supposed to be free, a way to leave all that cruelty behind. And look at it now, look at what there is left of the nation Will had promised her, the nation he had build with his own two hands.

-----

She sheds no tears when New L'Manberg inevitably falls. This country has been walking a fine line for months now, it's not the place Will had promised her anymore.

It's not. Fundy knows it, Eret knows it, even Tommy and Tubbo know. It's not worth her tears, not worth for her to spill her heart.

So she burns it down. Drops some TNT when she feels like it, because she wants to be a part of its downfall, wants to destroy the thing that had taken so much from her.

The battle has already been lost when she spots the tree, spots the one thing that had remained the same through all these years, and she remembers sitting here and smiling.

Now she watches the tree burn, watches all the memories and all the suffering turn to ashes. Because, even if she had called this place home, had loved its inhabitants, it was never meant to be.

-----

She freezes. Of course she does, because she knows that sweater, knows that beanie, knows who it belongs to. She doesn't know that skin, can't know that skin.

Fundy told her Ghostbur had helped with the renovation, but it couldn't be true, could it? Will is dead, he's gone.

He would've come back for her if he was still here. Ghost or not.

He would've.

It must've been her imagination playing tricks on her, there's no yellow sweater, no red beanie, no Ghostbur.

So she does the one thing she knows how to do. She runs away from her problems once again, doesn't look back, and sets the world further ablaze.

Her world. His world.

Their world.

-----

It starts making sense now. She finally gets why Tubbo exiled Tommy. Sure, he abided Dream in doing so, what only worsened the situation, but she does get it.

Tommy started this whole thing. He considered the discs worth more than anything his friends worked their asses off for. He kept aggravating Dream. He took away everything from her.

Maybe things would be better off without Tommy, maybe Will would've still been at her side if it weren't for him. Maybe Tommy should just die.

-----

The plan doesn't work. Either because Tommy knows what's up or he's just the most lucky bastard on this server.

It hurts to see him like this, though, so insufferably annoying. Because this is the Tommy she first met, the boy who was so bright and had no idea what the future would hold.

How much suffering he'd put everyone through.

She can't stand his innocence, his ignorance, she can't stand him.

"I hate you!" She does, doesn't she? "You left me behind, Will!" But she's not talking to Will, is she? "Tommy. I meant- I meant Tommy."

She takes a few steps back, shakes her head as brown hair returns to blonde, and she doesn't stop the tears that fall.

-----

It's only in her dreams that she finds peace. She doesn't get many of them, she barely sleeps anyway, but when she finally drifts off and it's not the usual nightmares that plague her, she can't help but smile.

It's all a dream, she knows that, but everything is better than her reality, everything is better than the endless cycle of hurt.

So when she spots the L'Mantree still standing, and it's Will welcoming her with open arms, she gives in. She hugs him tight and while it may not be real, it's still Will.

It's still safe.

"Maybe I'll join you some day, Will. Then we can laugh like we used to, sing some songs. We can be free again."

-----

[somedayonbroadway]

aaa hii! i was wondering if you could do the hercules au, please? thank youuu 💕

Hello, friends! This is an AU based off of @racetrackhigg original Mood Boards that you can find right here!

Hercules AU

Characters

Spot Conlon — Hercules

Racetrack Higgins — Megara

Jack Kelly — Phil

William Snyder — Hades

Morris Delancey and Oscar Delancey — Pain and Panic

Also, DeMarius Copes is all of the Muses. He just is.

So…

We are basing this off of the Disney rendition of Hercules, for the most part, even though their telling of this tale is very much modified for younger viewers. I mean, who are they kidding? The Greek Gods aren’t the loving, family friendly types that Disney tried to trick us into thinking they were when we were children, but it’s fine. We’re gonna roll with this, maybe change a little bit of it. And it is going to take place in modern day (excluding quarantine, because in fantasy worlds, worldwide quarantines don’t exist) because, why the heck not?

Back when the world was new, the planet earth was down on its luck. Chaos reigned and earthquakes and volcanoes ran amok. But then along came Zeus.

Ya’ll know the song.

There’s a party on Olympus, one of great importance. A son has been born to Zeus and Hera. A son they’ve named Hercules. Every single God shows up to celebrate the child’s birth and congratulate the ruling couple of Olympus who is adored by all but one; Zeus’s brother Hades.

Despite typically never leaving his kingdom, Hades has made a special exception on this joyous occasion to meet his new nephew, a new golden boy who is showered in gold and glitter already, although only having been born the day before. Zeus had even fashioned the child his very own flying horse, which he calls a Pegasus. Everyone adores the child and Hades dismisses him, looking disgusted at his very existence.

See, Hades knew something that the other gods didn’t. Hades just so happens to be great friends with the fates. He had a meeting with them prior to this celebration he had never intended on going to. The sisters explained to him that the great plan he’d been wielding could be successful, that one day the planets would align, making way for his rule over Olympus and then Earth. There was only one problem.

Hercules.

That fateful day when those planets aligned would be eighteen years from that very night. Hercules’s eighteenth birthday. And on that day, should Hercules fight, Hercules would win.

Hades saw only one solution. If there was no Hercules, there was no fight.

On Olympus, Hades has all eyes on, giving his two right hand men the opportunity to hide on the great mountain and wait out until nightfall where they would steal the child and force him to drink a potion that would make him mortal.

That night, chaos erupts among the Gods and Zeus cries, sending a storm down onto Earth as Hades men carry out his plan, taking the baby down to the land below and forcing the potion down his throat, knowing that he must drink every last drop to become truly mortal so that they can kill him.

Unfortunately for them, a young couple comes running when they hear a baby cry. The two henchmen drop the potion before the child can finish it and shapeshift into snakes before going to bite the kid and kill him. Having not drunk the whole potion, however, Hercules held onto the strength he’d been born with and was able to protect himself from the two monsters, sending them slithering back to their master.

He then gets taken in by the couple who’d been praying for a baby that they were unable to have. They claim him as their own and name him Sean. Sean Conlon.

The occupants of Mt. Olympus are crushed at the news of their prince becoming mortal. Still, they carried on, watching as their Hercules was raised from afar in a city that never slept, one he grew up to adore. Brooklyn, New York.

Growing up for young Sean, however, was anything but easy. With a physical strength he couldn’t begin to understand or control, he seemed to make a mess anywhere he went. People were wary of him. Kids his own age didn’t like him and he so he didn’t like them. He closed himself off from the world and hid himself away, only entrusting his parents with the fear that he didn’t belong there, that he was too different. It was beginning to get to the point that people were truly frightened of him and his abilities.

Sean didn’t have any friends. He didn’t have a phone. He didn’t need one. He didn’t have anyone to talk to. Girls would sometimes get flustered when they saw him because of the muscles he seemed to get from nowhere, but the second they realized he was the freak he was, they ran the other way. Sean didn’t mind. He could never look at the girls the way the first looked at him.

Eventually, while accompanying his father downtown, he destroys an entire building. He doesn’t understand what’s wrong with him. So his parents finally came clean. They admit to him for the first time how they found him, how he was all alone and already had these abilities that they didn’t understand. He asks them why they never told him and they don’t have an answer. They can only offer him a small necklace that had been around his neck when they’d stumbled upon him, one written in Ancient Greek. One that Sean can read, having never read Greek in his life.

It says Hercules.

Running off, feeling scared and alone and so confused, Sean finds himself wandering into the woods where he is met by a man wearing a white suit with a golden tie. The man claims to be Zeus, his father.

Initially laughing at this, Sean tries to leave, but is pulled back by an invisible force as Zeus takes him in, studying his face for the first time in nearly eighteen years. He looks happy to see him and tells Sean what happened, how he had been stolen from his home and in order to return, needed to prove himself to the gods. Sean is still a bit skeptical until Zeus whistles for a horse to come out of the shadows.

It isn’t until Sean sees Pegasus that he thinks there might be some truth to this man’s story. All his life he’d been obsessed with what he’d thought was a mythical creature. He’d made drawings of it, studied their mythology, had even learned to ride horses when he was young.

Pegasus missed him.

While reuniting with his old friend, Zeus tells Sean of a man he needs to meet in order to ensure his return to Olympus, where he belongs. He described the man as the son of a demigod, one who trains heroes and teaches them how to hone their skills and use them for the greater good. So Sean takes Pegasus up into the air, going to seek out this man, Jack Kelly.

When he manages to find the man’s apartment with Zeus’s help, he lands Pegasus down on the roof and knocks on the man’s apartment door.

The man is less than willing to open it up for him.

Jack tells him to go away, obviously not much of a people person. But Sean persists, finally calling out that he needs help and that Jack was the only one who’d be able to do such a thing.

Recognizing this desperate plea, Jack reluctantly opens up the door, asking what Sean wanted. To Sean’s surprise, the man is very young, probably only five years older than himself. When Sean admits he needs someone to teach him how to be a hero, Jack tells him that he’s closed for business and would never reopen.

That’s when Sean begs him for help, claiming to be the son of Zeus. He explains that he never fit in on Earth and needs Jack’s help to make it to Olympus. Jack has the same reaction Sean had to the news. He laughs, not believing it. Not until he hears lightning crackle outside.

With no other choice than to believe him, Jack tells Sean that he’s not the first kid that had come knocking on his door. Jack explains, while painting a picture of a girl that lives in the apartment across from him that he’s fallen madly in love with despite never having spoken to her, that his father assigned him with the task of training new heroes and keeping them safe on their quests and adventures, something Jack loathed greatly as he wished to have his own life and go on adventures. However, after one hero in training had been reckless and stupid, a demigod, son of Ares, he’d died, making his father angry.

Jack had been cursed after that day. He can’t die. He can’t age. Most people would consider immortality a blessing, but Jack explains that it’s not a blessing when he’s been trapped in New York City, unable to leave as there were invisible barriers specially catered to keep him inside. He’d always dreamed of running away and seeing the world, and it was as though that dream was being dangled right in front of him, just out of his reach. He’d been stuck in an endless cycle of nothingness for years and he didn’t want it to get worse. But Sean makes Jack a deal. If he were to train him, he’d ask his father to lift Jack’s curse and allow him to continue aging and growing like normal while also being able to see the world.

So Jack agrees, still skeptical, but slightly hopeful. He tells Sean that they would begin the next night in the woods where Sean had met Zeus and he better not screw this up for either of them.

To Jack’s surprise, Sean is a much better hero than he’d originally thought. He admires the boy’s strength and endurance and constantly tries to push Sean to his limits to see how much he can take. He never found a breaking point. He teaches Sean how to use a sword as well as a gun, he trains him mentally and physically for every situation he can. He explains that his own strong suit is knife throwing and archery. Sean begins to look up to Jack and treat him more as a friend than anything else. He likes Jack. Jack is the first person who didn’t go running the second he’d walked into a room.

So after weeks of training and testing, Jack tells Sean it’s time for the real deal. They’re gonna go see what Sean can do in the real world to help real people. Sean asks how they’re gonna do that and Jack replies with “Have you eva’ walked around New York?”

They begin to explore, trying to find any kind of trouble they can until they stumble onto an alley where a young man, about Sean’s age, is struggling to get away from an older guy who’s literally pinning the kid to the wall. Jack tries to help Sean come up with some kind of plan before Sean just runs off, leading Jack to resign himself to the fact that he’s doomed and his curse will never be lifted.

Sean goes in and demands the man get off only to find that when the man turns around, he’s got three eyes and a snake's tongue. Sean pulls out a knife only for the kid to tell him that he can handle himself, calling Sean “Wonder Boy” before the monster in front of him throws him to the ground and punches Sean in the stomach, sending him flying back into a wall. Jack can only watch from afar, not allowed to help any hero in his battle.

The monster turns back to the boy who tries to scramble away. It is clear to Sean that the monster is trying to take advantage of the kid sexually. So he steps back up, plunging his knife into the monster’s back before picking him up and throwing him into the opposite wall. He then scoops the boy up into his arms and rushes him over to Jack.

Jack immediately tries to check the kid over to make sure he’s okay, but the boy just seems mildly annoyed, making sarcastic comments about how The Incredible Hulk over there just saved a damsel in distress while he watches Sean fight the monster with the hell of Pegasus who helps him kill the thing.

Realizing that this other boy was genuinely concerned for him, the blond kid softens just a little as Sean walks back over to him. He introduces himself as Antonio, or Race as his friends call him. At least they would, if he had any. He calls Sean a variety of flirtatious names as he thanks him, including “Spot” because of Sean’s freckles. Spot introduces himself as Sean Conlon, or Hercules as he’d been named by his godly father. He offers Race a ride to anywhere he wants to go on Pegasus, but Race refuses, admitting that he’s terrified of heights and is a big boy that can take care of himself, but still thanks Spot for coming to his rescue.

Sean falls a little bit for him much too quickly and much too easily before Race gives him a wink and a wave and walks off, seemingly fine.

Jack then tells Sean how stupid he is before leading him off further into the night and forcing Sean to listen to him even though the boy’s mind clearly kept drifting off to the mysterious stranger he’d just met.

Meanwhile, Race is off to the woods where he is met by two young men he refers to as Morris and Oscar and Hades himself, who is wearing a grey suit and a blood red tie. Morris and Oscar force Race to bow to the god after the boy initially doesn’t. Race fights all the way until Hades snaps his fingers and forces him to submit, having full control of the boy’s body anytime he wants it.

The king of the underworld asks Race why he doesn’t have the monster that he had requested an audience with by his side and Race explains that the monster made him an offer he had to refuse. Hades takes the boy by the chin. He loves to manhandle Race whenever he can, reveling in the fact that the kid would fight back against his hold only to have nowhere else to go. He tells Race that instead of removing two years from his sentence, he’ll be adding two on. In attempts to save himself, the kid blames the stranger who’d saved him, calling him Hercules.

Morris and Oscar, the shapeshifters originally responsible for the murder of Hercules, pale at this as their master burns with rage. Hades demands to know what happened after his servants lied to him only to turn to Race and tell him that he still had use for him. Race rolls his eyes, still defiant after nearly three years. Still, he has no choice but to do as he’s told.

A couple of days after rescuing Race from the ally, Spot and Jack are once again exploring the city, trying to find more trial runs for Sean, who Jack has taken to calling “Spot” to tease him. Spot’s doing rather well, especially considering he hadn’t died yet. So Jack is ready to start getting him attention before they hear a commotion in front of them.

Race rushes towards them, near in hysterics. He is relieved at the sight of Spot and begins begging him for help, stating that two little kids got trapped under a collapsed overpass. Without even waiting for Jack’s help, he whistles for Pegasus who reveals himself to the world in broad daylight and Race hesitates, still terrified of heights, but Spot grabs him and puts him on the back of the flying horse, asking him where to go. Race clings to him as he screams out street names.

Jack is understandably annoyed at being left behind and is forced to run in order to meet them at their destination.

Meanwhile, Spot lands Pegasus and Race crumbles to the ground, nearly vomiting as his entire body is trembling from being up so high.

Spot manages to get two small children to safety and does not stop them as they run off, unbeknownst to him, right to Hades.

Race crawls over to a nearby wall to support himself as he catches his breath and silently prays for Spot to get out of there while he still can.

A crowd gathers nearby, applauding Spot as they’ve just witnessed his heroism. Jack runs up to find Spot unsure of what to do. Before Jack can help him a hiss falls over the crowd. He pales before trying to scream at Spot to get out of the way, but the minute he reaches for Spot’s sword, his hand is burned. He’s not allowed to help.

So Spot grabs his own sword, turning around to find a monster rising from the fallen overpass. Jack recognizes it as a Hydra. Spot just starts swinging at it. After cutting off one head, he believes the fight to be over only for the thing to grow back with two other heads at its sides.

Race can do nothing but watch as Spot is nearly beaten and eaten alive by this monster he’d lured him to. He is horrified at himself, finding that he actually likes Spot. The guy is sweet and loyal, but Race knows he can’t fall for him. He knows he can’t.

Spot continues cutting the Hydra’s heads, even as Jack yells at him to stop.

Hades is watching from afar with a grin on his face. He is ready for the Hydra to kill the only thing standing between him and his eternal rule, but Spot manages to burn the monster alive, effectively killing it.

Race is relieved at that and barely manages to hide a smile as he saunters back up to Hades who is furious at the turn of events.

After this, Spot is made famous throughout the world, having been on camera whilst fighting the Hydra. He is asked for interviews, he’s given money, he’s made a hero in the eyes of the public.

This goes on for months.

Spot revels in the light of being the main attraction after being an outcast for so long. Jack is annoyed with him, but sticks by his side as his own life depends on it. Eventually, Jack just starts to roll along with it all as it becomes more and more stressful for Spot to keep up with his own fame as he continues his training and continues fighting monsters. It becomes abundantly clear to Jack how protective he’s becoming over the younger boy and he doesn’t like it, so he gets harder on Spot and pushes him further, only tiring Spot out faster.

Race watches every minute of it, finding himself enthralled by the man who’d saved him all those nights ago.

Hades, however, is not happy in the least. His two servants have given up and his slave is falling for the boy who would be his undoing. Race teases him smugly, telling him that he might as well accept defeat. This just makes the god even more angry. So Hades orders Race to find him a weakness. Race laughs at him.

So Hades reminds him why he’s there in the first place. He retells the boy the story of a child, a merely fourteen years old runaway who’d fallen in love with another, three years older than him. When the elder boy had tried to prove himself to the gods, he’d gotten fatally wounded and Hades had come to collect him. Unable to cope with the loss of his love, the child who knew nothing about the gods or love, for that matter, begged and pleaded for the god of death to take him instead. The god accepted, letting the not-so-heroic-hero live in exchange for the other boy’s soul for the next hundred years. Finding out what the young child had done, the resurrected hero ran off, finding another to worship the ground he walked on while the boy who’d given everything to save him rotten in possession of Hades, the cruelest god there was.

Race insists that he remembers and that he’d learned his lesson and would not be making the same mistake twice. So Hades hands Race a cellphone with a picture of Spot on it and explains to him as though he were a child that all he needed was to know what Spot’s weakness was. Race does not respond. So Hades leans in close to his ear and promises Race the one thing he craved above all else in exchange for this simple task.

His freedom.

Race drops the phone at the words, having never expected to hear them outloud. So he does as he’s told.

Back with Spot and Jack, Jack is trying to work out Spot’s schedule while Spot wallows alone in his mansion after speaking to his father in the forest again. His father tells him that he has not yet proved himself worthy and must still remain on earth.

Breaking into the giant house, Race finds Spot who is relieved to see him after so long. He asks Spot if he wants to get out of here. Spot is hesitant, because he’s supposed to meet with Jack for training, but Race convinces him to take a night off and run away with him.

And Spot can’t say no.

Exploring the city, Race flirts with Spot and Spot is the perfect gentleman, only making life so much harder for Race who wishes that this boy could’ve just been a jerk who deserved all of this. Spot buys him flowers and makes him laugh and makes him feel free for the first time in years.

While they’re walking, Race accidentally trips, falling right into Spot’s arms. Spot carries him to a bench to inspect Race’s ankle even though the other boy insists that he’s fine. He explains that he has weak ankles and flirtatiously inquires if Spot has any to which Spot replies he doesn’t think he does and he scoops Racer up again, putting him back on his feet to make sure Race is okay. They dance beneath the stars for a long moment before Jack flies overhead on Pegasus and jumps down in between them.

He screams at Spot and tells him he’ll be training like hell for the next week and he warns Race to stay away, feeling bad about it later as there’s something in Race’s eyes that tells him this was not the whole story.

Spot gives Race a kiss goodnight and leaves and Jack goes to follow him before feeling too guilty and turning back to apologize. And he accidentally hears a conversation he was not meant to hear.

When Race is alone, he has a sinking feeling in his chest and feels as though he’s floating on air all at once. He knows he has fallen for this new hero and he stares at the flowers Spot gave him before he is forced to stand by the air around him and he looks up to find his master waiting in front of him.

Race tells the god that he quits, that he won’t keep doing this. Hades only laughs and cruelly reminds the boy that he owns his mind, soul and body and Race has no choice in the matter. The boy tried to explain that Spot doesn’t have any weaknesses. He says it proudly, blushing as he twirls the flowers around in his hand.

That’s when it hits Hades. He smugly tells Race that he is sorely mistaken and snaps his finger, vanishing right along with the boy.

Having only heard a small piece of the conversation, Jack rushes to warn Spot who calls him a liar and a jealous, ungrateful loser who will never be able to talk to the girl that he’s in love with. Hurt by this, Jack leaves, knowing he’s not wanted or needed anymore. It shouldn’t matter to him what happened next.

Spot goes outside to train, trying to blow off some steam, knowing he needs to apologize to Jack but not fully knowing how to.

There’s a man waiting outside. One that Spot recognizes.

The man’s name is William Snyder, a business man who’d been around town for the past couple of months. Spot had no idea that Snyder was a god, just like him. Hades, to be clear.

Hades begins talking to Spot about his heroism and strength and says he wants to offer him a deal. Spot initially refuses, trying to walk away only for Hades to reveal that he has leverage. With a snap of his fingers, a stunned and scared looking Race appears right in front of him. Race tries to run to him, trying to tell him not to listen to this man, but Hades waves his hand and Race goes silent, chains wrapping around his body and mouth immediately, rendering him helpless.

Hades then snaps Race to him and manhandles him, trying to enrage Spot even more. He tells Spot that if he doesn’t want to hear the deal, he’ll just take Race and keep him like that forever, claiming he likes Race in chains better than anything else. So Spot agrees to hear Hades out, all the while asking him to let Race go.

Hades grins and tells Spot to consider giving up his strength for a day, the next day, in order to save Race. Spot asks if people are going to get hurt in which Snyder simply smiles. So Spot asks that Race be left out of it. Hades gives his word that no harm will come to Race should Spot accept.

So Spot accepts, shaking the gods hand to finalize it and falling to his knees as his strength is drained from him.

For a moment, Race is left in chains as Hades has his fun knocking around the mighty Hercules. But Spot croaks out that he has to let the boy go, to which the god laughs. He complies, saying to Race that a deal was a deal and that he was now free of his sentence before he draws Race to him and gloats to Spot about what a wonderful little actor the boy was.

Race struggles against him, trying to get away and explain, but Spot just walks away, heartbroken.

Though his strength is gone, Spot still feels obligated to fight against whatever attack was headed for them. He goes on his own to the center of the city where the titans have begun to roam free after Hades released them. Though the crowd cheers at his arrival it is quickly made apparent that he is no match for these monsters and he will not win this fight.

After trying and failing to stop Spot from fighting, Race rushes off to find Pegasus. His legs are already shaking in fear just looking at the thing that had been bound by Hades before. He releases it and Pegasus senses that something is wrong, so he allows Race to climb onto his back. Race screams when they take to the air.

Finding Jack wandering around, oblivious to the takeover happening behind him, Race begs him for help. Jack initially refuses, revealing to the boy that he knew who Race worked for. Race quickly explains the situation to Jack and Jack takes the reins, flying out to find a passed out Spot in the middle of the chaos. He ignores the burning of his arms and scoops Spot up, flying him to safety so Race can plead with him to wake up.

When Spot does eventually wake up, he scrambles away from Race only for Jack to tell him that this wasn’t Race's fault and he still needed to fight. They couldn’t let Hades win. So Spot goes out to fight again only to get knocked down in front of a car speeding to get away. Race panics and rushes to push him out of the way, taking the hit instead nearly getting stomped on by the titan Before Spot screams and rushes to his rescue, catching the Titan’s foot before it can kill Race.

Jack rushes in to get Race out of the danger and Race lets him, curling into him in pain.

Not understanding what happened, Spot rushes to the boy he quite possibly loves who explains to him that Hades promised he wouldn’t get hurt and he had. The deal had been broken.

Hesitant to leave Race, Spot looks to Jack for help. Jack promises to stay with Race while Spot rushes off and fights.

That’s when Race starts crying. It’s the first time he shows weakness in front of Jack and Jack can’t help but cry along with him, trying to promise him that everything’s gonna be okay even though they both know it won’t. As he starts coughing up blood, Race begs Jack not to let him die alone and Jack holds his hand and pets his hair back, promising him that he’d be right there the whole time.

Race is scared when he dies. His cries about not being able to breathe and can’t move without being in pain. It’s the most heartbreaking thing Jack had ever witnessed. When Race takes his last breath, Jack presses a kiss to his forehead and closes the boy's eyes for him, hugging him to his chest and telling him how sorry he was.

Flying up to Olympus with Pegasus, Spot frees the gods who are being held captive by the Titans and helps them trap the monsters once again before flying after Hades who tries to get away. It’s only when Spot remembers Race that he stops, rushing back down to earth where he finds Jack crying over Race’s body.

So Spot does what he has to do, even as Jack begs him to come back. He flies down to the underworld (how he knows where to go? I don’t know… but he does. Maybe he walked a long way, around the back. That ain’t easy walkin’, Jack. It ain’t for the sensitive of souls— oh wait…) and demands that Hades tell him where Race’s soul is.

Still smug and arrogant as ever, Hades reveals Race’s soul in the River Styx and tells Spot that he is more than willing to let Spot dive down for him. It’s only after Spot does so that Hades calls after him any mortal to enter the river will die.

Spot swims down for Race’s lifeless soul. It breaks his heart to see the boy so lifeless. As he reaches for him, a power surges through his body, making it easier to move and breathe. He pulls Race to him and holds him in his arms, stepping out of that river as a god with the love of his life in his arms. When Hades goes to stop him, Spot punches him down and walks out with Race’s souls, climbing onto Pegasus again and flying back to New York, where Jack still sat with an unmoving Race on the sidewalk. Everyone else was so busy with their own concerns, no one paid them a second glance.

Returning his soul to his body, Spot waits patiently and Jack watches with so much hope in his eyes it hurts. But then there’s a glorious sound of someone taking in a gulp of air.

Race opens his eyes.

He launches himself at Spot who holds him tightly in response and Jack laughs in relief at the sight, letting Race hug him too before Spot confesses he has to go. Race refuses to let him go so Spot takes him along, flying back up to Olympus where he is greeted as a god and Race is left standing awkwardly all alone at the gates, proud of the other boy, but sad that he may never see him again.

But Spot kneels before his father, asking to be blessed with mortality so that he can live his life with Race and Jack. He asks that his father lift Jack’s curse and allow them to live in peace because he finally found where he belonged.

Zeus, although a bit sad, agrees, and sends Spot and Race back to Earth where they meet Jack and take him to the border of New York to show him he is no longer cursed.

Race and Spot and Jack are friends for the rest of their lives. Spot reconnects with his adoptive parents. Race and Spot get married. Jack finally meets the girl he’d fallen for and marries her.

And they all live happily ever after.

Thanks for reading!

For more Mood Boards and AUs, click here!

[jamiedc-they-them]

SIBLING DUTY (PART IV) PLATONIC

Requested Imagine: “Absolutely LOVED reading Sibling Duty part 3! 🙂 Would you mind writing part 4 set in season 5 where Reader and the team find out that Deke gave Daisy to Kasius and Reader attacks Deke in a fit of rage and Deke is confused by her reaction?”

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The lights had only gone out for a moment for you. That was all it was, a moment; three seconds at most. However, when the lights came back on, you were alone. Or, you thought you were, until you met the confused gaze of Fitz.

“Fitz?” You asked, silently communicating your confusion.

“Y/N?” He did the same.

You both, however, didn’t have long to think about it, as army soldiers stormed the place, aiming their guns at you. You both rose your hands, both in instinct and as you knew that there would be no way out of us.

However, as they pulled you away, you only thought one thing: Where the hell was Daisy? Why had she left you behind after going all this way to find you in the framework?

You were sat on a chair, getting looked down upon by two army soldiers; to be honest, you were shocked that Talbot wasn’t there….Oh wait, a Daisy LMD had shot him.

“Where are they?” The female asked you for what seemed to be the hundredth time, you groaned loudly as you through your head back with said groan.

“For the last time, I. Don’t. Fucking. Know.” You said with more and more frustration. They held fear in their eyes for a moment, it was then you realised that your power was taking control of you.

Oh, no; whether it be in the Framework, or here, it seemed you never did fully figure out control over it.

An older woman entered the room, given the look she gave you, it seemed she had experience with Inhumans, “Give us the room, go check on the other prisoner.” She ordered them. The word, “Prisoner.” Struck something in you.

“Wait, “prisoner”? What have you done with him?!” Fitz! Fitz!” You yelled out as they left to go after your friend. You got up, the woman even let you get the door as it closed and then locked, “FUCK!” you cursed as you looked back at her with hurt and teary eyes; she just waited for your move. Finally, you went back to the chair.

“Very good; now, let’s try this again, shall we?” She didn’t wait for an answer as he opened your file, “Y/N Johnson, Daisy Johnson’s sister. The ever famous, Quake. Shame the media never gave you a name, seemed you didn’t do enough for that.” You knew she was trying to goad a reaction from you, you weren’t going to let this bitch have this over you.

“They left you behind, that’s the main theory. The other is being explored by your friend. I mean this when I say this, that I hope we find them.”

“It doesn’t matter if you did, I’m already a monster. I mean, my ability is darkness, kind of on the nose.” You said, bluntly. The woman looked at you with what looked like pity.

“I have a family member that is kind of like you.” She admitted to you; you looked to her as continued, “She thinks she is too. I can’t speak for you, but I know I’d never give up on her, I’d help her. Because I know she isn’t.” She told you. You weren’t sure as to why. But you didn’t answer back.

As you then sat in your cell, you debated a question. That one, single, question; had Daisy given up on you because you were dangerous?

Maybe, was the frightening answer you always landed on every time like an unlucky flip that happened to land on its side every time. No, you weren’t liking that outcome at all. Sadly, though, it was all your brain could think of as you sat alone in your cell.

They were god knows where, as was Fitz, and all you had were your thoughts to keep you company. When you were alone before, you normally had company either next door or next to you (namely Daisy as you would’ve probably just saw a film or a show together).

Now, you had no idea if there even was a person next to you. As far as you were concerned, you were alone, and no one was coming to get you.

You had started making carvings in the wall, marking another day. After a while, it had started to fill up different walls. You had lost track, just another day with nothing but four walls and a boat load of self-hatred and doubt in a bond that may have never existed in the first place. Maybe it was just a grand thing you had managed to fool yourself of; you were good at selling yourself fantasies after all.

It’s what had made you hurt your bond with Daisy that she then tried to save in the Framework, maybe she’d found out that you had that fantasy and now she was breaking it and stamping on it under her feet.

You laughed as your mind joked that she was Quaking it apart.

That was, until you were dragged out of your cell on god knows what day. You were pulled into the room you had been in before. It was the first room you had been in that wasn’t your cell.

However, you weren’t alone in that room. Fitz was there too.

“Y/N?” He asked, taking in your appearance, the longer hair and much, much, less fight in your eyes. If anything, it scared him to see you look so defeated; so drained.

A few moments of silence passed you both as you weren’t sure whether or not this was a dream. When Lance Hunter, an old friend of you both, walked in; it didn’t help things.

He too looked a little taken aback by your looks, but still went ahead with his plan. That plan sent you both to the floor with ringing in your ears. Then outside and into sunlight for the first time; you had almost forgotten what that was like.

As you watched the best flyer that Hunter’s money could buy crash, you couldn’t help but laugh at it all. Now it all really felt like it wasn’t real.

Fitz’s steadying touch to pull along felt real, as did Hunter’s concerned hand on your shoulder as he spoke something to you. But you were just out of it.

“What’s wrong with her?” Hunter asked his friend, looking to him as he asked.

“I don’t know, I don’t think they let her out.” Fitz theorised as you looked around as if you were in a simulation. Although, that thought made him shiver; maybe part of you still thought you were in the Framework, seeing as how wrong things had gone right after they had gotten you back.

 Now, you were in an RV, as Fitz looked for any sign of your family. As he did, himself and Hunter looked at your now sleeping form, the way it shivered and as you muttered inaudible things.

“So, you both were in a simulation, and Daisy and Jemma brought you out?” Hunter asked, wanting to make sure he got this right.

Fitz nodded, “That’s pretty much it.” Fitz said, even if it just made him hate himself more.

“Right, so we need to find where they are and fast.” Hunter said, speaking aloud the thoughts swirling around in Fitz’s mind.

“We do.” The Scotsman agreed.

They had found a way to find everyone, albeit a little sci-fi ish. It involved you and Fitz traveling to the future and finding them and then bringing them back to this spot. You had somewhat found yourself again, less spacey and more unnerved rather than anything. Oh, and one more thing.

As much as it pained the two, you were sure that your dynamic with Daisy was pretty much shattered at this point….again.

He hated to say it, but you were pretty much the platonic (as if it needed to be said) version of what Fitzsimmons had going for them; that they were cursed. Or, so it seemed to be that way, anyway.

So, you looked at the pod you would be traveling in, a small space; but Enoch had promised you that you would be asleep the whole time and it would be like a click of your fingers and you would be there.

“Hey,” You turned to Fitz as he walked over to you after you spoke, “We’re going to find them.” You said, trying to sound optimistic, “You can be with Jemma again.”

“And you can reunite with Daisy.” Your friend told you.

“Yeah, we’ll see how that goes. But I’ll see you on the other side, right?” You asked him; he nodded instantly.

“See you there.” He said.

The next moment, you fell asleep and into the void once again.

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When Daisy had first landed, the first thing she did was look around for you. However, panic soon started to spread as she realised that she couldn’t find you, as you were not there.

She was away from you; she had lost you again just after getting you back.

She started to feel her breath pick up, her heart start to beat faster and faster as she fell back onto the floor. Jemma was by her side the next moment, “Daisy, Daisy, I need you to breath.” Her friend tried to get her to follow, but Daisy was too trapped in the thoughts of what had happened to you.

Jemma then grabbed her best friend’s face, “Daisy, Y/N will be ok. Both her and Fitz are together. If anyone can figure out how to find us, it’s them, alright?” Jemma said, trying hard to believe the words herself.

Daisy let herself nod as her breathing somewhat calmed down.

 In short, the place was like a slave trader’s yet dream, only in the future. Granted, it was filed with more a diverse crowd, sire; but a slave trader was a slave trader either way.

“That is Lady Karaba. She is a demented brute. Her affection a curse to anyone who receives it.” Enoch, the Chronicom who had brought you here, informed you. Another person walked into the room, this time a man who fit the slave trader name to a T, wearing a gold outfit and a smug smile, “And there is Senator Gaius Ponarian….I am repulsed by the sight. Even the man’s closest friends find his temperament to be that of a diseased child monster.” He admitted to you.

“So Kasius has assembled the worst of the worst.” Fitz summed up as you continued on your path through the area, trying to blend in as if one of the locals. TO you, it felt disgusting to have to try and act like such an abhorrent creature.

Then again, with your power, you already were in a way. As your brain “kindly” reminded you as yourself and Fitz continued on your path.

Now, as far as your knew, Enoch wasn’t a Clairvoyant; but, either way, his next words seemed to be spoken as if he knew what your thoughts were telling you, “Do not fear. You are far more reprehensible than any other creature in this room.” He told you, unhelpfully.

“Thanks for that, Enoch.” Turned out Enoch was alright at emotions with his response to Fitz’s sarcastic statement.

“You’re quite welcome.” He said with a sly smile, although maybe that was just you, as it seemed to be a genuine smile and a genuine response, “It was a rather fun pursuit, constructing your alias. No longer are you Leopold Fitz, but instead, Boshtok, a vile space Marauder of unlimited wealth. And you are no longer Y/N Johnson, but Quassatas, his trusty friend and equal in vileness partner.” Enoch told you both, giving you the roles, you now had to play if you wanted to survive.

So, you started to mingle in with the crowd, as much as you hated it; you had to do it to survive here. Fitz, however, kept putting his gaze to Jemma; you nudged him, “Go on, we’ll be fine here.” You assured him, pushing him up to the spot.

“I apologise that we haven’t found Daisy Johnson, yet.” Enoch said to you as you were the only two left standing around. For you, it was just autopilot; the fake smile and pleasantries you gave the other traders as you passed them.

You shrugged, “We’ll find her and the others and get out. Simple as, really.” You said, drinking from the glass you took from the servant.

“You sound as if you don’t want to find her.” He pointed out.

You glared at him, “Of course I want to find her, she’s my sister; these people are our family….It’s just, we went through a rough patch and never really figured it out.” You confessed, finishing the drink.

“Ah, siblings feuds. A tale as old as time.” Enoch said in a somewhat nostalgic tone.

“Not exactly a feud, more as in a fuckup on both sides. Why, you got experience with it?” You asked him.

“Not so much experience, more I’ve seen them on my time here.” You nodded at his answer.

 Fitz had had his talk with Jemma, and had told you that she was being kept in the role she was in as a maid to keep Daisy “motivated”, as you both knew nothing motivated her more than any member of her family being in danger; but especially not a sister like Jemma.

Now you were sat at dinner, trying to avoid the gaze of someone who you used to be the closest with, but now (to you) felt like a cold and distant relationship. You knew she had been taken, but still you knew that your bond had been hurt by a lot of things.

You could feel her gaze on you as she gulped, seeing you here and knowing that you were still in pain, “Someone you know?” Ben asked, despite being able to read her mind and already knowing the answer.

“She’s my sister….It’s complicated.” She settled on, knowing that he probably had the answers he was looking for anyway. Although, she then remembered that he too had an inhibitor on him.

“Sibling stuff is always complicated.” He empathised, “What happened?” He asked.

“We’re both powered, and we did some stupid stuff that accidentally hurt each other rather than helped; I then saved her from….a place, but we haven’t really had time to talk.” Ben nodded.

“But you still love her?”

“Of course, I do, she’s family. Maybe we’ll get to talk soon….Or, I hope we do.” Daisy admitted, showing a moment of vulnerability.

“If it means anything, I hope you do too.” She nodded, not talking, but the nod showed her appreciation for the words.

Still, she watched as you and Fitz staked your claim at the table, playing by your new roles as people who had crossed the line years ago and showed no sign of stopping; for Fitz, it was insulting the food; for you, it was the guests and taunting them.

As Fitz continued to talk about how the leader, Kasius, controlled the humans, you took over for him, “Best way to stop a monster from turning on you? Turn it on another monster or turn it on itself. That way it never points it’s beastly gaze at you,” You pointed to Kasius with a knife as you cut into the snail that was brought to you moments before, “Better to drive away the other monsters with your best one than accept it with the more….civilised of people.”

Daisy knew you and Fitz were both putting on an act; the two of you were being different people to get them back. She knew that, but still, what you both said and how you said it unsettled her a little. Did she had that it had? Of course, she loved you both immensely; still, it had to be said.

As she was hauled off to the arena, she tried once again to meet your gaze; for a moment, she was successful, but it was only a quick moment.

Still, it was nice to know that you were here; in danger, but when weren’t either of you in trouble in some way? At least here, you could finally reunite properly. She knew you had still yet to have a proper talk. Sure, she got you out and you both were elated to see the other; but this was different. Now, she was gone, and you were the one finding her. Only thing was, she could clearly tell that things were different with you; your power was ruling you more on an emotional level. You seemed more cynical and jaded. You had both seen the effects that going overboard for someone had.

Now, she could tell, you feared yourself around them, so you made the power go internal; just like she did with her own gift. Now, it seemed to be your turn for that.

 She was in the arena, fighting Kasius’ right hand woman, Sinara. She was doing an alright job, but Sinara was just about winning. However, you watched with slight fear. As much as you feared yourself and Daisy’s reaction to you, she was still your sister.

So, you watched as she fought, how she relied on her quips and skills that both yourself and May had taught her. You watched as she mixed in her powers with them to gain the upper hand.

You then watched as she lifted herself up with her ability, only to then be sent right back down with the click of a button via Kasius.

However, it was also in that moment where you acted; with Simmons stabbing the man, Fitz shooting a guard and lowering the shield, and you tackling a guard out of the window and onto the hard floor.

Seems you and your sister had that shit luck o not landing on something soft; plus, a reckless streak that you would probably never break.

Still, you landed on the floor, with your opponent landing next to you. You both writhed around on the floor in pain, before you felt your power grow as you were in the darker part of the room. You stood up, sending him flying backwards and skidding on the floor. He did, however, throw an object that you swore miss as you felt nothing from it.

The next moment, he was unconscious with a shot from Fitz’s ICER. You then looked down, finding the blade in your side; you put a hand to it, before pulling the blade out. As if being hunted wouldn’t be bad enough.

You knew that you couldn’t stop the mission because of you, however. You knew that your sister wouldn’t want that, especially in her condition.

Speaking of your sister, you then went over to her as your friends helped her up. Fitz seemed to communicate to Jemma that he could shoulder Daisy for a moment; that moment was then filled with Jemma hugging you.

You returned the hug, genuinely happy to have your friends (or two of them anyway) safe. Still though, as Jemma and Fitz led Daisy out, you trailed behind; telling yourself it was to keep an eye out behind them (part of it was) and not just so you didn’t have to see the fear in Daisy’s eyes at how much the struggle of keeping control of your powers were.

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They led and you followed, having not said a word since you left the arena. You knew that you were being hunted, which was just swell; seemed the only moment you got of peace that lasted was that cell as morbid as it was true.

Still, they led you into a room that you weren’t sure if it was a guard’s room or not. To be honest, you didn’t really care. It was a place to rest for a moment and catch your breath. For yourself as well to rest a little and try and fix your wound on your own.

As you turned from them, you saw a cloth on the table. While probably not the cleanest thing in the world, it would have to do. So, you picked it up and placed it over your wound; despite knowing that it wouldn’t be long until you would end up losing too much blood.

“You’re here, you both are here.” Jemma said to you both in glee; even though you knew she was more talking about her boyfriend than you. You just gave her a smile as you saw her eyes flicker back to Fitz.

You watched as Fitz approached your sister and knelt next to her. It was strange, in a way, with how he used to have a small crush that went away like nothing; now replaced with nothing but familial love for her. His love for Jemma, however, had an almost opposite course; going from friendship to Romantic.

You weren’t really sure as to why your mind took you down that trail of thought; maybe just to distract you from the pain you still felt from your wound and to distract you from Daisy’s gaze. However, you did hear how Fitz pulled her attention back to him as he seemed to know that ever since the prison, you didn’t want to have that conversation with Daisy.

He knew what it was like to still feel guilt from the Framework, go knew he did. He hated himself and he was sure you disliked yourself more than you did. Although, at least then, you had Daisy and the others to rally around. Now, you were trying to not have that.

He saw that when Jemma approached you to ask about you, when you gave her a smile and flinched from her touch. That only rose her concern.

“Y/N….what happened to you?” She was about to press for more information before she cried out in pain and clutched at her ear.

As she did so, you saw a guard about to enter the room. So, you did what you had to do. You had to defend your family, knowing that it would most likely put even more of a strain on their trust of you.

You launched yourself at the guard, knocking him to the floor. You went for his weapon, but a hand grabbed your foot and stopped you. You kicked him in the face and went for the weapon once again. You heard Simmons’ cries as you struggled against the Kree, the rifle that he was pressing down on your neck.

Your eyes went fully dark, and the man flew off of you as a shockwave was sent out; the place rattled at it. The lights even flickered for a moment.

As they pulled out the device in Jemma’s ear that had deafened her, they felt the room shake and saw the lights flicker. As Jemma recovered, Fitz and Daisy shared a look. They knew it wasn’t Daisy as she still had the inhibitor, so there was only one person left.

“Y/N.” Daisy breathed out as she ran out of the room, leaving Fitz to stay with Jemma and help her recover.

 As Daisy ran out, she saw you leaning against the wall and catching your breath. However, she did catch you wiping at your nose, “Hey, hey, hey.” She said, approaching you, reaching a handout to help you stabilize yourself.

“Don’t touch me.” You all but sneered at her; she had to admit, she was taken aback by it.

“What’s wrong?” She asked right after; while not the best question, it was the only one she could think of, “Are you –”

“Just go get Simmons.” You said, moving on to go find your ship. Daisy watched you go with both worry and sadness. She gulped back tears but complied with your order.

 As the other three followed you to find the ship to escape, that soon died out when you all saw the ship explode outside of the window. As it went, you shook for a moment, before you noticed that no one else had shaken at the ship exploding. Luckily for yourself, you were in the back of the four, so no one had seen you lose your footing for a moment and have a ringing sound in your ear that came for a bit before it died down once again.

You continued to follow them, until you came to an elevator. This elevator was meant to get you up to a floor to find your friends. As it started to move, Fitz checked up on Jemma, while Daisy checked on you. Fitz’s’ was done via asking her and physical contact; Daisy’s was done by a look that communicated to you the question of how you were.

She hadn’t seen you stumble, but she had seen that you had become paler since your last appearance. She wasn’t a doctor, not even close, but she knew that you weren’t ok. You weren’t even close to being ok.

Sure, she had brought you back from the Framework, but she could tell the damage that you had suffered before she had met you in there was still holding onto you. She didn’t know what it was, but she wanted to know.

Of course, you had to be alive for that to happen.

The elevator stalled; you were on the floor as of the next moment. Now the ringing was reaching an almost fever pitch.

As Daisy tried the pass on the elevator again, everyone was drawn to you via a vomiting sound. They saw you vomiting on the floor, but it wasn’t just vomit; it was a small bit of blood mixed with some of the energy of your power.

“Y/N.” Fitz said, walking over to you and rubbing your back; he lowered his voice, “Y/N, are you sure you’re ok?” He asked once more.

You met the concerned eyes of your friend, “Yeah, yeah. We’re all good.” You assured him, but now even you weren’t fully believing it.

As Daisy called him over, she kept her eyes on you for a moment longer before asking him for a boost to get to the vent that led to the roof. As she reached the top, she then reached down for Simmons.

Then it was just the two of you left, “Fitz.” You called after your friend; he turned to you, “I need you to do something in case I lose control,” He didn’t like where this was going, “Just, shut up and listen,” He nodded at your demand, “If I lose control, Daisy won’t be able to do it. But I need you to put me down.”

“Just like that?” He eve clicked his fingers at how quickly you were asking him to just kill one of his best friends.

You nodded, “Like a rabid dog.” You confirmed for him. Your breath shook as you justified (or rather, tried to justify) your want of him, “Daisy won’t be able to do it. She’s my sister, I love her. But….I can’t hurt her, not any more than I already have. Or….more than we already have hurt each other,” You sighed, knowing that he’d want to know what you mean by that, “We ended things rough in the framework. When she entered it….it was like an entirely different Daisy interacting with an entirely different me.” Fitz nodded, knowing that he could empathise with that; the struggle between your life in the Framework vs in the real world.

He remembered how dark you were in the Framework.

“Ok.” You could tell he still wasn’t fully on board; but it was a step in the direction you seemed to want. Even if he really, really, didn’t want it to come to that.

 You then ended up in a room with pipes. As Daisy inspected it, she found it to be warm. You were forced to put your hand on it to stabilize yourself. However, it was then that your shirt was stained red.

Daisy put your arm around your shoulder without stopping. You could tell, even as she spoke to Jemma about it being a spa, that she was still worried about you; as her voice shook. Still, she was trying to mask it and stay positive.

“Try the door.” She told you as you both pushed against it, only to no avail. She readjusted her grip on your arm and waist, trying to keep you upright. Trying to keep you conscious.

She then guided you over to where Fitz was; the man was currently staring at a thing he feared, Gravitonium.

“That’s not good.” You said, having to blink to keep yourself from falling asleep. However, you were then awaken by bullets slamming into the wall. One even hitting Fitz.

It was a Kree, and he had a weapon. Fitz was behind cover and bleeding; at least you weren’t the only one now.

Daisy pushed you both down onto the floor as she moved into fight the Kree. You, however, had other plans. As Fitzsimmons started to leave, you threw your hand up as Daisy was pushed back, the bullets hitting the void you had channelled in front of your sister to stop her from being killed.

However, he then turned to you, “NO!” Daisy screamed as he fired a single bullet at you, sending you to the ground.

As your shield dropped, Daisy finished him off with a punch, then ran over to you.

“Y/N? Y/N?! Hey, HEY! I need you to open your eyes! Can you do that for me?” She asked, tapping you on the check to try and goad a reaction for you. However, you didn’t respond the way she wanted, at all.

“Leave me.” She managed to make out as you mumbled a sentence or two out before stopping yourself and your breathing went laboured.

“Hey, what did I tell you in the framework?” She asked you. Again, it did not go her way.

“That I’m a monster that can’t be helped?” You managed to say, bluntly.

Daisy stopped cold in her tracks, “W—Wha….What?” She asked, each one in quick succession of the other. She then put your arm around her shoulder again as she lifted you up.

“It – It was what you said……when you –” You were starting to lose consciousness at this point.

“Hey, no! Y/N, no! You can’t go asleep on me! Stay with me, come on!” She yelled, but it was turning into a cry as she kicked open the door and put you on the floor. Jemma turned to you, and her eyes widened as she saw your figure.

“You….were right.” You were just talking (quietly but talking none the less) to no one in particular in terms of target. But Daisy knew they were meant for herself.

“Right about what?” She asked, holding your hand to try and keep you on this side with them, and not whatever lay beyond that.

“I let it win….I lost, Daisy.” The three friends shared a look.

“She let the darkness in.” It was Fitz who said the conclusion. Daisy looked at her brother figure with a look of tears and rage.

“What do you mean?” She asked, despite knowing the answer.

“That fucking cell.” You said, before coughing. That was then followed by more vomit, this time being just your void energy inside of you.

“What cell?” Jemma asked that one, looking between you both with fear and horror.

“We were locked up Jemma right after you were taken. We were on our own for six months.” She covered her mouth as she felt a pang in her chest the feeling of the two of you being along for so long.

“Y/nn,” Your eyes barely focused on your sister, but you were trying, “That version of me that said that, she’s a bitch, alright? You are not a monster. You are my sister, my best friend. And I need you to make it through this, ok? I need you to let Jemma help you in anyway you can because –” She was cut off by a new intruder in the room entering.

Your world blurred for a moment, but you managed to somewhat feel Jemma applying something to cover your wound.

However, when your hearing allowed you to hear for a moment, all you heard was, “This is the guy who sold me to Kasius!” from Daisy.

You didn’t care who it was, but you felt their presence. That next moment, they were up against the wall, restrained and having a blade up against their throat.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” He cried out as it happened to him, “I’m guessing this is the sister you told me – no, more like warned me about?” He asked in fear.

“That’s her.” Daisy answered, wondering if she should just let you do it. However, she then remembered the words you told her that she had given you the last time you had spoken in the framework.

So, leaving him tied up, she approached you and crouched down in front of you and cupped your face in her hands, “Y/N, I need you to listen to me; I know you’re angry, scared and scarred. In your head, it’s beyond repair,” She heard the man (Deke) choke more, “But, you’re not, ok? You’re not broken beyond repair. I’m here; so is Fitzsimmons, Mack, Yoyo, May, and Coulson. We know you, Y/nn. You are not a monster. You’re our friend; you’re our sister and daughter. We’re here to help you every step of the way. But you have to take this first one, ok? You need to let him go, Y/nn.”

It took a moment, as the man cried out as the blade neared him and neared him. However, just as it was about to impale him, it stopped and disappeared, and he was realised from it’s hold.

“Here.” Deke said, holding a syringe out to her as a kind of peace offering, “It’s adrenaline. Should keep her awake a bit longer.” He said as Daisy cautiously took it.

“You’re still on my shit list.” He didn’t seem to mind right now.

“Sure, but I know how important family is.” For a moment, she softened, before she jabbed the needle into your leg.

She then took a breath, “Let’s go.” She said to her other friends, before getting you up one more time, and they were on their way a once again.

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“You ready?” Your sister asked you as she continued to support you as you stood outside the entrance to the room.

“As ready as I can be.” You answered. With that, Daisy knocked, before Coulson opened it and hugged you both, before realising the state you were in.

“Oh god, here, let’s get you sat down.” Coulson said as gently as he could to try and hide his very clear fear.

The others all crowded you and Fitz as you were both put near each other, almost as reassurance that the other was still here.

“Alright, we need to get out of here, they are right behind us.” Daisy said, letting them all know what was at stake here.

As the others got ready to get another Inhuman, you focused on just keeping your eyes open and yourself alive.

“Hey, Y/N.” You opened your eyes to see Coulson crouching in front of you, making sure you were doing just that.

“Doesn’t that hurt your knees or back?” He chuckled a little at your words, before putting a hand on your shoulder.

“Keep fighting, alright? We need our hero to pull through.” He told you; Daisy had clearly told him. Still, you appreciated it.

“Sir, yes sir.” You said, with that, they left.

When they returned, you all realised that you actually had no where to go to. You were stuck. Then the holes started coming through the wall.

You knew it wouldn’t take long for them to get through. Then you looked at your hands, those that wielded the power that was so often terrifying yourself. It still did, but you had a bit more confidence with it now.

“Daisy!” You called; your younger sister was immediately by your side.

“What is it, Y/nn?” She asked, putting both her hands on your knees.

“I need you to help me up, please?” You asked, the last bit a quieter. But she only obliged your request.

“What are you doing?” She asked you; not out of mistrust, but it was just so you were both on the same page.

“They want in. They’d need to go through a layer of void energy.” You said as you shakily held up your hand; you were still weak. However, Jemma realised, and approached you to help you hold your arm up.

Once it was up, you then pulled all the power you could in your state and focused on the growing holes, they were then covered in that void substance.

As you did that, the new kid (Flint) removed the rocks as Deke did another thing to get into your good books; giving you his gravity buckle to go up the shaft to get to the Trawler (your way out).

When it came time for you and Daisy to go up, she guided you over and into the shaft, “Hold on.” She advised you, you did so. You had both hugged before, just never while being lifted into the air. That was new.

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You weren’t out of the woods yet, but you were in a better place. You were on a ship with your family (well, most of it. Mack and Elena had stayed behind) and ready to tackle what was next together.

You didn’t know what would lay down on the earth, you just knew you were ready to take it on. With people who saw you as someone that wasn’t ruled by the monster inside of you; but someone who ruled it.

Someone who they loved and cherished.

[vulpesmellifera]

The Strange, the Fantastical, and the Horrifying

I’ve discovered I love writing weird stuff, so I decided to put together a list of my strangest, my most fantastical, and my most horrifying fics. Maybe there’s something here for everyone. Enjoy! <3

Johnlock

Rose Madder - Explicit. 25,415 words. With a history of bad choices firmly behind him, Sherlock Holmes has established himself with New Scotland Yard as a brilliant if egotistical solver of crime. An island unto himself, he's avoided all thoughts and urges of sentimental or physical attachment to another person not only for the sake of The Work, but for the equilibrium of his Mind Palace. Until he meets John Watson. This seemingly ordinary yet compelling man catches Sherlock's interest as something more than a mere roommate. When John moves in, he brings with him something unexpected: a strange family heirloom. The nightmare begins. (Tags include: Season 1 AU, Gay Pilot, creepy dolls)

Into the Gloaming - Mature. 8,385 words. She lays the sage bundle down in one of his seashells, avoiding the label. How he loved cataloging natural items. That sharp mind of his so naturally tended to the sciences, and she’d taken great joy in encouraging him all his life. All the first thirteen years of it. The last year has been entirely different.His hand lies just outside the white comforter. When she touches it, the chill of his skin sends a shiver down her spine. His lips move, his voice as soft as dead, dry leaves. “What’s that, love?” she says.“In the trees,” he says, his eyes still closed. “Is it John there in the trees? I think he’s waiting for me.” Viola turns her gaze out the window and to the closest tree, a resplendent cherry in the throes of autumn. In the branches there, for just a second, she thinks she sees it: a black bird, feathers gleaming in the sun. (Tags include: Creator Chose not to Use Archive Warnings, Mythology References, child death, Heavy Angst)

Haunted - Explicit. 22,342 words. Plagued by the past, John moves himself and his daughter to a new flat for a fresh start - and it's not 221B Baker Street. While he grapples with new knowledge and old guilt, he's confronted with odd neighbors and strange noises in the night. But is it the new flat, or is John Watson losing his grip on reality? (Tags include: post-canon, apologetic John, child endangerment, scary) 

Mystrade

The Ghost in the Graphite - Explicit. WIP. He's spent his life avoiding idleness with pencil and paper. It's unpredictable. A visitor could slide into his mind, animate his limbs, and attempt to communicate through sketching. They come to him for closure - or for justice. Greg Lestrade joined the police force to placate the ghosts that haunt him. His greatest asset in solving crime flings himself off of a building, and Greg is once more faced with too many sleepless nights. When a forceful spirit and a troubling case appear, there's a chance an innocent man could end up in prison. Out of desperation, Greg turns to the one person he thinks could help him: Mycroft Holmes. As attraction blooms between them, the case becomes far more twisted and dangerous than expected. The full moon approaches. Time is running out. (Tags include: post-Reichenbach Fall, Medium!Greg, Slow Burn)

Among the Roses - Explicit. 14,043 words. The moon shone brightly on the garden, the colours of the roses now muted blue-greys like pebbles along the shore. A shiver ran down his spine as the hairs on his neck tingled. “Hello?” he said. Looked to the left and the right. Not a soul. “Who’s there?” His grip on the umbrella handle was clammy. A foghorn bellowed in the distance. Clouds crept over the moon’s face, casting long, gauzy shadows over the garden. Mycroft stepped back, and shut the door. He tried to quell the racing of his heart as he stood there, listening. “I’ve been waiting,” the man said, his voice as rough as waves hitting the rocks. (Tags include: MCD, Reunited and it Feels So Good, Angst with a Happy Ending)

A Song for a Siren - Mature. 13,992 words. Perhaps most fearsome among beasts is a monster with a sweet voice and an appetite that compels it to gorge on the marrow of men. It hid among the waves and in the crevices of the craggy rocks, its stringy hair slick along a back as pale as a fish's belly, its ocean-hued eyes forever fixed on the ship that carried the gallant Captain Lestrade. In a world of madness and monsters, many a man meets his fate at the pointed teeth of an otherworldly creature. (Tags include: Cthulu references, Multiple POV, Happy Ending)

Night of the Grey Mare - Teen. 8,606 words. Every Christmas Eve, Mycroft visits the Watson-Holmes family to deliver a story to his precious niece, and share in a little of the mulled wine. This year, Rosie wants to hear something scary. Mycroft tells her a frightening tale of The Christmas Witch, and then takes his leave before Sherlock and John can enact their usual routine to make him feel unwelcome. The way home is fraught with unforeseen events and Mycroft soon finds himself in his own frightening tale of horror. Or does he? (Tags include: Post-canon, Icelandic Mythology, Scary Stories on Christmas Eve)

The Tenth Muse - Explicit. 25,365 words. Mycroft sees things other people can’t. Lights, spectres, shades, demons, phantasms, and creatures that no one else can see. Voices no one else can hear. Colours eddying around people’s bodies, visible only to his eyes.It isn't deduction for Mycroft; it's a living nightmare that leads to self-imposed isolation. When Sherlock "dies," Mycroft finds himself reaching out for a golden slice of happiness, just one person to call his own in a landscape of horrors.

Sherstrade

[Deleted] - Teen. 10,400 words. Greg Lestrade and John Watson awake to find themselves locked in an unfinished basement. While they are well acquainted with one another, the two men aren't friends. But the darkness has ways of bringing people closer together. Meanwhile, Sherlock and Sally must work together to solve the case of a missing John Watson. They're running out of time. (Tags include: Pre-Slash, no TFP, Trapped, Rescue)

Hannigram

The Thing in the House - Mature. WIP. Horror-obsessed Abigail Hobbs lives in a cookie-cutter neighborhood where everyone is dreadfully boring. On the verge of graduating, she's eager to get out and pursue her dream of becoming a Special Effects Makeup Artist. Her big focus: monsters. She never thought an actual monster might move in next door. And she never thought that the monster might uncover her own secrets. (Tags include: Fright Night homage, POV Abigail Hobbs)

Geraskier

The Slippery Dark - Explicit. 7,944 words. Suspicion and guilt war beneath his skin like adversarial ant colonies - writhing and biting. None of this is right, but who is Geralt to demand answers from Jaskier? The bard has changed. He chafes at his clothes as if beset by a rash, he stares into the distance with a down-turned mouth and sad eyes, and he won't tell Geralt about the monster they're facing other than "it'll be easy for you to kill it," and "you're the only one I would ask." Anytime Geralt tries to bring up his angry outburst on the mountain, Jaskier walks away without a word. And the dreams. Geralt's dreams are strange and frightening. When they settle in at a castle in ruins for protection from a coming storm, will what lurks in the shadows finally consume the Witcher? Or will the Witcher find what he should have wished for all along? (Tags include: season 1 AU, Geralt apologizes)