#might do a deranged take on purpose

[lisafication]

Digging Graves for your Morals; Or, The Ethical Problem of Outlawry

Hello, yes, I am here again. This one is shorter, I swear (it’s under four thousand words, even). If this is the first post from me you’re seeing, this is a follow-up to my prior essay posted here on the game The Coffin of Andy and Leyley, although it should be able to mostly stand alone.

At the end of my last essay, I touched on both the game’s nearly uncompromising moral scepticism and relativity, but I didn’t really dig into it. I outlined that the game only textually frames actions as ‘morally bad’ in the context of a morality set by the society and the world that has treated them as no better than farm animals raised for the slaughter. Well, I have a lot to say on the topic of ethics on the topic of The Coffin of Andy and Leyley, so buckle in, this one’s going to talk about the social contract, moral scepticism and everyone’s favourite topic: Mrs. Graves.

As usual, this was originally posted and formatted for on Sufficient Velocity and you can perhaps more easily read it there. Spoilers abound, and my content warning from last time still applies.

She’s not too hot on either ethics or her mother

The Meat of the Matter

Since a lot of this is optional or otherwise missable information, let’s review the premise the game gives us. If you’re already aware of all of this, I apologise, it won’t take long.

First off the bat, the quarantine at the start of the game was a hoax-driven money-making scheme of which you can pick up more-or-less all the relevant details of. This is entirely missable and by the time it’s possible to discover, our protagonists have better things to dwell on and have dialogue about, so I’ll give you a summary of what you can deduce from reading the notes and thinking about it.

The quarantine is an organ harvesting operation, as per some documents you can discover in the wardens’ office. They entrap the residents, test their blood types and starve to death those they deem surplus to requirements — alternatively the starvation itself could be their method of ‘preparing the harvest’, there’s evidence in both directions and it hardly matters — harvesting the organs of the others for sale. As our protagonists are AB-typed, the ‘universal recipient’ or ‘most selfish blood type’, they’re some of the first on the chopping block.

If you read through the newspapers and the documents in Mr. Washing Machine’s car, you can discover that ultimately ToxiSoda are responsible, and a similar thing is happening in a different city under the guise of a ‘chemical leak’.  Should you further investigate matters, you will find mentions of the ‘man behind it all’, the doctor, or the Surgeon, as the fandom have been referring to him — you may recall Mrs. Graves mentioned someone similar! Yeah, he’s the guy who runs ToxiSoda, who are themselves partners with the water company that faked the parasite outbreak in the first place.

It’s all a life insurance scam, apparently

How much the details of the operation matter is something open to interpretation — it might just be something for players to figure out and Episode 3 will not cover the Surgeon at all, or he might play a major part; it's not particularly relevant to this essay. What matters is that it happened at all — indeed, it’s fairly easy to justify Ashley and Andrew in everything they did in Episode 1 (flashbacks aside), arguing that if they’d made any other decisions they’d have died — an argument that the victims dug their own graves, even if the Graves siblings put them in them. How correct that is is a matter of debate, but that you can make the argument at all matters, and we’ll be returning to this later. In my last essay (and again in the introduction here), I made an analogy to farm animals, raised without love and for slaughter. Let’s put a pin in the ‘for slaughter’ part for now and take a look at the ‘without love’ part. 

That’s right, it’s time to meet the parents.

As Andrew notes, there are significantly more compelling reasons for you to say that

They Fuck You Up, Your Mum & Dad

They really do. 

Our charming protagonists are, as with many things depicted in this game, an exaggerated, almost farcical example of this phenomenon — one that’s just grounded enough to still feel very real, just like the siblings themselves. 

The late and lamentable Mrs. Graves is just the same: originally a teen mother, hopelessly out of depth with two difficult children — even if one was good at masking it — and an unreliable, emotionally unavailable (at least to their children) partner who can’t hold down a job, ends up foisting them off on each other and doing a Parental Negligence because she simply Cannot Cope. That’s the real part. The part where she gets paid off by an organ harvesting operation to leave them to die, that’s the borderline-farcical exaggeration that throws all the nooks and crannies of her character into sharp relief.

Mrs. Graves does not have a good relationship with either of her kids. Having self-admittedly fobbed the job of raising Ashley off on her son, to the degree that they did not even celebrate her birthday as kids, both of them hold differing degrees and types of resentment for her.

For Ashley, it’s hate — perhaps not quite so clear cut as that, as it’s her that calls for the eulogy and she shows some potential signs of discomfort while cleaning up her parents’ corpses, but by and large, it’s fairly simple and straightforward, as usual for Ashley. The sentiment is not exactly unreturned, either.

This brings Ashley’s heart great delight!

The most clear incident raising her from everyday ‘neglectful’ to ‘wow she wanted nothing to do with this kid’ is the optional ‘birthday cake’ scene, obtained by finding the present in Ashley’s first ‘transitory world’ dream, in which we see Ashley’s birthday  and the founding of a lemon cupcake tradition between Leyley and Andy. She has received nothing from her family, notes that her ‘friends’ would say they were busy before she even told them the schedule and Andy takes her out to buy cupcakes with his pocket money.

This scene gets a callback in Andrew’s dream later. Just remember to Ask Nicely, rather than Kill Her.

Parents of the year, everyone.

So with Ashley it’s as straightforward and obvious as she herself is — she hates her mother, her mother hates her. With Andrew, as with Andrew himself, it’s a fair bit more complicated. His mother is a much more nuanced figure, who is believable in her role as an unfortunate teen parent who was trying her best. He has a degree of trust in her against, seemingly, his own good judgment In her conversation with Andrew, she acknowledges her fault in raising him and seemingly sincerely tries to offer him a ‘way out’, an olive branch.

I think many people have had relationships where they might say this

This scene in particular intrigues me, because she is acknowledging fault in a way that Andrew strictly avoids doing — and well, there’s nothing Andrew likes more than a good way to avoid acknowledging any fault of his own. With her dominant relationship over their father as a model for Andrew to draw comparisons to his own relationship with Ashley with, it’s no surprise that the narrative resonates with him to the point of ‘Accept’ being many people’s first completion.

Of course, that’s not all there is to it. There is a fascinating contrast with her later conversation with Ashley, where she — despite accusing Ashley of brainwashing Andrew — refers to Leyley and Andy as ‘two psychos’ and states that she always knew they were responsible for Nina’s death and that, implicitly, they owe her for not turning them in. 

There's something about mother-daughter relationships here that I just do not have the time or reading to dig into, unfortunately.

Meanwhile, when Andrew interrogates her on her possession of their death certificates, she has… an interesting, plausible story about a life insurance scam and claims that she really did think they died in the fire, implicitly denying the claim that she sold them. It’s entirely possible that she’s describing the details of the ‘scam’ correctly — you can even buy that she genuinely does care for Andrew in some way, if not Ashley, but her claim about being an honest, grieving parent shocked at their deaths… doesn’t add up?

This is a very normal reaction to your supposedly dead children showing up in your house.

As Andrew himself notes after hearing her story, she’s full of shit. This gets into speculation, because there are a few ways to read this, but the most plausible ‘gist’ is that she and her partner were paid off in money and jobs to not raise a fuss — the surgeon she mentioned is almost certainly the founder of ToxiSoda, remember?

The overwhelming difference in presentation between how she speaks to Andrew and Ashley invites investigation — and when Andrew turns down her offer and tells her he isn’t interested in her offer in Decline, her reaction isn’t… despair, it’s shock — and well, there’s a good reason for that.

Why do you think she did it in the first place?

This is the happiest we see her

Well — it’s so she can finally fit into society. That white picket fence, that idyllic 1950s life — hell you can call it the American Dream. She wants that, or as close to it as she can get — the working-class teen mother, living in poverty, aspiring to the middle-class. It’s a very common, very real and very grounded motivation.

And to that end, she effectively sold off her children. It’s no wonder she can’t fathom why Andrew wouldn’t choose the same.

That’s the part that makes you think — just like the deaths in Episode 1, well- maybe the siblings are justified here, too. It’s a weaker argument, but it’s still one you can make under many common moral paradigms today — what goes around comes around, all that jazz. Just look at how awful she was to Ashley.

She’s finally found what she’s been striving for.

Here’s the thing, here’s the thing though — what, reasonably, could she have done? Andrew and Ashley briefly highlight this in conversation about Ashley’s ‘friends’ in Episode 1 — was she supposed to fight gunmen to try and break them out? Throw food to the balcony from four stories?

Moreover, as she herself says to Andrew… would anyone really have been able to do better than her in her position? She was seventeen when Ashley was born, living in poverty with a partner who couldn’t even remember Andrew’s name when he was a kid. Anyone would have had difficulty, let alone with these kids.

Her evils are — they’re not any deliberate action, but rather… prompted inaction. She didn’t have the emotional energy, resources or plain capability to properly parent her children, she didn’t have any solutions to their murder of Nina in a state so blatantly hostile to its underclass, she didn’t have a way to connect with Ashley and she took the money rather than fight a futile and likely suicidal battle against a corporation and its armed goons in a dystopian setting.

Ashley, notably, does not deny this.

Her sin is the one we’re all, I think, guilty of — that of not trying hard enough, that of inaction in the face of difficult tasks, of not standing up on principle because it’s just too much that day and you don’t have the spoons, you’ll do it tomorrow (no you won’t). It’s a petty, everyday kind of evil — that of not doing enough. 

Is that enough to condemn her? Certainly, there’s a pretty manipulative read of her that likely has some truth to it — in the locked door in Ashley’s dream in ‘Decay’ you can discover that she has a ‘not-hatched’ tar soul — but consider that lens — the game won’t make up your mind for you, so you’ll need to choose that for yourself.

The dad is interesting in terms of negative space — but he’s mostly important in that he doesn’t matter, so I decided to not fit him in here. He has art, though — just no sprite, because, well, he’s never mattered to either sibling.

The Contract We Call Society

Right, it’s time to get a little bit Theoretical in here. Not much, but a little. Social contract theory is a complex topic with a lot of nuance, much of which I will be eliding in the name of not writing a twenty thousand word paper on semiotics, law, and anthropology, but the short analogy is… the idea that as long as you play by society’s rules, as long as you are a good citizen, a good person, the state, or the community, will take care of you.

In a number of ways, the harshest penalty levied by many historical states and legal codes was not death, but rather the criminal status of outlawry, a practice that’s cropped up a number of times in history — the practice of no longer being protected by the law. This meant one could be killed or worse with impunity — you were no longer protected by mob justice and, while overexaggerated as a term of reference, certain texts from Medieval England refer to outlaws as bearing a wolfshead, ‘for the wolf is a beast hated by all folk’. Never minding that wolves are actually delightful, this was a time when wolves were actively hunted and sold by people — and the same was intended to happen to outlaws. They were ‘fair targets’ as far as society was concerned, no longer to be treated as your fellow citizens.

This was the gravest punishment on the books, for most of these legal codes — something saved for those who had broken the social contract so completely that there could be no turning back (civil outlawry is… a bit different, that’s not the topic here). Among others, a modern critique of the concept is that it offers no incentive for improvement, no incentive to change or to cease harming society — if an outlaw has none of the social contract’s protections, what reason do they have to obey… any of the social contract? If that seems familiar, well, let me ask you this:

What if the state or community fails its end first? What responsibility does the innocent outlaw have to that contract?

It’s an interesting phrasing, that the world is better off.

It’s time to talk about the incest, and part of why it’s there. The cannibalism too, but that’s less impactful here. If you’ve seen me elsewhere, you might have seen me say that the incest is a load-bearing narrative pillar — in large part due to it being a critical facet of the siblings’ relationship, but in another large part due to it being an equally critical part of how the game uses taboo.

A taboo is in this context something that is considered repulsive and to be avoided by society. It’s a more complex term than that — you can also use it for certain sacred actions or utterances that are only permitted to certain people, for example — but that’s what it is here. Swearing, premarital sex, BDSM and murder are, approximately from weak to strong, some example taboos held in modern Anglospheric society. 

Strong taboos are a staple of horror — they shock, they disgust, they draw people’s attention and it’s that last one that’s critical here. Incest is a very strong taboo — while I am absolutely not segueing into its historical context, the very well-established Westermarck effect gives it a certain timelessness and immunity to desensitisation that most other taboos don’t have — murder, to contrast, is a taboo we’re largely desensitised to in modern media and works of modern media have to put in actual work to make a murder seem horrifying — through atmosphere, cinematography, evocative prose etc.

And this is important because the use of taboo I’m covering in this essay is that the incest is used to invite judgment — it is so ingrained as a ‘wrong thing’ in people’s brains almost regardless of background that it forces the player to engage with the work morally. And that’s where the fun starts.

I’ve mentioned before, very briefly, about the juxtaposition of tone between the Burial & Decay endings, contrasting with the very monstrous difference in morality. Burial is remarkably light-hearted — they play around with the drain blockage, they joke about their mother’s personality and this is further exaggerated on the Love path, where Andrew is much more comfortable with casual contact and the two make a game out of how far they can throw their parents’ skulls, the humour is directly contrasted against their abhorrent actions.

I’ll be real Ashley is far more merciful than I, I’m shuddering at the thought of that gunk in my hair

In comparison, Decay is… bleak. I’ve seen it being referred to as being ‘emotionally sandblasted’ and, yeah I think that’s fair — it’s uncomfortable, it’s heavy and it’s just not fun. And this is the route in which, if you chose Trust into Accept, Andrew has bought into the narrative that his mother’s offered — that he can fit just fine into society if he wasn’t stuck, if not for Ashley — the route that ‘fits’ most closely to the social contract, to Andrew feeling the guilt that we think he should and hating the monsters that they’ve become, as the social contract deems them. Given the pains the game takes to attach the player to the protagonists, this normative moral ending is very easily interpreted as the bad ending.

And well, isn’t it?

Thing is, as mentioned above, the social contract has never held up its end for them. The game takes careful pains to point out to a viewer that they’ve never had the life that society promises people, so why do its moral standards apply?

The game invites you to judge the characters, and in the same motion, asks you from what principles you judge them, making a pretty good guess in that, like most people who haven’t spent a large amount of time navel-gazing and reading some very boring books by very dusty old men, they come from the society around you.

Love even has Ashley express this sentiment directly after the incestuous dream — she asks you — well, Andrew, but this is also something for the player to mull over — why this is what’s engaged your morality or sense of revulsion, rather than the desecration, cannibalism or murder.

Andrew and Ashley are both very funny and very fascinating in this scene.

And that’s the framing that it casts all of its own moral judgement in — even the ‘tar-soul’ aspect is… well, it’s unclear what it even means. Mrs. Graves was a ‘not-hatched’ tar soul, after all. Other than that, it’s society and the world being better off without them, rather than any kind of assertion of objective morality. Due to the present of ‘soul colour’, we’ll presumably see the game make some moral statements in Episode 3, but as it stands?

It’s nearly completely morally sceptical, in and of itself — it’s not interested in moral assertions or education, it’s interested in making you question your own morals. Deconstructive (not that kind), rather than dialectic, to be mildly pretentious.

It uses taboo and shock to invite moral judgement, but then uses tone, charm and our instinct to look for the happiest end for our blorbos to get you to recognise that these are principles you yourself brought into the game, rather than any it’s handed you. 

To summarise: you’ve brought these principles in from society, but what do the siblings, the protagonists, the villains to the world, owe society? Enough that they should follow them? It failed them first, after all.

Closing Thoughts

This one is a bit less energetic than the last, tragically — my sleeping schedule is the stuff of nightmares recently, I love windy weather. Wait, no the opposite. Huge thank you to everyone who commented on the last one, you are the wind beneath my wings and the main reason I managed to get this out this week.

This essay is a bit more interpretative than my last one — certainly, there are alternative readings and I’ve been toying with the idea of deliberately taking a reading I don’t like very much and writing from that perspective as a demonstrative exercise recently — mostly that you shouldn’t just take my word for things!

Otherwise, if the last bit at the end seemed murky, I apologise — I did try to write a more detailed version, but firstly, it was three thousand words and secondly, I re-read it the next day and I could not understand what the fuck I was talking about. Personally, I blame Derrida — suffice to say that I strongly recommend playing through it with an eye towards considering culpability, morality and why you think certain characters are more or less forgivable than others, and for what deeds. See what you get out of it.

I managed to keep one particular thread open to wrap up with here —  I try to keep speculation on Episode 3 content to a minimum in the main essays, but it should be fine here — you might have noticed that I refer to Episode 1 and Episode 2 being on something of a spectrum of justifiability, with the siblings’ actions being ‘more’ justifiable in Episode 1 and ‘less’ justifiable — but still justifiable if you try — in Episode 2. 

To continue the thought of the happiest ending being the one in which they step the furthest away from common morality and to further jar the viewers’ sense of morality by contrasting societal morality and blorbo-oriented morality, Episode 3: Burial could continue this trend in having a major victim be someone who, well, has done nothing wrong and isn’t even guilty of bystander syndrome.

I wonder if there’s any good candidates, someone who’s sweet, harmless and will indisputably be an innocent victim…

…I’m sure she’ll be fine

[soubiapologist]

i don't expect any of you to understand the reference but alice cooper. from riverdale. is a little like if a loveless character was really really really fucking funny

[e1dritchjackal0pe]

ᴛʜᴇ ᴠᴏɪᴅ ᴄᴀʟʟꜱ

Summary: Your arranged marriage to the na-Baron is something that you look upon with a sense of dread and reluctance. His violence, brutality and cunning are something that haunts you. You should fear him. You do. But for some reason, you can't seem to stay away.

Warnings: 18+ content. MDI. AFAB, she/her pronouns. Reader is a virgin but not entirely inexperienced, virginity loss. Hints of morally gray reader. Oral (F!Receiving), biting and blood, PinV, non-protected sex, Canon typical violence (blood, death, gladiator fights). Feyd. Not proofread.

Notes: 20.4k words. The essence of enemies to lovers. The reader is an Atreides but not a daughter of Jessica. IDK ya'll, something about seeing Austin Butler bald and deranged has altered me.

𝔓𝔞𝔯𝔱 𝔦𝔦

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. 

Your heart is in your throat. It feels as though it's lodged itself in place between the cartilage and flesh to choke your windpipe, making each breath snag and tremble. You can practically feel it pulsing along your pharynx. You try to focus, steeling yourself by lacing your fingers together until you fear you might break them. Not even the litany that has been engrained in you since childhood serves to center your thoughts, but still you try. Chanting lowly in your head and quietly under your breath as not to be heard. As not to reveal your anxiety, but you know that the evidence of your distress must be more than obvious. And it had been very apparent since this morning, as you prepared for your travel to Giedi Prime where you will be married. 

Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.

The looks that Lady Jessica had given you were harsh and piercing. The eyes of a teacher. You had found no forgiveness in her arms even though she has done her best to take the place of your mother. But she is a Bene Gesserit first. Always. Just as you must be. But you must also be an Atreides. Duty is your purpose. It runs in your blood. It's the very reason why you pull air into your lungs. It's why you were even born. You have to honor that. Even if it requires sacrifice. Even if fear trembles down each and every notch of your spine; even when your thoughts are scattered and wild; even with the entire trajectory of your life being placed into the palms of some of the most ruthless beings in the universe. You will survive. 

I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me.

You swallow harshly, trying to force down your nerves with it but the way that the craft shudders and trembles with the strain of breaking through the foreign planet's atmosphere doesn't help. It only serves to make your inner turmoil worse. Your gaze sweeps around the cabin, a hollow thing meant for military, not comfort, and the presence of a small squad clad in their combat armor reminds you of the strained relationship that your family has nurtured with this house for several millennia. A reminder that you aren't supposed to be here on your own. Nearly clawing at your own hands and struggling to center yourself as the cold, dark walls of the ship tremble and shake like the stomach of starved animal. Your wedding was supposed to take place on Richese, a neutral planet that no longer governs political alliances with neither Caladan nor Giedi Prime. That is what had been negotiated long before you were even born, with both Houses having been too paranoid to allow both products of their lineage onto enemy territory. But a month before the wedding, the Baron had sent word. An invitation of sorts, that he wished to encourage the House of Atreides to allow the union to commence on his soil as a token of good faith. As a signal that all of the bad blood and the violence shared between each party could finally be laid to rest.

But as with most houses, it was more than just an invitation. It strengthened the Harkonnen image to place forth the olive branch and if Duke Leto refused it could be seen in bad light. A sign of weakness or distaste. The summoning could not be refused lest it smear the Atreides name in the eye of the Emperor, always a fickle and superficial man. Even with that logic, you can't help the spike of anger that rouses in your chest and threatens to burn. It's because of that sense, no matter how correct it may be, that you're sitting in this damned ship, breaking into the polluted atmosphere of a dead planet when you could have had just one more day on soil that wasn't obscured and marred by heavy cities and volcanic rock. 

Selfish. You're just being selfish. 

Even though she is not here to guide you, the image of Lady Jessica's eyes flash within your mind, sharp and exacting despite their light shade; amplified by the delicate, embroidered fabric that framed her head just this morning.  School your face, her expression tells you. And she - or at least the mental image of her, is right. You can't let yourself fall to your emotions, no matter how strongly they want to eat you alive. You've prepared for this moment since your first breath. You've spent nearly every waking moment practicing in the ways of the Bene Gesserit under the guidance of Lady Jessica. You'vee spent countless hours poring over the history and politics of both houses in preparation for your future role; what must have amounted to months of studying the culture and customs of the Harkonnen. All of them seem to be rooted in violence and savagery in some way or another. Aggression and cunning are prized traits. Bloodshed is coveted. The people according to old texts and educational filmbooks are just as severe as their environment. An environment that they had cultivated from their brutal and avaricious nature, tearing up all of its resources until nothing was left. 

You can't help but wonder if you will suffer the same fate. 

But if you are going to be honest with yourself, it isn't the toxic hellscape or even the idea of marriage that puts you on edge. It is him. Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen is someone who is notorious for his violence. Stories of his conquests and cruelty echo out across the houses, Minor and Major; there is not a soul who hasn't heard of his reputation. And despite having been promised to him since before your birth, you haven't met the na-Baron once in your life. Both houses had been too stubborn to schedule an interaction between the two of you. Most likely due to mistrust. Plus, a meeting isn't necessarily required for a marriage to commence, not one amongst houses, at least. But the fact that you haven't so much as seen the na-Baron's face has always left you feeling horribly vulnerable. Like you have been left to navigate you footing in the dark and the slightest misstep might leave you to tumble into the void. It had been another reason why you have always been so adamant on learning of the Harkonnen people; some desperate venture to discover as much about your soon to be husband as possible. You've tried to paint some sort of image of him in your head with the information provided by word of mouth and old filmbooks. Gurney had been one of the first people to warn you of Harkonnen ruthlessness. Their proclivity towards greed and violence. A violence that they don't even spare their own people from. 

"You will have to be strong," he told you just before you had boarded onto the star craft, eager to speak to you before you left forever. It was his worry you knew. He was panicked inside despite being the picture of composure. The look in his eyes had kept you frozen in place, locked onto him even with the mild thrum of chaos and bodies clamoring around you, servants and soldiers alike working to prep the ship for your flight, loading trunks and chests full of your personal belongings onto the carrier. It was firm; the type of resolution that is brought from experience. From a personal sort of pain and the glint of it left you feeling empty; gutted. The only thing that kept you centered was the grip of his hand on your forearm, firm and warm in its hold like it may help to drill his words better into your skull. "Every moment will be a fight for you. Harkonnen sniff out weakness like dogs. You cannot yield. Ever." 

You've heard words like that about them all your life. Horror stories from Atreides soldiers who had encounters with opposing Harkonnen forces. Tales of stark, pale skin and the glint of snarling blackened teeth before they deliver a killing blow. Features that a younger version of yourself never would have imagined for her intended. But those naive, wistful fantasies that you used to entertain as a child are long gone now. Replaced by the harsh realities of war and bloodshed. When you were a girl, still ignorant to the true depth of your duties, you had imagined someone with kind, intelligent eyes as your future husband. Someone patient and understanding; even with the whispers of the Harkonnen's true nature lurking over you like leaping shadows. But back then you were young enough to have hope. Back then, you would dream of him too in the flashes of deep, piercing eyes; you'd hear the low rumble of a voice while blades flashed and carved through pale air. 

 And on some nights visions still torment you. But now they taunt with the sensation of phantom touches and the mirage of balmy skin that sears against you own so intently that sometimes it tears you from your slumber with ragged breaths and a humiliating heat between your thighs. 

You can feel the pressure in the cabin shift around you, weighing over your head and bearing down on your shoulders as the ship continues its descent. Your ears pop, and the sound has the awful, paranoid visual of snapping bones and tendons projecting across your mind. You pull a heavy breath into your lungs, holding it there while you try to shift your thoughts onto something less violent. Escaping to fond memories to try and soothe yourself. For a just a moment you pretend that you are not here at all, but back home on Caladan. You can see the ocean. The long stretch of crystalline water, glittering underneath the cast of the balmy sunlight as trawlers coast along the current to capture netfuls of fish, looking like dots along the distant horizon. But it's always the wind that you love the most. Even when the skies are clear, unmarred from the blot of heavy rainclouds, you can always smell the presence of a storm in the air, perfuming the breeze with the earthy musk of petrichor and the fresh salt of the ocean. You can practically feel the brush of lush grass sweeping along your palms, prickling along the sensitive skin with the damp hint of the dew that seeps from the rich ground. 

Your reverie is shattered to a million pieces when the metallic hum of the craft's engine reverberates across the walls and floor of the cabin, signaling that it is approaching the ground; preparing to land. Each pulse of the sharp groan sounds like the pound of a nail in a casket. You can just barely focus around the wild patter of your heartbeat in your ears and for a moment you think that you might become ill. You could still feel the warmth of your brother's arms around your body. The way that he had clung to you. Like he was afraid to let go; to watch you slip from his life. In turn you had latched onto him, hesitant to unwind your arms from him, trying to claim the feel and scent of him to memory. But you couldn't have remained that way forever, and when you had pulled away from each other, the corners of his mouth were perked up into a smile. But it was too dull, too forced to be truly happy. You saw something mournful peeking through it, even while he tried to appear composed for your sake. You know how much he opposes of your intended matrimony. You have eavesdropped on the arguments he has shared with your father behind closed doors, attempting to fight for your sake even though it was a lost cause. His fear that you might not survive the ruthlessness of the Harkonnen, his misguided guilt for you taking his intended place. It had made you sorry for him the first time he had confessed that remorse to you. That he felt as though he was the one to blame for your marriage because it was his initial future to wed into the Harkonnen House had he not been born a male. Even with your near constant insistence that it was not his burden to bear, he refused to shed the weight of his self-imposed guilt. Always so damn stubborn. 

You had done your best to return his smile, softly squeezing his hand to comfort him and center your mind while the briny Caladan wind swept across the landing pad. But the memory cannot keep your heart from plummeting down to your gut when the craft finally touches the ground, shuddering lightly as it lands with a deep whir. 

You're here. You are actually on Giedi Prime now. 

There is officially no turning back. 

You feel like a ghost when you are drawn to rise, and you hardly register the fact that you haven't moved from your place on the seating to stand on your feet once the ship is still. You feel like an empty vessel, seeing but not registering as everyone moves about the empty space with practiced ease to stand before the hatch. The small unit of four soldiers have all built a formation around you and your own handmaidens, who stand diligently behind you. On any other occasion, they would have lined themselves in front of you all as well. Especially during affairs with the Harkonnen. But this is not a regular affair, and as trivial as it may seem, something as simple as guards posed in front of the Duke's daughter could be viewed as an act of distrust. A blight on your wedding and the union of the houses. 

Despite the way that everyone holds themselves; the images of discipline with perfect posture and heads held high, the apprehension that taints the atmosphere could be mistaken for a tangible thing. You could still see glimpses of tension set in the soldiers' shoulders; you could see the rigidity in their necks, anticipation and worry hidden underneath their armor.

Your father should be here too. Your family. But you know that they can't. A matter of ill, convenient timing that required them to board their own ship to leave for Arrakis. The Emperor had passed the fief to the House of Atreides, calling them to abandon their position on Caladan - to abandon your ancestorial home - in favor for the desert and the production of spice. It was an unexpected development, but one that your father would not turn down. As angry as you would like to be, you know how difficult this is for him. You have wanted to blame him for so long. And for a while you did. He's your father. He is supposed to protect you. To keep your happiness and security in mind. But because of the perspective, it is also easy to forget that he is more than just your father, he is also a Duke, with countless lives to defend and shelter. He is an Atreides. 

You are an Atreides, and there is no call you do not answer. 

You had shared one final look with him on Caladan, underneath the golden rays of the morning sun.  You didn't flinch or waver underneath his gaze. You remained firm, and some sort of understanding passed between the both of you, melting away the hatred and betrayal that ran thick in your blood stream. In that split second, you saw so much pass through his eyes: determination, acceptance and something like a bare shred of loss before it was quickly masked by unwavering resolve. A resolve that you too had to master. 

A dull jolt sounds out across the dark, metallic space and with it the large hatch of the ship begins to open, exposing a sliver of pale light. Butterflies erupt inside of your gut at the sight of the glow, brushing along your stomach and threatening to overcome you with a rush of nausea. But you hold yourself still, attempting to swallow down the unease but suddenly your throat is bone dry and stuffed with cotton. Perhaps the only thing that keeps you in place is the promise the Feyd-Rautha will not be present at your arrival. A small respite that your father had been able to secure you in the form of a Caladan wedding custom; that your husband should not be able to see you before your ceremony, lest the matrimony fall to bad luck. And in truth it is a tradition. One that has trickled down through the ages from Old Earth, so it was not necessarily done by means of deceit. Even so, the Baron had apparently been less than thrilled by the prospect of keeping you and his nephew separated once on the same soil, though it seems that your father still had managed to persuade him regardless. A small victory for you at least. 

Now all you can do is hope that the Baron has stuck to his word. 

You watch with ice in your veins and frozen lungs as the ramp continues to lower, yawning open akin to the jaws of an animal that threatens to discard you at the feet of starving beasts like scraps. More of that harsh light flows into the dark of the cabin, spilling over the heads of the soldiers, eating up the floor until it slips over your body, rising up over you until it reaches your eyes like a blaze; threatening to blind you with its intensity. You wince from the brightness of it, blinking rapidly until your eyes adjust to the absence of shadows. The surprised, low hiss that erupts from behind you, tells you that one of your handmaidens has also been taken off guard and blinded. 

With the continuation of its descent, it begins to reveal a blackened skyline of buildings that rise like slopping monoliths. Massive structures eat up the ground and cast stretching shadows across the dark platform. It strikes you that the little bit of the visible sky is a pale, as though a flat storm cloud had consumed the heavens. It isn't blue like the skies back home, or even orange or anything. It is simply a white void. It's all monochrome. Devoid of color and life. Everywhere that you look is either a piercing black or a violent white that almost burns to behold, and it is with a quick, almost hesitant inspection downward that you discover that the emerald hue of your silk dress has turned a shade of a deep smoky black from the strange illumination. 

But you don't get time to dwell on the discovery for long before the ramp meets the ground with a dull groan. It might as well as be a death sentence. You just barely catch sight of the of the figures that are lined along the platform, silently waiting for you to step out into the light. In your stupor, you have noticed that the number of Harkonnen that wait for your exit is a rather small group. It is not a massive procession with banners or celebration; there is no intrigued crowd of citizens awaiting to evaluate you. No more than five Harkonnen stand out on the platform, focusing on you with the distance the separates your parties with clasped hands and heads held high. The Baron it seems, holds no excitement for your arrival and has made no effort to welcome you on Giedi Prime. The message has been made clear of what he thinks of this union. Of you. 

The bastard. 

The world has gone hush. Dead silent as everyone awaits your move. And it is with that thought suddenly that you realize that everyone is waiting for you to take action. You are no longer expected to follow. You aren't allowed the crutch of following after your father or Lady Jessica's footsteps. They aren't here to guide you anymore. You steel yourself with a deep breath, drawing up your shoulders as you will yourself to step forward. Your legs are suddenly heavy like they have been strapped down with boulders and iron, but you force them into a stride regardless. Even when each move forward feels like a motion closer to your demise. 

You can hear the gentle clink of your Handmaidens heels as they dutifully trail after you. It gives you some comfort, no matter how small, that you have some familiar faces amongst you. That you aren't completely alone here. 

Still, you try to distract yourself. And in some mad scramble, your mind latches onto some old passage that you had read back on Caladan during one of your distant studies. It has you daring to sneak a few glances upward to the pale sky in between your focus forward, squinting through the glare, ignoring the way that the delicate chained veil draped across your face nudges against your eyelashes in your search for the sun. You had heard of its description countless times, seen holograms of it before, but none of them had managed to do the true thing honesty. In its blaze, it is claimed to cast an infrared shine which explains the bleak, washout coloration of the planet. But seeing the source of said lighting was entirely different. You do your best not to openly gawk at. To not stare at it for too long. The last thing that you want is to go blind; your fortune is terrible enough as is. But you're unable to stop yourself from stealing fleeting peeks at the star. If you didn't know any better, you could have mistaken it for a sort of eclipse. It looks like a black hole has torn through the heavens, gaping like an open wound, and you would have no idea that it was burning if not for the streams of light radiating from its rounded edges like a halo. 

Even with the remnants of your hatred smoldering through your body and turning your muscles rigid, you can't deny that there is a kind of odd beauty about the star. It's strange to see something that you had learned about so many years ago, and there is some detached part of you that has not fully accepted that you are even truly here. That small piece is still safely tucked away on Caladan, admiring as the sea meets the cliffside in a rolling crest of foam and froth. 

But that still is not enough to keep you from your reality. 

You all come to a unanimous halt, standing to leave a decent breadth between you and the Harkonnen. You have heard many things of the Baron of Giedi Prime. His guile. His hedonism. Whispers among the houses claimed him to be a gargantuan man. Someone whose intensity and mannerisms alone command attention and make men cower. The Baron, you quickly deduce, is not here. It seems that he has sent his advisors and servants in his stead. Whether that be from arrogance or indolence, or hatred, you are not sure. 

The man who stands at the in the center of the greeting committee holds himself with an air of importance. Back straight and hands clasped as he analyzes your small party. He is awfully pallid, just as his other companions are, a product of being denied ultraviolet rays that could be found in your planets own sun. The hulking black star cradled in the sky above you is hardly able to provide a proper tan it seems. The stark, unforgiving light casted from the solar body bathes you all in a layer of an achromatic hue, and it glints across the rounded skin of his bare scalp. They are all bald, you have easily observed, and you can just faintly recall reading a chapter in regard to Harkonnen beauty standards. Their proclivity to remove every ounce of hair from their bodies as a sign of cleanliness and purity; the means to extract themselves from their meek beginnings and perhaps, to a degree, a way to separate themselves from humanity. But the dark vertical strip that stretches across the expanse of his bottom lip signifies his position as a Mentat. 

"Lady Atreides," the Harkonnen advisor greets, voice deceptively placid and monotone. "We are grateful for your arrival. I trust that the trip was respectable." His words are kind, but the expression on his face is decidedly neutral. There is something about him that instantly unnerves you. Be it the unrushed nature of his mannerisms or the sly look in his eyes, you are not sure, but he sets you on edge. 

You force yourself to speak, calming your features into something just as blank and fixed as his own. "It was fair," you answer truthfully, before pointedly scanning the surrounding area. "It is a beautiful planet." A lie is you have ever said one, and the Mentat does not appear to be ignorant to your sad attempt at charm. Even with the unmoved aura that radiates from him, you are sure that you spotted a small glimmer of amusement pass through the dark of his eyes. 

"I am pleased you think so," he replies easily. "In any case, I have my orders to deliver you to the Baron as soon as possible. An event is being held in the honor of your union to the na-Baron. You shall not want to miss it." 

The confession feels as though it has doused you with ice water, but you refuse to show your distress. You're not stupid. You know that at some point, you would have to face the Baron. You were just hoping that it would not have been so soon. You should have known better, you suppose, that the Baron would give you single moment of reprieve once on his planet, and now you are suddenly not so sure that you want to have to attend a celebration of any sort. 

"Wonderful," you force a smile, one as polite you can manage while making sure to keep your voice gentle and inviting. 

"Leave your soldiers here. They won't be necessary." 

The request leaves you troubled. For a moment you stand there silently, a little dumbly even. That last thing you want to do is leave your only form of proper protection outside on an unfamiliar world. Especially one as hostile and deceitful as Giedi Prime. But you do not have many options here. You are in no true form of power. You are not yet married to the na-Baron, you are lightyears away from your own planet - which doesn't belong to your family anymore by the Emperor's decree - and your father must be on Arrakis by now; even farther away. You are now the one who dictates your fate and survival, and although promised to the na-Baron, your life is still not secured. You must be tactful. 

You turn your head to look over your shoulder at the soldiers who diligently stand behind you and your handmaidens. Your focus meets the unwavering stare of the lieutenant; his hardened countenance, his lips pressed into a firm line. The nod you give him is subtle, but it is still a command, and with it, he and his men silently step back. 

When you return your attention back on the Mentat it is difficult to tell if he is pleased or not with how blank he keeps his features. It's unnerving but then he spins on his heels without any more fanfare and his fellow Harkonnen are quick to shadow him. Hesitation bears heavy in your gut, but even with your instinct telling you to run; to flee, you steel yourself. Drawing in a deep breath to clear your mind, you follow. 

You are not sure what you had expected to find when you had allowed the Mentat to lead you. Some wild, senseless part of you feared that he may have taken you to your death. Led you to a trap to be slaughtered. But no dagger has been raised to your chest. He has not summoned soldiers from the shadows to pull you away and toss you into a tomb. Or maybe in a way he has. 

The doorway that you stand before is daunting. Affixed in front of you like a rival. It is such a trivial, ordinary thing. You have passed through thresholds millions of times in your years, twisted knobs and guided doors open to pass through them. But suddenly, such a mundane thing seems to stand out like a hazardous sign - a bad omen. You know who lies beyond it. Who you must face. Now your bravery threatens to allude you. To leave you abandoned and flailing. It does not help that your handmaidens had been dismissed for you. Guided away by Harkonnen servants, and when you had asked the Mentat as to where they were being taken, what intentions lie ahead for them, he didn't answer. His silence on the matter has left you disturbed; fueled your mind to wonder and theorize about the worst. That they may be harmed. 

He stands next to you now, just as silent as before, watching you expectedly. 

No. You cannot flounder here. You cannot cower or cry. Your duty - your lineage will not allow it. 

With a newfound determination, you step forward with your chin raised proudly. Activated by the motion, the dark door slips open, beckoning you enter, and you answer the invitation without wavering. The Mentat doesn't follow after you, but you hardly pay that any mind, too focused on analyzing the room that you now stand in. The space is open and capacious, and you spot a line of servant girls rowed up to the right with their backs against the wall. They don't glance up when you look at them, even though you can tell that they are aware of your presence. They remain silent, eyes trained on the floor and posture rigid. There is fear in them. 

As if drawn by a magnetic pull, you attention leaves them to wander to the opposite end of the room. His back is facing you, but even then, you are certain that all of the stories you have heard of him will not prepare you for this moment. Even as he perches - lounges on the support of his seat from fully across the room, his presence commands your attention. The order that his being silently instructs is only amplified by the cool, harsh light that pours down around him from the viewing window, highlighting his shape as he sits like a gargoyle poised. The gossip was true, it seems, he is a corpulent man and shares the same ashen complexation as the other Harkonnen that you have seen thus far. And suddenly as curiosity burns in you to see the face of the person who has harmed so many, who has left his blight on the galaxy. 

"Are you joining me, or are you intent on staying in the shadows?" 

The voice is so rough and crude that it shocks you, prickling over your skin with the all the coarseness of sandpaper, and you just barely refrain from showing your displeasure at its harshness. It's graveled as it passes into your ears, but it seizes one's attention instantly, causing the hairs scattered along your body and at the nape of your neck to stand on end. Still you move forward, by the impulse of your own intrigue or the authoritative quality of his voice, you aren't certain, but you cross the breadth that separates you all the same. Each step reveals more of his face to you. The slope of his nose, the crow's feet that cluster around the corners of his eyes, the prominent frown that weighs upon his face. He doesn't spare you a glance as you stop beside him; intently focused on what lies outside of the balcony. 

"Lord Baron," you greet, nodding your head down and bending your knees in a curtsy. 

His hand raises up in a manner than almost seems reprimanding, and it causes you to freeze still, staring at those fingers like he might mean to strike you. But the curl of them is far too lax to deliver a proper blow and it is enough to give you some relief. 

"There is no need for formalities, " he speaks. Then his stare is on you: flaying you open, evaluating, weighing, searching your worth. But underneath the judgement of someone like him, you cannot waver. "We are family now, are we not?" 

The mere implication has you fighting off the urge to shudder in disgust. Instead, you straighten yourself and manage a polite smile. Or you hope that it seems polite at least. Thankfully, he doesn't wait for your answer. He casts a brief glance to the vacant chair close you, and you need no verbal instruction on what he wants, even though he still gives it. 

"Sit," he offers. Commands really. 

 It pains you to comply, to follow the will of the man that you have been guided to resent since you realized consciousness, no matter how small the order, but you swallow your pride. 

Carefully you turn on your feet, being mindful not to nudge the small table that is posted beside the chair, and you make note of the pair of theater binoculars that are displayed on the counter, waiting to be used. Gathering the light pull of your skirt to sit without crumbling the fabric, you allow yourself to recline in the seat and try to ignore how close you are to the Baron. But you suppose that you should learn to come to terms with it. He will be a permanent fixture in your life, whether you like it or not. Though it does not make it any easier to swallow down the bitter taste of loathing on your tongue. Desperate for a distraction your eyes are quick to look out past the boarders of the balcony and the sight that greets you latches onto your focus instantly. It is a wonder how you had even managed to miss the view upon your entrance. But in your defense, you were a little preoccupied. Now you are hardly able to look away. The sheer mass of the structure leaves you captivated. Great, sweeping, walls rise; climbing up towards the blank heavens with rows of seats secured between the hulking barriers. Pale, shifting shapes roar and cheer inside the stands in a fervent display of excitement and anticipation. People you quickly realize. All of them chanting loudly. But the distortion their voices all layered up into a chaotic stream makes it difficult to understand it. The walls that hold them and the very room you sit in encircle a massive plot of bare earth. It is an arena. 

You have seen a few of them in your lifetime. Visited the old coliseums on Caladan. The same ones that your very ancestors had fought wild bulls in. You walked along the ancient, stone walls and pillars, cupped the golden sand within your palm and allowed it to run through your fingers. But the sheer scale of this structure is mindboggling and the number of people that have all massed together to bear witness to its exhibition is even greater. The Mentat had promised you a celebration in the honor of your marriage, and you had been left to wonder what that said celebration may have been. But now you have your answer. There is the evidence of a ferocious fight having taken place in the arena. The face of the white sand bellow has been disturbed. Blemished and smudged by footprints and the clear sign of a struggle; that the fighters had rolled along the ground and tussled for their breath. But even more damning is the dark stains that are streaked and pooled along the course earth. Even with the coloration altered black by the dark sun above, you know that it is blood. 

"A gladiator fight," you conclude aloud, and there is even an edge of scornful humor on your tone. "If you truly wanted a spectacle, you could have me thrown down there. I'm sure your people would love to watch an Atreides be slaughtered." You are not sure where the comment comes from. A sudden burst of confidence or perhaps defiance. You regret your snark as soon as you register the words, but it is too late for apologies now. You simply squeeze your clasped hands together tighter, even while your head is held high. A raspy, amused sound erupts from beside you, like air escaping a puncture, and you just vaguely realize that it is a chuckle. The Baron is laughing even as the smile hardly reaches his face. It is a small sound. Barely even qualifying as a laugh, but it eases you still. 

"A spectacle indeed." He says it as though he is in on a secret that you are not privy to. Part of a joke you might never know, and it immediately snuffs out the small sense of composure that you had achieved. "But I have no use for you dead." 

"Then what use do you have of me?" You pry. 

He hums, a hushed, guttural sound. "Do you know why you are to be married to my nephew?" 

The question gives you pause. There are many duties that you are required to perform in the union with the na-Baron. It is a political alliance first and foremost. A joining of two rival houses, meant to put to rest the animosity that has burned between you both for over 10,000 years. But it is also much more than that. You are to give him an heir as well, the continuation of his lineage. But the Harkonnen are not the only ones who intend for you to produce a child: the Bene Gesserit also demand a progeny of your union (though the Baron must remain ignorant to that design). It is why your mother had been sent the Duke in the first place, to correct Lady Jessica's mistake and birth a daughter. To birth you. So much is dependent on this marriage to flourish. Much that you yourself probably are not even privy to, but it is your duty to perform regardless. If you fail, your family name will forever be smeared and the possibility of the Kwisatz Haderach may be lost to eternity. And you will not allow your mother's death to be in vain. 

"Yes." 

Once more he turns his head to face you and his eyes glint with a deadly intensity. "Then you know of your purpose. "

It is a plain sentence, but it speaks volumes in its simplicity and its intent is not lost on you. It is a warning. A set of instructions that you are meant to follow. Keep your head down, your mouth shut and fulfil your function as promised and you may make it out of this arrangement unscathed. It has anger flaring in the pit of your stomach, prickling over your skin and heating up your face. The desire to say something in defense of yourself rises up high, but you know that you must hold your tongue. You are sure that he can see your opposition in your eyes as much as you try to control it, but he does not mention it. His vision roves over your visage like he is studying you and your reactions, in search of weakness. 

"Now watch." He says and returns his attention back to the bloodied sand beneath. 

Your eyebrows furrow, openly showing you confusion. What the Baron desires you to see, you don't know. You can hardly imagine what he has in store for you but given the nature of the arena and the Baron himself, it surely won't bode well for you. You don't dare to question him or ask that he elaborate. Your mouth remains fixed shut as you survey the colosseum with your breath locked within your lungs. An unwanted type of anticipation prickles at your fingertips and toes; spurred on by the way that the crowd rouses into a frenzy and the vibrations of their riotous cries strike across the atmosphere. The sound of their shouting spikes until it is thunderous, and you can hear the blunt sound of their fists beating against the stadium like a hammer striking down on an iron nail. Despite the many voices overlapping and yelling to be heard of the others, somehow in their clamoring, their words have become clearer. And it is not just words that they are spouting. It is a name. 

Feyd-Rautha. 

You are certain that your lungs cease to function. That they die inside your chest while you still live. The na-Baron is going to fight. You're going to see him. Despite wanting to slip your eyes closed, your body betrays you, leading you to scour along the dark sweeping walls of the arena in a terrified search that does not stop until your vision lands on what looks to be a massive entrance built into the bordering wall of the colosseum. Your heart flutters like a startled bird, quivering wildly like a pair of wings would. "I thought my father said that we would not see each other before the wedding?" 

"He said that he could not look at you. But there was no discussion of you witnessing him," the Baron answers. 

You do not know why the prospect of it makes you shift uncomfortably in your seat, wishing that you could sink into the cushion and vanish. Perhaps it's because seeing him would truly sink the severity of your new reality in. There would truly be no avoiding it once you do. All you can think of is all of the rumors and gossip that you had heard over the many years. The horrible tales of a psychopath. A man unhinged. No better than a rabid dog on a frayed rope. People spoke of a remorseless monster that delighted in blood and was unflinching in delivering death. Other's claimed that his appearance is just as terrifying as his actions. That he's gaunt and hideous to behold with awful, jagged teeth and bloodshot eyes. 

That is not a truth that you are ready to face, and your desire to remain ignorant to the possibility of his unsightly features burns in your gut. You are so caught up in your own anxieties that you hardly register the blaring of the announcer's voice sounding across the stadium, warbling over the sound system to praise and declare the arrival of the man who you have been dreading. You're entirely conflicted; transfixed as the entrance on the far end of the arena begins to slip open, even though your instincts tell you to turn your focus elsewhere. The floor, your hands, the crazed crowd. Anything. But is like watching a great fire or a calamity. The entire time your consciousness warns you not to look, but you are unable to. It is almost as if you have been casted under a horrible spell. Bewitched to see him even though you don't wish to. 

You stare helplessly at the threshold of the arena, and for a moment you wonder if it might be the entrance to the underworld instead. A dark, consuming void for a demon to come crawling out of. But this demon does not crawl. He marches. 

A figure strides out from the gateway wielding two recurved blades and the crowd erupts in an exhilarated cry. From the distance and height, you are unable to discern his features, but the way that he carries himself is already more than enough to give insight to his personality. His steps are long, eating up the ground in quick, measured paces; his shoulders are raised and straight, exuding pride. It's the saunter of someone confident in themselves and their abilities. Someone who is not just in their element but basking in it. He raises an arm high in the air, brandishing his fist and the weapon he clutches in it to address the masses, pointing the tip of the blade to sky as it erupts in a flurry of strange fireworks that burst and flourish like blots of heavy ink. The crowd punch their own arms up in turn and shout his name like an impassioned prayer. 

The apprehension chilling your chest begins to thaw, giving way to a strange sort of curiosity and before you know it, you're reaching for the theater binoculars placed on the table beside you. Anticipation thrums in your veins, nearly making your fingers shake around your grip of the handle as you lift the device up to your face, lining it up to peer into the eyepieces. It takes a moment for your brain to process what it is seeing. Who it's seeing. It's surreal how his once distant, blurred features have become clear and amplified underneath the optics of the binoculars. The familiarity of him strikes you like an unforgiving wave despite never having met him before. But everything, from his gait and the shape of his face seems as though you have gazed upon it a thousand times, ran your fingertips across the rise of his cheek bones and the plains of his face even though you haven't. The familiarity terrifies you, but it also keeps your attention firmly locked onto him. 

What catches your attention first are his eyes. It is difficult to tell their shade from underneath the monochrome emittance of the sun - they seem dark but some buried, distant instinct whispers that they're truly blue. A light shade akin the ocean, glittering in shades of pale cerulean and teal. It strikes you how they burn with a calculated excitement. A dangerous, fervid type of delight as he gauges the crowd with rapt attention. Even with the intense light bathing most of the scenery shades of white you know that the pale complexion of his skin is natural. Paired with the sharp angles that create his features it makes him seem as though he could have been cut from marble; a statue gifted with life and will. His lips, you shamelessly notice, are plush, and are set into a soft pout. 

Even with resentment for the Harkonnen still fueling your heartbeat you're unable to deny that the stories and claims that you had heard about his appearance were awful exaggerations. Absolute lies. You don't want to admit it, but there is a kind of beauty about him. Not one that you would have found on your home planet, but he's quite attractive in a way that is almost lethal. It strikes you in a way that it shouldn't. 

You continue to watch him as he comes to halt in the center of the arena, twisting his feet in a circle to look upon every section of the crowd before facing the direction of the balcony. He begins to lower himself to the ground, resting a single knee onto the sand in a sort of bow. All the while his eyes are trained upward, dangerously close to where you sit and you know that he's looking towards the Baron, kneeling to show his respects. All you can do is pray that he will pay your presence no mind. That he won't care enough to acknowledge you. 

It seems that the universe has no desire to answer your prayers this day. 

His dark focus flickers onto you so suddenly that you hardly have time to register it. As your eyes meet through the glass of the device, you suddenly feel as though you have been laid bare. The deafening cries of the masses fade down into a distant hum as all of your focus centers down onto him. You've never felt so exposed in your life. Like all of your every part of you has been spread open and seen; the darkest facets of you are held forward. It's like he's actually seeing you somehow. Peering at you through the distance that keeps you apart. But it's impossible for him to truly make out your features underneath the guise of the decorative chains that drapes over your face. He can't properly see you from your place this high. Still it feels as if he is looking directly at you, past the distortion of the distance and the cover of your veil and peering into your soul. 

You drop the pair of binoculars away from your face, severing the image of his focused gaze and the odd connection that had been created. Still you can't drop your attention from his figure down in the arena, but the loss of the close, magnified image of the device offers you some type of reprieve. He had felt too close, too near with their usage and the distance helps to soothe you. And with your regular vision provided to you, you are able to notice the other entrances posted along the walls are opening. 

The na-Baron realizes this as well. His head cocks in the direction of the open threshold to his far left, rising up from his crouched stance to properly assess it, eyes trained on the dark gapping gateway as a man ambles out from the shadows. Two others emerge from separate doorways on opposite sides of the colosseum, and Feyd-Rautha shifts his body to appraise them both in their slow approach. The three of them all but shamble towards the na-Baron, feet dragging lethargically across the sand like they caught under a drunken stupor. The realization dawns on you easily, and you are unable to stop yourself from turning to face the Baron with bewildered scowl. "They're drugged?" You accuse, sparing no judgement in your tone. 

"We cannot risk the safety of the na-Baron," he explains without shame, and draws a deep drag from a smoking pipe clutched within his hand. "Measures must be taken." 

You want to argue. But what use would that be? There is not an ounce of remorse or shame in his body. You've known this for years; you didn't have to meet him to realize that. You have heard countless tales of the Harkonnen's selfishness and deceit, so it should be no surprise that they're underhanded enough to rig a fight to the death in their favor. That they couldn't even do their slaves and prisoners the respect of dying in a fair fight. And the na-Baron stands so proudly in the center of that ring, holding himself high as though the scales have not been tipped in his favor. You knew that you were to wed a sadist. A violent, venomous man. It was a shame that you had to marry one that is also dishonorable. 

In the prisoners' approach, blackened figures seem to materialize from the walls of the arena looking like creatures out of a twisted fable. There is a great number of them, six you believe, if your hasty count does not fail you, all clad in a dark skintight material. But even more strangely are the horned headdresses that they all wear; it extends over their countenances to make them appear faceless and inhuman. They vigilantly wander along the border of the arena, and some even dare to skulk close to the slaves as they near the na-Baron, wielding some sort of weapon within their hands like they are prepared to strike the fighters if necessary. They must be referees of some sort, but their costumes make them look like dark spirits instead.

This game truly is devised in Feyd-Rautha's favor. 

The gladiator-slave that approaches from the left is the closest, covering the distance that separates him and the na-Baron quickly despite being lamed by the hinderance of drugs. With the raucous roar of the crowd resonating across the air, the suspense is palpable, hanging heavy and almost painful like a breath that has been held for too long and the people are desperate for release. You can't help the way that you watch expectantly, holding onto the handle of the binoculars like it might help keep you grounded while you observe Feyd-Rautha from the safety of your perch. 

He faces the approaching fighter. And for a moment you think that he is going to make the man hobble to over to him entirely, too cruel or perhaps even lazy to meet his competitor head on. But when the fighter brandishes his sword in an overreaching arch Feyd lunges forward on spry feet, cutting up the small remaining bit of distance with two massive strides and blocks the blade with his own. The arc that the prisoner had raised his weapon in was far too high. It left his most vital organs exposed to be gutted, and the blink of an eye the na-Baron takes the opening, deftly shoving the tip of his opposing weapon into the man's stomach and driving it in deep. The fighter's body goes limp near instantly, the hand holding his weapon slackens and when Feyd-Rautha pulls his sword from his opponent's stomach, he stumbles back on weak legs before tipping back onto the sand, lying belly up in a dead weight to bleed out on the ground.

You have heard of death all your life. Soldiers of your house have shared their stories of gore and anguish to you before. The horrors of the battlefield. And you yourself are no stranger to blood and bruises, having been trained by the best of your father's ranks and even Lady Jessica herself in the ways of fighting and hand to hand combat. Your teachings were meant for survival. Defense. But this is senseless murder set in the guise of entertainment. Cruelty.

Feyd-Rautha does not share the sentiment. He twists around to face the remaining fighters, mouth twisted into a feral snarl, muscles tense, ready to deliver another killing blow. He is clearly on some type of rush after claiming his first kill and his eyes dart between the pair of gladiators, gauging which one to attack first. Both of the prisoners have synced their steps as best as they can, with one coming towards the na-Baron from the front while the other nears from the back, intending to slay him together. 

But Feyd does not appear to be stressed by the prospect in the slightest, in fact you are sure that even from your elevated height you can still make out the presence of a smile on his lips. Delighted and fueled by the rush of adrenaline and the hope of slaughter. He evaluates them both carefully, waiting them out. He doesn't have to wait long though, because suddenly the one who stands behind is rushing towards him in a move that is entirely too impatient, the lapse in judgement probably brought on by the influence of the substance coursing through his veins. The other fighter is still too far from Feyd to offer any assistance, making them both fail in their effort to overwhelm him and attack at once. The na-Baron deflects the strike of the prisoner's sword easily, shoving the man back with the union of their blades to create enough space to deliver a harsh bone rattling kick to the man's bare chest. He stumbles back a few feet, dust spraying in his flounder as he struggles to collect himself from the soiled earth. 

Feyd doesn't have time to strike him down while he is vulnerable, because the second fighter finally reaches him, dipping his body low with the intent to strike his sword into the na-Baron's unguarded back, aimed for the spine. But Feyd is unsurprised by the attack; smooth and effortless in his movements as he rotates around on his feet to slip from the blades course and with the glint of silver the man's throat is sliced as he passes the na-Baron. You hardly would have realized that his neck had been cut at all if not for the way that rivulets of black have begun to pour from the wound, slipping down the pale hue of his skin and dripping to the bleached sand below before he collapses. 

The crowd somehow manages to erupt with even more passion to goad their na-Baron on dispatching the last man. But Feyd doesn't move on prisoner while he's still down on the ground, up righting himself on sluggish, weak knees. It is hard to stomach the sight of it, and you're certain that you can feel the oily, distant impression of nausea bubbling in your stomach. It urges you to look away, but you can't. You are frozen still. Locked into place as you watch Feyd pace around the arena like a predator stalking the bars of its enclosure. He's impatient in his wait for the fighter to finally get up on his feet, and you find yourself a little disbelieving that he would even allow the prisoner that little bit of respect, instead of slaying him while he was down and unable to properly defend himself. Maybe there is some honor in him after all. It's buried and diluted, but it seems there may be a shred of it still. 

The gladiator finally raises himself to his feet, spreading his legs wide to distribute his weight between his feeble legs. You can see resolve slip across the man's body, straightening his shoulders as best as he can to secure the grip he has on his weapon.  But it only prompts more of that amusement to flicker over Feyd's features before he springs towards his opponent. They meet in the clash of lethal blades, and their bodies twist and move like well-oiled machines. Even being drugged and exhausted, the prisoner's movements are powerful and practiced, but you doubt that it will be much of a match for Feyd. He has too many aspects in his favor. The game has fully been fabricated for his victory. But even with that in mind, you would be foolish not to acknowledge the way that the na-Baron uses his body. It is truly a sight - hypnotic almost. The slices he takes with his sword and the strikes that he bares down at his rival are tight. Swift, calculated blows that are charged with raw strength. He acts with pure, practiced confidence. It's clear that the art of combat comes as easily as breathing to him; second nature. The sight of him dodging and deflecting jabs underneath the extreme shine of the dim sun is an impressive display, and you can't help but wonder how well he would fair under the pressure of a fight with real stakes.

Maybe it was the controlled vehemence of his maneuvers and how skillfully he brandishes his blade, but you think that he would thrive. 

The gladiator is still alive, outlasting all of his fellow prisoners and it's honestly a wonder that he has made it this far. But you don't miss the casual way that Feyd holds himself, the security in the slices he delivers and how easily he dodges and moves around his opponent. Often dipping low into the man's space to nick his flesh with small, annoying cuts before dancing out of his field of reach. He's playing with him. Drawing out the fight like a bored cat toying with a wounded mouse. You can see the hope and determination dying in the gladiator with each passing second; it melts from his limbs, giving way to a venomous, mindless agitation. It makes him sloppy. 

He leaps at Feyd with little thought, desperate to get a decent lick in but the timing is once again ill and his body too open. The mistake does not go ignored and the na-Baron uses the mishap to sweep his opponents legs out from underneath him. And curiously, he casts one of his blades aside, banishing it to the sand. But you don't have to wonder for long before his hand strikes out like a serpent to grip ahold of the fighter's hair, using the leverage he has on the sluggish prisoner's head to harshly force him down and secure him on his knees. You can see the way that the man's face twists into a pained grimace, teeth gnashed together to fight off his agony as he pants raggedly, chest rising and falling with labored breaths. Feyd stands behind him like some sort of figure of death. A creature sent to drag weary, tortured souls to their end. 

You see the gladiators loose grip twitch around the handle of his sword, struggling to build up the last remaining scraps of his energy to swing the blade back and drive into the na-Baron's ribcage. But he doesn't have time to deliver the blow. Feyd raises his own weapon, hitching his arm back to build up tension in his hold. In that exact moment, you are certain that your eyes meet. That somehow, between the distance, his gaze reaches your own, focused in its intent like he is looking for your approval, like he is gifting you a sacrifice in your honor. You hardly have time to think of the implications of it before he drives the sword forward into the back of his victim's neck, severing the man's spinal cord and shoving it forward until the tip of the blade peeks through his throat. It is a horrid display of brutality. The violent sight almost forces a gasp from you, and you can feel your body shudder at the presentation of it. Your mind has long since gone blank, too rattled and shocked to form a coherent thought and the frenzied way the masses arise and breakout into a rapturous applause fills you brain like a haze with the wicked, rhythmic chanting of his name. 

He extracts the blade from the captive's body, spraying a dark splatter of blood across the pale sand with the pull and lifts the gore-soaked weapon up into the air in a silent claim of his victory. 

"Is he everything you had imagined?" 

The Baron's course timbre breaks you from your daze. Your head swivels to him like a doll, but the challenge proposed in his tone rouses your focus to the center. He wants you to be afraid. To shy away from his nephew. Why you aren't sure. Perhaps he simply enjoys the idea of an Atreides cowering, but you will give him no such pleasure. You harden your gaze before you speak next, making sure to project your resolve clearly when you answer. 

"He's perfect." It scares you because it doesn't even feel like a lie. It leaves your tongue too easily, like the compliment belonged there. Like your body and soul held it as a truth that you aren't ready to accept, and you're not sure how to cope with that. But what you say next surprises you even more. 

"I want to meet him." 

A part of you had hoped that the Baron would refuse your request. That he would stick to firm to your father's traditions and prohibit you from seeing the na-Baron until the wedding ceremony. But you know better than to think that he would honor or be controlled by old superstitions.  All too soon you find yourself being led by timid servant who wordlessly guides you deep into the inner depths of the arena. The look that the Baron had spared you before you left had been unsettling and sharp, and it made you wonder if you have agreed to go to your own execution. In your descent, the rabid cries of the masses fade into a distant warble, and with it, the corridors become dim and chilled like the walls of a forgotten crypt. The caution in your gut churns with that treacherous sense of anticipation and you struggle to concentrate past the separation in your emotions. You're not sure if you should be fearful or intrigued and it leaves you caught between a confusing sort of purgatory. 

The little bit of suspense hanging over you reminds you of when you used to dream about meeting him when you were both young. Nearly longed for it even, when you'd lose yourself to childish flights of fancy and daydreamed of love and adoration. It scares you to think that the sense of pining you had once entertained for him may have never truly gone away. Even with the stories of his brutish conquests, a blemish on your naive yearning. A stain of red; soaked with the scent of iron and viscera.

The sight of his violent display down in the arena seemed to confirm all of the horrid rumors that you have heard throughout the years. His indifference towards death, how casually he is able to take a life. It should all disgust you. And to a degree it does. It coats your tongue with something acetous and tart. It makes a shiver threaten to tremble down your spine. But as much as you wish to hide from it, you can't deny that he intrigues you. That the sight of him gazing upon you from the ashen sands of the colosseum like you were an ambiguity that he desired to unravel made your body thrum. You wonder if he would look at you so openly in the same way once you are both on even ground. Or if perhaps, some pathetic, traitorous part of you had simply imagined it. 

The servant stops suddenly before a wide threshold, forcing you to still in your tracks to watch as she steps to the side and bows silently without so much as meeting your eyes. And then she leaves, turning sharply on her feet with the gentle echo of her feet pattering along the obsidian floor while she skitters away. 

You're on your own now. 

You're not sure what you will find when you cross this barrier: pain, misery . . . pleasure. A primordial type of anxiousness wells up inside of you, screaming at you to turn heel and run. You could do so easily. Escape these dismal, tenebrous chambers before he even realizes that you're here. But you're quick to squash that wild impulse. It is a dangerous thing to entertain. You must eliminate that urge all together. You're not an animal. You are an Atreides. A Bene Gesserit. You have survived the Gom Jabbar. You passed the test. And you will survive this. 

With no further hesitation you step forward, focusing on sound of your dress whispering over the floor as a means to center yourself. As soon as you cross the threshold it opens up into a massive space, but the shadows are so thick and vast here that it is difficult to see where the walls truly begin or end. A pair of servant girls stand in the corner, just as rigid and silent as the others that you've seen so far, standing with their backs to the wall like they mean to merge into the shadows and hide. The only light to speak of pours from the ceiling, broadening in its descent to encapsulate the massive round pool that sits in the center of the room like a spotlight. And there, lounging along the far end of the bath with his arms draped along the border, relaxed in the murky, steaming water, is the na-Baron. 

When your eyes meet you have to wonder if this is what prey feels like when locked within the gaze of a wolf; poised to lunge and jaws longing to bite. The way that he had gazed upon you in the arena had been appraising and seeking. Like he was sizing you up and searching for your favor all at once. But something in his stare has shifted since then and dipped into something searing and stifling, and it serves as an obtrusive reminder of who you've willingly confined yourself alone with. But you're unable to stop yourself from admiring him as he does to you. Roving your examination over his face, and you find your attention captivated there. The glow of the florescent lighting reveals a delicate cream undertone in his skin, and the light blush in his lips that had been hidden outside, stunted by the black sun. It breathes a sense of life into him, and nearly separates him from the otherworldly image that had been crafted by the violence he had basked in earlier.

"You must be lost." 

The voice that speaks abruptly is husky and inflected with an accented lilt that blends into the rasp of it. It buzzes over your skin, and you can feel it murmur across your fingertips, but it is not enough to distract you from the confusion that sparks in you from the comment. He must notice the perplexed look that crosses your face because you don't even get time to ask him for clarification before he speaks next. "We're not to see each other. Or was that a lie?" 

If you didn't know any better, you would have thought that he sounds insulted. Like the mere suggestion of you not meeting each other before the wedding had been a great offence. But surely it simply came from a place of ego and not genuine rejection or hurt. That would require affection. And that is an emotion that you're certain the na-Baron is incapable of. Still, regardless of if he truly harbors a sense of fondness for you are not, keeping this relationship as cordial as possible is in your best interest for both of your sakes. 

"It wasn't a lie," you finally answer, clasping your hands together in front of yourself. "But I wanted to congratulate you on your win. . . And to finally see the man that I am intended to marry." The final admittance comes out somewhat reluctantly. But it catches his attention still. You can see the intrigue openly flit through his eyes and he tilts his head while he surveys your from across the room in a curious manner. 

"And what do you think?" 

You are not sure if the question is in reference to himself or his performance in the arena. Either way, your answer still stands. Though you find yourself reluctant to reveal it, even while it burns in your throat. But the way that the na-Baron watches you with a glimmer of restrained vehemence in his heavy stare almost rips the truth from the depths of your chest. But your eyes pointedly flicker back over to the servants in the corner before moving back over to the na-Baron. The question hangs heavy in the air, silently exchanged between the two of you. 

"Leave us," he dismisses firmly, without removing his gaze from you. They nearly spring forward on their feet, vision casted down on the floor as they cross the room and vanish past the threshold like a pair of phantoms. You catch the subtle nod of his head as he watches you, and it is hard to tell if it is done with disinterest or an air of mocking.  "There. You may speak freely now." 

You don't hold in your answer now. "Disappointed," you say firmly, and you're thankful that your voice comes out stronger than you feel. A palpable shift rushes over the room. It is frigid. Moving over the blackened walls like a cold front and seeping into your bones; brought on by the subtle vexation that shifts across his features. You can see the muscles along his shoulders and the plains of his chest ripple underneath his pallid skin, tensing in his ire. It has you stuck in place like the bottoms of your feet have been glued to the floor. It doesn't feel like you're in a room with a man but sharing the space with a hunter that has its teeth and claws poised to slice. But you know that you can't cower. Not with men like him. If you give him and inch, he'll take a mile. And if you are going to make it out of this arrangement alive, you're going to have to try to stand on even ground. "That fight. It was supposed to be in my honor. But it isn't much of a victory if your opponents are impaired with drugs." 

"It was out of my hands," comes his answer. It nearly could have been overtly defensive if he hadn't delivered it so steadily and direct. It's a knee jerk reaction to assume that he is lying. It has been instilled in you since birth to be wary of the Harkonnen and their words. And perhaps it is simply a dangerous form of hope, but the intuition in your gut promises you that he is telling the truth. But even then, it is difficult to find forgiveness. 

"And you fought anyway." 

"Careful." His voice cuts across the atmosphere like a sharp growl. He bares his teeth with the warning, letting you catch a glimpse of that dark snarl and for a moment your mind treacherously imagines what it would be like to feel the sharpness of it grazing along your skin. "I've taken tongues for less." 

The threat does not strike fear in you like it should have. Like you expected it to. The longer you spend in Feyd-Rautha's presence, the more that your initial caution begins to ebb away. For better or for worse, confidence seeps in to take its place. You shock yourself for the second time today by moving towards him instead of backing away like someone with common sense would. Though if you're being honest with yourself, you have always flirted with danger. The temptation towards things that you should not want has always taken you to places not meant for you, and it is a trait that your family and teachers alike had struggled to dissuade. That you yourself have always fought. But you can't resist the urge to close the distance between you and him, following after it blindly like you're being tugged along by an invisible string. 

He trails your approach with that calculated sort of interest, fully invested on your form as you carry yourself up the pair of steps. You continue to move even once you reach the final platform, but your feet do not stop moving. It is like some subconscious part of you is determined to cut as much distance between you and the na-Baron as possible. He doesn't tear his attention from you once. It's fully fixed to you as you saunter around the boarder of the bath like he couldn't bear to look away from you, and it fuels you to keep moving forward, only stopping once you stand beside him. He turns his head to gaze up at you from his position, studying you as he lounges. 

"I'd save that for after the wedding, it may be difficult to say my vows otherwise." You level him with a firm stare as your tone shifts from subtly sardonic to hardened, and possibly even disappointed. " Though I'm glad to know where we stand." 

You see something harden in his gaze. What, you are not sure, but the ferocity of it makes you breathless and something heated stirs in your gut. 

"I mean you no ill will," he assures you, as if he had not just threatened you just a moment before. But the gravelly tone of his voice is distracting. It courses over your skin like an electrical current, humming and warm across your body. "I will bring you the heads of a thousand men if it pleases you." 

It's not the admission itself that shocks you. You know that slaughter comes naturally to the na-Baron. You have witnessed that firsthand. But the sincerity and passion that cradled his words made it sound like a promise. A vow. And you know for certain that he is being purely honest. It floods you with disbelief. The way that he watches you is raw. Vulnerable but not weak or insecure. He said it with the zeal of a devout follower speaking of their faith. Full of hunger, reverence and sincerity. It makes your knees weaken and the oxygen in your lungs is suddenly useless. The devotion burning in the dark hold of his stare is something that you never imagined Feyd-Rutha could be capable of. You know that it is not love. That you are not naive enough to believe. But it is admiration. Consuming and wanting. It is almost frightening how he looks at you. Like you are an oasis, a banquet, and he is a man parched and starved. It only draws you to him even more. Like a moth fluttering closer to an open flame; hoping to be burned in its welcoming, vicious warmth.

"Why?" Your voice comes out weakened. You nearly pant, trying to breath around the fit of your bodice. It has suddenly become too tight, squeezing around your ribcage and sweltering against your skin. 

He does not answer immediately. Instead he rises from the depths of the dark water, shifting to turn his body to yours, causing the water to ripple and gleam underneath the light. You can smell the perfume of the oil on his skin, fresh and warm like amber. A scandalous part of you is tempted to glance downward, even though you know that the height of the dusky liquid still hides the most intimate parts of him, but you are unable to tear your eyes away from his. They look like heavy black chasms, drawing you in and stealing your focus until he is all you can see. You can just vaguely register that he's stepping closer to you. He angles his head as he draws near, and you feel the point of his nose brush over yours through the chilled chains of your veil; the warmth of his body seeps past the barrier of your dress and sinks in deep, settling between the cradle of your hips. 

"You and I; we belong together." He says it like it is a fact. A creed. To him it is. He beholds you like you are something worth worship. And the thought of having such a formidable man observing you as though you were an answer that he has been seeking makes something in you burn. It is scorching. Powerful. It knocks you breathless. "I dream of you." 

The admittance makes you gasp. You briefly wonder how he could possibly have been touched by the sight of visions. Much less ones of you. How he had managed to see you in his sleep just as you had seen glimpses of him. But your marveling is quickly flooded and overruled by images of your own past dreams dancing and flashing in your mind. Pale hands sweeping across your body and leaving white-hot trails in their wake; the sting and glide of teeth and tongue; the musk and salt of sweat in your mouth. It rouses a heady sense of curiosity inside of you. And when he raises a hand and slips it underneath your veil to cup your cheek, sweeping his thumb over the shape of your lips, it makes your interest burn hotter. When you speak next your voice nearly catches in your throat. "What do you see? In your dreams." 

The weight of his stare pulls you in and grips you tightly, heavy with a wild sort of hunger that might eat you alive. When he speaks next, the smoky rumble of his voice courses over you and clouds your head with a low mist. "Let me show you." 

You are not sure when he had slipped the veil from over your face and off of your head, but you hear it fall behind you. Hitting the floor with a sharp, twinkling clatter. But you hardly pay it any mind. Too entranced on the heat of Feyd's palm cupping your face, holding you close while his heavy, heated stare bores into your own and in your haze, you admire that they are truly a shade of blue, just as those old visions promised. A gorgeous splash of color caught in a world of black and white. He shifts closer to you - as much as the low edge of the bath will allow, and with it you feel the sultry impression of his body heat glides over you. The cradle of his hand on your face slips from its place, traveling downward until it reaches your neck. Your heart skips a beat when the hold of his fingers reaches around your throat, and you're sure that he could feel the wild pulse of it fluttering against his palm. A flicker of amusement passes through his gaze, and suddenly it feels like some kind of test. He wants to see if you'll crack and flounder while he holds your life in his grip. But you find that the urge to flee has vanished. It's been wrung from you as though it had never been there, and suddenly you can't understand why you had ever wanted to run in the first place. 

The pressure of his hand tightens like he means to squeeze the air out of you and to block your breath. Fear doesn't rise up to greet you. This isn't a challenge that you have the desire to shrink away from. You want more of it. Of him. You lean into his touch instead, tilting your chin back to bare your throat to him, and you see a ravenous type of delight pass over his expression when you do. The weight fixed around your neck; the heady scent of the rich ointment wafting from his skin dips more of that intoxicated haze over you. 

For a moment you wonder if he might actually rip the oxygen from your lungs and attempt to send you to your death. The tight hold of his hand and the dark look glittering in his eyes imply that he might. But then his hold goes light, and you nearly mourn the loss when he allows his fingers to slip from around your neck. Disgracefully, you almost feel a low whine rising to the tip of your tongue. A desperate plead to have his touch on you again. But like an answer to your silent prayer, his hands unanimously run down your body, roving dangerously close to your breasts, leaving your skin tingling in their wake as they trail down and past your ribs to settle on your hips. 

Time seems to slow when his fingers pluck at the smooth fabric of your skirt, bunching the material up into the cradle of his palms until it starts to slip up and over your legs, gradually revealing more and more of you. He doesn't stop until its rucked up enough to slip his hands underneath your dress, and you silently gasp at the warmth of his palms blossoming over your hips. His fingertips dig into your skin harshly enough that you know it'll be tender tomorrow, but you welcome the sting. 

You can see the silent question glimmer in his eyes. The whisper of his nose gliding over your own and the nearness of his lips beckon that you come closer. He steps back just enough to allow you space, and without further prompting you lift your legs over the lip of the bath. The water is nearly scorching when you slink inside, nearly sweeping up to your waist and encapsulating you like melted wax. His grip on you didn't waver or weaken as you moved. If anything, it grew stronger, like he was worried you might slip away from him, even though the idea of escaping is a faint memory for you now. 

When he tilts his head closer to yours, you think that he finally might kiss you and satiate the restless hunger that's been buzzing between the both of you. You feel the low brush of his breath against you lips when he speaks, and the throaty rasp of his voice curls out in one word: 

"Beg." 

It gives you pause. As soon as you hear it something defiant rises inside of you. But it isn't aggressive or wildly so. It's languid and playful. Testing. Despite the shred of desperation that you had nearly caved into earlier, you have no desire to give in so easily now. You aren't going to roll over so quickly. Not without good reason.

"No," you answer calmy, resisting, even when lust burns in your veins. "Give me a reason to." 

In truth, you aren't sure where the burst of confidence comes from. Your experience with things of this nature - the touch of a man and pleasure, isn't nonexistent. You've indulged in a few nights tangled in the arms of a random temporary lover. Secretive kisses exchanged in dimly lit corridors, the ecstasy of a mouth between your thighs. But the art of it is not something that you have fully grasped onto. Flirtation and conviction in regard to sex doesn't come naturally to you. So you aren't sure why you feel inclined to tease him like you know what you're doing. But you want the challenge. Some twisted, perverted side of you wants to see the glint of the psychotic excitement that he had displayed in the arena. You want his hands on you while his eyes burn with that unrestrained ferocity. It's dangerous to goad him on. To taunt him like you understand him. You're playing a dangerous game. Like prodding at a wild animal in its enclosure, or waving a blazing, red flag in front of a pacing bull. 

A fearful part of you expects for him to get angry. That he might lash out and punish you assuming that you could toy with him so freely. Maybe he'll remind you of your intended place and tell you that you aren't equals. That you mean nothing to him. But he doesn't do any of those things. Instead, he sinks down to his knees, lowering himself until the water rises up to his chest. His eyes don't stray from you once, and the hold on your hips remains firm. The intent and hunger in his eyes nearly make you lightheaded. He watches you in a way that's starved. It has you wondering if you're going to make it out of this alive. But a stronger part of you can't wait to be torn apart. 

His hold on your hips gently nudges at you, guiding you to lower yourself until you're seated on the edge of the bath. You spread your legs without him having to ask, and you can see the hint of an arrogant smile perking at the corners of his mouth when one of his hands sweep down to your knee, prying it open. Anticipation simmers inside of you, searing deep inside of your gut like a hot ember. You feel his fingers sweep along your undergarment, hooking his fingers underneath the fabric to tear the delicate scrap of clothing from your hips as though it was made from paper. It stings against your skin when it snaps free, breaking with a sharp hiss as it rips apart. 

You watch in awe when he lifts the frayed fabric up to his nose to draw in a heavy inhale. Embarrassment prickles at your face when you realize that he's breathing in the arousal that had soaked your underwear. It's vulgar. Filthy. But it has excitement buzzing over you and seeping into your bones. You hardly pay attention when he tosses the tattered fabric somewhere across the room, too transfixed as he leans himself forward between your knees, making a space for himself around the cradle of your thighs, hovering dangerously close to where you need him the most. 

His stare pierces yours, digging a place for himself in your mind and soul, and latching on as he delivers a promise. "I'll make you scream." 

Coming from anyone else it would have made you scoff or roll your eyes and cringe. Despite your inexperience, it's a line that you've heard before only to be met with utter disappointment. But you can feel the determination rolling from him, and you know that it isn't a lie. Still, you're prepared to say something snarky. To try and knock him down a peg or two before he's even started, but you never get the chance. 

His head is between your thighs in an instant, spreading you open with his tongue, hot and sweltering against you. It wrenches a startled cry from your chest, and your hands scramble blindly to support yourself, clinging onto the chilled edge of the bath and the damp warmth of Feyd's shoulder so that you don't tip over. He's only just started, and his enthusiasm already leaves you suspended in disbelief. He works his mouth against you with a ravenous intensity, swiping his tongue over you before dipping it deep inside of you in a way that has liquid pleasure pouring over your body; making your nerves light up like wild, hot sparks. Your hips lift up in a mindless roll, grinding over his mouth to chase after the curl of his tongue, and he follows after the sway of your body, unshaken by your desperation. 

Already you feel like you've been lit on fire. Dipped in a pool of nectar and bliss. It has your legs quivering, tensing and flexing with every suck and stoke from his mouth. It pulls ragged gasps from your heaving lungs, and you just faintly register the airy, punched out breaths lightly echoing off of the walls of the room. You can hear the wet drag of his lips and tongue licking at your cunt, tipping you closer and closer to euphoria. It's filthy. Utterly debauched. The very notion of the daughter of a Duke sleeping with a man before her wedding - fiancé or not - is scandalous, and you should be entirely ashamed that you've even wound up in this position at all. But you can't manage to find a single ounce of humiliation in your body. You're in too deep now. Nothing else matters but this moment. Nothing except for him. 

Your head rolls down on your neck, and you're immediately insnared by the sight of him watching you. Most of his face is hidden by the skirt of your dress bunched around your waist, how your thighs frame his head, but you can see his eyes clearly. A haughty sense of excitement dances in them, clearly pleased with the mess that he's already made of you. You want nothing more than to wipe that arrogant look from his face, but it's almost like he can sense the quip that you're prepared to use, because the wet heat of his mouth licks over you before he closes his lips around your clit and your mind glazes over. He drags the hint of teeth over you, lighting up fire in their wake and then he sucks. Your back bows tight, breasts heaving underneath your dress, and you openly sob. But he offers you no reprieve, no chance to breathe. 

With little warning he slips a finger into the wet entrance of your cunt, forcing your walls to stretch around the width of it as he curls it deep. You've touched yourself before. Used you own fingers to pleasure yourself, and you've only ever felt the hand of one other man before. A random soldier amongst the Atreides ranks, but that had been some time ago. The width of Feyd's is much bigger than your own. Thick and long enough that a single one has you gasping. The stretch of it nearly burns. But it builds a heavy ache between the apex of your thighs, rooting itself so deeply along your spine that it tears another watery cry from you. The motion of your hips turns choppy, losing your rhythm in your desperation to reach the scorching pleasure that looms over you like a wall of fire. He barely gives you time to adjust to the first finger before he's inserting another in alongside it, making the muscles of your abdomen contract and wildly. The walls of your cunt flutter around the thickness of his fingers; your body desperate to fall into the throes of release. 

The fullness of it makes your mouth drop open in a silent scream, forcefully teetering you along the edge of something all-consuming and debilitating. You can taste it searing on your tongue, feel it on your fingertips and all the way down to your toes. Uninhibited moans and broken mewls of his name have begun to spill from your mouth. Punched out of you by the ceaseless drag of his tongue and weight of his finger inside of you, crooking along your walls with nasty, wet squelches to shove you closer and closer to that shattering precipice. It forces out a gutted cry that nearly stings on its way out, and you can feel Feyd's pleased laughter reverberate over your flesh in response, and the low tremors only inject more rapture into your veins.  It's so close. Welling and foaming up like boiling water; a rising tide that threatens to sweep you and drown you. 

All at once it stops. 

You cry out like you've been wounded when he tears his mouth from you and removes his fingers from your cunt, leaving you empty and aching. You don't even try to hide your betrayed scowl as you glare down at his face, which looks entirely too delighted for your liking. Your lungs struggle around a ragged gasp, making your voice catch in your throat. "Wha- why you did sto-" 

The question hardly has time to leave you before he turns his head and sinks his teeth into the plush skin of your inner thigh. It sears across your nerves, molten and white-hot, ripping a pained yelp from your chest. The smile on his face is pleased, stretched wide into that dark, impish grin. Your attention is stuck on him as he drops his jaw open, holding your scolding glower as he slips his tongue out to glide it along the sore bite mark that he left with his teeth. The wet warmth of his tongue laving over your skin, soothing the sting that he had made has your brain splitting between pain and pleasure, merging the two sensations into a muddled, delicious blur. 

"Feyd." You meant for it to come out reprimanding and harsh, but instead it sounds thin and panting. You see the satisfaction spark in his eyes at the weakened tone of it, and seeking more out like a glutton, he reaches his hand forward to roll one of his knuckles over your clit. It's pure torture how he's keeping you hung along the edge of bliss. You're still sensitive from your ruined orgasm and the simple graze from the back of his hand has you doubling over like you've been struck in the gut. He tilts his head back to nuzzle his face against your own when you lean in close enough. An action that's deceptively sweet for someone so violent. It has something that feels a lot like affection bubbling up inside of your chest; dulcet and soft. You tear it away and burrow it deep before it can grow. 

Guided by instinct, in a scramble to replace that unwelcome hint of tenderness, you tilt your head to join your lips to his. You can taste yourself on him, earthy and mildly sweet, and just the thought of you marking him with something so intimate - so filthy, makes you weak. He's quick to respond, meeting you eagerly with tongue and teeth. It's nearly bruising. Just as harsh and impassioned as the way that he fights, and it has you moaning into his mouth. But it isn't enough. Your hands turn greedy, sweeping over his shoulders and up the back of his neck, and in retaliation for teasing and his earlier bite, you sink your nails into the skin there, meanly dragging them until your reach his clavicle bone. But he doesn't hiss or wince in pain. The groan that spills against your lips is one of pleasure. The sound has your body thrumming and winding up tight, and paired with the steady circles he draws on your clit it has you dangerously close to tipping headfirst into the throes of melted bliss. But his touch is too light, the rhythm too slow to fully guide you into it. It leaves stuck on the edge of a torturous limbo, and you nearly whimper against his mouth. 

You break the kiss in an effort to regain a sense of clarity, but he's quick to chase after you, nipping at your lips and alleviating the sting with the point of his tongue. "Feyd," you repeat, and this time it sounds horribly close to begging. You can feel your resolve cracking. Splintering down the center and melting with every glide of his finger against your clit. 

"I already told you, Atreides," he murmurs it like a taunt and promise all at once. "All you need is ask." 

He makes it sound so simple. So temptingly easy, but you try to cling onto your pride with a shaking grip. You know that he can see the conflict openly reflected in your eyes. The urge to fight. He moves his face from yours just enough to tilt his head as he evaluates you. It feels so condescending and the low, patronizing way that he tuts at you has a small whisper of determination peeking through the cloud of lust that fogs your mind. But he presses his knuckle against your clit in a mean drag, making your body clench and twitch like it had been stung with a live wire, and with it all cohesive thought blanks out. 

"Why are you fighting?" He asks, leaning his head to run his teeth along your ear, and then the wet blaze of his tongue trails up your throat to lick the salt from your skin. "It could be like a dream." 

It's such a simple sentence, but it reminds you have of how you've gotten here in the first place. The promise of pleasure, the feel of skin under your teeth, the rough grip of his hands on you. In truth, you aren't sure what you're resisting for. What game you're trying to play and win. You're just torturing yourself at this point. Holding yourself back from what you truly want needlessly. It's because of pride. The trait to endure, to remain resolute underneath the call of a challenge or opposition has been instilled in you. You've been taught to be unyielding, to hold yourself back from temptation. Especially when facing an adversary. You cannot show weakness lest you bring humiliation to your house. But you're quickly learning that you don't have much shame anymore. Being in Feyd's presence seems to drain every ounce of it from your body, shifting you into something debased and wanting. And you want him. 

"Please, Feyd, I need you touch me," you beg, panting against his lips. "I need you to fuck me. I need - " 

You aren't certain who moves first. If it's you who slips down from the edge of the bath or if he's the one that takes ahold of you by the hips and tugs you onto his lap. The murky water splashes and ripples from the disturbance, bathing over the lower half of your body in a warm rush as you meet in a desperate sweep of grabbing hands, and the passionate exchange of lips and the harsh graze of teeth. You follow after him as he shifts so he's leaning against the boarder of the bath, allowing you both to focus on the press of your bodies grinding against each other without the worry of falling into the water. His hips roll upward, tearing a surprised gasp from you when you feel the hard weight of his cock nudge between the apex of your thighs, brushing over your clit in a slow drag. 

The feel of it is jarring almost. Dousing a small chill across your body with the reminder that you're beginning to reach the point of uncharted territory. You've never gotten this close with anyone else before. Had never entertained the idea or even desired it. Your explorations of the male body had never gone past you taking them into your mouth or vice versa. This is completely out of your depth and all of the efforts that you had taken in preparation had done little to soothe your nerves. You had spoken to your chambermaids and Lady Jessica alike about sex before, the art of love making and what you should brace for, and they had all warned you of pain. A deep tearing pain and the blood that comes with it. It had given you hardly any inclination to anticipate losing your virtue. 

But even with worry tensing your gut the fervent, burning desire that's consumed you hasn't released you from its snare. Still, Feyd seems to have noticed the rigidity in your body, the way your muscles have coiled in your internal distress. He tips his head back to part his lips from yours so that your eyes can meet, and you can see amusement glittering in the darkness of them like your nervousness is humorous somehow. 

"You have nothing to fear. I'll be gentle, just this once." The reassurance (or threat, you aren't quite sure) skirts over you, rough and enticing within the gravel of his voice. One of the hands that he has on your hips softly grips around your wrist, and you're left to watch curiously as he guides it down into the inky water. You gasp when he slips your palm around the weight of his cock. He's rigid and smooth in your hold, and when you inquisitively stroke your hand up the length of him, it's a little intimidating to discover the substantial girth of him. You swallow nervously around the saliva that pools in your throat. It's difficult to focus around. It's like your own body is confused, thrumming with an electrical sort of anticipation, and the clutch of anxiety that stubbornly burrows deep underneath the influence of your lust. 

But there's something about the arrogant glint in Feyd's expression that makes you bristle. It gives you a touch of confidence; small, hardly there at all, but it's enough. You grip him before your determination can falter, holding him steady as you line him up to the soaked entrance of your cunt. It takes you a moment to notch him against you - a combination of your nerves and lack of practice. But when you finally do, you have to draw in a deep breath to center yourself. He's thick and warm against you and it's such a foreign sensation. A side of you still hasn't caught up with the fact that you're well and truly here, tangled up in such a scandalous position with the na-Baron - your enemy. Your rival. But it's even more shocking with how little the fact is beginning to bother you. It should frighten you. It should sicken and repulse you. But you find that it doesn't in the slightest. You only feel the damning lick of desire, the urge to chase after your pleasure and to feel the na-Baron come undone underneath you. 

With a deep inhale you begin to sink yourself down on him before your nerves can get ahold of you. The stretch stings from the head of his cock working inside, the muscles between the junction of your hips straining from the effort. It's already intense, splitting you open with a fullness that you have yet to feel before even though he isn't even halfway in. Every shred of oxygen has been punched out from your lungs, and your mouth drops open in a silent gasp as you continue to slip yourself down onto him, forcing your body to accommodate to the width of his girth. Liquid, molten honey drips down the length of your spine, blurring with the raw sting rooted deep inside of you, nearly making you double over from the intensity of it. 

"Easy," Feyd hums suddenly, reaching up to cup the side of your face. When he swipes his thumb underneath your eye, you just vaguely register the dampness there. Tears. You hadn't even realized that you had begun to cry from the overwhelming nature of it all, and even though it's expected, it's a little irritating to see how unbothered he appears to be while you feel as though you're coming undone at the seams. But the warmth of his hand against your cheek pulls you from the searing, electrical pressure of your muscles giving around his length, a beacon in a storm. It's another oddly, sweet gesture from the someone so brutal, and combined with the soothing weight of his hand on your waist, it has another bout of that horrendous affection rising up inside of you. Even when he lifts his tearstained thumb to his lips to lick the damp salt from his finger. 

It's all too overwhelming. The sensation of his body on yours, his eyes on you, the push of his cock filling you up. It has more desire building up inside of you and it guides you to sink even more of yourself down on him, eager to take every inch. You feel it when the crown pushes past the tight ring of your cunt. The abrupt pop sends heavy tremors across your body, making your spine bow forward like a melted candlestick. It's like every bit of your energy has been sapped from you by a single motion and you have no choice but to let your head prop against his shoulder as you collect yourself with a trembling sigh. But you don't bother giving yourself any reprieve, discarding his earlier advice and bearing your hips down to force more of him deep inside, and your jaws drops open in a silent, punchout scream when your walls stretch to accommodate him.

Your mind has all but melted underneath the intensity of it, shifting to a blank with each inch that you take. By the time that the back of your thighs meets the support of his lap you feel like pure, useless mush. Reduced to pliant mess by the sudden fullness that's been stuffed into your cunt. You swear that you can feel him in your throat, shoving your lungs tight against the walls of your ribcage, keeping you breathless. 

"I told you to go easy." The rumble of his voice breaks out, bleeding past the clouded over haze in your mind in a deep rasp. It's difficult to discern if he's mocking you or chiding you, but knowing what you've learned of him already, it's safe to assume that it's probably both. 

You distantly feel you shake your head against his shoulder, more of that defiance rearing up. "I don't want to go easy," you counter. It takes you a moment to build up the strength and coherence to pull yourself back, tilting your chin up to assess him. His eyes are like burning pits, a yawning void that wants to eat you alive. But you don't have it in yourself to shy away from it. Instead you lean forward, slipping your hands around to grip the back of his neck, supporting yourself has you brush your nose along his. The press of his body underneath you is unflinching, his expression relaxed, but you are certain that you feel something in him waver. The hint of a vulnerability. A fleeting glimpse of it. But that's all you need. It's more than enough to tell you that if you want to, you can just as easily have him wrapped around your finger.  

You angle your head closer, pressing soft kisses along the plush of his lips and the sharp cut of his jaw. "Please," you beg softly. 

His mouth is on yours in an instant, hot and hungry, pulling you into another frenzied kiss, licking into your mouth to taste you. Just the glide of his lips against yours is enough to have that heated coil in your stomach already winding up tight. You feel like you're drowning. Caught up in a torrent of heat and bliss. It has your hips rising up mindlessly, instinctively working yourself on the length of his cock in a desperate need to chase after your pleasure. Stinging aftershocks trickle across your muscles with each short drag, but it only serves to make your nerves hum; aching so wonderfully deep that your eyes nearly roll back. 

His lips leave yours to trail along to corners of your mouth, sweeping down your jaw to nip and bite along the delicate skin of your throat, intent to leave his mark on you. It distracts you. Pulling your focus onto the sharp cut of his teeth on your neck, that it completely catches you off guard when he secures an arm around your waist, pinning you close to his body before he thrusts his hips up into yours like he's determined to carve his place between your them. The pace that he sets is grueling. A merciless rhythm that strikes the air out of your lungs with each pronounced roll. He fills you in a way that hurts, stretching you open with every plunge of his cock. But it's an exquisite type of pain. It feels like it's tearing you apart just to piece you back together again. 

You struggle to meet his pace. Your movements aren't as coordinated; choppy, and he doesn't wait for you to catch up and figure out the greedy movement and rhythm he's set. The sway of the water around your bodies seem to stifle and aid the motion of your hips simultaneously, dragging them down and lifting them all at once. You're practically useless above him, forced to sit and take it. But he doesn't seem annoyed or undeterred in the slightest with the way that he pounds himself into you. It has your brain going fuzzy, glazing over with the impression of his veins gliding along the walls of your cunt. His chest rubs against your breasts, shifting the smooth material of your dress over your nipples, and the added friction makes your back pull taut. 

The heat of his mouth closes over the vulnerable stretch of your throat and you can feel the tip of his tongue glide over your pulse like he's tempted to sink his teeth in deep to drink the flow of your blood. Your cunt clenches down on his girth at the thought, and you're rewarded with a low, guttural groan that reverberates across his chest from the inside out. It makes you eager to hear more from him. To make him just as broken and debauched as you are. 

You can hardly recognize yourself anymore. The way that he's practically turned you into an animal; wanton and gluttonous. You can hear the sound of your own voice, unrestrained and loud as it cries out in pleasured moans and whimpers. You don't think you've ever heard yourself this way. So uninhibited and sinful. None of your past lovers, as satisfactory as they had been, had ever been able to pull reactions like this from you. It nearly makes you feel like a stranger in your own body. Unfamiliar with your skin. But it's irresistibly good, unprincipled and shameless. But it feels like pure release, untethered by expectations or rules. And like a starved thing, you want more. You want more of him. To hear him, to feel more of him, to taste him on your tongue. 

In a wild craving to hear the throaty sound of his pleasured breaths, you slip your throat away from his mouth, ignoring the disgruntled snarl that stretches across his lips to grip the nape of his neck. You lean forward before he can question you and press your teeth into the smooth flesh that stretches over the junction of his shoulder, careful not to break skin but enough to cause the sting of pain. It's like a prize when a deep groan rips out from his chest, but the sharp, bruising thrust that follows closely behind nearly dislodges your teeth from him. He must have noticed the grip of your jaw waver because he slips a hand up to cradle the back of your skull, securing you in place. 

"More," he demands in a thick rasp. 

The sound of the request has liquid fire dousing over you, and you don't have the strength or desire to resist. You sink your teeth down even more until it threatens to split skin underneath the weight of your bite, stopping short before you could do any actual damage. But the irritated, almost forlorn sigh that greets your ears catches your attention. His fingers flex around the back of your head like he wants to shove you closer. But surely he doesn't want that. Your teeth will tear right through him if you apply any more pressure. 

"Harder." The insistent order comes out like pure gravel, and matched with another wild thrust, it has your teeth clamping down on his shoulder. The muscles in your jaw squeeze tight until flesh breaks and something iron and strangely bitter spills across your tongue and threatens to pour down your throat. The noise that leaves him is gutted and wanton. Your body clenches around him as soon as you hear the ragged panting that trickles from his lips, setting you alight with even more ardency, and the sting of your bite searing across his nerves somehow manages to fuel him with even more vigor. He rams his cock into you with heavy strokes that are debilitating. You nearly feel like a doll, nothing more than a being for his pleasure, if not for the reverent way that his hands begin to glide along your body. Clutching you to him like might slip away. 

It pulls you close to him, and the position has his pelvis grinding against your clit with every roll of his hips. Unable to hold in the string of moans and whimpers that beg to slip from your chest, you have to slip your teeth from his skin to pant and cry against his shoulder. It's like the sun is eating at your body. Warmth, and heat, and rapture scorching you from the inside, threatening to burn and tear you apart. You can taste it, warm and sweet on the tip of your tongue, mixing with the dark tart of his blood into an intoxicating flavor. It makes you lose all sense of yourself with your mind slipping under a blank mist. Your body is so distant from you now and the only thing that keeps you connected to it is the pleasure and ecstasy soaking your limbs and filling your lungs; the thickness of him stretching you open and stuffing you full.  

"Feyd," you gasp like a warning and a plea, blindly clawing at his arms and shoulders to keep you tethered down and present. But each relentless thrust just hurtles you closer to that yawning precipice. The head of his cock brushes against something deep and devastating inside of you and that's all it takes for you to split apart with a ragged scream. You hardly have time to brace for it when it finally reaches you. Bursts of white and piercing stars explode behind your eyes like a kaleidoscope; fire and electricity seize you tight, forcing every muscle in your body to wind up tight like you've been shocked. All of the air has been snatched from your lungs making your feel as though you've blacked out; lightheaded and sluggish. 

You can hear Feyd grunting in your ear, but his pacing has turned messy, losing the pronounced, steady rhythm he once had in his desperation to reach his own end. Thrusting into you in a manner that's almost wild. Both of his hands find your waist and his fingertips dig in deep enough to tear a weak cry from you. With a long, guttural moan he reaches his climax, burying himself deep into your cunt as he fills you with a flood of pulsing warmth before sagging back against the boarder of the tub. 

You aren't sure how long you stay like that for, suspended in a space tucked between your body and thrumming, pulsing heat. When your breath comes back to you, it's labored and deep, drawing in the scent of perfumed oils and the heady salt of sweat. You've gone limp, limbs lax and useless as your full weight drapes across the firm press of Feyd's body underneath you. It's soothing to have him close, even though it shouldn't be. There should be fear in your chest. Self-disgust and betrayal should hang over you like a cloud, but there's nothing except for satisfaction and peace. Maybe it will leave you once the influence of pheromones and the high of sex dissipate, and reality will come hurtling down on you with the conviction of a calamity. But as of now, you have no desire to entertain any of those anxieties. You nuzzle closer to Feyd, tucking your face into the crook of his neck with the ease of someone who's done it a thousand times, even while a faint part of you worries that he'll shove you away. That he might push you from him and rise from the bath to leave you abandoned in water turned tepid and soiled to remind you of your true place here. But he doesn't. He lets you settle over him, idly running his fingertips up the divot of your spine from over the cover of your soaked dress. 

You feel the thrum voice of his vibrate across his chest before you hear it, and a part of you expects some sort of scathing remark.

"Did I still disappoint?" 

Your eyebrows furrow at the question as your slow-moving brain struggles to follow the question, and the near flat quality of his voice doesn't assist you any. But when your finally grasp onto the realization, you can't fight off a light smile that perks at your lips from the notion that he might be teasing you. The affection is back with a vengeance. Blossoming in your chest, saccharine and warm. But now you don't have the strength to try and shove it away or to distract yourself. 

"Hmmm," you hum lowly, feigning consideration as you draw in a deep sigh. "I suppose you've redeemed yourself." 

The scent of something strongly metallic fills your nose, settling deep and pulling you from the gentle fuzz that's stuffed your skull. It draws you to pull yourself from the cradle of his chest to evaluate him. Your eyes are quick to scan his pallid skin and you immediately notice the rivulets of black that pour down his shoulder, streaming from the angry bitemark that has been cut into his flesh. Guilt spreads through you at the sight even though he had commanded - begged, really, for you to do it. You're sure that his blood is still smeared across your lips in a dark stain. More proof of the pain you had eagerly inflicted on him. 

"I'm sorry," you apologize softly. You reach down to cup some of the murky water into the divot of your palm, it has healing properties you remember reading, and lift it up to gently pour it over the wound. Even though it must sting, he doesn't so much as flinch underneath the feel of the medicinal liquid flowing over the gash. 

"Don't be," he assures. He glides the pad of one of his thumbs across your bottom lip, and you distantly gather that he's collecting the glaze of his blood there. His eyes follow the motion like he's entranced, and the intensity behind it could have sparked another bout of lust in you if you weren't already so spent. He lifts his black-stained fingers between you both, rubbing his fingertips together as he watches the smear of blood glitter underneath the cast of the pale lighting. "I'll wear it with pride." 

There it is again. More of that odd, unwavering devotion. Perhaps you should be suspicious of it. It could be some sort of ploy to lull you into a false sense of security, but instinct tells you that he's being purely honest. And that might be even more frightening. If he's already so committed and consumed by lust and entitlement now, then there's truly no idea what could happen if his admiration were to evolve into something deeper. Darker. Less restrained. Horrendously, the prospect of it intrigues you. You can't help but wonder what it would be like to bask under the attention of Feyd-Rautha's obsession. An even sicker side of you might hope for it too. 

You snap that thought shut and bury it deep before it can flourish. You concentrate your mind on your surroundings instead, like the dark water lapping along the edge of the bath, soaking the expensive fabrics of your dress, now damaged and defiled, and the musk of sex and fragrant oils hanging heavy in the air; the press of his flaccid cock still stuffed inside of you. But the weight of Feyd's stare cuts through all of it, gravitating your own to raise to him in turn. You can see the pale hint of blue reflecting in them, just as gorgeous as the expanse of a wild ocean. It draws you closer to him and he angles his head to join his lips to yours. For the first time this night this kiss is something soft and gentle. It feels like reverence when the plush of his mouth parts against yours. Drawing in the taste of you on the tip of his tongue, exchanging a mix or your arousal and his blood with the glide of your lips. It's a kiss that pulls you down into his orbit. It makes everything fade it an unclear background until the only thing that matters is the warmth of him underneath your hands; the pulse of his heartbeat thrumming steadily within his chest. With another delicate nip of his teeth and the sweep of his hands around you, temptation rings throughout your bones and begs you to fall into him. 

And without any resistance, you do. 

[sexydoffyman]

Could you do Alejandro for any day 26-28? I couldn't choose so🤷

day 28 - POSSESSIVE

Alejandro Vargas

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genre: smut

mdni

Oh, Alejandro is a passionate lover. Poor dude just can't get enough of you. He is very loving and doesn't want to be separated from you for an extended period of time. He brings you to some more casual meetings he has with the 141 or Los Vaqueros.

He will, of course, make sure to not let any danger close to you. He avoids going with you to meetings that involve you meeting other people than he knows and trusts. He doesn't want you to get affiliated with his work life, Rudy being the only exception.

He isn't really mean about it. He just doesn't let you go with him. All playfully. He loves to play fight with you. It's fun, and it's the least aggressive way to make you stay home.

This month is different than the others. An enemy task force has infiltrated Las Almas in hopes of finding Alejandro and Rudy. They wanted to use them for interrogation purposes.

Fortunately, this task force didn't really have their plan settled. Thanks to this, they went in blind, and Price was able to get intel on them. Since no one else other than Alejandro and Rudy, plus their families, was in danger, Price decided to let them look for the two men while keeping a watch on them.

They didn't want to cause any harm to any other civilians. No one saw a problem with Price's plan. Alejandro came home early that day, telling you to pack essentials. You panicked at first, knowing that there might be danger thanks to his job. But after he calmly explained why you needed to get out of Las Almas for a while, you followed his instructions.

He brought you to a military base where you met Rudy's family. While you were talking to Rudy's older sister, Alejandro was arguing with Price. Price wanted you in the meetings because they discovered you were also one of the targets.

Alejandro argued for the sake of your privacy and just because he didn't want dangerous, strange men in the same room with you. Price eventually convinced him to have at least one of the 141 with you at all times. But when everyone was on a meeting, you had to be there too.

And that's how you ended up in the meeting room with Alejandro on your left. He wanted you on his right side to make sure he could act in time in case of an attack. You finally realised why Alejandro didn't want you there.

Two dude's eyes on you. They were both equally deranged. They haven't seen someone as cute as you in a long while. They have been surrounded by rough, sweaty men for months, after all. One was half checking you out and half paying attention to what Price was saying.

The other one was watching you like a hawk. You glanced at Alejandro, but he looked like he hadn't noticed. You didn't want to bother them, so you kept quiet.

Alejandro led you to your room and chatted with you about the mission. He had you next to his side, so why not engage in some small talk. He wanted to get some coffee, so he gave you the keys to lock yourself in the room.

After he walked out of the room, you locked the door just like he instructed you. A few minutes later, you heard knocking on the door. You went to open it for Alejandro. You were putting the keys into the lock but stopped immediately. You noticed that it took him a strangely short time to get the coffee.

You got all of your logical brain cells working and just decided to look through the peephole. To your surprise, the man standing in front of your door really was Alejandro. You opened the door ready, already asking him how did it take him such a short time to make the coffee. But something stopped you from saying the full sentence.

His hands were bloody, but he wasn't wounded. He said with a smile, "Ghost made coffee for Soap and Gaz, but forgot that they were on a jog, so I just decided to take them both so as to not waste."

"And Ghost wasn't questioning why are your hands bloody?" You asked him. Alejandro put the two coffees and something else on the bedside table before turning to you. "He helped me when they walked in."

You stood there surprised, realizing that he must have noticed at that time. He walked up to you and lifted you off the ground on the bed. He sat above you and continued with his story. "He held the other one in place when I took care of the bigger asshole."

You were on your back. You looked at his pants and understood where was this conversation heading. Before letting him do whatever he needed to do, you decided to look at the bedside table. You wondered about what he put there.

What you noticed were the IDs of the two dudes. You chuckled to yourself for thinking that Alejandro wouldn't notice. "Whatcha did to them?" You asked while he was already taking your shirt off. "Bashed one's head over a counter, chocked the second one."

He was kissing you and smiling, knowing you're his and his only. This view was only for his eyes to see. And he wouldn't let any other man get to you. He was a little upset that you thought he would let them get away with that.

He just decided to fuck it into you. To make sure you remember he won't leave you behind. You wouldn't be on his dick right now if he didn't even love you enough to save you.

[iwritenarrativesandstuff]

I'm going to expand on one more deranged (very unlikely) theory before I go to bed.

So, many people have pointed out that Fyodor's last words were Jesus' as well, shortly before he died and was resurrected three days later. @originalaccountname makes an excellent point that the other side of the Page was set to be activated on the next full moon... which is in three days.

But I also suggested that Fyodor did something to Sigma - and here's how we can merge these theories, through the power of flex tape and my egregious lack of sleep.

Here's the thing about Fyodor's ability. We still don't know how it works but many people have commented on how he only seems to use it on non-ability users - and it kills them instantly. Blood spurts from their heads. We've never seen him use it on an ability user... so many people assumed it couldn't kill them. When Fyodor lets Sigma take the information from him, Sigma sees everything and passes out, comatose from sheer information overload. But it's entirely possible this is not the only thing Sigma "received". Fyodor simply allowed him to read whatever he wanted, and his ability also works through touch. Is it possible Fyodor's ability activated too?

If that's the case, what did it do?

Well, this was where I kept saying - guys, I think the split personality has an element of truth to it. While that performance was all an act - perhaps it draws from the truth of Fyodor's ability. Maybe the killing people part... is actually the ability not working the way it is supposed to. Then what else could that action of allowing Sigma to read him (and thereby making contact) be, but some kind of precaution in case he were to die?

I'm suggesting that Fyodor's ability may involve some kind of possession. A possession through corruption over time.

If that's the case, it would make Fyodor something that perhaps was once human but is no longer - if he's been surviving by transferring himself to others through his ability, then might it be said that he has ceased to be truly human? We know abilities require human souls... but what if both a person and their ability were to transfer to another body - would the body not have to be suitable to harbour an ability? It implies ability users are the only ones who are suitable "hosts"; for people without abilities, they cannot take the strain of the invasion of Fyodor's being and die instantly.

Fyodor is likened to a demon or conjuror. If he is able to hijack others' bodies, then that's rather like a demonic possession. What does this have to do with Crime and Punishment? Well, I won't speak on the book itself, but I will say that in Dead Apple, Fyodor says "I am crime" and his ability responds with "I am punishment".

He sees the two concepts as "close friends". Crime as the body, punishment as the ability. Two possible interpretations - one, Fyodor learned how to cheat death using his ability, which is a "crime" that he commits to carry out his "punishment" on those who are sinful (this "crime" could've been learned by poking around human brains, which may explain why he knew how to give Ivan and Nathaniel a lobotomy lmao). The other is that the "crime" is whoever he happens to be inhabiting (as an ability user, he sees them as sinful innately), and the "punishment" is inflicting his ability on them to corrupt them and take control. In other words, his true punishment can only be inflicted on ability users - death is not punishment and is seen by him as release.

There's also the final words he says, which are Jesus'. I want to go back to Sigma for a second. A man written into existence from nothing for some as yet unknown purpose... Is it possible he will awaken three days from now?

If so, it's possible he could use the Page on the full moon, goaded into it by the piece of Fyodor that was transferred to him, in order to actually, properly resurrect Fyodor, and/or slowly take over Sigma's body and mind as he gains more control from the inside. That is all.

Hope this was at least coherent. I can barely keep my eyes open I'm so tired

[scarletsaphire]

It's @ecto-implosion posting time folks! This is my fic for @pokkeshii, whose (incredible fantastic epic cool) art can be found here. And thank you to @pricklenettle for betaing, I really appreciate it!

This fic is 5 chapters, and will be posted every other day. The images are inserted during the fic, but PLEASE go show keshii the love and admiration she deserves for making this MASTERPIECE IT IS SO COOL!!!

Summary: Danny’s been doing fine. Sure, he has to focus on keeping himself from shaking, and the voice in his head goading him to hurt has been getting louder, but its fine. He’s got it under control. He’s human more than he is ghost, and he has things to fight for. He can’t afford to give in. He won’t give in. He won't.

Danny let his backpack fall to the ground beside him with a thud as he took his seat in the back of the classroom. His shoulders were tensed, his jaw was clenched, and his leg tapped a fast, anxious rhythm, causing his knees to bang against the bottom of the desk hard enough to hurt. Anything to help ease the vibration settled under his skin. It did help. Just a little.

He only had to make it through this class. One more class, and he’d be done with school today. One more class, and he’d be able to do something that actually helped. 

Danny raised his hand to his mouth on instinct, coughing the icy exhale of his ghost sense into his fist and suppressing a groan. He stood up and walked to the door, not bothering to get permission to leave or let the teacher know where he was going. All of the teachers at Casper High had long since given up on keeping Danny in class. Most of them had given up on Danny completely. He didn’t blame them.

The closest room was the janitor's closet, which was locked. That was annoying. He reached his hand through the door. The tingling in his hand got worse as it went intangible, nearly causing his whole arm to vibrate. He grit his teeth harder, and focused on unlocking the door from the inside. That's all he had to do. Unlock the door.

He heard the soft click of lock, and pulled his hand back quickly, dropping his intangibility. He shook it, trying to get the residual tingles out. He kept trying even as he slipped into the dark, musty confines of the janitor's closet, pushing the mop that probably hadn't been used in months out of his way. He stopped shaking his wrist, and braced himself. 

His transformation washed over him quietly. Danny kept his eyes shut tight, his fingers digging into the side of the splintered shelving unit. As he shifted the vibration only got worse, more severe, and his grip tightened until the wood started to crack under his grip. Finally, his transformation finished and the sensation faded away into the normal vibration of his core and a persistent voice in the back of his head. A voice that he would not acknowledge.

Danny still didn't let go of the shelves. He focused on taking breaths he didn't need, pushing that voice further and further back. For a moment, his entire purpose narrowed down to suppressing it. One deep breath in, one deep breath out, and a futile attempt to quiet his mind. 

It took the scream of someone out in the parking lot for him to snap out of his haze. Not a scream of pain, thankfully, but one of joy, calling out Ember’s name. Now that he was focusing, he could hear Ember singing from somewhere outside the school. 

Just because they weren’t hurt yet didn’t mean he could waste time. Every second he waited was another that someone could be in danger. But he couldn't just throw himself into a fight anymore. He needed to prepare himself, or else that voice in his head might get what it wanted. If that started, it wouldn't be a fight Danny could win.

With one last exhale he let go of the cabinet and let his body relax. He couldn't waste any more time. 

—

Ember was about where he expected to find her; crowd surfing on a small hoard of teenagers and shredding her guitar all the while. 

"You know, for someone who can fly, you'd think you'd be able to stay in tune while crowd surfing."

Ember floated up off the crowd, much to the mind controlled masses disappointment. "There you are baby pop," she said. "Always fashionably late these days. Might as well try not showing up next time."

"And leave you to inflict mediocre half finished songs on these poor people?" Danny crossed his arms and bared his teeth in an almost smile. "Not a chance."

Ember scowled at him, and his smiled widened. Ember was always easy to goad. "Why you little-" she cut herself off by flying up to him,  her hands fluttering over the strings. Danny dodged to the left of the sonic blast she sent his way. He let his body settle into the routine of the fight, and let his mind clear. Even the voice that normally pounded against his skull went quiet. It was satiated. At least for now.

Danny switched his momentum on a dime, twisting back to charge at Ember. She could throw a punch if she needed to, but she always preferred distance. That meant that if Danny wanted to end this fight quickly, he should take advantage of that. " But why would you want it to end early?" The voice whispered. It sounded like him, blending in with the rest of his thoughts. "You always have such a good time. Why cut it short?"  

Ember twisted her guitar around to block Danny's approach, sending out another sonic blast at him. He tried to maneuver out of the way but was pushed back. He managed to stay on his feet- or at least stayed oriented the way he wanted to be. Danny his ectoblasts in his hands, continuing the charge. He launched them both at Ember, but she deflected the first one into a nearby car, the other one whizzing just by her ear. 

Danny was almost close enough to grab her, but she let herself fall back into the crowd still gathered below. Danny cursed, hovering above the heads of the people, glaring down at Ember. "Aw, what's wrong? Still struggle with crowd control?" She strummed her guitar again, and the star struck crowd went from hovering around her to trying to climb on top of each other. She’d used this trick before; they were trying to grab Danny and pull him down.

He needed to separate Ember from her groupies. Even if she hadn't decided to weaponize them, just their presence was boosting her power. Now that she was in the center of them, she was even more of a threat. Getting her out without hurting any of the people was going to be a problem. The one good thing about this situation was that Ember wouldn't hurt the humans herself; injured fans didn't cheer as loud.

"Why worry about it? They're the ones in your way. It would be so simple if you just stopped worrying about them."

Danny let himself float further away, and the crowd stumbled on top of one another as they all tried to follow after him.  Ember stayed behind the group, strumming a cord on her guitar and a wave of sonic energy at him. He dodged it without a thought. Interesting. Just as his plan started formulating, he started talking. "And here I thought you liked being center stage. Just letting all these folks steal your spotlight?" 

"Every good musician has background dancers," Ember said. Another ectoblast was fired Danny's way, and he flew further backwards to avoid it. The crowd continued stumbling after him reaching over each other and trying to grab his boots. 

"They don't seem very background to me," Danny shouted. Another ectoblast, and another few feet backwards. 

"Then we'll call it my opening act. Once they're done with you, I'll be sure to put on a real show. " She laughed and sent a volley of attacks at Danny, pushing him further back. 

As soon as there was a break in the attacks Danny leapt off the ground, flying forward as fast as he could. His legs shifted into a tail behind him, letting him fly even faster. He zoomed over the heads of the crowd, their reaction speed too slow to grab him. The group had been following him as he led them away, creating a nice space between them and Ember. Enough space for him to do what he needed to do.

"Enough space for you to do what you want to do. Stop being such a stick in the mud. Let yourself go a little, let yourself tear her apart, just-"

Ember had enough time to dodge to the side, but he'd expected that. A blast of pure cold left his hands directly towards Ember. The already icy ground was coated in a layer of frost, and Ember hissed as her flame hair flickered from the change in temperature. Danny used the opportunity to skirt around her, transferring his momentum onto the ice. By the time she turned around, Danny had his hand pressed to her side, an ectoblast charged against it.

"Bye." Danny waved, and Ember was sent flying into the side of the school. 

Danny turned towards the school. Ember was sitting in a pile of what used to have been the wall, the foundation of the school visible through the bricks. She was clearly dazed, as she hadn’t bother to try and phase out of the pile yet. This was the perfect chance to end the fight. His hand went to the Fenton Thermos on his belt

"Keep fighting. Prove that you're stronger, prove that you're the best. Show her what happens when someone messes with you, with your territory. She's vulnerable. She's weak. Make her never able to show her face again. Or even better, take her face."

Danny shook his head and uncapped the thermos. Ember was sucked inside, leaving claw marks on the ground as she went. Danny twisted the cap back on. He let himself just one moment to exhale, just one second. He just needed one second. And one second turned to two, and then three.

Unfortunately for Danny, that was too long. Three seconds was enough time for the mind controlled humans to snap out of it, gather their bearings, and see him standing there. As much as he loathed it, Phantom was a celebrity. Now the crowd of people were trying to grab at him of their own volition. All he had to do was turn intangible. All he had to do was fly away. The fight was over, they weren't trying to hurt him. He didn't want to hurt them.

The voice in his head didn't care.

You can stop them with nothing more than a thought. They’re too weak, a threat to what’s yours. You can fix it, get rid of the problem in the blink of an eye.

Danny tightened his fists further. He heard the creaking of metal; he was still holding the Fenton thermos. That wasn't good. He couldn't deal with another fight. Not right now. But you want to. Let her back out. Finish this, properly. Not when he was like this.

It took more effort than he'd care to admit to let his intangibility wash back over him. The act itself was just as easy as ever. The problem was convincing as much of himself as he could that he didn't want to touch these people, let alone hurt them, that he wanted to get away, not hurt attack fight -

Danny flew away, soaring up into the sky and blinking out of vision. Here, floating high enough that he couldn't hear their voices, couldn't feel their grabbing hands, the voice in his head was...manageable. Only a bit more annoying than the buzzing he'd grown so used to. He'd been dealing with it long enough to know that the second he got back near the crowd, or anyone else, it would only get worse. He needed a good place to cool down. He just needed time.

He wanted to go to the school’s roof. That had always been his go to spot, back before the voice got so loud. No one was ever up there, no one could see him, and it had a fantastic view of Amity Park. But he needed to go ghost to get down, and that wouldn’t help him. The bell still hadn't rung for the school yet, but it would soon. Even if the group of people had dispersed, the parking lots were out. So were the bleachers, the soccer field, anywhere inside the school, the front steps...

Danny started flying towards the woods. It was cold out, cold enough that most everyone was wearing winter coats, even if the trees still clung stubbornly to nearly dead leaves. No one would be in the woods in this type of weather. As long as the animals stayed far away from him it would be fine. They probably would. Most animals had been scared of him since the accident. At least now they had good reason to be.

The moment Danny was certain that the trees would cover him, he transformed back. The voice was fainter like that, but still there, whispering in Danny’s head. All that really changed was that  the vibration under his skin had returned, stronger than it had been at any other point today. It shook Danny hard enough for his teeth to start chattering, for his legs to give out underneath him. He didn’t quite enter the fetal position- the voice in his head wouldn’t let him give up that last scrap of his dignity. But he did dig his fingers into the ground until they were nearly completely submerged, and heaved heavy breaths into the earth. His labored breathing wasn’t because of the earlier fight, or the effort of holding back the trembling, or even trying to resist the temptation of the voice. His breathing was labored because he was forcing air into lungs that didn’t need it anymore, forcing organs that had started to forget how to work to remember again. 

Danny choked on every breath, but he didn’t stop. Humans needed to breathe, and Danny was still human. He had to be. 

With no targets around, the voice in his head faded away to a faint whisper, drowned out by the vibrations still rattling his bones. After a few more minutes, that too subsided to a now familiar hum. It was still uncomfortable; Danny refused to ever find it comfortable. But it was manageable. 

He climbed back onto still shaking feet, and started to walk back towards the school. He'd lost track of time, but he was almost certain that the bell had rung by now. Sam and Tucker would have heard the fight and would be looking for him. Danny couldn't afford to be late. Not again.

---

He took a seat on the half wall that lined the teacher's parking lot. No students would be coming that way, and the teachers wouldn't be out for another thirty minutes or so. Danny shot a quick text off to Sam, nothing more than his location. He didn't bother going back for his backpack. One of his friends would grab it; it was routine at this point.

In the few minutes it took for Sam and Tucker to round the corner of the school, the vibration had faded to its normal level. Bothersome, distracting, and just shy of painful, but manageable, and more importantly, something Danny was able to hide.

Sam tossed the backpack at Danny's feet at the same time he hopped off the small wall. "Thanks for letting us know how it went," she said, crossing her arms.

"It was just Ember," Danny said dismissively. "It's not like it's something we haven't seen before."

"You could at least let us know!" she snapped. "Or come back to class after? I know you had time, but no. You have to ditch us, and everyone else, just like you're always doing lately."

"I am not ditching you," Danny lied. It came out far sharper than he intended. "Tucker, back me up."

Tucker pulled a face. "You know I've always got your back, dude, but... well, Sam is right. You have been disappearing after fights. Even when its just us. We've talked about it before."

"Oh, so what, I'm not allowed to take some time to recover?" Danny said.

Sam took a deep breath, exhaling in a puff of cold air. "You can recover with us. Do you have any idea how hard it is to deal with everything when you just take off and leave? We're worried-"

Danny cut her off. "Oh, it's hard for you? Newsflash, I'm the one who takes the hits. I'm the one who gets thrown into walls. I'm the one who has to fight-" Danny cut himself off. He couldn't mention the voice, couldn't mention any of it. "If its so hard for you, than maybe you should just quit."

"Danny, that's not what we-" Tucker started, but Sam talked over him.

"Quit? You're asking us to quit because we're worried about you?" Sam said. "Do you even hear yourself right now?"

"Yeah, I do," Danny retorted. "I know what I'm saying, just like I know what I'm doing. Or are you going to try and say that I'm doing that wrong too?"

"I'm not saying that you don't know what you're doing!" Sam shouted. "I'm saying that you should at least tell us! We're your friends, Danny!"

"I don't need to tell you shit," Danny spat back. "If you were my friends, you'd understand that."

"Danny, Sam, please-" Tucker tried again.

"Oh, so we're not your friends now?" Sam pressed forward, crowding Danny’s vision. "Fine then! You clearly don't want us around anymore, so we will quit. When you realize just how shit you do without us, let us know." She grabbed Tucker by the arm, walking back to the school. "Come on, Tuck. We're going home."

Tucker looked between Sam and Danny rapidly, clearly conflicted. Danny waited for him to do something, anything, but by the time they reached the walkway at the end of the parking lot, Tucker was walking of his own accord. All Danny got was an apologetic look.

Danny bent down and swung his backpack over his shoulder with a thud. He didn't know why he expected anything. It was a miracle they'd stuck with him as long as they had. But it was fine. Danny was fine.

He couldn't afford not to be.

[moodymisty]

(This isn't a request, just some Konrad daydreams driven by 4am insomnia that had me screeching and I just have to share with someone while I wait for my meds to kick in!!)

Your recent post about the stinky rat man got me thinking of something truly, hilariously awful: Konrad's favorite meow meow is a PERPETUAL.

Maybe he watches her die. Maybe he accidentally kills her himself. Whatever happens, he'd probably be losing. his. fucking. mind.

..And then she comes back. Oh god, I'm loving imagining at how truly deranged he would be over that. I know he tortures Vulkan SUPER HARD after finding out he's a perpetual, but that seemed driven a lot by "You think you're good and noble(and sane)? I'll drag you down to my level."

I wonder if he'd mistake her as some kind of phantom/delusion brought on by grief and madness at first. Extra comedy: he accidentally(purposely?) kills her again while freaking out over her showing back up alive LMAO. Meow meow can't catch a fuckin' break with this man.

Now I'm wondering how a few other primarchs would react to something similar though

Sanguinius and his sons in mourning and his dead wife just shows back up like "Why did you bury me alive?!" completely unaware she DIED.

Perturabo's shitass sons being like "I told you it was a waste of time!" and then the horror of realizing they didn't escape their step-mom after all.

I'd assume all the primarchs would try to find out what the fuck happened, and maybe go to Malcador for information once they start drawing blanks? Idk.

Fulgrim would so cute, just hyped as fuck. "I have a wife? That won't get old and die before me?? I don't have to lose this one???" Bonus points if she's the last one he was going to marry because he got too heartbroken seeing his wives get old and die over and over 😫 the queen and her corgis vibe forreal

I can't really figure out Mortarion even though he's one of my faves. On one hand, WITCH!! On the other hand,he'd be so relieved the One Good Thing in his life isn't actually gone forevet..

Oh my g o d. Lorgar. Thefucking goddess shit would go CRAZY. Kor Phaeron slamming his head against a wall because he thought he finally WON. HOW DID SHE DO THAT? Some of his followers getting spooked about being rid of her because s u r e l y it was the Powers who orchestrated such a miracle... So maybe she is meant to be here? Uh oh.

Guilliman is another one I'm just like ????. All I can think of, is he'd quietly go find Emps/Malcador and be like "whattheFUCK? explain?please?how?"

It might be because I'm heavily sedated but it's all sO funny to think about. Some legions quietly rejoicing because The Distraction is gone and shejust. Comes back 😭

But can you imagine the parties thrown by the ones who really loved their legion mothers?! And you thought theFUNERAL was extravagant..

Im not sure what time it is there but I hope you slept well and have a good morning! Sorry forcthis stream of consciousness garbage by theway LOL but you always have such cool takes on things I couldnt help muself

This a joy to read friend, I have nothing to add.

Lorgar in particular with a perpetual beloved would be fucking INSANE. His whole religious trauma would be going wild as well as even some of the more apprehensive Word Bearers might be a bit more, respectful.

Imaging Vulkan's wife ends up coming back a few weeks after they desperately mourned her loss, and it's time for the galaxy's largest hug. They form a line.

[lonleydweller]

yandere prompt 11 for assault on arkham riddler?

🥀Yandere assault on arkham riddler + prompt 14🥀

FOAMING AT THE MOUTH THANK YOU ANON

The prompt did haft to be worded a bit differently as his cell is a glass wall, not bars. Same idea though ^^.

!Warnings!: yandere trope, obsession, cursing, mentions of stalking, harassment

Yanderes are OK in fiction. They should stay fiction. They are not example of healthy relationships. These behaviors are NOT okay in real life. This is for entertainment purposes

-----------------------------------------------------

In and out, that's all it was supposed to be. You were supposed to go into the asylum quickly, do your job, and get out. You didn't even consider the fact you might run into him. You had been free of him for months, a drastic change to constantly being bombarded with harassment. Living in fear of him being around any corner ready to drag you into some sickening game of his.

You almost hurl at the thought of going home and finding another riddle at your doorstep. Another game, another maze, another puzzle, another sleepless night worrying wether or not you'd wake up in your own home. Now, it was all over. Right? He was locked away in the aslyum. No way to get to you. No way to contact you even. That's what you told yourself.

The only soud that can be heard as you move throughout the halls of the downtrodden aslyum were the echos of your footsteps. Faintly outside you could hear the sound of gunshots, yelling, and screams. The asylum halls gave you nothing but dread, with the cracked walls, peeling paint, cold air, and unknown stains that liter it. No wonder people come out of this place worse than before. You pass the now empty cells that line the walls.

Empty, empty, empty. You almost completely pass another cell, until you spot bright orange out the corner of your eyes. A ear grating smug voice accompanies it, "Well, look who's come to visit. Couldn't stay away from me my dear?" Your body comes to a staggering halt, your feet glued to the floor. You can feel the color drain from your own space as your stomach drops. This wasn't how things were supposed to go.

It's him. Of course it's Edward. Why didn't you think this through? You basically just walked right back into the trap you just freed yourself from. You're brought back to reality with the sound of glass being tapped, "Did you suddenly loose the ability to speak since my absence?", he taunts.

Without thinking you blurt out a choppy response "I- you're not the reason I'm here you bastard. don't talk to me." You try to fend off your tears to the best of your ability. Hoping to shut down the conversation as quick as you can, maybe this time you'd be able to drill it into his dense skull that you would never be his.

A scoff can be heard, "Oh, please. Don't act as if you have any other reason to be here. Why can't you just admit to yourself that you love me-". Your tears boil over, along with your anger.

"I don't love you! I never will love someone as deranged as you! Why can't you get that into your god damn head!?", you plead through sobs, "..Why can't you just let me live my life?". Your cries are met with silence from Edward. Seemigly for once not having some witty remark to fire back at you with.

Shuffling is heard as he sits up, he gives a shrug. "I'll leave you be once you realize that you love me.. even if takes years, decades.. in the end I'll win this game of ours." You hear the tiniest bit of glee in his voice as he desperately tries to hold onto his own delusions.

"Decades is what you'll be spending here. Where you can't do anything to torment me anymore."

The dingey bed creaks as Edward gets up, approaching the barrier that keeps you safe. His hands press against the glass as he croons, "Oh.. my dear.. if only this glass wasn't here." His ego never faltering. In the end, you've only given him what he wants. Your attention.

-----------------------------------------------------

[dpsisquared]

do you think dimitri would purposely homewrecker or upstage byleths bf? Maybe if he was deranged or depressed enough to think he could make byleth realise he was the better choice?

Oooh interesting. Depends a lot on the stage he's at, I'd say.

Acadimitri: so full of self loathing and guilt about getting revenge that he doesn't say anything, pining so hard he's close to physically bursting, ends up taking a training spar with his competition WAY too seriously, culminating in disastrous goddess tower scene. Aka, canon lol.

Feralmitri: avoids her for a few weeks, has a few really deranged hours where he considers killing her/her partner to get rid of the distraction. Eventually decides fuck it, we're all just worm food in the end, corners her in a dark alcove and very firmly asserts that she should be with him.

Savior: makes up flimsy reasons for them to meet officially, monopolizes her time, tries to put his best face forward around her. He doesn't THINK he's trying to win her, he has convinced himself that this is just being civil about the whole thing. The partner sees right through it and is pissed. Byleth has no clue anything is out of the ordinary. She's enjoying the extra tea times.

Hopes: totally passive aggressively separating their battalions, assigning Byleth as his own adjutant, giving the mercenaries a raise lolol

Tempest: a lot of variables here. If Byleth joins him, he might be possessive. If she's with the empire, I think he writes it off as just another betrayal and sharpens a pike for her head 😬

Thank you for the ask!! 💙

[bat-eclecticwolfbouquet-love]

Ok i gotta say it 410 and 411 have me thinking. I have some views on Shigaraki and it's not all " Yes win baby" or "Look at my king" thoughts. Of course I want him well at the end, that hasn't changed. He's still my all time fav character even if a certain other Mha character is right behind him, Tomura will never be knocked out of 1st place in my heart. Now with that being said I sincerely want Izuku to beat some sense into him.

His hate is corrupting his own mind and heart. He can never be happy or at peace like this. Hatred eats up your soul leaving a shell of nothingness behind.

I love how extremely powerful and Godlike he is, but I also miss the old tantrum throwing guy who didn't know how to display his emotions. Or the guy who fought Giga and took the PLF. The amount of power he has is scary cause he can't live in mha with that degree of power. No I'm not saying he will die but he will have to lose it somehow.

Does he still care for the league. He once told Toga he wouldn’t destroy what she loved, that he wanted his allies to have what they wanted, yet he's destroying the very country they live in. The destructive Villian who was feared but had a heart and cared for those around him was what alot of people found endearing, often mentioning it as a reason he would be OK at the end. That guy is gone. (Temporarily I think)

Went from wanting to destroy All Might to Hero society to all of Japan. This is what happens when hate takes root in your heart. When no one REACHES OUT A HAND TO HELP.

His smile use to be almost sweet and calm and now has elements of deranged power behind it (yes he's still gorgeous hot sexy, I'm just stating thoughts)

The leader who cared for his comrades and took revenge when they were hurt yet hasn't wondered if they are OK. Sure, he mentioned Spinner, but idk it was off like an BTW moment

He doesn't see himself as human. What he does see himself as was not mentioned but im willing to bet he sees himself as a God of destruction.

With all this said YES I belive he will be alive at the end (well I'm about 80% sure he will, if not he will always be in my heart) and no I don't think he will be locked in some prison, it wouldn't serve a purpose for Hori to keep him alive just to lock him up now that's not saying he won't be in some program to actual HELP HIM cause if he lives (he will) he won't have a quirk, I dont see it. And lastly somehow Izuku will have to literally reach out a hand to him. Seriously how many times has the actual image of someone physically reaching out been shown, dozens.

Also the whole make him a kid again is stupid. Tenko and Tomura are the same person, he doesn't have a child living in his body, his heart...yes. Tenko represents all that Tomura Shigaraki has repressed, his dream of being a hero, the sweet little boy who cared for his friends (hmm the more powerful he got the less we saw this quality) so he becoming Tenko again refers to his heart not having that black hole inside it. It means his heart will be free. Not that he will revert to 5 years old. There is still a chance Hori could do that but even if his writing can be questionable I don't think he'll go this off the grid.

[reinahwanggg]

I Met You At Sunrise • Masterlist

•pairing college student!beomgyu x fem!college student!reader

•genre college!au, strangers to friends to lovers, summer fling!au, vacation!au, socmed (probably will have written parts since i love to describe stuff) fluff, angst (maybe idk yet)

•synopsis beomgyu believes in soulmates (sue him), and when he was about eight years old, he had a dream that he was older, and his hand was intertwined with a beautiful person's own as they waited for the sunrise, very much in love. ever since, he's been desperate to go on vacation to the caribbean and find his "forever". and his chance comes in the form of two menaces graduating high school, and yoon keeho tweeting about being caribbean bound.

or.

beomgyu's kinda delusional, but that won't stop him from meeting the woman of his dreams (literally).

•warnings obscenities (in like the first few chapters cause i wrote it in october when i cussed like a sailor), friends that "bully" each other, "kys" "kms" "ch*ke" jokes, an obscure amount of mentions of food (because y/n works as a server at a restaurant), light mode (just in case you hate it)

•featuring TXT, Enhypen, KEEHO of P1Harmony, YUNJIN of Le Sserafim, and an original character (or several. idk yet lol. more kpop artists might make an appearance)

•status ONGOING

•schedule whenever i can

•start date 2023.06.15

•end date TBA

•taglist ✨OPEN!✨ to be added, please fill out this form , send an ask, or comment under this masterlist!

•disclaimer this is the work of FICTION! all thoughts, deeds, actions and sequence of events that will be typed out and written here are for ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES only. it doesn't reflect any of these characters nor does it reflect how i see them. i am making this for fun and for people to read. which means, don't take this seriously, thanks.

PROFILES >

daily dose of slay || beomgyu and the soulmate hate club || jay and his six deranged kids

CHAPTERS >

CHAPTER 1 • Do It No Balls

↳CHAPTER 1.5 • Out for a Vengeance

CHAPTER 2 • Feeding His Soulmate Agenda

CHAPTER 3 • ALWAYS CRY BROKE 1.1k words (smau + written)

CHAPTER 4 • the triangle stuff

CHAPTER 5 • shocking

CHAPTER 6 • so this is pain mmhmm mmhmm

CHAPTER 7 • finals shouldn't exist

CHAPTER 8 • when in doubt; rich people

CHAPTER 9 • jay 🔛🔝 807 words (smau + written)

CHAPTER 10• frickin hermit crab

↳CHAPTER 10.5 • enjoy your flight

CHAPTER 11 • *gasp* nepotism

CHAPTER 12 • your future gf , why ?

CHAPTER 13 • walking around eggshells

CHAPTER 14 • #finalsshouldntEXIST

CHAPTER 15 • i can take you right now

CHAPTER 16 • EXTREMELY COMMON YUNJIN W

CHAPTER 17 • that’s embarrassing 917 words (written)

CHAPTER 18 •

CHAPTER 19 •

CHAPTER 20•

CHAPTER 21 •

CHAPTER 22 •

CHAPTER 23 •

CHAPTER 24 •

CHAPTER 25 •

CHAPTER 26 •

CHAPTER 27 •

CHAPTER 28 •

CHAPTER 29 •

CHAPTER 30 •

...more to be added : chapter names are also subject to change ...

BONUS >

•Director’s Cut 1 (can be read between ch.1.5 & ch.2)

• Gia and Steph (can be read between ch.3 & ch.4)

• Do I Have a Chance ? (can be read between ch.3 & ch.4)

•

2023 © reinahwanggg ... don't copy me and steal my work please ! socmed writers and writers in general work very hard to do stuff like this, and stealing their work is inhuman bro. all credit to whatever happens in this plot is reserved to ME!

[asmolbirb]

Birb liveblogs the final Temeraire trilogy: League of Dragons

Overseas travel edition! I devoured this book on a 15hr flight without the ability to update my reactions live, so here they are all in one go, with much less screaming in the tags

So obvs I’m devastated that Tharkay is gone again but it’s tickling me pink that Laurence is like “oh we’re cuddling on dragonback? It’s Tharkay or bust for me uwu”. And it’s undeniably hysterical that in the middle of The Most Important War Effort So Far, Novik is taking extra time to discuss dragonback cuddle logistics. Truly zero notes

Naomi Novik stop killing off everyone Laurence cares about challenge ToT ToT ToT

Laurence screaming and thrashing while Hammond and Temeraire play dress up with him might be the funniest running gag in the entire series

I LIED the funniest running gag in the series is every single description of Temeraire “heroically” expressing 1 singular generosity

The Miss Merkelyte romcom C plot is absolutely sending me. What the fuck is happening lmao

CALL THARKAY A FUCKIN WHACKAMOLE THE WAY HE’S ALWAYS POPPING UP OUT OF RANDOM-ASS HOLES IN EVERY WRETCHED SWATH OF BACKCOUNTRY ON THE PLANET

“I’m soooo over my act of treason it doesn’t bother me at all” <- words dreamed up by the utterly deranged (someone who is not over his act of treason even a little bit)

Awwww baby’s first PTSD…….. :(

This will not surprise anyone but I’m immediately obsessed with Ning. Big fan of a character whose primary narrative purpose is to tell everyone they’re being big old idiots

Hoo boy the way Laurence handles his authority, particularly when reprimanding rude subordinates, sets off my competency kink like no one’s business. And he’s built like a linebacker on top of that?? *fans self* I’m so so glad we get to see him be a proper captain again, it’s a lovely bit of closure to finish out the series

“My dear, that is the Temeraire, herself” PARDON ME I MUST SQUEAL, I’m so unbelievably soft for this owo

Laughing my ass off at Laurence turning his raggedy band of ferals into a bunch of crypto bros

Man remember in the first few books when the divine wind was this mighty and rare thing? And now it seems Temeraire is loosing the thing twice a chapter. I love *clenches fist* a tangible depiction of growth over the length of a narrative

Crying screaming gnashing my teeth over Tharkay showing up out of nowhere at the end of everything and saying “hey. Do u wanna retire with me while ur dragon menaces the government? Do u wanna do that maybe forever? Haha jk……. unless…..?” They’re both so silly and speaking in so much euphemism. It’s gonna take them 10 years to even kiss each other. I’m coming apart at the seams about it

[tumblingxelian]

Chrysididae 

The Birth of the Hero Chrysididae!

A student film premiers, a lost heiress in enraged at the perceived betrayal of her sponsor, classmates, family and even oldest friend.

Why she wonders, why do these things keep happening to me?

It is a question she had wondered before but only rarely, too often it was too easy to find some enemy to blame, or her own lack of exceptional talent.

But on this day, when she reflects on Gabriel Agreste's souless stare from the tablet, something clicks.

He did this on purpose.

Like one domino hitting another, it sets off a chain of memories and with them a realization.

On what was to be Adrien's first day of school, the first Akuma appears, despite the fact that surely other teenagers were embarrassed or angered.

This should have scared Adrien and compelled him to stay home, but no.

So it is again with Stoneheart, but somehow, for some reason he chooses Chloe as a victim despite nearly every member of class being terrified and enraged, despite his intent to be to confess his love to Mylene.

He still takes the time to kidnap Chloe, who was the instigator of Adrien's rebellion.

This would be her first near death, but not the last.

Lady Wifi would come next, suitably aggrieved perhaps but to what purpose? Hawk Moth of all people should know Chloe could not have been Ladybug, so there needs to be another motive, one to target the girl and not a presumed hero.

Ah yes, punishing her for helping Adrien slip his grasp.

Evilillustrator, would be next, neglecting the humiliation and abuse his teacher subjected him to in favor or murdering a girl for a snide comment regarding his crush.

Now you might say, what of Roger, Rose, Juleka and Kim?

But remember, even an Akuma will not go against the deep and abiding instincts of its source human. Their loved one's may be in endangered on accident or in a deranged bit to assist them.

But never would they be intentionally harmed.

In this same vain, a man who believes wholeheartedly in his duty to be of service to the community, a girl whose most malevolent self only wanted a dream wedding, a girl who wished to be seen and a boy who wished for love to disappear.

All Akuma that either would not or could not kill by their nature or that of their powers. They would be insufficient for breaking the girl who defied him.

Antibug is where things begin to change.

Convinced that her beloved idol hated her just as her mother always had, Chloe began to break. So much so she could not avoid his Akuma this time.

Able to defeat Chat Noir and a fair match for Ladybug she was one of the stronger Aluma. Not in the upper echelons like Style Queen or Sanboy, but worth stoking over the coals for an even greater reaction.

Speaking of Style Queen, you may question why Gabriel would allow his son, who has so far avoided all harm from any Akuma to be struck low.

I remind you that while his control is great it is not infinite. I would add that not only does Hawk Moth's ego outstrip his control but so too does his scheming.

Why snub the notoriously angry Style Queen? Why would Nathalie, an otherwise sensible woman go along with the insult. Only to see him retract it the next day? Why was Gabriel who has refused to leave his manor in all other attacks absent when the Style Queen invaded his home?

Why if not for the fact he sought to make Style Queen and with Mayura's help could do so. But she was not enough alone, but her presence would bring about inspiration for his newest scheme.

It would bring about Queen Wasp.

But first, you may question why Gabriel would allow his son, who has so far avoided all harm from any Akuma to be struck low. I remind you that while his control is great it is not infinite, and would go further and note how strange it is that Gabriel would be absent from his manor.

He would not leave during any other Akuma attack, yet the this one? How odd, lest

Murdered by her mother the day before, then rejected by her yet again, mind on the edge of snapping she orchestrated her own self destruction and from the wreckage crawled the first Akumatized Miraculous User.

For we cannot call her a hero.

Who was the next Akuma, but her own father. His intent with her just as it was with his wife, to keep her in Paris for his own pleasure at her expense. Conveniently ensuring Hawk Moth's new muse could not slip the leash she did not even know was fastening around her neck.

Just as hoped it would see, she was chosen this time to wield a Miraculous and she would be chosen again on Heroes' Day. Hawk Moth's only known effort to Akumatize others rather than letting the people of Paris do his work for him.

This was where we first saw sign of Mayura and to any who have been wondering. Yes, this is why The Collector & Simon Says mean so little. There was always a hidden second who could have commanded the Akuma, and if not, paint a target on his back from a target so far away that the here's would surely arrive in time.

With Mayura's arrival came a new wave of terror, not just for Paris but Chloe in particular.

Don't believe me, I do not blame you, but it is the truth.

Over the months following Heroes Day, battle after battle would be fought before the former Miraculous Holder. Always in front of her home where the Bee Signal shone, always to see her rejected by her idol.

From this came Miracular.

Close, but not close enough, Chloe resister the Akum, but Sabrina could not and within moments of Chat's arrival Mayura was upon them.

The villains had been waiting, a clear signal they had been observing her for sometimes, a clear signal of their continued interest.

Especially given, despite the months of absence, the moment it was necessary, Queen Bee flew again. Even as Ladybug swore this would be the last time as she doubtlessly had done for the last two months of battle.

Only to change her mind as needs demanded it.

But do not think her egotistical my witnesses. It was not merely Chloe who was targeted but another as well.

Marinette Dupain Cheng. A girl who has yet to be Akumatized, who holds a disdain for liars and seeks truth. Such an ideal recipe for an Akuma that could force Ladybug & Chat Noir into the light.

Thus it was, she'd be framed for cheating, theft and assault before her classmates by one Lila Rossi. Perhaps this would not convince you alone but I ask.

How did Hawk Moth know the class he has so often predated on, the class which contains Adrien Agrest, if he did not have a hand in this event?

This was not the first time Lila was used as such. Whispering sweet lies into Chloe's ears about how to summon Ladybug but leaving her humiliated instead.

Has she not done the same with others? Kagami for instances.

Decaying day by day, and nightmare by nightmare, Miracle Queen approached and this is where it all comes together.

Her feuding parents presenting with a garment both ugly and enraging that binds them together by a man who proclaims himself a designer.

An Akuma on the scene in mere moments, to combine them into one. The parents turned against the child enough to harm her yet again, but kept from devouring her. Finally, the Bee Signal sabotaged.

Why this family, why this girl even before the Miraculous? Who would know her well enough to orchestrate such targeted strikes against her psyche? What man has the motive, resources and insight to break Chloe Bourgeois?

Why its the same man whose beloved assistant fell ill at the same time as Mayura vanished from the field of battle. Its the same man who had a hand in the transformation of Style Queen & Heart Hunter. It is the same man who promised a desperate girl a movie, only to rip it away with a subtle smile. Knowing his Akuma would find her soon.

But he was not ready for me, or in a way, for her.

Chloe Bourgeois, the girl you knew, no longer exists. She had no desire to anymore, more than Hawk Moth saw to that.

What she did desire was to prove she was more than a Super Disaster and means by which to free her from the role long since assigned to her.

For the latter, came a Sentimonster not long for this world. Its power exorcising that malevolent miasma of Hawk Moth. But even as it was destroyed the creatures magic did as it was bid.

For his voice had gone silent, the rage faded and the Akuma was taken into more than this mere suit but into the skin, to course through her blood and bury itself in her marrow.

Now I emerge from the girl that was once Chloe Bourgeois with three purposes.

To tell the world of Gabriel's crimes, to defeat Hawk Moth, and be an exceptional Hero.

I am Chrysididae and for what its worth, I am sorry.

[altocat]

In the AU where Hojo breeds Sephiroth and Sephiroth takes the child and runs, what would he do if his child died? Say from some lack of nutrition or some genetic defect only the lab knew how to cure?

Sephiroth might not be the warmest father. But in any scenario in which his child dies, he'd break. Completely. Possibly even worse than at Nibelheim. At least then, despite his insanity, Sephiroth maintains the façade of still being calm and in control.

Not so here. Sephiroth is absolutely deranged with grief, destroying everything indiscriminately in his path, tearing into anything he comes across, including himself. This was a chance. A chance for connection, to finally have something he could protect and keep. He might have been a flawed parent, but he'd vowed that his child would never have the kind of life he was given. And now they're gone.

Perhaps Sephiroth will learn of Jenova in this AU. But the era of mommy issues is over. This time, he wants to become a god solely for the purpose of tearing open the Lifestream to retrieve his child. And he will willingly sacrifice the entire planet and its people to do so.

[terminatorbuns]

Revisiting Shiver's role in Splatoon 3 (An addendum to "Frye is the new Marina")

This is an addendum to "Frye is the New Marina", if you have not read that, please do read it first for context.

A side note first, I've since been informed that Splatsville might be visually inspired by Kowloon, which places it in Hong Kong rather than Japan. This is pretty interesting because it would reframe the Japanese Shiver as also an immigrant, but since Hong Kong is still East Asian she passes much more easily as a native than Frye's much darker South Asian complexion. Frye and Shiver's respective relationships to their race is still mostly unchanged.

Apart from that, I realized that I omitted one other detail about Frye and Shiver in my previous essay that didn't seem significant at the time, but I've come to reexamine its importance. I'll readily admit to having a Frye bias but examining Frye and Shiver as a duo really helped me understand Shiver better and discover reasons to like Shiver, and I've come to the conclusion that I've seriously underestimated Shiver as a character.

I previously said that Shiver should have a gender narrative and be trans or non-binary, and I still stand by that. Shiver displays the signs of a gender struggle and it would be extremely meaningful to a lot of people to see Nintendo do a gender narrative for Shiver. I thought at the time that it would put her on par narratively with Frye, who has a compelling set of traumas and anxieties stemming from her status as an obvious racial minority, compared to Shiver who passes as the majority culture much more easily. However, I've since come to realize that there's another angle to both idols that needs to be discussed, one that gives Shiver a much more compelling role in the design philosophy of Splatoon 3. In fact, the journey to understand Shiver's character has become uncomfortably personal for me in a way that I could not have expected.

1. Opposing Views on Heritage

The one detail I forgot was Frye and Shiver's opposing views on their cultural heritage. Frye had the most struggles with her heritage growing up, but ironically she ends up embracing her upbringing more closely than Shiver. With the new interview we now know that Frye was too busy with dance recitals to make any friends, but Frye ultimately ends up embracing her family's dance techniques whole heartedly and reproducing it faithfully as part of her personal fighting style. Despite struggling to fit in with her small town East Asian community Frye keeps her country bumpkin accent and takes up banditry to give back to the same community that could not accept her. It's in this way that Frye's specialty as a villain shines the most brightly: Frye embraces struggle and loss and recontextualizes them into her strengths.

Shiver is the opposite in every way. Shiver learns a regal theatrical accent to hide the fact that she originates from the same backwaters town Frye is from. Shiver's clan has already changed their older tradition of shark slaying once to shark taming, but Shiver breaks tradition even further by adopting a deranged biker persona and putting motorcycle handlebars on her shark. Shiver dresses extremely unconventionally with a punk fade haircut, visible Sarashi bindings that have connotations with crime and delinquency, and very low cut torn pants. In comparison, Shiver's expression of her heritage feels much less faithful to tradition.

Part of the discrepancy in their personalities is due to the fact that Nintendo is a Japanese company, their audience is more accustomed to Japanese visuals than South Asian. Frye's South Asian aesthetics are inherently exotic and exciting when reproduced more faithfully, but Shiver's traditional Japanese aesthetic needs more modification to be interesting to a Japanese audience. An unfortunate side effect is that Frye feels objectively cooler than Shiver: there's a genuine strength and purpose to Frye's passion for South Asian culture while Shiver's presentation of Japanese culture feels somehow less sincere.

And yet, as I wrote the earlier drafts of this I felt myself drawn more to Shiver than Frye, which took me a little bit  by surprise. It begs the question, what does Shiver stands for, and why would people be drawn to Shiver over Frye? I found that I had little canon lore left to explain my feelings, but it gave me the realization that the tools to understand this must come from my own personal experiences. And so, I'd like to share some of those experiences with you, the reader.

2. Struggling with Tradition

My relationship to my cultural background is complicated. I am an East Asian immigrant in North America, but I was lucky enough to live in areas that were friendly to my demographic. I had a multicultural group of friends and was rarely bullied for my ethnicity.

I say this because the vast majority of my personal anxieties come from my OWN culture and upbringing. I remember a distinct pressure to fit in and not cause trouble, and I was good at it, but I also remember how much it confined my artistic growth until I left the house to be independent. I remember a general unease towards artistic expression in general, the idea that cartoons and games are for children and I should be spending my energy on math and science. I still hide my art from my parents to this day.

I remember, most of all, a grating, xenophobic distrust towards other cultures, and the subtle yet consistent suspicion that anything I did wrong was a result of outside influences. The idea that my progressive politics was a corruption of "Westernization" just because it went against traditional, conservative culture. The often unspoken, but sometimes spoken, fear that my multicultural friends are influencing me negatively through their different cultural upbringings, when those same friends helped me discover my artistic voice in the first place. I remember accusations being made against other POC, some of which are more vulnerable than I am. I remember accusations specifically towards friends LIKE FRYE.

This was the point my analysis into Shiver took a deeply uncomfortable, personal turn, as I started to see my experiences in Shiver. Shiver, who also feels the need to hide a part of her personality that can only be shown to her accepting and diverse friend group. Shiver, who excels at passing for "normal" in a community that is friendly towards East Asians, but has witnessed that same community ostracize the darker, South Asian Frye. Shiver's loose presentation of Japanese culture starts to remind me of all the ways that I myself struggle to celebrate my own culture openly and faithfully, because I've come to associate so much negativity and baggage with it. Through this lens, Shiver's behaviors no longer seem like flaws, but rather defense mechanisms that I have too much experience with.

Now, I have no reason to believe that the original creators of Splatoon 3 had ever intended Shiver to convey such a specifically detailed cultural narrative. What is instead undeniably true is that Shiver ended up representing my experiences in a way that Frye could not on her own. I had previously understood the narrative of Splatoon 3 through a Frye-centric point of view, the huge Frye fan I am, but I am starting to understand that it is an incomplete analysis without considering Shiver's perspective as well. Shiver's role in Splatoon 3 is simply too important to be diminished.

3. Understanding Shiver as a Rebel

For me, Shiver has come to represent a rejection and reinvention of tradition. I've come to realize that what I had thought to be Shiver's weakness could actually be the core of her strength: her refusal to replicate Japanese traditions exactly. As much as she likes Japanese traditions and presenting like a traditional Japanese girl, she's also the first to put an unconventional spin on everything. Her punk hair, her Sarashi wrap, and her motorcycle shark, all symbolize this. Also, the fact that she wears her shoes on Tatami mat stages (the audacity).

As I said previously, a purely traditional Japanese aesthetic would be boring for a Japanese market, so Shiver's design has become an inherent struggle against tradition and normalcy. Shiver wants to be anything but normal, anything but boring. This puts her in direct contrast to Frye, who ends up being the traditionalist of the pair. Frye even has a preference for traditional analog forms of performance like stage plays while Shiver gravitates towards the newer medium of television.

Shiver's friendship with the culturally different Frye and Big Man is, in itself, a departure from tradition. Frye does not have the conventionally attractive TV features for an East Asian audience, but Shiver wants Frye to be on TV. Big Man can neither dance or sing, but Shiver wants him to appear on stage. Shiver's Rakugo specialty is a solo act, but she's modified it to include both of her close friends so they can be on TV together. I would also suggest that this has a special meaning for Frye specifically, whose personality and skin tone has caused her the most difficulty with fitting into a polite, East Asian coded society. As much as Shiver likes traditional Japanese culture, Shiver has taken steps to avoid replicating Japanese culture in a way that would exclude the exceptionally vulnerable Frye: Shiver refuses to hurt Frye.

This understanding of Shiver ties in well with her perfectionist tendencies. From the new interview we now know that Shiver made Big Man revise Anarchy Rainbow 7 times, she's picky to say the least. However, song lyrics are not the only thing she intends to perfect. Shiver's not content with cultural traditions the way they were taught to her: she's searching for ways to enhance her artistry, but she's also searching for ways to include her multicultural friends in her art forms without harming them.

Ironically her experimental perfectionism is also a weakness: reinventing safe, established traditions is inherently risky and Shiver has some hilarious failures to show for it. Shiver's villain persona is a take on the Bosozoku biker gang subculture of the 80's, also Japanese but notably a criminal counter-culture in Japan's history and a far cry from Shiver's usual polite, civil presentation. It's more than obvious that the biker persona is outside of Shiver's comfort zone, as she becomes clumsy and manic in a way that severely undercuts her ability to be a genuinely intimidating villain like Frye. However, Shiver's failures are entertaining and charming in her own ways, and her willingness to fail in the pursuit of perfection is uniquely inspiring.

4. Contrasting Shiver and Frye

Frye's still my favorite member of Deep Cut: she's peppy and likable, and her design tells the story of a cultural underdog that's extremely sympathetic and easy to root for. She doesn't have to represent my specific personal experiences to be my favorite. That being said, I think I now have the tools to understand the ways that people might find Shiver to be more appealing.

Shiver holds a lot of symbolic power for people that struggle with family and heritage, having seen those things harm either themselves or their friends. Even at a surface level many fans have already noticed the way that Shiver defies basic gender and social norms in her visual design and have found a sense of attachment to that. For people like me, Frye's fearless optimism towards her cultural roots isn't always helpful because I don't want to replicate those cultural traditions the way I have learned them. I'm deeply scared of accidentally replicating the hurtful aspects I've been taught to associate with my cultural heritage in a way that will hurt my friends. I want the inventiveness required to change my traditions into something more positive, and the courage to sometimes fail in the attempt. Shiver passes for "normal" in a society that easily accepts her, but that doesn't make her less interesting than the underdog Frye. Shiver speaks to a set of very real cultural anxieties that is just as compelling as Frye's, and both of their perspectives are required to complete the core narrative of Splatoon 3.

Splatoon 3 is a narrative about many things, but the most compelling narrative of this game is the dual commentary on cultural heritage that Frye and Shiver represent together. Frye is the cultural misfit that wants to be normalized, that wants her culture to be accepted despite being different. She represents an optimistic sense of traditionalism, one that sees the positives of traditional artistry and the value they can bring into the future. Shiver is the culturally normative girl who craves change, who is easily bored of rigid traditions and is eager to reinvent the past. She represents a healthy skepticism towards tradition, one that sees the dangers of harmful traditions but believes in the opportunity to change them into something healthier. The two perspectives form a symbiotic relationship: Shiver helps Frye to imagine a world where the dominant culture changes to be more inclusive of Frye, and Frye helps Shiver identify the positives of Shiver's traditions that should be retained in Shiver's quest for cultural innovation. It's a powerful, mutually-beneficial relationship that helps both artists visualize and achieve their respective artistic goals. It's beautiful.

I would do more to justify Splatoon 3 as a narrative focused on cultural heritage, except I don't actually have to because Nintendo straight up TOLD US their intentions in game. There's a key piece of cultural context in the original Japanese text that is lost in the English localization that really clarifies the design philosophy behind Shiver, Frye, and Splatoon 3 as a whole. We have to discuss the Bankara movement.

5. Bankara

I've written about this before but Splatsville is named Bankara city in Japanese, in reference to the specific Japanese Bankara counter culture movement of the early 1900's. Bankara was created in direct opposition to the Haikara movement, which was a fashion and cultural movement caused by Japan's rapid modernization and Westernization at the time, represented by western style "high collars" (Haikara). Inkopolis is called "Haikara City" in Japanese, in reference to the hip Western style Streetwear and music that previously defined Splatoon. The Bankara aesthetic mostly consists of traditional Japanese garments, kimonos and geta and such, the least Western stuff possible, to signal a discontentment with Japan's assimilation into Western aesthetics. At the same time these clothes were worn in a ratty, disheveled manner to signal a discontentment with traditional Japanese culture as well, as it had allowed the rise of the Haikara movement in the first place. A rejection of the new and the old. Later successors of the Bankara aesthetic include the Bosozoku biker and delinquent aesthetics, which consists of school uniforms worn in deliberately disheveled styles, fused with traditional Japanese elements such as Sarashi wrap and geta (sound familiar?). 

Shiver and Frye's entire city is named after Bankara so of course this duo is themed after the Bankara movement as well, it's so obvious in hindsight. Frye and Shiver together represent the dual focus of the Bankara movement: Frye represents a preservation of heritage in the face of modernization and homogenization, and Shiver represents a rejection of outdated traditional values. Both of them wear traditional garb as a reference to the traditionally Japanese garments that defined the Bankara movement, except Frye puts a twist on the concept by wearing traditional South Asian clothes instead. Shiver's secondary Bosozoku biker aesthetic also falls under the Bankara umbrella. The original Japanese name for Anarchy Rainbow is "Bankara mixed modern" (in English, no less), clearly signaling Deep Cut's design philosophy as a reimagining of the Bankara aesthetic for a modern, multicultural audience.

I must point out that Splatoon 3's take on the Bankara aesthetic is deliberately modified in some key ways. The original Bankara movement was largely a right wing men's movement that centered toxic versions of traditional masculinity and prioritized an insulation of Japan from foreign cultural forces. Deep Cut immediately recontextualizes the goals of Bankara by being majority female led (trans versions of Shiver would not have been considered traditionally masculine, either), and including the multicultural friendship between Shiver and Frye. In this way Splatoon 3 borrows from the aesthetics and themes of Bankara as a counter culture movement without condoning its original goals; Splatoon is intended as a progressive, inclusive space, after all, if the fanbase is any indication.

In these very changes we already see the push and pull between the ideas that Shiver and Frye represents: there's a desire to retain the counter-culture themes and cultural signifigance of Bankara while disregarding its original, dangerously right wing meanings. It's fascinating how much Shiver and Frye's designs naturally reflect the design process behind Splatoon 3 as a whole, whether intentionally or by accident. It's also very frustrating that the English speaking audience kind of has to dissect all the themes of Splatoon 3 the long way around through tiny context clues, when the Japanese audience is given it directly in big shiny text. Either way, Splatoon 3 has succeeded in crafting a dauntingly complex multilayered narrative on the evolution of culture, both as a reinvention of Bankara and as a reinvention of Splatoon as a franchise.

Splatoon is so deep, you guys.

[ziptiesnfries]

Upstairs

kinda continued from here - Roux & Ambrose masterpost

tag list: @theelvishcowgirl @transgender-scout @gala1981

Takes place a week into Roux’s captivity

CWs: captivity, drugged food, creepy whumper, panic attack

The door creaks, and suddenly Roux is wide awake, bolting upright in bed. They blink the bleariness out of their eyes to see Ambrose standing in the doorway, the scent of bacon wafting in behind him. Despite themself, their mouth begins to water; he neglected to feed them yesterday, and now they’re sure it was on purpose. “Good morning,” he chirps. “I made you breakfast. Are you hungry?”

On cue, their stomach growls, and their face turns red. They shove the covers off their legs and hop to the floor, stumbling at the drop—they’re still not used to sleeping in a bed that’s so high off the ground.

Ambrose smiles at them, like he thinks it’s the cutest thing in the world that they’re too short to reach the floor. They want to strangle him. “Come on.” He motions them towards the door. “It’s going to get cold.”

Warily, they follow behind him. He hasn’t let them out of the bedroom yet, so they’re curious—and a little scared—to see what the rest of this place looks like.

Just beyond the door, there’s an open living room and kitchenette area, with small windows set high into the walls. Beyond the windows, all Roux can see is grass. So this is Ambrose’s basement. That explains why the bedroom—as nice and normal-looking as it is otherwise—doesn’t have any windows.

They want to keep looking around, get more familiar with their surroundings so that maybe they can find a way out, but Ambrose puts a hand on their back and guides them over to the kitchen table. There’s one place set, the plate heaped with pancakes and bacon, a glass of orange juice sitting next to it. Suddenly Roux is having a hard time concentrating on anything else.

But they’re not hungry enough to be stupid about it. They sit at the table, eyeing the plate warily. Ambrose takes the chair across from them, a perfectly innocent smile on his face. “Well?” he prompts.

Again, their stomach growls, reminding them that they can’t afford not to eat. They pick up their fork and take a small bite of bacon. That should be safe, right? It would be hard to subtly drug bacon. Unless it was cooked in something, their brain helpfully supplies. It tastes normal enough. They keep eating, trying to reassure themself that if Ambrose wanted to kill them, he would’ve done it already. But it’s not so comforting when they know that he could do a lot worse than kill them.

The way he’s watching them right now, for example, the same way he might watch a cute animal video, is a lot worse than death. “Do you have to stare at me like a fucking creep?” they ask, just before taking a tiny, tentative bite of pancake. It practically melts in their mouth; it might be the best pancake they’ve ever had. They swallow, still trying to decipher whether it tastes drugged.

Ambrose’s smile falls. “You’re very rude, sweetheart.” His expression clears quickly, though, and he rests his chin on his hand. “You’re lucky you’re so adorable.”

They glare at him, trying not to squirm under his invasive gaze. Another bite of pancake, larger this time. They wonder whether Ambrose really made this himself, but a glance behind him shows pans on the stove and utensils in the sink. Maybe the entitled rich boy does know how to cook.

They decide that the pancakes taste safe enough, and also that they’re too hungry to care. “I’m not adorable,” they finally reply as they eat another forkful of pancake. “You’re just deranged.”

It might be unwise for them to taunt their captor like that, but he just laughs. “Like I said, you’re very rude. We’ll have to work on that.” They don’t want to know what he means by that. Hopefully they’ll be out of here long before they find out.

They finally get around to the orange juice. One tiny sip, and they’re already sure it tastes wrong, something extra under the tanginess. But they keep their expression indifferent as they swallow, putting the glass down. They’re not drinking any more of that.

Then the first wave of dizziness washes over them, and they almost drop their fork. What the hell? They blink, trying to snap themself out of it, hoping desperately that it’s a fluke. Then they start feeling a little drowsy, their muscles weakening, and they know it’s not. But they only drank a tiny little bit of the orange juice—that wouldn’t be enough to do this to them. Would it?

A slow, pleased smile spreads across Ambrose’s face as he notices. “Something wrong, sweetheart?”

They grip the edge of the table, partially out of rage, and partially to keep themself balanced. “What did you do?” they hiss.

“Oh, well, I did put a light sedative in those pancakes. Just something to keep you calm.” Right now, they feel anything but calm. Their vision is getting blurry, and they don’t even realize they’re listing to the side until Ambrose reaches across the table to steady them. He quickly gets up to help them out of their chair. “Careful, there. No need to panic; I’m not going to hurt you.”

They shove him away, but it makes them lose their balance. Suddenly they’re sitting on the floor with Ambrose looming over them. He scoops them up in his arms. “Let … let go of me.” They try to claw at him, but their muscles feel so weak.

“Shh, it’s okay.” He bounces them a little, like he’s trying to calm a baby, as he carries them across the basement. “I just wanted to take you upstairs with me, and I couldn’t have you running off. You don’t have to do anything, okay? Just relax.”

“Put me down,” they whine, but they’re already going limp in his arms, their head lolling against his chest.

Ambrose carries them to the back of the basement and up a flight of stairs. Part of them wants to just close their eyes, give into the drowsiness, but they force themself to pay attention. Maybe this is finally their chance to figure out how to get out of here … Ambrose nudges open a door at the top of the stairs, emerging into a hallway with dark wood paneling. Once he starts moving, though, all sense of clarity is lost. The space passes Roux by in blurs of dark wood, gilded paintings, brass light fixtures … It makes them dizzy, trying to watch it all blur by. Finally, the nausea forces them to close their eyes.

A door creaks, and a moment later, Ambrose sets Roux down on a soft surface. Their eyes crack open long enough to see him leaning over them, with the vague outline of a wall of bookshelves in the background. He gently lifts their head to slide a pillow underneath, and they feel like a ragdoll in his hands, too drugged up to move a muscle. “I’ll just be working at my desk.” He strokes their hair, and although it makes their skin crawl, they can’t find the strength to flinch away. “Let me know if you need anything, sweetheart.”

“Fuck you.” It’s hard to put any venom behind the words, but they try.

He pats their cheek as he stands up. “We’ll work on your attitude problem later.” Their eyes slip shut as his footsteps recede.

Without much else to do, they doze. Occasionally, briefly, they try to look around, but moving their eyes too much still makes their head spin. Judging by the bookshelves and the desk across from where they’re lying, they gather that this is some kind of office. Or, rather, a study; someone as pretentious as Ambrose would probably call it a study.

For a while, the only noises are typing and quiet sighs from Ambrose. Roux tries to sleep, tries not to think about the fact that he only brought them up here to stare at them. What a fucking creep. At least they know how to get out of the basement now, but the information isn’t doing them much good in this condition. Maybe another time, though, when Ambrose trusts them enough not to drug them … they don’t know how they’re going to build that trust. They don’t even want to be here long enough for that, really, but unless they get really lucky, they doubt they’ll get an opening. He’s had them locked in the basement for the past week; he’s being careful. But maybe they can find something to pick the lock with, and maybe there’s some other way out of the basement, like a cellar door …

The soft sound of rain against the window panes snaps Roux out of their sleepy ponderings. Their stomach jolts, and they take a deep, shaky breath. It’s just rain, they reassure themself. Nothing to worry about. It’s not like it’s—

A low rumble starts up in the distance, and the blood freezes in their veins. They squeeze their eyes shut and take another breath. Please, not here, not now. Not in front of—

The thunder gets louder, and they swear they hear the windows rattle. A whimper slips past their lips, and the show of weakness makes them wince, even with the panic setting in.

“Roux?” Ambrose’s chair creaks. “What’s wrong?” They open their mouth to respond, but another rumble of thunder cuts them off. Their breath hitches as they tighten their arms across their chest, like that’ll keep their heart from pounding out of control. “Oh.” He laughs a little. “It’s just thunder, sweetheart. It won’t hurt you.”

That’s what everyone says. That’s what people have been telling Roux since they were a little kid, hiding under the bed with their ears covered to escape a storm. But knowing that it won’t hurt them doesn’t stop their heart from pounding, their chest constricting, their head going fuzzy every time they hear thunder in the distance. It may be true that thunder is only a sound, that it can’t hurt them. But the lightning? That will hurt them. The fact that it never has before doesn’t stop the gut-churning certainty that it’s going to kill them.

As if on cue, right as they open their eyes, a flash of light illuminates the bookshelves. Their chest constricts, and they begin to sob.

“Oh, sweetheart …” They hear Ambrose hurrying over, but the sound is quickly muffled as they clamp their hands over their ears and curl into a ball. Part of them is mortified to be doing this in front of Ambrose, exposing a weakness he could use against them. They desperately want to stop crying, but their body won’t let them. Every flash of light they see from behind their eyelids—even if they know it’s just their eyes playing tricks on them—sends them into hysterics all over again.

Ambrose gently lifts them up to sit beside them, but even that doesn’t snap them out of it. He pets their hair, pulling their head into his lap, and they can vaguely hear him murmuring reassurances, but the low rumble of his voice just sounds like more thunder. They can’t stop crying, can’t even control their limbs enough to pull away. They feel mortified and pathetic as they sob into his shirt and let him hold them, even though all he’s doing is making them feel worse.

Finally, he scoops them up into his arms and carries them out of the room. It’s almost a relief to be out of the study, if only because it means they’re farther away from the windows—Although the lightning could always strike the house and burn it down, their brain helpfully adds in. They grit their teeth and bury their face in Ambrose’s shirt. It’s a relief when he takes them back the way they came, back down into the basement, with its lack of windows and relative sound insulation.

He sets them down on the bed, and they curl into a ball, tentatively removing their hands from their ears. Right now, they can’t hear any thunder, but they don’t think being in the basement would completely block out the sound anyway. They’re still tense, ready for it to start up again.

The bed dips as Ambrose sits beside them, rubbing their back. “So,” he says lightly, “you’re afraid of storms?”

They jerk away. “Shut up,” they hiss, their voice thick with tears. “Just shut the fuck up.”

His hand chases after them, and he continues rubbing their back. They grit their teeth and begrudgingly allow it—they’re too exhausted and drugged to keep squirming away from him. “It’s alright, sweetheart. Everyone’s afraid of something, aren’t they?”

“I said, shut up.” Their face burns with humiliation. This is why they didn’t want to do this in front of him—because he’s so goddamn smug about it, using it as an excuse to get closer to them, to baby them.

“I hate to tell you this,” he says, “but there are a few storms in the forecast for this week.” They know he’s just trying to get a reaction out of them, but still, their whole body goes rigid. “But don’t worry, sweetheart,” he continues, “you’re perfectly safe down here. Maybe we’ll hold off on having you hang out upstairs for a little while.”

They’re too exhausted to argue with him or to retort that they’re anything but safe down here. They bury their face in a pillow and let him pretend to comfort them.