#or if she didn’t destroy it then she at least helped it down it’s path of ruin

[cultofdixon]

Let me help, sunshine

Daryl Dixon • She/Her Pronouns • Your anxiety toward your own self worth because of what’s happen to you, makes it hard to be a part of certain things. But he’s so in love with you that you never had to worry. • ANGST/SFW • TW: Injuries / Limping / Canon Violence

Requested by: Anon

It feels like a fever dream. The good.

Y/N stood outside the burning prison holding herself as she shook from the blasts that forced her out of the bed she almost died in. The force from the blast also knocked her on her side, resulting in injury…

She’s been limping trying to find another from her group, or really shelter for that matter.

This feels like the start of the outbreak all over again. Struggling to walk through the destroyed earth and being mistaken as the undead. One too many accidents happened because of such.

The Claimers found her alone before Daryl joined them, even before Rick killed one of their own. He didn’t know Y/N was a part of them because their paths never crossed, and then again Y/N wasn’t…free. She was controlled that entire time, even when Daryl ended up with them.

He was relieved to find her alive. Relieved on an astronomical level…but it wasn’t a happy reunion. The two of them…

Daryl tried to check on her when he first saw she was with them. But this Len or Lenny guy blocked his way and glared at the archer.

“She’s been claimed, buddy”

The archer of course didn’t know what that meant but given her tense posture and the injuries that looked fresh, this group was one of the messed up ones. Or at least this guy that said such.

Their leader explained the rules. Whatever you see that you want, you say “claimed” then no one can do anything about it. Daryl instantly questioned why it was used on a person and was met with obvious looks that made his skin crawl.

“He won’t do nothin’ around us.” Joe laughs leading the way and the group started to walk.

Daryl wasn’t going to leave her and didn’t want to fight anyone in case they’d inflict anything on Y/N. Because little does she know…

When this group started to move and Y/N slowly faded into the back of the group, Daryl looked to the one who “claimed” her and given he wasn’t forcing her back beside him. He took that as his chance to talk to her in hopes no one notices.

But before he got a word in—-

“I’m glad you’re alive” Y/N whispers to Daryl as both felt that reassuring warmth grow in their chest, relieved that the other is still standing.

“Are you okay?” He whispers as she didn’t say a word but shook her head. She looks like a wreck. “You understand this claim nonsense?”

“I know if I just touched your arm, I will meet the short end of that stick”

Daryl wanted to help her given she seemed to be having trouble walking. But this situation with the Claimers only escalated.

This Len guy that claimed her, wanted to get rid of Daryl and decided to use their rules against him. Though it backfired on the guy and the leader in a way, preferred Daryl in their group. But when Len met the other end of a bolt…that brought up an uncomfortable situation.

“Can we claim what was his?” One of the Claimers stated and Daryl instantly stepped in front of Y/N covering her.

“Claimed.” He states and glared at those who even had the thought, which was most of them. Joe laughs a bit to himself and to Daryl’s eagerness.

“She’s yours, man. Even if she is kind of a dud” Joe continued to laugh and every fiber of Daryl’s being wanted to snap him in half, but given she doesn’t have to worry about any of them laying a hand on her. He could check their injuries at the next break they take.

But the next break happened in the middle of a road…where they were met with those who killed one of their own…that happened to be their family. Daryl did his best to intervene, even Y/N.

Then of course, violence was the only answer there.

It happened fast.

Rick taking out Joe, Michonne going after the Claimer keeping her down and the two going for the one on Carl. Daryl took out one of the Claimers on him as Y/N took down the other on the archer.

But the remaining Claimer knocked Y/N onto the ground, pinning her and the painful scream that ripped out of her when he applied all his weight on her already bad leg…triggered Daryl to full on football tackle this man off of Y/N and boy did he meet his maker.

Daryl went to check on Y/N but she wasn’t letting anyone touch her in the moment. He kept a respectable distance when they recuperated for the night and Y/N held onto herself for most of her avoiding eye contact from everybody. She was really wishing they didn’t lose the prison in that moment. Then she wouldn’t have succumbed to all the pain from the illness to her leg causing a lot of discomfort.

“Have you been with this group since the fall of the prison?” Michonne asked Y/N as she shook her head struggling to catch up to her pace when they walked to this ‘Terminus’ place. “Did you see anyone when you woke up? From the illness…”

“I heard Glenn, but I wasn’t quick enough to getting out. He wasn’t there anymore when I got out so there’s hope that he’s still alive”

“And knowing Maggie, she’s probably lookin’ for him” Michonne reassures whatever ounce of anxiety courses in Y/N’s mind when it came to the living status of their family.

Daryl glances back every once in a while to check on Y/N, making sure she was still behind them. She was getting slower and slower the more they walked endlessly.

And that only got worse after Terminus, and after the hospital…

The group was walking endlessly to a shelter that they have no idea exists. Everyone followed Rick’s lead and didn’t question it, but everyone was exhausted. Depressed. Mourning. It was just too much to deal with. Every break they took felt like it wasn’t enough and Y/N didn’t want to share anything on her mind when it came to her physical well-being. Meaning every thought of “just another five minutes” got shoved down and she found herself dragging her injured leg to avoid limping and stepping on it at times causing the sharp pain to radiate.

Her family took notice of the times she end up in the back and those who didn’t want to face the pain they endured mentally, they would stick with her and talk about it. She couldn’t just walk away, not that she would either. It was difficult to push her pain aside, literally.

“Why is he always looking back here…” Y/N whispers, catching Carol’s attention to look ahead noticing Daryl checking on them every now and then.

“You are always at the back. He’s checking on you. Making sure you’re still with us” Hm…

“It’s just…the deadpan look” Y/N shivered slightly a bit tense. “He’s a bit intimidating…and mysterious. But he’s kinda been like that always…just a bit more protective ever since reuniting…”

Carol may not know about what happened from the prison to terminus regarding her friends. But she knew why Daryl would be protective of Y/N.

The walking became rougher the more their group grew tired and dehydrated…Y/N started to think about staying behind. Because the stops didn’t last long but she found herself taking a while to get back up. Least her wounds weren’t bleeding anymore. The bruises lingered. Main thing being the limp and swelling…

Daryl couldn’t help the anxious feeling he got when the group started to pick back up after they had a break to look around their surroundings for food and water. He checked the group around him and then to the back…

No Y/N.

He didn’t want to rile anybody up and make everyone freak out, so he did his usual check around the group until he got to the back and once no one was looking he started to track back. It didn’t take long for him to find Y/N still sitting at the last spot they took a break at, she just thought it would be easier on them if she disappeared.

“Daryl…” Y/N frowns watching him kneel down to her noticing how bad her leg was and mentally beating himself up for not taking care of it sooner. A lot happened, there wasn’t a big enough window to take care of it. “You shouldn’t be here”

“Oh yeah? And you should?” His anger spilled into his tone with a hint of regret. “Why didn’t yea holler for anyone? Or me?”

“Thought it be easier…” Daryl gave her that same deadpan look that made Y/N now sigh because of the situation. “For me to just. Not hold y’all back”

“That ain’t right. Ain’t right one bit” Daryl scoffs trying to help Y/N up but she smacked his hands away for a moment. “Y/N.”

“Daryl just go. Seriously.” She frowns. “I don’t want to hold anyone back. That’s why I just told a few of y’all that I’ll catch up…”

“But you weren’t. And yea didn’t even tell me that. Since yea knew I would argue…well I’m gonna fucking argue” He sets his crossbow down turning himself around and patting his shoulders for her arms.

Y/N was confused. Confused as to why he cared so much. But she complied as she was too exhausted to try and defend her point in any way. What even was there to defend? She didn’t want to be the burden that she currently was and didn’t want to hold the group back. Daryl got that but every fiber of his being would scream if she wasn’t with them.

The retired sheriff gained suspicion when both Daryl and Y/N weren’t around him. But when he turned toward the back he saw the two. Daryl carried Y/N on his back as she had his crossbow on hers. He sighed a bit relieved before continuing further.

All this walking…made the suspicion thing of water magically appearing, very appealing.

“You think it’s poisoned?” Carol questions Rick as he shrugs, still not trusting it though.

“Someone is watching us”

“So we shouldn’t trust it” Sasha states watching Eugene instantly go for a bottle and the moment he opened it, Abraham smacked it out of his hand. “Seriously?”

“What?! Someone has to test it for poison”

“Should’ve been me” Y/N scoffs. “I doubt imma last much longer on this leg”

“Stop.” Daryl couldn’t help but be upset by such as he blocked her from going over to it. Even if she wasn’t going to.

Then a miracle happened, or a coincidence, whichever you believe in…when the rain started to pour. Few started to open the bottles, empty them and fill it with the rain. Others enjoyed the downpour…and those who’ve lost took it all in

Y/N still kept close to Daryl, this time for warmth but she felt uneasy…nothing changed with the physical feeling but something pained her chest as she looks up at Daryl noticing the sadness that radiated from his blank expression. She took a chance by gently interlocking her fingers with his as he instantly brought his attention to their hands before looking at her.

“I’m gonna be okay, Dixon. I have you”

Her words struck him down, while the rain actually made her fall down from slipping. A small laugh was shared even if that drew more worry from Daryl’s end.

The two have been close and the time from the Claimers to the barn being told about this new place that they could call home brought them closer. Now the group was being evaluated to be helpful around the community, they took their chances with it. With caution of course.

“How’s your leg?” Maggie asks Y/N once she got settled on the couch, after being told to stay out by both Daryl and Rick.

“The surgeon guy they have said I won’t lose it but I have to stop walking on it”

“And yea better listen” Daryl was quick to add bringing himself to the window behind the couch sticking close. Maggie let out a small laugh to his response but she knew he cared for Y/N.

It’s been a day and a half with being in this new community and Daryl kept to himself for the most part. Sticking outside on the porch of Carol’s on the side that connects to Rick’s. He would look in the window every now and then to check on Y/N making sure she stayed put. She slept for the most part given she didn’t let herself sleep when with the Claimers and during the illness she was afraid to. Finally not dealing with any threat she thought it would be okay and she was being taken care of so nothing to worry about.

Reg, Deanna’s husband, made his way over to the Grimes’ residence when most of them were out and Daryl instantly shot up from the porch when he got to the steps.

“Heard y’all had someone with a bum leg. Thought I’d bring these over” He states pointing out the crutches in hand. “We found them a while ago but knew Pete didn’t want your person using them immediately.”

“Thanks.”

“You gonna give them to…?”

“Y/N.” Daryl brought himself to the Grimes side and took the crutches as Reg smiles in his direction when he didn’t return it back. “Her name is Y/N”

“She’s important to yea, huh? I can tell” Reg smiles with a laugh followed as Daryl felt a twitch of a smile that he did his best to hide.

“I uh. Better get these to her…”

“If you ever need anything, don’t be afraid to ask” Reg adds while taking his leave as Daryl watches him go to make sure he was gone before going inside the house.

The man always manages to sneak up on everybody, but to his surprise Y/N wasn’t asleep and gave him a smile the second he walked in.

“You shower yet?” She smirks listening to him scoff instantly. “Carol made me ask next time you came in to check in on me”

“You know I’ve been checking on yea?”

“You are sneaky, but not that sneaky” Y/N smiles bringing her legs off the couch patting the space next to her. Daryl approached at first because of the discomfort that grew on her face when she moved her leg, but then sat with her when she relaxed once more. “Those for me?”

“Nah they’re for me” Daryl jokes, a bad one, but it got a small laugh from Y/N. “The swelling down?”

“Yes. Not completely but enough to move around I guess…” She carefully brought her leg onto the coffee table showing Daryl as his worry poured out of him but in his own way. His eyes said everything. “Daryl, can I ask you something?”

“Mhm”

“Why…why were you so upset when I told you to leave me behind? I didn’t…if this place never came, I wouldn’t have wanted to be a burden to you all”

“And I can’t live in a world without you” Daryl without any hesitation admits a hidden feeling that Y/N, of course, didn’t connect that at all by everything he’s done. But it made sense…

“Daryl…”

“I wanted to go back in, when that son of a bitch attacked the prison…but Beth dragged me out. Tellin’ me you’re still alive. I believed her, but I was angry” Daryl frowns keeping his eyes onto his hands as he messes with a loose thread at the hem of his shirt. “I would’ve been angry forever if I let yea die in there…then those fuckers had yea. Hurt yea…and thank fuck they met their end, for ever laying a hand on you. But it just got worse and you were hurting the entire time that I just. I just needed to control one thing just for a moment…to keep you around…so I’d understand if yea don’t feel the same way or anythin’. But I’ll always do my best to keep yea around. For everybody, for myself, and for you.”

The immediate silence gave mixed signals to Daryl but before he could even have the thought of getting up and giving her space. Y/N gently brought her hand to his, letting him carefully take hers.

“I know you’re serious about your feelings…Im a bit…taken back…because I’ve never been a first choice or whatever. I’m not the best at explaining my feelings”

“Neither am I” His thumb rubs circles against her hand feeling her squeeze his hand while a soft giggle escapes her lips.

“Yeah, but at least you said something” Y/N smiles warmly. “Because let’s be real. Rick or Carol or Maggie—-literally anyone in our group. Would’ve probably had to lock us in a room together to get one of us to say something…if my anxiety of being locked in places didn’t kick in” he hums for a quick response taking in her words.

“I thought I scared yea. That’s why I didn’t say nothin’ sooner”

“Mm. You are intimidating, but I was more afraid of being rejected more than anything”

“So…”

“It’s mutual, Dixon” Y/N continues to smile leaning into his space pressing her lips against his cheek as his eyes closed to impact, and he found himself leaning toward her when she pulled away. “We’ll take it slow, Daryl. But to reassure you…I’m yours and no one will change my mind”

Daryl exhales finally letting that weight of possible rejection go as he turned entirely toward her releasing her hand and gently brushing the loose hair out of the way of her beautiful face. Admiring every feature for a moment.

“Will you let me finally help yea, sunshine?”

And so she did.

It took a few days to get used to walking without the help of crutches or her family hovering whenever they got the chance. Y/N was given a pantry job like Olivia which made it easier for Rick’s plans and Daryl got close with Aaron so he’s been planning a run with him while also building a bike. Which lifted his spirits when in this place, beside her of course.

“Hey!”

Daryl quickly turns to the voice after turning his bike on and tried to fight back the smile that succeeded in shinning through when Y/N made her way over to him without too much of a struggle.

“Hey…how’re yea feelin’?”

“Better. Going on a test run?”

“Yeah, ain’t letting yea on it until I know it won’t fling yea off without me knowing”

“So considerate” She laughs followed by a smile. “Be safe. Can’t have you limping”

“Mhm. I will…and even if shit happened, I know I’ve got yea”

[m1d-45]

any chance of a part 2 of opportunities arisen? perhaps tighnari finds out who we are? or someone else comes after us? 👉👈 i love him sm and ur characterization of him is perfect, that fic is 100% canon in my mind for every imposter au now

prime fortune

a/n: hope this one didn’t absolutely destroy your expectations anon. it took a hard left turn halfway through and i couldn’t bring it back—

word count: 3.1k oh wow-

-> warnings: minor spoilers for sumeru archon quest (3.0-3.2), dubious medical facts that you should not follow, likely ooc cyno, excessive use of the word ‘something’ with little reasoning to show for it, cyno’s excellent humor

taglist: @samarill || @thenyxsky || @valeriele3 || @shizunxie

<< part 1 || < masterlist >

adapting to life in the forest was easier said than done.

you’re often paired with collei, who’s in the middle of a bad eleazar flare that keeps her confined to the village, and though she teaches you the different salves and plants, a lot of it goes over your head.

you’re interested, you are! the liveliness with which she speaks, and the animated gestures from tighnari as he explains proper safety when preparing medicine easily capture your attention, but when she hands you two mushrooms and asks her to tell you which one is morchella….

by some strange luck, you often guess correctly, your intuition knowing more than you do, but when she nods with a smile and asks you to repeat the differences…

your mind falls blank.

something about the density of the fibers inside the mushroom floats through your mind, but you can’t remember whether the true or false mushroom is heavier.

collei’s smile falters, and yours turns sheepish. when she takes you out on walks, slowly walking up the paths so you don’t strain your ankle, you can point at the differences between portobello and death caps, you can pick out holly and honeysuckle and marigold, but here…

you pass the field practice with flying colors, but your basic by-the-books forest ranger tests always end in failure.

tighnari picks out two plants from a small case, holding them up in front of you.

“you come across amir sitting just off the side of a path, clutching his stomach. after some questioning, you determine he has a stomach cramp from dehydration, and spot these two plants nearby. you’re about a 15 minute walk from the village; what do you do?”

one of the plants has many flat white flowers blooming from the top, with yellow centers, while the other has orange petals that form a ball shape on top. you know one of them is yarrow, but not which one…

you pick the latter on a whim, spinning it between two fingers as you think. “pick the petals and crush them into a paste, taking care not to overwork them. give him about a spoonful, which should be most of it, then help him up. report to shirin once we return.”

the blank mask on his face falls into confusion. “how do you even mix up marigold and yarrow?” he asks, picking the flower—marigold, you now recognize—from your hand. “you got the procedure correct, at least, but marigold is bitter and will only worsen his aches. oh, and additionally, the leaves of yarrow—however small they-“

the door to the cottage slams open, jars rattling on their shelves, and tighnari whips around to face whoever it is, one hand steadying a stack of reports.

“and just what do you think you’re- w- collei? is everything alright?”

collei’s violet eyes were wide, her shoulders heaving with breath, when she spoke, exhaustion was evident. “m-master tighnari! the matra are here on behalf of the akademiya! i tried to tell them to wait so i could get you but they just-..”

emotions flashed over tighnari’s face faster than you could catch, eventually setting on a sharp determination. “alright collei, calm down. go find amir and do your best to delay them, but don’t seem too suspiscious, okay? just remember what we planned, i’ll take care of things here.”

her eyes flicked to you, worry evident, but she quickly turned away.

the moment the door closed, you and tighnari sprung into action. he collected the plants from your test and tucked them into their proper places, you standing to help return a mint plant back to its place.

he caught your wrist, taking the pot. “don’t. take your bag and go, don’t worry about this.”

you hesitate for longer than you should, then nod. he lets you go and returns to his case, and you move to crouch by the bed. feeling under it, your hand eventually brushes against a cloth handle, which you grab. you take a step to unlatch the window with one hand and sling the pack over your shoulder with the other, leaving with your good leg first. as you carefully close the window behind you, you can see tighnari moving to hide all the notes you’d taken, the only sign of his worry being his tail lashing behind him and the slightest flick of his ears.

with a soft smile, you turn away.

tighnari checked over his room once more, ensuring that every trace of your presence was scrubbed clean. your laundry was out and mixed with the rest of the rangers’, but your notes and records were carefully hidden under patrol logs and his own personal binders. he knew everything was tucked away, he had explanations lined up and answers to every conceivable question the akademiya could have, but his heart still beat frantically against his ribs. even as he pulled apart and neatened up a stack of patrol logs, repeating the action to look like he was doing something whenever the matra came to his hut, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he missed something crucial.

he had to fight to keep his tail from betraying his emotions, the energy not going into mussing up and then fixing the papers spent on hiding the symptoms of his distress. he knew he didn’t miss anything. the moment you told them the sages were on active lookout for you and he knew you weren’t a threat, he had memorized the plan. he was foolish to worry.

he hasn’t known you for long, barely over half a year, yet his mind is clouded with the same worry as when collei collapses out on patrol. the same numbing sort of adrenaline, the icy feeling in his bones even as his skin starts to burn up, the apprehension in every movement, as if at any moment-

somebody knocks on the door.

tighnari takes a steadying breath and fusses with the papers a final time. “come in!”

the door creaks open and he taps the papers on the table, turning slightly to speak over his shoulder. “sorry, you caught me in the middle of something.”

“no matter,” a familiar voice says, and he can’t stop the way his body freezes at the speaker.

he carefully tucked the papers into a folder, finally turning around. “general mahamatra. to what do i owe the honor?”

cyno crossed his arms, red eyes surveying the room. “oh, nothing at all. just somebody from vimara village reporting somebody that looked suspiciously like the primo fortuna walking around with collei when they’re supposed to be in liyue.”

tighnari stares. the primo fortuna…? he thought they were after you, but you couldn’t be…

“are… are you suggesting somebody is attempting to imitate the creator?”

sure, he wouldn’t deny you shared some features—you had the same shape of nose, you were around the same height and build—but for you to be the creator? no, it wasn’t possible. your eyes were much kinder, you stopped and helped nasrin when she couldn’t find the proper forms, you directed shirin to the area of the forest where you and collei found nilotpala lotuses, you were nothing like the creator he saw at pardis dhyai. you didn’t stare with glazed eyes as padisarahs and sumeru roses were brought forth, you listened in earnest when he spoke about the differences between the various kinds of ferns.

if anybody were to meet you, they’d know in an instant you were not the creator.

his heart itched within his chest. he ignored it as worry.

“that’s exactly what i’m implying. as i’m certain you know, their identity is hallowed, and anybody attempting to infringe upon it needs to meet justice.” the golden eye on his headpiece flashed, the sides beginning to narrow into eyes before he shook his head and it passed. “but in truth, that is not why i am here.”

tighnari stared. despite having a fondness for jokes, cyno was never one to laugh about his duties. “what do you mean? collei told me you were here on behalf of the akademiya.”

“the matra are here on behalf of the sages,” he clarified. “i… i am here for other reasons. personal ones.”

his eyes flicked around the room again, and tighnari’s narrowed. “well, don’t hide behind double meanings, then. what is it?”

cyno’s jaw flexed as he chewed at nothing, his arms uncrossing. his eyes focused somewhere around the bed, and he seemed lost in thought. whatever it was, it had to be a big deal, but for him to hijack the matra’s arrival instead of coming on his own time…

“the one on the throne is not our god.”

he said it with such conviction that tighnari found himself agreeing, waiting for whatever had gotten him worked up, and it was only when cyno’s eyes closed as he braced himself that it registered what he said.

“what?”

“i have gathered evidence across many sources, both academic and religious, common and exclusive, and i can’t bring myself to kneel at their feet any longer. i have been ignoring my own mind for too long for the sake of my conscience, and i am confiding in you now what has been brewing in my mind for months.”

in the silence that stretched, tighnari almost wished he hadn’t spoken.

the way he spoke, from his words to his tone, reminded tighnari of when he reported to the sages, like he wasn’t tighnari to him and was instead an authority.

“cyno, i don’t.. is this why you didn’t go when they were at pardis dhyai or sumeru city?”

he nodded. “i can’t be in a place where they’re being worshipped when i’m so conflicted. i thought about pulling you aside in the city, but…”

tighnari didn’t think he’d ever seen cyno so meek in his words, none of his normal power behind it. he’s… tired, a quality he knows he’s felt but has never seen on him, the almost nervous way he keeps glancing around the room edging on alarming.

“alright.. uh, moving past that for a moment, what does that have to do with why you’re in gandharva ville? wouldn’t you want to not be involved?”

cyno’s eyes dragged from where they were locked behind him with uncharacteristic slowness. “the person you’re hiding may be the real creator.”

the simplicity to his words had tighnari believing it, even as it didn’t fully register in his mind. he knew cyno attached a religious aspect to his work, to the point the people in sumeru city sometimes calling him an extension of their judgement—even as it was more like the akademiya’s, most time—so he knew that whatever he said on the topic was both well thought out and reliable.

which is why he was silent even after it clicked.

“what are you saying, cyno?”

“they’ve been staying here, haven’t they? in this room?”

“this is my and collei’s-“

“don’t tell me you haven’t been able to feel the difference in the air? the way it seems to flow slowly, lingering, like it has something to wait for? there’s no heavy blankets on the bed, and yet everybody else is talking of how cold the weather’s been lately.”

“that’s because this is an insulated room, and we’re right up against a cliff.”

the quick pace to his heart was back, this time less of worry and more of confusion. you couldn’t be the creator, not when you bore so little resemblance to the one on the throne. you were good at what you did, plants thriving under your care even if you forget to water them. call him selfish, but tighnari almost wished the creator could go back to wherever they’d been, since they’d been much kinder there, both to their vessels and the world.

you weren’t them. they weren’t even close to being you.

“you’re considering it.”

he crossed his arms, forcing himself to still. “i’ll admit—not that you didn’t already know it—that we have taken a refugee into the village, one the sages might call a criminal-“

“that’s not what i mean, tighnari, and you know it.”

“can you give me a minute? you can’t just drop a massive load of information on me like that and expect me to continue like it didn’t happen!”

“you’re reacting oddly.”

“well of course i am, you’re telling me the same person i took in and sheltered from your bosses is somebody you want to take away back to them, and that’s not even covering their injuries- they’ve barely been able to walk outside of the village, and you want to take them to the city?”

“when did i say anything about the sages?”

tighnari stopped, his chest heaving. his hands froze mid-air, his tail still flicking in a mix of irritation and stress, thoughts moving quicker than he could understand them.

“what?”

“i never said anything about the sages. i never said i would take them.”

“w- well it’s implied, if not in your words then-“

“i don’t deal in implications. you know this.”

he did.

he knew cyno. he knew how he spoke and acted, he knew that the small emotion in his eyes was indicative of empathy and not ruthless justice. he knew he held reasoning in high standards, he knew that if he stopped and thought about the words coming from his mouth then he would agree.

but he couldn’t think.

all of his usual composure had faltered and faded, leaving him grasping for a hold as his thoughts swam like a raging river around him, even standing a struggle amidst the tide. all he could do was watch, his head racing and hands shaking, as cyno stood on the bank of rationality, with his crossed arms and cool eyes that dared him to step forward and sink beneath the waves.

he had no real reason to fear so much for you. by now you were gone, by now you were safe and far past the statue of the seven by the chasm, hidden in a place where even cyno would struggle to find you. you were crafty, clever, and you had more than enough supplies to last until he could go to find you.

he had no reason to be afraid.

yet his heart still raced a rhythm he couldn’t follow, his mind tripping and skipping with worry.

why?

his tail wrapped around his side and he picked out a cluster of petals from it, mostly just to give his hands something to do.

as he did, he noticed it was a full flower, likely knocked off one of the samples on the desk. it was small, blue, with smooth petals, and he recognized it after a moment’s pause.

“this is a hydrangea. what is it used for?”

the flower quivered in your shaking hands. “root and stem are for… for medicine. petals are tea.”

collei nodded, smiling brightly. “exactly! you’re a quick learner, aren’t you?”

you smiled sheepishly, trying to hand her back the flower, but collei held up a hand, closing her pack with her other hand.

“no, you keep it. take it as a congratulations for all your progress!”

you were hesitant to accept it, that much was clear, and tighnari tied off the small parcel in his hands before speaking.

“you really have done well. you’ve only been here for a few weeks, but you’ve learned a lot.” he set down the packed herbs beside where he was leaning on the table, directing all of his attention to you. “i know it’s mostly for safety, and you’re not going to be a ranger-“ too much paperwork was required, he couldn’t risk it “-but still. i’m proud of you.”

you smiled.

it likely wasn’t the same flower—that ‘class’ was months ago, now—but it dragged a realization to the surface of his mind.

in the short, fleeting time he’d known you, he had come to care for you as he did collei.

even then, only after a week or two of you being there, a certain fondness had taken root in his chest. something bright, something that bloomed like a rose yet without any of the thorns. something that he watered every time you winced when you walked, something you fostered when you helped treat collei’s eleazar when he was out clearing a withering zone.

something that grew as he realized the poultice you had made had helped clear the pain faster than anything he’d made, even as you both used the same recipe, something that lashed out when kamran questioned your place in the village. something that spurred him to action when he thought you were in trouble, even if it was only cyno.

something that burned bright, something hot that blurred his reasoning even when he knew it was wrong, something that made him want to bare his teeth and keep you safe by his side.

something that should be impossible for him to feel towards you, as it was a golden and warm feeling that did not exist in teyvat, only ever glimpsed at altars.

tighnari looked up from the flower and into cyno’s knowing eyes.

“alright.”

relief washed onto his face, a small nod the only other sign that he’d heard.

“i’ll report nothing to the team—i trust you’ve gone over this, given your reaction?”

he let the comment slide. “yes, everybody here knows what to do in the case of the akademiya or the millelith coming here. it was collei’s idea, actually, and she took care to make sure that everybody had it memorized.”

cyno nodded, taking a step towards the door. “good. and if you ever need to collei matra, just get me instead.”

“…”

“do you get-?”

“i got it, cyno.”

[misdeliria]

what's up, babe? k. bakugo This is something I wrote for class, and I'll be changing the names ofc

“What’s up, Dynamight?” 

Marion flashed her toothy, condescending smile at him from where she hovered five feet off the ground. 

Katsuki, too busy catching his breath, flipped her off. 

The young woman laughs, holding her stomach and falling back as a massive robot destroys a block of windows. 

“You need some help, tough guy?” Marion jeers, still beaming with her smug expression. 

“I have it handled,” he says gruffly with his haggard posture and torn uniform. The damn thing threw him through a building. 

“Yeah. It sure looks like it.” Marion flies over to him, and when she does, she twists and moves like she’s gliding through water. “Don’t worry about it. Leave the job to a real hero.” She flies off with a wink, leaving Katsuki shaking with rage. 

Who the fuck does she think she is? Talking to me like that? I’ll put her in her fucking place.

Japan’s favorite American, Marion Beaumont, was touring the country as a friendly gesture from the States—uncaring if they stepped on a few toes to allow it. 

He watched Marion soar through the sky, swing her leg around, and land a devastating blow to the robot’s side. The colossus tipped over, losing its balance and shaking the Earth as it impacted the ground.

Katsuki ground his teeth as cheers erupted from the onlooking civilians. 

It was without question that Japan’s populace would fall in love with Marion. Jet black hair and fair skin with an exceptional quirk: Invincibility. It was without question. 

Marion’s quirk gifted her with flight, super strength, and—

“Watch out, Grandiosa!” Someone screamed from the streets. 

The robot attacked Marion with mechanics shooting out from its torso, but she didn’t flinch. Red beams of power flashed from her glimmering blue eyes, breaking each mechanic like twigs. 

“No need to fear everyone!” Marion announced, waving down at the onlookers. 

“Grandiosa will save us!” A relieved man shouts, further irritating Katsuki. 

Marion laughs, eyes closed and careless, not noticing the robot’s hand winding back to swing. 

It wasn’t until a woman screamed, too late, that Marion finally turned to see the impending hit. Just as he practiced, it only took a second for Katsuki to launch himself two blocks up to where the invincible hero braced for the attack. 

“No!” Marion shrieks as Katsuki shoves her out of the way. The heavy assault sends Katsuki through an adjacent building, but witnessing it is enough to piss Marion off. 

Putting Katsuki off for after, she cocks her arm back and throws her fist into the robot’s chest, punching a hole through its armor. As the robot twitches, malfunctioning, Marion shoots beams from her eyes at the arm’s connection to the body. Despite the arm extending nearly as long as four cars, she rips it clean from the robot before tossing it to the side. 

Her last stop is at the head, where its glowing eyes seem to look past her. Ripping its head off and holding it up for the growing crowd offers Marion relief until she sees Katsuki staggering out of the building wreckage. 

“You alright, tough guy?” She asks with a short laugh. 

“Fuck off,” Katsuki growls, stretching his arm and scratching the rubble out of his hair. 

“That was quite a hit you took for me,” Marion continues, floating after him as he walks off. “I take back what I said before. That was such a beautiful act of heroism.”

Her words are dripping with sarcasm, and the enchanted eyes she’s giving Katsuki make his stomach roll. 

“I don’t care what you think,” he snaps back. Marion giggles behind her hand. 

“If not for me, that robot would have thrown you through buildings until sunset,” Marion says with such certainty that Katsuki’s almost convinced. 

“I would’ve worked something out.” Why does he keep responding to her? Just ignore her and walk away. 

“I don’t think so,” Marion coos. She flies in his path, and suddenly, Katsuki is face to face with the American. “At least thank me for stepping in.”

“Thank you?” Katsuki roars, eyes bulging out of his head. 

Marion smiles like she has the cream. “You’re welcome, Dynamight!”

“NO! No,” he quickly retracts. “Why should I thank you? You should be thanking me for saving your stupid ass.”

Marion holds Katsuki’s gaze momentarily, keeping that permanent smile across her lips. “Thank you, Katsuki.”

His name spilled from her lips so rashly that heat flooded his ears. He’s stunned.

“Don’t call me that when we’re in uniform,” is his only retort. His weakest comeback, in his opinion. Katsuki will regret it late at night as he’s getting ready for sleep. 

“So, you’re saying I can call you that when we’re out of uniform,” Marion takes away, drifting closer. “Then, we should find time to see each other outside work soon.”

[imissthembutitwasntadisaster]

“Sweetheart, if you knew the things I could do with you, you’d have run away a long time ago,” said the young man standing below the arch of the city gate.  If you looked at him full-on he seemed normal enough, but catch him in your peripheries and he seemed Wrong somehow.  Like he had too many sides to him, or like his limbs were just out of proportion, or like he moved with a grace that wasn’t quite human.  He reached out to run a finger along a stray lock of hair escaped from the pigtails of the young woman he was talking to.     

She groaned loudly.  “Don’t. We’ve known each other far too long for this bullshit.” 

The man grinned.  It was an unexpected grin, usually men like this are expected to smirk, or leer, or smile slyly, or even quirk an eyebrow if it came to it.  But the grin was real, open and glad, briefly washing away the aura of inhumanity and leaving merely a boy who very much liked talking to this girl. 

“But it’s funny.”

“I’ll kill you.”

“But it’s really funny.”

Let’s back up a bit.  Everyone knows that history repeats itself and certain outcomes always arise.  Violence is condoned through complacency.  Tyranny lasts for a while then tends to burn itself out.  Empires always end up toppled in the end.  These are our stories, at least, which crop up again and again.  The principle is true in other lands as well, they just happen to view different things as histories. 

Fulfaran was particularly high in story density as cities went.  It seemed you couldn’t turn a corner without running into a run-away princess, or a charming scoundrel, or a crone (crones were particularly bad – it was a 50/50 chance as to whether they’d try to destroy your life or give you genuinely good advice).  The markets were teeming with exotic goods, the castle at the top of the hill flew its banners brightly in the breeze, and there were established parts of town you went to only if you wanted to a. meet an orphan, b. meet a thief or c. fall down a hole.  Rather a good place for Reynard and Connie, who tended to be plagued by stories. 

Constance was a baker’s daughter who had been taken as a teenager to live in a tower by a witch in exchange for her impoverished family receiving enough gold to live on.  She never fully understood that witch’s motivations but that’s just how it went.  She had immediately proceeded with a number of escape attempts, most of which failed until Reynard had ridden below her window and she had bargained with him until he snuck a rope inside with her food deliveries.  He had claimed to be a prince, but wasn’t.  Connie knew he wasn’t quite human either, but he didn’t seem to want to talk about it and she didn’t want to pry. 

She had wanted to go home, but she knew the witch would try to exact vengeance.  So, she said her goodbyes for a second time and started out in the opposite direction, which happened to be where Rey was headed as well (or so he claimed, in truth he had no direction or purpose.  But he liked Connie, she was sensible and she made him laugh). 

Unfortunately, it seemed the two of them were not fated to have an easy path.  For one, events kept transpiring which forced Rey into situations where he was expected to betray Connie.  Said events seemed rather upset every time he simply told her everything and they worked out a solution together.  Connie, on the other hand, was continuously being offered chances to fight royalty and claim a kingdom.  It wasn’t that she wouldn’t like a kingdom, she commented once as the two of them wandered through the woods, but she didn’t think she had the training to run one.  She was, after all, a baker’s daughter.  She could make excellent bread but she didn’t care for administration. 

They also stubbornly refused to fall in love with each other, which seemed to make the stories very distressed indeed.  This was not helped by how within a few hours of meeting they had become firm friends – Connie rather thought they had been expected to be unlikely allies who hated each other at first.  But it wasn’t in either of their natures to hate very hard and she liked Rey – he was clever and cutting, but never cruel.

Eventually the events all became too much, which is why they had come to where they were, the main gate of Fulfaran.  The storied city.  Surely someone here must know how they could get out of this. 

Connie felt herself smiling back despite herself.  “Fine, it’s a little funny but I honestly don’t know how you can say stuff like that in public without wanting to curl up into a ball and die,” she said starting to walk again, under the gate into the crowds.  Rey fell into step beside her. 

“I have no shame,” he shrugged, “besides, I don’t know any of these people. No one’s paying attention and even if they were, they’d think it’s normal.  I’m pretty sure I saw at least three pairs of ‘people who definitely hate each other’ coming in after us."

Connie was going to reply, but she was cut off by a harsh voice that had snuck into their path. 

“Child! I see greatness in you—”

“Oh not today, thank you!” said Rey, doffing his cap to the aged woman in the dark cloak swaying before them.  Connie summoned up her best customer service smile, the one with just enough of a hint of rage in it that it tended to shut people up without them knowing why, and slipped past the figure. 

“Wait!” the crone cried, “there is a prophecy—”

“Probably not me,” said Connie cheerily over her shoulder.  “Try that girl with midnight-blue eyes over there, that’ll do the trick.”  She rolled her eyes at Rey who grimaced. 

“When we get to the inn we’re taking the most boring room imaginable,” he said emphatically.  “Nothing on the top floor, nothing with secret passages, just four walls and a bed.”  The two of them had long since given up on multiple rooms, or even multiple beds.  No matter how hard they searched every inn was always just a little too full. 

“We better do it quick, I want to sleep before dinner.  Who did you say this place was recommended by again?”

“Basically everyone I know who’s been here,” said Rey, scanning the buildings as they passed.  “They say it’s lovely, really quaint and unique. We should be there right around this corner—”

He halted.  Connie almost hit his shoulder but she hardly noticed, too focused on the inn they had found.  It was small and smoky, almost crumbling beneath the weight of the sky.  Hooded figures passed in and out, glimmers of gemstones sometimes flashing out from beneath their clothing.  The sign was covered in enough grime that it couldn’t be read and there was a large board on the front with dozens of papers stuck to it advertising quests, monster-hunts, missing people, missing dogs, various balls, festivals, and competitions, and the best shops to find weapons in the area.  Connie’s heart sank and Rey’s expression told her he was feeling the same thing. 

“I saw a TreacleTavern down the road,” he said under his breath.  TreacleTaverns were in every city and they were all huge and identical.  Connie nodded vigorously.

“Let’s go, let’s go.”  She all but shoved him back down the way they had come. 

As they left she shot one last look over her shoulder.  A young man was staring at them.  He had chestnut brown hair and an intense expression, as though he had seen them before.  He seemed oddly familiar to Connie, though she didn’t know how she might have met him. 

It was probably something very important that she would have lingered on had the circumstances been different.  Unfortunately for the stories, however, she was still extremely invested, come hell or high water, in getting her pre-supper nap.   

[sepublic]

So we have a young and older person... Both want to indulge in their fantasies, with one (low key non-binary) preferring an idealized world where they can play with and befriend everyone, while another wants to be feared by the enemies he ruthlessly conquers, and has the power of the Titan at his disposal.

You can say this applies to Luz and King... But it also applies to the Collector and Belos, now that you think of it?

And because the ages are reversed with these roles, with the one who wants to destroy his enemies being the ‘mentor’ of sorts, that plays a part in Belos and the Collector being so much more disastrous. Something something, restorative justice VS retributive justice, and how blindly pursuing either without regards to others can be dangerous. But at least with restorative justice, you want people to get better and be happy, not dead; The Collector’s reign lasts much less than Belos’, but we can see how their policies lead to less carnage.

It’s interesting that Luz and King are primarily paired with their ‘compliment’ on the antagonistic side, so to speak, even dressing up in their clothes; King with the Collector, who tries so hard to be Luz. Luz with Belos, who claims to speak on behalf of the Titan. And we see Luz get to reach out with her more ‘direct’ parallel in the Collector, although alas King never really gets to interact with Belos... It’s mostly in spirit, as I’ve said, with Belos acting in the name of his father, justifying his atrocities with the Titan in a way that convinces King he doesn’t want to be seen as a monster, as he later discusses with Steve. And there’s at least the fact that King kills Belos at the end of the story, too...

Luz and King are still a lot alike, as are Belos and the Collector; So of course this is going to apply between Luz and Belos, and King and the Collector. Luz is haunted by who she could’ve been by Belos, and feels trapped by this, whereas King feels obligated to help the self he recognizes in the Collector; It helps that King is playing more of a guiding role out of sympathy, whereas Belos is deliberately seizing power to gaslight Luz, insisting on these comparisons.

Luz and King are trapped in a twisted version of an early relationship, which is made explicit with King and the Collector, while Belos sees himself as the older person trying to rein in the younger, steer them from the less destructive path. And because the Collector wants to befriend others, they’re actually open when Luz steps in; Whereas when King steps in for Belos, it’s literally, as in he steps on Belos and stomps him to death, because that man would rather die than change and boy did everyone take him up on that claim.

I kind of get the sense that another reason things went wrong with the Collector and Belos is that they didn’t have their own Eda, an older mentor figure who could help temper and guide them! The Collector could’ve had that with the Titan, but the potential mentor succumbed to passion and lashed out at the kid for something the Archivists did. Likewise, Belos might’ve had that with Caleb and Evelyn... But the potential learner rejected both, killed the former even! And Caleb and Evelyn are Eda’s ancestors, no less; Just as the Titan and Eda are parents to King, and teach Luz magic!

By the end of the day, it really is down to the person themselves to get better, to decide to change; Look at Belos! But an older person providing guidance really can make a world of difference, when we look at the Collector and how they received that at a more impressionable age. 

[arisewanekosuki]

Dreamer in Teyvat -Night 1- (7/?)

[1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6] [For the next part check Masterlist]

[Equipment: Backpack, bag, shield, 3 Sango pearls, 3 Onigiri, comfortable Inazuman clothes for traveling]

Thankfully you haven't woken up in your world yet, that means one day and night in Teyvat doesn’t equal one night in your world. But still, you can’t help but wonder how much time is left till you wake up.  Well you can just sit and think about it or do something… of course you choose to do something. Thankfully Miss Momoko let you sleep in her house for the night, she even prepared some Onigiri so you have something to eat later. She didn’t want your mora but you felt bad how much she did for you, so you left it in a place where she will be able to find it later. For today’s plan is to find Gorou and ask him to accompany you to Mouun Shrine. The first place to search for him was where other soldiers gather but you couldn’t spot him anywhere. You ask the first Samurai that you spot. -“Excuse me, do you know where I can find General Gorou?” The man looks surprised. -“General is now busy. If there is some problem I may help you.” -“Ah no, thank you! I just…um…a-anyway! Have a nice day!” and with that you run off.

It's really unlucky that Gorou is busy today. You’re not sure where he is and when he will have free time, so for now you decided to go to Mouun Shrine alone. You pass an old bridge and follow the road and pass another one.. You continue following the road till you reach the beach. You notice that for now you’ll walk on the sand, so you take off the sandals, holding them in hand. You pass through shallow water and then continue walking on sand.  You reach the small canyon, you take a look around it wondering if it's a good route to the Shrine.

You decide to continue through it. The sand here felt much colder. When you pass it you notice something. Katanas and some destroyed things were lying around. It looks like someone was fighting there. You only hope whoever won is not here anymore. You take one of the best looking katana. At least now you have something to protect yourself with. Even if you don’t know how to use it you still can stab someone or something with it. From here you can see the skeleton of the whale but before it on the right side there is another bridge. Passing through another shallow water that changes into a waterfall, you reach the bridge. The wooden bridge seems to be in worse condition than the one close to the village. You put on your sandals and step on it, testing if this holds your weight. It seems stable enough so slowly you go through it. When you approach the end you notice that some planks must fall off. You had to jump. You take some steps back and then run and jump. Your feet slipped and you quickly grabbed the planks, knee hitting hard into the wood. You hissed in pain but you got up and left the bridge. You sat down on the ground to check your knee. -”At least it’s not bleeding..” you sighed. Deciding to take a small break, you start to eat the onigiri that Miss Momoko prepared for you. It’s delicious. You notice there are some Berries so you take them for later. After resting for a bit you continue to follow the path. After some time, you see 3 Torii Gates.

Passing through them you see the ruins of the Shrine. Looking around you don’t see anything unusual. There are some loaches so you try to sneak on them and get some loach perls. After some time you managed to collect 5 loach perls, maybe you will be able to sell them later. Going around the shrine you search for anything. But then you hear something.

There was Abyss Mage, it seems it was searching for something. It didn’t notice you yet. Should you try to attack it with a Katana? It doesn't have a shield yet, but what if the Abyss Mage noticed you before you'll struck it? Should you just hide and wait till it will go away? Or maybe should you run back towards the village?

------ Yes, I didn't forgot about this series. Tbh I had a bit more time and motivation so I wrote the next part! But I can't promise I'll be back of writing other parts immediately after the voting is over ;; Also sorry for mistakes, the worst is when even I notice silly ones after posting it but I can't correct them because you can't change post if you added voting T_T

[hellowhisperingstars]

I See you

Summary: Maisie has a bad day at daycare and you talk to Steve and Robin about your worries.

Pairing:  Ghost!Eddie Munson x Mommy!Reader x Psychic!Daughter

Words: 5K

Warnings: 18+, no y/n used, fluff, angst, ghosts, cussing, bullying, mentions of things from S4. Let me know if I missed anything.

A/N: Part two! This one is still sad, so I apologize for that! Let me know what you think and please let me know if you have any requests! My inbox is open!

You can find more of my stories on my Stranger Things Masterlist!

You can also read this series on AO3!

Previous - Masterlist - Forward

That night you had a long conversation with Maisie about her dad and how he passed in an accident. You never want your little girl to know the terrors of the Upside Down so you danced around the subject. When she’s older… way older… like fifty, maybe then you’ll tell her. 

You also asked her to not let anyone else know that Eddie was still around and to be extra careful about talking to him in public. The town didn’t need to know that she was special. You didn’t want anyone to look at her the way they looked at Eddie. Plus, you were already a social pariah because you had a child out of wedlock in a small town. Not to mention she was the child of the so-called “cult leader” who everyone believes destroyed the lives of half the town. You knew he wasn't, his friends and family knew he wasn't but you still explained to Maisie that people will say mean things about her daddy but she shouldn't listen to them. They didn’t know him. 

But her dad was a hero. 

It's been at least a week since she dropped the 'your late boyfriend was haunting your house and he wants his Garfield mug' bomb and to say you were on edge was a little too on the nose.

You didn't know what to do. You had never raised a child before and for that kid to be a psychic, well that was just the tip of the iceberg. Both of you were learning how to walk down this path you were on, you just hoped the ground didn't fall out from under you as you went. 

It took a bit of fighting with yourself but you were finally able to muster up the courage to talk to Steve and Robin about this while Maisie was in daycare. Pushing the door open you looked around the Family Video for your two friends, usually one of them was at the front. Over the years they had been promoted to Manager and Assistant Manager so they ran the place now that Keith was gone. “Hello? Guys?”

The sound of crashing tapes caught your attention, a quiet “Oh shit..” was heard as Steve muttered to himself. Your head snapped to the right as you slowly started to move around the rental counter towards the horror section. 

“Welcome to Family Vide- oh! Hey!” He smiled as he walked out of the aisle and over to you engulfing you in a hug before he stepped back to look at you. When he noticed your pensive look his smile fell and he got worried. “What happened? Why aren't you at work? Is Maisie okay?”

“Maisie's fine.” You say holding your hand up. “I took the day off. But there is something about her I need your help with... Where is Robin?” 

Looking at his watch Steve frowned. “She’s on her break. Went to grab some coffee. Should be back soon.” 

“Cool,” You said, with a nod. Moving towards the counter you leaned against it. 

“What’s wrong?” Steve asked as he went around the counter to lean on it next to you. 

“It’ll be easier if I tell you both at the same time.” You mumbled turning when the bell above the door rang. Hoping it was Robin you looked over your shoulder only to come face to face with Mrs. Cunningham who was sneering at you. Slowly you stood up and moved away from the counter so she could return her videos, licking your lips you wandered over to the kids section looking for anything Maisie would be interested in watching. She really liked The Little Mermaid.

Maisie sat alone on the swing set of her daycare, her little Mary Janes kicking the sand below her to make a small pile. She didn't like daycare. She was alone a lot and none of the other kids wanted to be her friend. Plus the old lady inside was mean. Looking up she glanced at the window of the building to see the stern looking old woman staring back at her. Maisie didn’t understand why she didn’t like her, she always left some of her lunch and her afternoon snack for her when the other kids didn’t, always made space for her at the table so she could join them when they colored. All the other kids didn’t seem to even notice her which confused Maisie since the lady was always there. She asked Miss Britney about her once but she told her that there was no lady.

Maisie looked over her shoulder when she felt a cold set of hands on her back giving her a gentle push on the swing. 

“Hey kiddo,” Eddie said as he smiled down at her.

“Hi. Mommy said I can’t talk to you outside of the house.” She muttered as she looked at the ground again kicking her legs out as he pushed her back again so she could go higher.

“Yeah, your moms smart like that.” He said as he pushed her once more. Looking over his shoulder at the other kids making sandcastles in the sandbox he turned back to her. “Why aren’t you playing with the other kids?”

“They don’t like me.” She shrugged with a sad pout. “They say mean things.”

“Well don’t listen to them okay,” He said as he moved to lean on the pole of the set as she swung back and forth. “You’re worth a hundred of them.”

“Mommy said you were my daddy.” 

“Well, your mom doesn't lie.”

“Why can't she see you?” Maisie asked as she looked up at him as she continued to kick her legs back and forth. Going higher and higher.

“I don't know, bug.” Eddie shrugged as he watched her. “Don’t go too high. I can’t catch you if you fall out here.”

Or maybe he could…Nah, better not test it, it took a lot of energy just to push her on the swing. 

Giving a quiet okay she let her legs dangle as she started to slow down. The two of them sat in silence for a while, Eddie watching her from his spot leaning against the swing set. It was strange to know that he had a daughter, that she was sitting on this swing. He was so proud of you for bringing this little girl into the world, but he was also incredibly sad he couldn’t be here to help you raise her like he wanted too. Glancing up at the school he narrowed his eyes at the old lady in the window for a moment as she glared at Maisie, you would think she would be more polite to the only living person that could see her. He watched her for a few more minutes until the daycare attendant walked from the building as she looked at her watch. 

“Time to come inside!” Miss Britney called as all the other kids started running to her. Giving a quick headcount she looked up and waved her hand giving the little girl a smile. “Maisie! Come on!” 

“Watch this daddy!” She said as she jumped from the slow moving swing landing in the sand about a foot in front of where she was before.

“Woah!” Eddie laughed as he followed her towards the house. “You're cooler than I am. You know that?”

Maisie giggled as she ran to the group and walked into the house. Turning she smiled at Eddie as he followed them inside. 

The old lady glared at him. “You're not supposed to be here. You take that devil child and get.” 

He narrowed his eyes at her his protective side coming out. No one was going to pick on her when he was around. Alive or dead. "Don't you dare call her that. She's just a kid, my kid. So if you have anything nasty to say you say, you say it to me, got it you old hag?”

The woman huffed in indignation before she disappeared. She'd be back. She was the old owner of this home before it was turned into the daycare, not like she could go anywhere. Eddie knew it was rude but he didn’t like the lady. Turning he gave Maisie a little wink as she sat down to color and he sauntered over to the long bench of cubies to perch on top of it. He'd be right here in case she needed him.

Once Mrs. Cunningham left you peaked around the shelf to see Steve glaring at her back as she walked to her car. 

“Why don't you ever stick up for yourself?” Steve asked, looking over at you. “What happened to Chrissy wasn't yours or Eddie's fault. It was Vecna.”

“Do you really think anyone would believe me? Trust me if I had the money I would just leave this place and never come back. But I don't want to leave you guys or take Maisie away from Wayne. She's all he's got.” 

Sighing, Steve gave you that look that said you were being stubborn. 

“No need to rock the boat when the boat's already capsized. I'm just the girl who dated the devil, remember?” 

The bell rang again and Robin walked in. “They didn't have any mocha so I got you vanill- hey!”

“Hey Robs.” You waved with a small smile. 

“I just saw Mrs. Cunningham walk out… you okay?” She asked as she handed Steve his coffee and leaned on the same side of the counter as you.

“Yeah. She just glared.” You wave it away. No point in being upset about it. 

“Great, now that Robins here you can tell us what's up with Maisie.” Steve said as he took a sip of his too hot coffee. He made a face when he burnt his tongue. 

“Is she okay? Is she hurt? Sick? I can run to the store to get her medicine if you need me too.” Robin asked quickly. Maisie was the first baby of the group and the need to protect her was strong in everyone. This little girl sure did have a lot of loving Aunts and Uncles. It made your heart swell. 

“She's fine.” You soothed, taking a breath you looked at them both. “But I think Maisie's a psychic.”

“She's what?” Steve blinked, rolling his sore tongue on the roof of his mouth to try and get the pain to stop. It didn't help.

“Psychic.”

Steve gave you a confused face as he looked between you and Robin. “You think she's… crazy?”

“That's psycho dingus.” Robin said, rolling her eyes at him. “Mai is like El or something.” 

“So she has powers?” 

You shrugged a little bit. “Well, she doesn’t have telepathy or anything like that. She's a medium. She can see and talk to ghosts.”

“But, I mean she's four… it could just be her imagination. Like an imaginary friend.” Steve said, taking another drink of his coffee.

“An imaginary friend who is named Eddie and looks just like her dead dad?” You argued as you looked up at him.

Steve choked on his coffee. You watched him sputter as he tried to breathe. “E-eddie?”

“That's what she said.” Wiping at your tired eyes you looked sadly at them. “She knew things that I never told her. Like that I called him Teddy. The jerk even opened every cabinet and drawer in my kitchen because he wanted that damn Garfield mug at his Uncle's. Twice now.”

“Did you or Wayne ever say anything about him in passing?” Robin asked as she fiddled with her coffee lid. “Maybe she picked up on something, you know? Or seen a photo?”

You shook your head. “No, we are very careful about what we say right now. She's already getting hate for being his kid. We don't want her being a bigger target for the town to go after cause she won't stop talking about him. I only told her that his name was Eddie after she mentioned he said she could call him Teddy. I have one photo in my room of him but it's at the top of a shelf that she can’t see."

“Can you… see him?” Steve asked quietly. Weirder things have happened here in Hawkins. “Eddie… I mean?”

You shook your head and looked down at the counter pushing a box of Mike and Ike’s across the counter. You would give anything to see him again. “No. Just Maisie. She described him perfectly, you guys. She told me about his hair and that damn green vest he was wearing when he died. Is this my fault? I didn’t know I was pregnant when we went into the Upside Down. Do you think the spores we were breathing did this?” 

Robin and Steve looked at each other before they both sorta shrugged. Steve crossed his arms over his chest as he leaned on the counter closer to you. “I don’t know. But I know it’s not your fault. This might not have anything to do with the Upside Down, it might just be a Maisie thing.”

Nodding you sighed leaning your forehead against the counter top. A Maisie thing… 

After your talk with Steve and Robin you tried to go about your day like normal, grabbed some groceries, a coffee, and when the time came you picked up Maisie from her daycare. 

She wasn't her normal bouncy self when she ran over to you. Her arms going around your neck as you pulled her into a hug. “Hi baby. Have a good day?”

Shaking her head she shoved her face into your neck as you held her close. 

“What's wrong? What happened?” Looking up at Britney as she walked over to you both. “What happened?”

“We had a little incident today.” Britney said as she gave you a sad smile. “I walked away to change one of the smaller kids and one of the boys called Maisie something mean and they got into a fight. Maisie has a few scratches but she gave that boy a black eye.” 

“What did he say?” You asked, trying to keep in your anger as you pulled Maisie away from your neck to check on her. She was a little banged up, nothing that wouldn't heal in a day or two. Her eyes were a little red around the edges from her crying.

Britney hesitated a bit before she took a deep breath. “He said his dad told him that her dad was a murder and that you were a witch... He also said that she was a freak, and his dad said he should stay away from her.”

Anger boiled hotter under your skin as you looked around for a kid with a black eye so you could give his parents a matching set. “Where are they? I would like to talk to them.”

“They're already gone.” She said holding her hands out to soothe you. “I told them that since he started the fight that he wasn't allowed back for the rest of the week. He needs to learn that he can't speak to someone that way. But in turn… Maisie is also suspended for the rest of the week since she hit him.”

“Shit…” You mutter, pulling her close to you again. You have to go back to work tomorrow. Would Hopper mind if she came with? You could have her color at your desk... or one of the teens could watch her… “Okay. I’ll.. I'll figure it out.”

“I’m sorry.” Britney frowned. “She can come back next week.”

“See you next week..” Sighing, you picked Maisie up and started towards your car. Maybe Wayne could take her since he has days off… no he needs to sleep since he hasn’t been able to switch to the day shift yet. Once at your car you helped Maisie into her seat you crouched down next to the car so you could be almost eye to eye with her. “Are you okay baby?”

Sniffling Maisie nodded her head as she looked down at her hands. 

Nodding, you brushed your hand over her head and gave her a quick kiss to the forehead before you closed her door and got into the driver's seat. Pulling away from the old house you turned on her favorite cassette and made your way through town towards home. It didn’t take you long to get back to Forest Hills and as you pulled into a spot by your house you looked back at Maisie through the rearview mirror to see her looking out her window, her breathing a little fast. “You see something?” 

She nodded her head and looked away from whatever she saw, “She has a scary face.”

“It’s okay,” You soothed as you unbuckle your belt. You were trying really hard not to freak out so you didn't panic her. Sometimes her sight scares you. “Just close your eyes and I’ll let you know when it’s okay to open them. Okay?”

You watched her nod again and shut her eyes tightly in that kid way like when they faked being asleep and you quickly grabbed your keys from the ignition and threw your purse over your shoulder as you got out of the car. Looking around you tried to see something, anything, that could be what your daughter saw but as usual there was nothing. Taking a deep breath you moved to her door and went through the paces of getting her out of her carseat before you lifted her into your arms, closing the door behind you and walking up the steps to your home. Unlocking it you moved to the side so the door could swing open and you closed it behind you, quickly you moved to the couch and set her down. “Okay, there we go safe inside. No more scary lady.”

Maisie slowly let one eye open as she looked around the living room, seeing it was safe, you saw her relax. 

“I still need to get the groceries from the car,” You said, helping her out of her jacket. “Why don’t you get comfy and then you can help me make dinner. That sound good?”

“Yeah!” She smiled, completely forgetting about the ghost outside the house, as she bounced off the couch and then down the hall to her room to change out of her day clothes. Maisie loved helping you make dinner. 

Smiling after her you left the trailer for just a few minutes to grab the bags from the trunk and locked up your car for the night and moved up the small steps to the front door. Turning you give one more sweep around the empty area, your eyes narrowed, and you square your shoulders. “I don’t care who you are or what you want but you leave my baby alone. You’re not welcome in this house.”

Turning you enter your home, closing the door behind you just in time for Maisie to run from her room in her home clothes. It was just a little dress that you made from an old set of curtains and a sewing machine from the goodwill but she loved it. “What’s dinner?”

“I was thinking of grilled cheese and tomato soup.” You said as you put the bag of food on the counter and started pulling out the cans of soup. “That sound good?”

“Yeah!” She smiled as she ran into the kitchen to pull the step stool out of the corner and up to her usual spot at the counter. She was a good little helper and you let her butter the bread as you started on the soup. The knife she used was a kids learner one so there was nothing sharp to hurt herself with. You smiled at her as you handed over four single wrapped things of cheese to open. 

Grabbing a pan from under the counter, you cleared your throat and started a second burner. “You wanna tell me what happened at daycare today?” 

 Maisie stopped peeling the plastic from the cheese to look up at you. “Tony was being mean about daddy and me. He was saying mean things that his daddy told him. I didn’t like it. I told him to stop but he didn’t.” 

You listened as you stirred the soup. Letting her tell you in her own time, you had learned from being around Eddie as long as you had that sometimes pushing for an answer would just make the other person feel cornered so you nodded your head giving a little ‘mhm’ as a cue to continue.

“I told him I would tell Miss Britney,” She said as started to open the cheese again. “But he pushed me and called me a tattle tale and a fr-freak. So I got up and I hit him.”

“Gave him a black eye.” You said, looking over your shoulder at her. “Who taught you how to punch huh?” 

“Uncle Steve.” She shrugged as she handed over the pieces of buttered bread now that you turned the burner for the soup off to cool. 

“Okay,” You’d have to talk to Steve about that. He taught a four year old to punch when he could barely win a fight? “How’d you get those scratches?”

“He put his hands on my face and he scratched me.” She pouted.

“While I’m proud of you for standing up for yourself and your daddy, you can’t hit people, baby.” 

“I know,” She sighed as felt a zing up her spine and she looked around the kitchen to see Eddie standing at the kitchen door staring at you sadly. “Hi daddy.”

“Hi sweetpea,” Eddie smiled at her before he looked back up at you. Five years older but still just as beautiful as the last time he saw you. 

Your back went ramrod straight as you looked over to where she was looking and just saw the empty doorway. “He’s… um… here?”

Maisie nodded and pointed her little hand to where he was standing. “Right there.”

Your eyes moved around the empty space before you gave him a little smile. “Hi babe.”

He smiled as he took a step towards you. “Hi pretty girl.”

Maisie giggled behind her hand as she looked up at you. “He said you were pretty.”

“As he should!” You said smiling back at her before you finished making your dinner. 

The two of you sat at the table and ate your dinner chatting lightly about what's going to happen the rest of the week. You'd have to call Hopper later tonight and see if you can bring her down to the station. She had plenty of books she can read, pages to color, little toys she can play with. She'll be fine. You stared at her in awe as she told you about the rest of her day. You had to remind yourself that she was four, but she spoke so well for her age, guess that comes with having no one but adults for friends. She picks up on words and habits like a sponge. 

After dinner you set her up with The Little Mermaid and a puzzle as you washed the dishes. After a while you caught yourself staring at your daughter as she sang along with the movie a puzzle piece in her little hand as she watched Ariel sing “Part of Your World” and you wished you could be like her. Seeing so many scary things, dealing with people being rude for the hell of it, and taking it all in stride with only a few bad patches here and there. Really you wished you could see what she sees. Help her learn how to shut the bad things out. How were you supposed to protect her from the things you can't see? You could barely protect her from the things you could. 

So lost in your thoughts you jumped as you felt a cold spot grow on the small of your back. Like someone had placed their hand there. It was comforting. Eddie. It was like he was saying that everything would be okay. Looking over your shoulder you watched as a small puff of air left your lips in a little cloud like it did when it was winter. "Eddie, that had better be you or I swear to God…" You mutter trying not to get Maisie's attention. 

The feeling left a few seconds later, but that spot stayed cool for a while after that. You finished the dishes quickly and moved to your room to change into your pj's. Looking up at the photo you had of Eddie in your room you smiled sadly. You loved that photo. Eddie was sitting on his Dungeon Master throne in the drama room of Hawkins High, his arms wrapped around your waist as you sat on his lap, his nose was buried in your hair as you laughed at something he said. Pulling on one of Eddie's old band shirts that Wayne gave you after Eddie died you left your room and got comfy on the couch to finish the movie with your little girl as she pointed out things you never noticed before. 

You watched her yawn as the movie came to a close and you looked up at the clock to see it was time for her bath and then bed. Together you moved into the bathroom so you could give her her bath, the tub filled to the brim with bubbles as she played with her toys. Once you had scrubbed your girl clean, you wrapped her in a fluffy towel, and dried her off as you got her ready for bed. Tucking her into her little pink princess bed you kissed her forehead as you sat on the bed next to her. “Goodnight baby. I'll see you bright and early in the morning. Do you need anything before you're off to slumberland?”

She shook her head. “No.”

“Do you remember what you say if you see something scary?”

“You’re not welcomed here. Get out!”

“Atta girl!” You smiled as you pushed her curls from her forehead. 

“Night mommy. I love you.”

“I love you too.” You smiled as she got comfy in the bed, making sure to grab her stuffed bear, Mr. Noodles, that Joyce bought her when she was born, before you stood up and left the bed leaning down to switch on her nightlight before you moved to the door turning off the overhead room light. You stood in the doorway for a moment watching her in the dim purple light of her little nightlight before you left the room leaving the door open just a crack in case she needed you. 

You took a few minutes to turn off the TV and clean up her puzzle pieces making sure not to lose any so she can continue it later. Moving into your kitchen you grab the phone off the wall and by heart you hit the buttons for Hopper and Joyce's home. You listened as the phone rang and rang before Jonathon answered. 

“Hello?” He said into the phone. 

“Jon!” You smiled as you leaned on the wall. “How are you?! Back from college already?”

“Hey!” You heard him smile as he said your name. “Yeah, got in this afternoon. How are you? How's Maisie?” 

You caught up with Jonathon for a couple of minutes before you got the courage to ask for Hopper.

“Everything okay?” Jonathan asked.

“Maisie got into a fight at her daycare and now she's not allowed back until next week. I just needed to ask Hop if I could bring her with me to work.” 

“Bring her here. I'll watch her.” Jonathan said as he pulled the phone away for a moment to say something to his mom about watching Maisie at their house. 

Joyce jumped at the chance to see the little girl and through the receiver you could hear her say “Of course! She's always welcomed here, you know that!”

Your eyes stung with tears as you laughed a little. The love you felt for your found family was otherworldly. “Jon, are you sure? I don't want to mess up any plans you have with Nancy.”

"Yeah!" He said, "Yeah it's fine. Nancy has to work tomorrow so it'll be okay. Plus I'm sure she'd love to see her."

“Thank you guys. I'll bring her by on my way to work. Is eight o'clock okay?”

“That’s perfect!”

Letting out a sigh of relief you thanked him again before you let him go for the night and grabbed your book from the counter. You liked to use the time that Maisie slept to read uninterrupted. Moving back into the living room you got comfy on the couch and opened the book to your saved spot. You had just started to get into the story when the lights started to flicker. Looking at the lamp next to you your heart started to race. Eddie said that the lights flickered when Chrissy was killed by Vecna. It couldn’t be… 

Slowly getting off the couch you dropped your book as you stared at the lamp as it continued to flicker randomly before you realized… It was morse' code. S.O.S. Eddie. Looking around the room you jumped letting out a little scream before you clamped your hand over your mouth to keep from waking Maisie as your TV turned on by itself. The static white noise was all you heard before you looked around for the remote that seemed to be missing. You needed to turn it off by hand. Slowly you moved towards it and got down on your knees so you could turn it off. The powering down sounds happened and you breathed a sigh of relief when the world went quiet again. Looking up at the TV your eyes went wide as in the reflection of the screen was Eddie. Sitting behind you so close you could feel the cold. You had been so preoccupied by the lights and the TV you didn't even notice the drop in temperature. Tears collected on your lower lashes as you looked over your shoulder at your empty living room and then back into the TV. "Eddie…"

He smiled at you. Looking as handsome as he was before the demobats attacked him. He looked healthy and whole. You couldn't hear him but you saw his lips move. "Hi baby."

"How…" Shaking your head you smiled at him with a watery laugh, you didn't care. Your daughter wasn't crazy and Eddie was here watching over you both.

[andromedagrrrl]

{a moment of silence}

as the wind accelerates, and the grass becomes drier than it was ever before,  the air gets thicker with every breath i take.  i can hear the vines on the metal gates talking to each other,  murmuring about her, teasing her, gossiping, taunting.  when everything comes to a halt,  what was once important then is suddenly the least of my worries. and the smallest sounds of crickets echo around this little brain of mine  it's just all so fuzzy i can’t think straight. the tiny voices in my head that were once quiet, are now the loudest they have ever been.  who did this to her? who hurt her? the tears push against my eyeballs,  blinding me as she takes her last breath. and as if in slow motion she bellows and screams in rage. somewhere in the world, along the tectonic plates is a volcano erupting.  molten rock spilling down the rim, like smoke in a bubbling cauldron.  destroying and eliminating everything and anything in its path.  the ground shakes again. for a moment i consider screaming with her,  but i let her have her moment. a moment. our moment.  i can hear the sound of my heart pounding against my chest,  begging to be set free. the great sound pierces through glass, setting multiple alarms off. i don’t stop the tears from streaming down my cheeks as my entire world comes crumbling down.  everything i’ve ever known in this life will cease to exist after this moment.  the first raindrops fall, making my new red blouse a see-through crimson,  i don’t bother putting my umbrella up.  what’s the point anymore? i want to help her, but how can i? another gut wrenching scream. somewhere in arctic circle the ice is cracking,  swallowing all the polar bears, and seals by pulling them into the ground for the rest of eternity. her face is a violent shade of vermillion,  and all she can do is scream, and scream, and scream, and yell, and stomp around.  ‘this is it, kid,’ the trees tell me  who did this to her? who hurt her? my eyes are as my shirt,  red and soaking wet soaked, and crimson red. i let out a breath that i didn’t know i was holding in.  i want to help her.  i want to tell her that it is all over now.  i want her to know that  she’s free from this place.  i want to kiss her blood-stained lips.  taking some of her with me as my world collapses.  i want her to know that it is going to be ok.  but i let her have a moment. she deserves love for ever and ever and ever and ever.  she deserves forgiveness for all her ‘sins,’ that is if she has any.  all i know is that there’s a special spot in paradise waiting for her.  so, as my world comes to an end, i’m not doing anything but merely existing for a moment of pure silence.

[nemrut]

“Taylor's had plenty of friends, and believes in, and understands, trusting and relying on those friends--Aisha stood by her even in the depths of her madness as Khepri, Lisa and Rachel worked to help her and understand her as best they could even when communication was impossible for her, Parian and Foil willing came under her control when she needed them. Taylor firmly believes in the value and power of friendship, to the point where how she treated and parted with her friends was a deep regret she had. But that doesn't really change her perspective on Unity, because that was forged in the flames of the apocalypse, wherein even the impending annihilation of Mankind across all Earths couldn't make people get over themselves, work together, etc. A dozen different factions turned on each other in the midst of the end of the world, people kept secrets and lied to the very end, and perhaps most importantly--even those who did work together in the face of impossible odds couldn't actually do anything. Many Parahumans did work together against Scion, for example, and broadly speaking, they spent a week dying without accomplishing anything of note. Making progress required dominating and destroying everything in her way, and the fact that her friendships endured even when the world didn't and remained strong even when the world was ending is important, it's true, it's something she's held close to her heart for twelve long years--but it doesn't change that fact, either. And even then, well...when it came down to it, as Lisa complained, Taylor did things her way(....)

(...)Simply put, Taylor believes that friendship is an amazing, priceless thing. She believes that extending a hand of friendship, in the right place and the right time, can save someone and change their life and that it's valuable beyond words, and that the bonds of that friendship can be unbreakable, that they can hold someone up even when all else seems lost, and survive when nothing else does. She believes in love and devotion and holding on. What she doesn't believe is that people will put aside their differences and work together if the world started ending, or that it would necessarily matter even if they did. Sort of like how Taylor loved her father and believed he loved her and believed in the value of that love--but didn't believe that going to her father would, say, resolve any of the problems that she was having with her bullies, which, to be fair, it didn't. She believes in love and while she doubted her feelings for Brian, she wished she could have loved him and that that love would have be enough--but deep down, she knew it wasn't. She believes in friendship and holds onto it forever, but couldn't rely on that in the end, either. Because deep down she knows--or, at least, 'knows'--that the way to effectuate change in the world is to dominate and destroy everything in her path, because that's the only thing that ever did. TL;DR: Taylor was born to be a 90s Magical Girl, but was taught to be a 90s Supervillain.”

Ryuugi about Taylor Hebert from Worm

[fizzigigsimmer]

Fargo Season Five: Finale thoughts.

I AM UNWELL. I have never seen a piece of television so beautiful. More of me just rambling and processing my thoughts beneath the cut. Spoilers naturally for the season.

Oh boy. I’m going to start this off by saying preemptively that I know there is going to be a portion of the audience who feels underwhelmed by this finale. In comparison to seasons past, this last episode was surprisingly lite on the blood. The epic showdown and fantastic shoot outs that Fargo has become known for was quite literally skipped over. The feeling is anti-climatic and that won’t sit well with some.

But here’s why I don’t give a shit and wouldn’t have it any other way.

This season wound us up. It brought us to a place where we were on the edge of our seats, so certain that the only way out for Dorthy, if she got out at all was going to be pathed in blood and bodies. We thought that the only way for Dorthy to be free was to rip and tear and destroy all who tried to stand in her way. We wouldn’t have blamed her. What else can she do, in a world that is kill or be killed. Fight or die. Conquer or be conqured.

But that was never the point of Dot’s story. Her story has been about how to live this entire time, and the secret to living is not more death. It’s acceptance and forgiveness. It’s empathy for your fellow man and a helping hand. It’s sacrifice, doing the right thing even when it costs us everything.It’s learning to bear the burden of the unfair, because those sacrifices are rarely made by the people with the most to give and the least to lose. It’s giving what you can, and leveraging the privileges you have for the greater good and learning to appreciate those around you. It’s putting aside our bias to find common ground and appreciate the best in each other. It’s a meal made with helping hands. It’s oatmeal cookies. It’s a buttery biscuit. It’s love.

👏🏾

I will forever love this season for giving me Dot’s story. For telling a story about abusers and survivors without the cinderella syndrome. For showing abuse survivors as they are in reality : complex human beings with flaws, phobias, bias, and toxic coping mechanisms just like everyone else. The only truly innocent character in the entire season was Scotty, a child and that is purposeful. Everyone else is just human, and it’s the choices they make that are important and define their fates.

Roy chooses to be a cowardly monster until the very end and so Lorraine sentences him to a lifetime of feeling the suffering he’s dealt to others. Feeling what it is to be weak and small and violated and at the mercy of the system. We stan a queen.

Lorraine didn’t have to open Dot’s file and hear her truth, or accept it for that matter and at first she had no interest in educating herself about the woman she disdained and tried to discard. But she chose to open that file and reckon with Dot’s past, and not only that she let it change her and how she lived going forward. It changes her for the better in small but significant ways. It saves Dot, preserves her family and allows for the chain of events that lead to Roy getting his just deserts. *Side note, Dot hugging her and her not knowing how to deal with such a kind touch and intimate moment is such a mood. 😆 I laughed out loud.

Indira was laden down by a man who could only love himself, but still she chose to get up every day and try to serve her community. Even when nobody else cared, she cared about finding the truth and helping the real victim in it even if it cost her everything. The only person she didn’t know how to fight for was herself but Dot and Lorraine showed her how. We stan a principled Queen who knows her own value!

Witt. 😭 😭 😭 In a lot of ways Indira and Witt are two sides of the same coin. They are both sentinels. Principled individuals who truly want to serve the greater good. And it’s so meaningful that the two characters showing us what true justice - true law and order - should look like, are marginalized individuals. While Indira’s struggles as a brown woman in the police force are less pronounced for a more internal subplot, the narrative does such a beautiful job of showing us the battle against external powers through Whitt. He is a state trooper. A good and dignified man worthy of his badge and yet his authority is always challenged and he is constantly reminded by those around him that he is less than. There’s a huge emphasis on names and their meaning throughout the season, and the importance of what we call people. But few characters bother to remember his name. He’s called Boy or Son more than any other character on the show. Every time he stands up for Dorthy and goes into battle we’re made aware of his powerlessness despite the badge he wears. He’s powerless to stop Gator stealing evidence. He’s consistently demeaned and threatened, and yet he chooses to bear it all with grace. He chooses to stay his course and help Dot, even when he has the least power and the most to lose. He dies alone, without backup and the last words he hears are Roy’s “Don’t fight it, it’s over now Son.” It’s not fair. It’s not right. But in so many ways he saved Dot’s life. He’s a big part of the reason she gets to go home. She’s the last character to say his name. “I’m looking for my trooper. Whitt Farr.” I cried. Still crying.

Gator. Gator, Gator, Gator, Gator. 😭 I will probably do a longer post about this someday when I’ve fully processed it all, but for now… I was fully expecting for Gator to have a “last moment act of goodness” through killing Roy, and probably die himself. My Billy girlies know what I am talking about. I’ve seen it over and over again in books and movies. I have talked about this many times over the years in multiple fandoms, but our society loves to write “the human villain” for their capacity to emotionally hook an audience. But they have no idea what to do with that humanity once it is written, and that’s because we ourselves barely know how to live once we’ve been at our lowest and done our worst. We don’t know how to forgive ourselves or others, and we don’t know how to heal and move on. We’re afraid of the work required when you live past the redemptive moment. We resent the work required and the loneliness of it. It’s boring and difficult and messy and it never seems to end. It’s so much easier just to write characters who either choose not to change or die sacrificially. But we need more than that. We need to see and to believe that it’s worth it - clawing your way through the dark, searching for light - doing the right thing and learning from the pain of yesterday. We also need to know that we will find someone waiting on the other side for us, who sees that struggle and believes in our potential. This is what Billy Hargrove deserved. This is what anyone who has ever been abused and abandoned deserves. This is what everyone who wants to change and chooses to do it deserves.

Ole. What a phenomenal use of magical realism this character is. He is the man who has swallowed the sins of mankind for centuries. He’s carried the burden of our atrocities and our most inhumane impulses until he forgot his name, his place of birth, or even how to dream. Until he became a function of the system. Tit for tat. Eye for eye. The man who ensures that the debtors pay their debts. A soldier. Until he became a code and forgot how to be a man. His use of the third person as if he is narrating the life of All Men from some position outside himself is so profound in the face of the truth he finally shares with Dot and her family. A truth he’s probably never shared before. He echos Gator’s character in a fashion. He’s a soldier who doesn’t know how to dream, a victim of an unjust system, but deep down he yearns to be better.

The old woman whose house he invades is never named, simply called “Mama Munch” and we see how he takes on an almost childlike role with her. She asks him what he wants, and the answer is pancakes - reminiscent of Scotty’s love of all things breakfast for dinner - and it’s of course deeper than pancakes. He wants to feel a mother’s love and a child’s ability to take comfort in it. But he can’t. Because he has invaded her life, and even when he guards the door the war gets inside. She’s abused by an ungrateful child and then killed on her own front step. Ole came to Dot’s house to continue the cycle and perform the only function he knows, but Dot reminds him that he can choose. He can choose to stop swallowing the fruit of the poisoned tree. He can choose to remember beautiful things. He can choose mercy. He can choose kindness. He can forgive and he too can be forgiven.

Dorthy Lyon’s story was always about more than survival of the fittest. It was about more than the fight to live on and get back to the people who loved her and find a safe space for herself. Her story was about rejecting the lie we’ve all been told since birth.

That life is like a prison. You’re born and then you’re shuffled into groups, separated by class and race, and within those groups the strongest rise to the top. And until death it’s an endless fight to take take, and hold onto what you take.

Dot’s story presents us with an alternative viewpoint. That life can be devastating, but it can also be beautiful and it all comes down to who we choose to be.

[ptn-imagines]

can you write romantic relationship headcanons about mcqueen where the reader is also a sinner ? :D

Here you go! Admittedly I feel like there wasn't enough Sinner-specific stuff, so I added in the MBCC stuff for that reason. I'm also putting this one beneath a read more due to allusions to McQueen's self-destructive tendencies.

Romantic relationship between McQueen and Sinner!Reader

You have never heard of “the path of least resistance.” The harder they are to get, the more you want them. Or you’re just crazy. Possibly both.

The path to actually dating McQueen is going to be a long one. Oh, there will be flirting, touching, dates and possibly even more, in no small amount; however, being a Sinner isn’t a free pass into McQueen’s confidence.

The fact of the matter is that, at least at first, she is absolutely using you. You’re a fun toy to play with for a bit, and she’ll discard you when she gets bored of you. And she will get bored of you if you don’t do something to grab her attention permanently.

If you truly want to pursue a relationship with McQueen, you’ll first have to be able to see through her disguise. Background knowledge of the art world will help, but the second McQueen has you eating out of her palm, you’ve already lost your chance.

Secondly, you have to sympathize with her pain and understand what led her to this path. If you can’t do that, you’ll forever be held at arms’ length, and that’s if you’re lucky. McQueen has a lot of power, after all, and it wouldn’t be terribly difficult for her to make a troublesome Sinner sniffing around in her affairs disappear.

If you support her in her destructive path, your relationship will ultimately be a short-lived but passionate one. The two of you will burn down the filthy, sinful world around you for sure, but you’ll likewise be consumed by the inferno. You’ll have no regrets, though, and likely you’ll go to your ruination at your own hand with a vindictive sense of satisfaction.

If you want something longer-term that won’t destroy the both of you in the end, however, you need to rebuke her. Sympathize but don’t support; McQueen will scorn any idea that she can be redeemed, and indeed it’s likely she’s too entrenched in what she does to ever truly abandon it, but it’ll chip away at her defenses. Though she’ll deny it, McQueen still has fleeting fantasies about the what ifs, if her mentor hadn’t found her that fateful day. Seeing something in her she thinks is no longer attainable, giving her hope, is what will ultimately win you favor.

You’ll end up dating McQueen long before she allows herself to actually be vulnerable around you. McQueen is a whirlwind of messy feelings and contradictions and for her, the falling-in-love part comes before the development of true trust. This is going to be infuriating. There’s no two ways around it. Still, if you got this far, you knew what you signed up for. Nevertheless, no one is going to blame you if you back out now, least of all McQueen; in fact, that’s what she expects. It’s what she thinks she deserves.

Patience is key. You should be cautious about pushing McQueen past her limits when it comes to vulnerability, but at the same time don’t let her be too evasive and dodge uncomfortable subjects all the time. Her first instinct is to flee from emotional situations and avoid vulnerability and intimacy. It’s nothing to do with you, it’s just an ingrained survival instinct and trauma response in her; however, if you don’t hold her by the metaphorical scruff from time-to-time, your patience will dry up long before you make any progress with her.

Ultimately, if you can be patient with her and rein in her self-destructive tendencies, you’ll end up with a partner who might seem flamboyant and insincere to an outsider, but is in actuality incredibly attentive and adoring of you. McQueen knows your preferences down to the most minute detail, and if you’ve gotten this far, her extravagant demeanor clearly didn’t put you off. She’ll go above and beyond to spoil you, and she’ll never mess it up; each day with her will be a surprise. Just don’t think too hard about how she’s funding all this.

In addition, McQueen is incredibly tuned in to your emotional needs, and can pick up on minute cues that most others will miss. Most of the time you might not even know you’re giving off these cues; McQueen likes to joke about it by saying she’s a mind-reader.

On rare nights, if you’re lucky, you’ll get to see the side of McQueen that she’s tried to leave dead and buried. If you’ve comforted her in the wake of a terrible nightmare, held her as she shook from a particularly bad flashback, talked her down from the height of her self-harming impulses… Know that McQueen is trusting you with everything that she is. Be kind and gentle with her. She doesn’t think she deserves it, but it’s what she needs. She hates herself enough as it is. Don’t reinforce that.

Don’t expect to ever get married to McQueen, either; the whole dating thing is hard enough for her. Still, if you’ve gotten to this point, you hardly need a piece of paper to cement your relationship to one another; McQueen isn’t going anywhere unless you yourself break it off.

In the MBCC, expect McQueen to spend a lot of time around you and show you off to the other Sinners, bragging about her amazing partner. If this bothers you, tell her; contrary to the expectations many might hold of her,  she’ll quit that behavior right away. You’re the most important thing to her, after all, even more so than her revenge. She can probably live without her revenge. After all, that Chief is monitoring her actions. Living without you, though? That’s an idea she doesn’t even want to entertain.

Some of McQueen’s old habits might slip through, and you might catch her flirting with MBCC staff or other Sinners. It’s not serious and she’s not even really thinking about it. Still, call her out on it if it bothers you, and… Well, she can’t promise it’ll never happen again, as flirting is part of the persona she wears, but she’ll make a concerted effort to stop, and you’ll definitely notice the dramatic decrease in flirtations.

She’s going to complain constantly about not being able to share a cell with you. You could probably convince the Chief if you want to, though. If not… Well, she’ll cope.

If you have any scruples with her forged artworks, be careful not to express any interest in any artwork, though, lest you find yourself the new owner of an “authentic” McQueen piece.

Also… If you notice your enemies in Eastside suddenly going missing or winding up dead… Well, McQueen won’t say she was involved, but she also won’t say she wasn’t. Don’t worry, though; nobody will ever connect the deaths and disappearances to you. She’s got skills that the Garden would respect, after all.

[psalacanthea]

WiP Wednesday

Since I'm working on something I can't share, I just grabbed a random bit from one of my WiPs! From the next chapter of the Hawke and Varric post-canon fic :)

Varric sighed, briefly reaching up his hand to pat her arm before he withdrew.  

Oh, not again.

“All right, what is it this time?”

“Excuse me?”

Naomi squinted an eye, leaning forward in her chair so she could peer at him suspiciously. “What are you brooding about now?  The only way this ridiculous situation works if we’re together, and you know that!  You need to know where I am, and I need to know where you are, so if we’re together everything is solved!”

Still avoiding her stare, Varric sighed and reached for his mug of tea. “I hate that you make honesty the path of least resistance sometimes.  It’s rude.”

Hawke grinned at the fondly annoyed note in his voice.

“I’m doing a lot of big secret shit at the moment, and I didn’t want to bother you with it,” Varric said with an irritated sigh, dropping his mug and staring into it contemplatively. He shook his head, eyes meeting hers in a reluctant sidelong stare.  “I’m meeting up with an old friend from the Inquisition today, late.  It’s…you remember when you asked me about Solas?  The guy who helped you in the fade? Not the spirit, the other one who helped you escape.”

“Mhmm,” she said, glancing down at her breakfast.  The eggs were hard scrambled, which they’d discovered was the only texture she could handle from eggs any more.  Maybe one day it would come back.  She missed oozy eggs with her smoked herring.

Varric's voice was dripping with exhausted, sharp exasperation. “So it turns out he’s an Elven god!  And ah, he’s probably still trying to end the world.  Or at least end our world, which is something I’d like to prevent.  Naomi, are you listening?”

“You remembered my pickled onions.  Thank you,” she said with a smile, nose crinkling.  

“I told Orana, don’t give me too much credit.  Were you listening to me?”

There he went again, brushing off her thanks.  What a bad habit.  Why did he think she’d be shocked by this, though? Did he forget that they'd killed a demon Merrill had said was one of their gods, too?

“Yeah, okay, evil Elven god.  Is that even a surprise with all the shit we’ve been through?  Which one is he?  I only know what Merrill’s told me.”

“Ah, the Dread Wolf.  Fen’harel.”

“The one–”

“Merrill always swears about, yeah.  But the thing is, I don’t so much want to kill him as I do stop him.  I’d like the chance to talk him down before everything goes to shit, at least.  I’d like a chance to stop something bad from happening for once.”

Surprised, she leaned back a little from him. Despite his warning, she still felt a bit of prickly anger thinking about all the shit he'd been through with those fanatics.  “I didn’t think you were close with any of the people from that Chantry debacle.  You and Dorian didn’t seem to like each other very much.”

He laughed sarcastically. “Dorian and I were fighting because of you.  He was going nuts over the idea of studying you, figuring out what being in the Fade had done to you.  And I wasn’t…feeling reasonable.  All I wanted was to get you home.  Dorian and I are fine.  Fights happen.”

“I want to be there.  Will you let me in?”

“Are you going to give up on your grudge with the Inquisition?”

Well, that was a big ask!  “No, but I’ll hold my fucking tongue at least, Varric.  Maker’s balls, I know how to keep my cards close to my chest.  I understand wanting to save a friend!  Don’t I?”

“Usually if someone tells someone else they’re trying to convince a god not to destroy the world, there’s a bit more skepticism.”

“At this point?” she asked him dubiously, picking up a thick slice of bread. It was a little bit bizarre he thought she'd be freaked out by this. She'd been trapped in the fade!

A hand lifted in defeat, Varric's voice lowering to a mutter. “I get what you’re saying.  I just keep hoping that one of these days I’ll see any self-preservation from you at all.”

“Not when it comes to you,” she said with a winning smile.

“Fine, you can come.  Just don’t threaten anyone.”

“Some people need to be threatened."

[maisonaime]

Ilithyia's Blessings - Part 4

I literally do not expect anyone to read this a mere hour after Miss Maas herself dropped the H-bomb on us, but I wanted to get this out into the ether before I lose myself in the next 900+ pages of her world. I promise after this chapter I will actually start fixing things rather than simply destroying them, but enjoy the demolition for now! ~2.2k words.

Warnings: depiction of a panic attack, fears about pregnancy/birth/motherhood, violence, choking, heights, family conflict, angsty, some would say a little dark

Part 1;  Part 2; Part 3;

Part 4:

There was nothing above the din in her mind and the shattering of her heart amidst the blackness. She could not stop this path of destruction, couldn’t quell the fire spitting out of her, taking aim at every person she loved. There was deep exhaustion settling into her mortal body that her power just ignored, dragging her down from her chest to her knees as she curled in on herself and sank to the floor. She didn’t care if it stopped. She wanted to burn and burn until she blew away on the wind, at last settling into the dust her bones were wrought from. 

Tarquin stood frozen in place as the black hole of power in the antechamber to his study churned and churned until finally, he decided he had to do something. Feyre appeared to be smothering herself with night once again, and that kernel of their shared power he had latched onto previously had spiraled completely out of his grasp. As his brain caught up with the events of the past 15 minutes – running at about a four-minute lag time – he was still trying to decipher if he had actually seen the unmistakable blue glint of siphons amongst the darkness. 

Enough was enough. He had yielded to this display of power, yielded to his base instinct to help those who had nowhere to go, yielded to her highly unusual interruption of his Court, yielded to her request for asylum and anonymity. 

All things that would probably see him split down to a molecular level by her deceptively gorgeous husband. Until he had learned of their pairing he had lusted after them both, and after? Well, what was unfolding had certainly not crossed his mind any of the many times he pondered what the Lovers of Night did with (and to) each other. 

Enough was enough. She was entitled to her protection here, but if she wanted to rip open the bridge between space and time in his Court… she would at least need to step outside. 

The High Lord of Summer steeled himself against the blackness and sent ribbons of water imbued with fractals of precious light from his palms. It wrapped itself in the same pattern as the chains of blackness had curled themselves around Feyre. Tarquin sent bursts of his power from his fingertips to propel the shards of light into the fraying enclosure.  As the blackness began to dissipate like ink, he flinched to see Feyre thrashing on the floor. Panic washed into his chest as he worried she had seriously hurt herself, motivating him to push the last of the thick night away. 

He quickly shifted the intention of his powers, allowing those ribbons to quietly reach Feyre and lift her off her feet, running soothing currents across her pulse points, gently uncurling her limbs and immobilizing her from further endangering herself. 

Feyre was certain she had died. One moment she was keening against the ground, unable to breathe, the burning behind her eyelids and between her brow like iron ore being dripped into her brain. The next, she was weightless along the cool planes of Tarquin's power. 

Only her mouth and nose were left exposed for air, forcing Feyre to refocus all efforts on breathing deeply as she was distracted from her mania. The silence that wrapped itself around her like a soft embrace nearly had her adding to the saltwater surrounding her. She hadn’t the energy to form a single thought, wisps of words and images stuck on repeat in her mind without taking coherent form. The confusion ebbed away into nothingness as she finally gave herself to the burnout. 

She hadn’t told anyone, had felt useless to state such an obvious fear, but she was so scared to give birth. She was afraid she couldn’t do it, that the pain would be insurmountable, that her body would not obey her and she would lose control at the cost of her and the babe. She had been quietly doing her own research and found a healer who specialized in attending to laboring women for their emotional support, but she had told no one, not even Rhys. 

It somehow felt silly to say that she was afraid to be in pain, though she knew that it went against every rational thought process. Of course, she was going to be afraid to be in pain, that pain would last for hours and would only escalate until her son was out. She was creating a new life and a task so important was bound to be hard and long and painful. And maybe that was part of it too, the part she really hadn’t found the words for. That she was afraid, not just for the pains of childbirth, but for the pains of being a mother. 

That she would lay her heart bare every day of her child's life, allowing it to break over and over again without complaint. Being forced to watch the realities of the world claw at his dreams, reminding him of his essence while letting him change, one day watching him set off on his own without knowing what world he would face. 

In the depths of the night when Rhysand would be so heavily asleep next to her that she could shield the bond without him noticing, she worried she might not be as ready as she thought she was, that she rushed into having a child with centuries still ahead of her. How could she hope to impart the same wisdom at twenty-one that she might’ve at one hundred and twenty-one? Had she ever stopped to consider living a life that was truly for herself? 

She thought she could overcome it, the birth and the rest of it. With time. With her family. With Rhys. With a team of good healers. 

And now she had nothing but herself. And the shattered promise of a son she may never get to meet.

— 

No force on earth could stop the powers converging in the scummiest alleyways of an otherwise beautiful city. Save for a god unleashing itself upon Velaris there would be little to stop the cataclysmic implosion of the most important family in the Night Court.

Nesta was set in a dead sprint down the streets; hurtling through corridors and refusing to look back as she felt that cold midnight power bearing down on her, creeping alongside her as Rhys hunted her in earnest. Her rage had already dissipated, but the well of power churning inside of her sang with glee at the challenge. She had no illusions about being able to avoid the oncoming confrontation, but she prayed that some pitying god might allow her a last drink before her sure death. 

Cassian was surveilling the city in a frenzy, staying close to the rooftops to avoid provoking his brothers' ravaging power as he trailed the plume of raw power hurtling toward Nesta. The notion of having to put himself between his brother and his mate, the sting of betrayal at the both of them for their actions, for their disregard. His chest felt like it was caving in with the dissonance, the knowing of what he might have to do. 

Azriel was contemplating continuing his freefall straight into the Sidra and letting the current wash him away. Unfortunately, it seemed his new master did not prefer that course of action. He could taste her potent blood on his tongue. As if she were seeing through his eyes, thinking his thoughts, she spoke into his mind. Now Azriel, we can’t have that. He had the distinct sense his wings would continue flying with or without his will. 

The new bond was more than chafing, it was blood-curdling. Where he had always hoped to hear his shadows sing, they now shrieked like the violent scraping of all the strings on a violin, like talons against steel, like a boy staring at his own hands on fire. Remember, you’re not to breathe a word of our secret, I expect not a blink or a breath out of place. He flew on. 

Amren and Morrigan stood on either end of the alley that led to the entrance of Nesta’s favored pleasure hall from before her intervention. Varian was hurriedly canvassing the neighboring streets hoping to spot Nesta and give the two females warning, if only a few seconds. They had reasonably gambled that given that these few city blocks were the only ones Nesta had ever really bothered to learn, her feet would probably carry her there by habit. 

And naturally, they were correct. 

Nesta made her way around the corner, chest heaving as she slowed to a brisk walk and shrieked as Mor made to grab at her and winnow her away to safety. She lunged out of the way, only to back herself directly into Rhys. He landed and swept her into the air in a blur of wings and smoke so fast, that Mor could do nothing but stare at the space where Nesta had stood for fractions of a second. Cassian bleated like a wounded animal as he launched himself into the sky after them.

There was nothing but the wind in her ears, the burgeoning pressure of altitude and her power crooning for more, more, more. 

They were hundreds of feet above the city when Rhys paused in the air and held her out in front of him by her throat like she were little more than a ragdoll. Nesta clawed at his arms and struggled not against his grip, but for more of it as her panic threatened to take over. 

He sneered cruelly, bringing her close to his face. Gone was the male she had seen look at Feyre with such softness; like their souls were intertwined and carried on twilight clouds. Finally, a monster to rival the one raging inside her. 

“If I have anything to say about it, you will never see your sister or our child ever again.” Rhys snarled.

That caused Nesta to pause, cold steel sweeping through her veins and into her irises. The silvery goddess in her spoke softly and with such venom that his grip softened just slightly in shock, preventing him from stopping what happened next.

“Neither will you” she leveled. Then she spit in his face and pushed herself out of his grip and into the awaiting sky. She was freefalling for mere seconds until she was in Cassian's arms as he hauled ass out of the city, towards the safety and coverage of the Illyrian wilderness.

—

Azriel landed at the River House moments after Rhys, having caught the brief skirmish between Nesta and Rhys in the sky. His heart had stopped as Nesta fell through the air, even as he saw Cassian moments from intercepting her.

He saw Rhys disappear from the sky and cringed as his power and voice flooded his mind. The house. Everyone. Now. There was no room for insubmission, it was a power Rhys rarely wielded over his Court. Azriel cringed at the realization that he was now bound to two oaths, even while betraying the one. None of Rhys’s authority over him had waned, independent of Feyre’s usurping thread to him. 

There was no avoiding it, and he couldn’t give anything away by his behavior, so he landed on the lawn and stalked after his brother into the River House. 

They had all reconvened in the study. Elain was wide-eyed and adding generous droppers of mirthroot tincture to each glass of brandy she had poured for the group. Mor leaned against the wall next to her, murmuring an explanation.

Amren was draped on the couch looking thoroughly fucking annoyed by the whole lot of them. Varian was perched behind her looking like he knew he looked like he wanted to be anywhere else. 

Rhys had his head in his hands, his elbows perched on his knees as he sat in the middle of the floor. Everyone looking and not looking at him through their peripherals. 

Mor downed her drink and grabbed a glass, bringing it to Azriel with narrowed eyes. 

“And just where the fuck were you while we were dealing with all of this?”

Azriel took the glass and murmured a thanks. He brought the glass to his lips but Mor’s hand shot out and pushed his arm back, her eyes narrowed as she sniffed the air. 

It happened too quickly for anyone to see, but the tumbler was shattered on the floor and Rhys had Azriel by the collars of his leathers, pressed against the wall so hard it had splintered to the vaulted ceiling. 

“Azriel” Rhys said, his murmured growl barely audibly over the din rumbling from the depths of whatever cavernous power he possessed. 

“Why do you have my mate’s blood in your mouth?”

Azriel shucked his siphons, letting raw power flood and fortify his shadows as they formed a shield around him. Fodder in the face of his second beast of the day, he wondered at whose rage would prove more destructive. At whose hands he’d be reduced to carrion. Or if perhaps, the two bonds would simply ribbon him.

He hardly had time to weigh his fates as Rhys hauled him by into the skies high above Velaris, into the cover of the clouds where no one could bear witness to the slaughter, save for the few curious gods.

And Rhys exploded.

[ask-missparker]

The reckless denial | Agents Of SHIELD Fic

Setting: Takes place during season 2

Characters mentioned: Skye, Fitzsimmons, Mack, Coulson, Rick Banner, Luna Marsh, Cole Lehnsherr and Liane Felton

Established Pairing: Rick & Luna

Fic type: Blurb

———

—Last said in the last post…

And most importantly, Amelia undergoes an even more shocking turn of events due to shield discovery of alien, inhuman and mutant activity across the country. During an trip to Puerto Rico, one of islands underneath the caves held the rumbling ability to unlock unhinged truths.

While Skye and Tripp were down there, in the mist of the explosive wave that resulted in Skye’s odd transformation, Amelia was effected in the blast getting hurt as she watched Tripp die.

But that wasn’t the only thing that happened…

Amelia woke up on the thick warmly crumbling ground with a splitting headache cause she was throw against a deep wall in the cave. She bleed a bit from the blast, seem to have taken a strong impressionable hit.

She rolled onto her chest, pushing herself to stand up as she winced racing around to the edge to only looked over to notice Tripp’s in crumbling ashes. Dead, as if he was turned to stone then been destroyed within a matter of seconds.

She noticed Skye on standing there, surrounded by dust and rock, as the whole place was rumbling and pillars were falling apart within the cave. She looked at her with fear, confusion, and surreal shock as her fists were uncurling themselves.

Amelia didn’t hesitate to hover a hand over Skye’s back ushering her out of the cave, as she helped lead everyone out of there as safety as possible. The rumbling continued frequently as they all moved along the path then stopped by the women they reached most of the other half of the team.

~~~~

Some time later, everyone returned back to the SHIELD facility, being looked over and being patched up for any damage. Skye was quickly moved into a separate clear room, being watched up machines, scientist and medical staff until further noticed.

She was basically in quarantine for a while, meanwhile everyone else was doing their best to figure out happens next. Everyone was quarantined for a bit to heal and release whatever might’ve been in their system from the swimming blast.

Fitzsimmons were suspicious as they ran tests on her state. They all were suspicious at how Skye was still standing but seemingly hurt.

Her vitals were interesting to say the least, Amelia was more than curious about it as she took recommended Advil for her headaches during the whole situation. Hell, they were grieving Tripp’s death in their own way! She noticed everyone’s cyclone ways of dealing with the aftermath of the storm they were all hit with.

A storm of emotions filled with sadness, anger, anxiety, depression and straight up denial of it all. Trying to forget everything happened but they couldn’t. Hell they were ready to fight one another and throw a few chairs. Skye was shaking and crying at the mere thought because she was the one to see the process of his death, everyone just saw the aftermath. Blaming herself as Amelia and Coulson comforted her, knowing it wasn’t her fault even though it felt like it was to her.

~~~

To keep herself from getting too overwhelmed and wanting to smack someone like Mack or race off to use Hunter as a mini punching bag, she decided to escape to Avengers Tower for a bit due to not being there in a while.

The consuming energy that floated around Amelia as she watched and hung out with friends such Rick, Liane and Luna calmed her down. They asked her what happened but she was under strict orders to not say much of the circumstances to her visit, despite the fact that she wanted to let them know. Assuming it was on the news right now of the rumbling from Puerto Rico and tunnels being collapsed.

Rick being the more cautious person there, sensed something was off about her energy. He sniffed an underwhelming amount of concern and denial from her but he sensed something more, after hearing about the strong headaches. And the fact that seemed to have not slept in a long period of time. Luna was more than curious about it all and wondered what happened, promising to not tell the others as Amelia pointed to the TV screen and slowly explained how there was a swimming blast that knocked her out cold. She tried to connect the dots.

Liane’s firey personality was suspicious and skeptical of Amelia Parker, wanting to figure out what exactly happened to her physically after hearing the story beats of her tale. She watched her fingers tinker, her eyes narrow as of she was having another headache, almost nervous like Luna. Imitating her impressions and anxiety from curiosity that surged into her veins, as Liane grinned as her and Rick went to talk.

It confused and concerned Amelia as she stayed talking with Luna at how much they felt about the situation. One moment she’s fine and another she’s feeling ticked off due to Rick and Liane’s dispute as Luna kept wanting to ease her mind.

~~~~

It felt like her head was hurting, spinning as she sense the uprising engulfed energetic personalities bounce off from one another. Like she can sense their feelings battling to stay a bay. Amelia thought back to the argument at the SHIELD between Mack, Bobbi, Coulson, May, Hunter and herself as she sensed Skye’s discomfort for a split second, yelling over everyone to cool down separately.

This anxiety written feeling crept up her back, feeling hot and heavy blinking between Luna and the table in the living room. As if her vision went blurry for a moment, like she might pass out. Luna held her up and asked if she was alright, with her own powers she could sense she was freaking out as she called for Rick and Liane for help.

Luna gasped greatly noticing a flicker in Amelia’s eyes then disappeared just as quickly. She barely saw any color in her eyes.

~~~~

Rick raced in surprise to see Amelia having a anxiety attack, it was rarely a thing to see with her always being just fine, but it concerned him watching her as he tried to help calm her down. It reminded him of himself but less strong but still there something that didn’t match up, sensing a slight denial difference taking in her whole appearance as it clicked. She was effected, traumatized by it all.

Luna moved over to let Amelia have some space to breathe, as she never good at calming others down without getting scared or anxious herself. Especially after seeing what she saw and whispered it into Liane’s ear.

Liane gasped and almost screamed hearing her, noticing some things as Luna did more promptly. The subtle shifts and movements that Amelia made, as she glanced at the girls and back at Rick with almost a glare, sensing the same as him, something was going on.

She quickly calmed down, as her glares soften thinking about Skye for a slip second and the whole fact that Fitzsimmons was suspicious of everything, running test on a couple of people like Mack while she was gone. Her focused returned to the trio because as she zoned out, they were talking among themselves.

~~~

Then she heard it.

Liane out of curiosity and excitement yelled, “OH MY GOD SHE IS ONE OF US! Another mutant of some kind?!” Luna gasped looking back at her friend questioning how is it possible but she was interested. Rick was the most confused being a man of espionage and science fiction, he wondered the extent of this difference, if it was something semi-permanent or long lasting. But a part of him was intrigued.

But Amelia was recklessly in denial about all of it. The shock, sorrow and questions didn’t wrap around her head, yet. She was a normal human being, an agent of SHIELD and got examined earlier by Fitzsimmons, her vitals were fine.

Suddenly Cole busted through the door and shouted, “Ah ha! I knew something was suspicious was going on the second she wanted into the room!”

Rick rolled his eyes and snorted as Luna chuckled. Liane smirked. Meanwhile Amelia raised an eyebrow at her best friend, “Your unbelievable sometimes, you know that?”

Cole just grinned.

~~

—> Thanks for reading. ✨That’s what I got! Comment down below with ideas and reblog your thoughts

Tags: @missstrawbs2001 @purpleprincessonfyre @meiramel @gcthvile @rickb-chaos @gaminggirlsstuff @wizzzardofoz @mallowbee4 @thechoooooosenone @luna-d-marsh @sherloquestea @rooster-84 @starkleila and etc

[drivinmeinsane]

i want that essay about six x k!! im curious to know what your favorite ryguy ships are because you write some interesting ones. what about your least favorites too?

Thank you for the question! I'm not sure I can ethically subject anyone to that essay, anon, it'd just be the ramblings of a madman. However, I'll let some of it slip through in response to your ask. Just for you. ♥

I narrowed my favorites down to three and provided explanations of sorts for all of them. Spoiler alert, they're not short and probably don't make a lot of sense. (；′⌒`)

»{ Driver x Ken

Ken desperately needs to be provided for. He withers and dies if not wanted, sincerely or not. He’ll accept someone’s false desire no matter how hollow it leaves him. He snaps up scraps of affection like a starving dog. He's bossy and flashy as a show of false bravado to cover up his deep insecurities and abandonment issues. There's that desire in him to be a little plaything, to let someone else call the shots. He’s very susceptible to being molded into whatever form someone else desires. He wants to be the “and Ken” even as he tries to figure out what it means to be himself. Driver has a deep seated need to be needed, being wanted is just a cherry on top. He's obsessive and territorial. He never got to keep anything for himself. The effect his parents had on him is clear. There’s traces in him of the way that his mom kept bugs trapped under drinking glasses until they suffocated rather than let them go. There’s flashes of casual brutality in him that echos when she took two knives to his father’s throat at the kitchen table. His father’s only need of him was to aid him in stealing, but found himself discarded the moment he hit his growth spurt and became too tall. He latched onto a childhood friend, carries pieces of his time with him and his family with him (his love of Mexican food among other things). His foster family didn’t need him, not really, so he left to find someone who did. He lets Shannon undercut him because Shannon finds him useful. He’s the best wheelman in the city and an excellent mechanic because it means people rely on him. He can taste being the most important person in their lives for just a moment. He's made himself as indispensable as possible, always chasing the dragon. He would destroy himself to be needed, never mind anyone else in his path. Driver latches onto Ken, because Ken needs him in order to survive in the real world. He’s needed more by him than anyone has never needed him, and oh, he revels in that need. In return for Ken’s reliance, Driver wants him, wants him so badly that he would throw any semblance of sanity out the window. He doesn’t ask questions of Ken’s circumstances, doesn’t want to know the hows and the whys, lest it break the spell. Ken can place the fragility of himself in Driver’s hands and know that Driver still wants him despite it. He can trust Driver to shape him with the careful touch of a mechanic, fine tune all the parts of him until there’s nothing else but tender maintenance. There’s no scraps here, it is a sickening feast of devotion and Ken will gorge himself. Driver will suffocate Ken under a glass and Ken will help Driver place it over him.

»{ Officer K x Sierra Six

There’s nothing truly real in K’s life. Everything is pretend, playacting, a pantomime of something greater. He is so wrapped up in the desire to be a real human being to the point where he does stop to consider the ways that he already is. He has his own humanity, his own soul, his own emotions. He doesn’t address the human quality of the drive to want. Instead, he yearns until it kills him and what is more human than that? He craves a family, craves connections. K patches together what he can. He finds a mother, a father, a wife. He collects things from replicants that he’s retired. He’s trying to make up a soul from pieces of others. He’s desperately reaching out only to hit walls. No one is reaching out for him in return. He’s nothing more than a means to an end, a tool. Six sacrifices himself, goes where he’s pointed, throws himself in the path of destruction over and over for people that he loves. He lets himself be injured, lets himself be thrown away, lets himself be used. All in the name of love and duty. He does not stop to contemplate what he is or what he might be. There is no chase for a deeper meaning of what it means to be human. He just simply is what he is because there is no time to be anything but that. He doesn’t have the time to examine his feelings. Tools don’t think. They are reflections of each other. Two men without human names, treated as objects. Their autonomy is of no consequence. They were two scared boys standing up for what was theirs only to become two scared men willing to die for what matters to them. K would be forced to see Six as a person. Perhaps he would realize that if the other individual is human, K must be as well because they are the same. Six would finally be able to open the lid on the swirl of thoughts inside him, to share a part of himself with someone who would understand. They could gather up the scraps of their lives and put them together to make something meaningful. Family. K would reach out to his mirror image only for it to do the same and meet him palm to palm. Flesh to flesh. Interlinked at last. Maybe the burden of what he has have done wouldn’t weigh so heavily on Six with someone else’s equally tainted hands on the stone beside his. Maybe the boulder wouldn’t roll back down the hill.

»{ Henry Letham x Sam Foster

No matter what, Henry is hell bound. He can’t imagine a happy ending for himself. He has woven a tangled web of destruction and self-flagellation that I think holds true even if he hadn’t been going through the events of the movie. He’s an artist with the flair for the extreme. He’s obsessive and ruminates over the same things over and over, wringing out every ounce of meaning. He assigns significance where there is none. Sam is a fixer. Despite his own mental well-being, he has to try to save others. He cannot sit by passively. It’s that kind of attitude that gets him crouching beside a dying man on a bridge at night. Outwardly, he has it all together, sensible. He is likely the model image of a good doctor, going above and beyond for those under his care. Henry would haunt Sam, consume his thoughts. Sam would let Henry infect him. They are intertwined and neither wants to truly break free. Henry finds a captive audience in Sam. He’s able to admit things to him he would never say to anyone else, couldn’t say to anyone else. Henry is Sam’s destruction in any reality. Sam will never not be too late to save Henry.

+ Shoutouts to Holland March x Jackson Healy. I really like the ship but would never write for it without my bestie, @danime25, collabing with me. It just doesn't scratch that itch in my brain in a way that makes me want to go solo.

Also, I'm not going to dive into ships I dislike here. I might be a hater, but I'm not going to hate publicly. This sideblog is for fun. We're all just celebrating the RyGos boys here so I just want to focus on what I do enjoy. ♪(´▽｀)

Feel free to share your thoughts. I'm always down to talk about these guys.

[fanartfunart]

A Mirror of the Past

Chapter 1.

Summary: Link is the Hero of Legend, an adventurer who fought Ganon, rescued maidens, controlled time and seasons, fought Ganon again, and Ravio gladly sought out that Hero when he could. But before all that: Ravio was… just a scared kid, with a lot of people expecting him to be more while a war for the Triforce broils over Lorule.

Linked Spirit AU Ravio's version of alttp- but literally no need to know the au tho, its pretty much just Lorule alttp

Warnings: canon character death, violence, angst

Ao3: here!

---

The Legends of Lorule speak of a Golden Land… in which lays the triforce, a divine object, left behind as the great goddesses ascended to the Sacred Realm. Lorule prospered under the shadow of the Triforce, a golden mirror of the sacred. However, the Triforce held a wish making power. Soon people began to fight for such power. The desire to hold the mighty triforce drove many to madness, undoing the very order and unity it was made to represent. The royal family have kept it secured against intruders, where none can touch it. But war brews in Lorule. Many aim to take the Triforce, even if it means dismantling the throne. Sickness, thievery, and distrust is sewn into the land. A strange haze of evil seems to hang in the air, waiting to strike… 

“Ravio… I am Princess Hilda of Lorule… The Wizard Drahnim has destroyed all but one barrier to the Triforce, I am the last seal… You must find me… Help me… Please.”

Ravio startled out of bed. He fumbled hastily with blankets and stumbled out of bed, nearly tripping over himself. 

“What are you doing?” his uncle asked, frowning softly. He secured a leather bracelet to his wrist and a sword to his back.

Ravio took in a deep, calming breath, “I… had a nightmare.”

“Go back to bed,” he said, voice steady and sure, “I’m going out, I’ll be back in the morning.”

“...Where are you going?” Ravio asked, shuffling closer. He looked up with big green eyes, hoping for a hint of reassurance. His uncle frowned.

He turned around, running a nervous hand over his pink-blond hair, “...I’ll be back. Just stay inside tonight.” His uncle opened the door to a howl of wind and rain, and shut it, disappearing into the night.

Ravio took a step back away from the door and crawled back into bed, wrapping his blankets around his shoulders. It only made sense, to stay inside, as his uncle said. The howling winds were treacherous enough, let alone whatever else lay behind the door. He curled up into his blankets, considering how to occupy his mind away from the downpour and the dream.

“Help… me…please,” The voice from the dream whispered again. Weak, with a sense of broken pride in the words. As if she had exhausted all other options. 

Ravio took in a deep breath, covering his ears, “Look mysterious voice, I’m sure this is super important, but perhaps you can find another person who’s better built for-”

“I’m in the castle dungeon… HURRY”

He yelped at the urgency in her tone. He jumped out of the bed, racing over to grab his hood and boots. Stumbling, he got up to the door, then paused. A lantern. He half tripped over himself. He leaned half his body into the chest to grab the lantern. He raced out of the door, tugging the hood closely around his face, nearly covering his eyes. The downpour of rain obscured his view and beat down on him hard. Ravio nearly ran into a tree. 

“Ohhh this is a bad idea- bad idea-” He gasped his breaths, turning to find the proper path to the castle. He cowered behind a bush as he spotted a soldier pass. He didn’t need anybody else telling him to go home, or else he would just do it…. At least it was the right spot. He looked around and dashed across the grounds of the castle, weaving through until he was able to find a pathway obscured by a bush. 

He whined a little and took in a deep breath as he jumped into the dark passage. His boots were muddy against the stone of the castle. Ravio swallowed, slowly following the passageway. He heard someone cough and he stumbled backward, flattening himself against the wall. The large shadowed figure ahead slouched against the opposite wall, and eventually fell entirely against it. Ravio’s eyes strained in the dark. “Uncle?”

The man looked up at the sound, “...Ravio?” he coughed again, “Boy, come here”

Ravio inched closer, eyes widening at his uncle's state. Wounds deep, clothing staining darkly. Ravio took a step back again. “Un-Uncle- What- what do I-”

“No, come here. I had hoped to protect you from destiny, but it appears I can not…” His uncle reached up and grabbed his small hand. It marked him red. “Take this bracelet-” he pushed the old leather bracelet and a sword into Ravio’s hands. “I hope it will protect you….” 

Ravio looked at him wide-eyed, fumbling with the sword and pushing it back into his uncle's hands. “No- no no, I can’t do this!”

“Find the princess….she is…your-” With a slow rattling breath, his uncle fell limp.

“Uncle?” Ravio shook his shoulder, “She’s my what? Uncle?” He shook him a few more times, frantic, "Uncle wake up! Wake up!" He looked around. Ran back towards the opening he came through. But the passage was obscured again, and there was no stairs or ladder. He jumped and strained, but it was futile. 

He stood under the passage entry, glancing back at the limp figure. “Uncle?” He asked quietly, voice breaking. He dabbed at his face, pulling his hood closer over his head. Quietly, he walked back to him, gently leaning to press his forehead against his Uncle’s. He sobbed, sniffling and gasping his breaths. “I love you,” he whispered, “I’m so sorry-”

He let out a breath. He stood and turned to run down the passage.

Ravio quietly sneaked into the castle proper. Carefully, he tiptoed along the edges of the walls, hiding behind a statue. He watched the soldiers patrol the room, eyes flickering across their path. He waited until their backs were turned, and rushed across the room, the heat of lava warming his face. 

He raced down a hall and took the first door. The one straight ahead was locked. He turned to the door on the right. The door clicked behind him. In front of him, a soldier turned and looked at him. 

“Intruder!” he announced. The soldier raised his sword. Ravio screamed, raising his hands up to shield his face. He stumbled backwards in a panic, back hitting the wall. A twang of power. The bracelet glowed a vibrant purple hue. The sword hit the purple light and a painted sword clashed back against it. Ravio stared wide-eyed. The soldier attempted another swing, and the magically drawn sword mirrored its arch, clattering against it again.

Ravio stumbled away from the wall, eyes flickering to the key on the soldier’s belt. The magical sword vanished. Ravio circled around the soldier, snatching the key and scrambling to the door, fumbling to unlock it. 

“Halt!” the soldier shouted. 

Ravio shut the door with a slam and jumped back as a thunk rang against the door. He scrambled to lock the door again.

He heaved his breaths, and glanced at the bracelet. "Ah." He whispered, swallowing. "That's what you do. Never would’ve imagined that."

He closed his eyes, letting himself rest for a moment… The voice came back, “Where are you?! Hurry!”

“My heart needs to restart! Come ON,” Ravio shrieked to the air. He turned to the locked door ahead and tested the lock with the soldier’s key. The door clicked open. He sighed in relief. He slipped through and began the rest of the journey to the dungeon.

He followed twists and turns, hiding behind statues, throwing pottery to distract soldiers and scrambling deeper and deeper into the castle. He found the dungeon nearly on accident, stepping down the stairs to avoid another soldier’s view. He glanced into the room, a barred cell visible in the corner. Ravio slowly inched down the rest of the stairs, leaning around the corner of the wall. A soldier with a flail stood guard beside the princess’s cell. The keys jangling against the soldier's hip.

He looked around nervously. Surely he could do something to avoid this. The lamp. He threw the lamp across the room. It landed with a thunk and rolled into a banner, catching the fabric on fire.

"What the-" the soldier swore several times, and fumbled to attempt to put the fire out. Ravio dashed forward and unlatched the key loop. The soldier turned at the sound. “You!” he shouted. Ravio ducked and dashed into an open cell. The soldier’s flail grated against the bars. The soldier growled and followed him into the cell. Ravio dropped to the ground, rolling out of the way of another swing. He rushed to lean against the cell. He grinned awkwardly at the solider as he turned to look at Ravio. He let out a wordless shout as Ravio shut the door on him, and locked it. The soldier roared and swore, crashing his weapon repeatedly, almost blindly, against the metal.

Ravio could've nearly laughed and cried at the same time.

He raced to the Princess's cage and fumbled with the lock with numb hands.

“You- you found me” the princess whispered as she stood, trembling. Her eyes watching his each move carefully, “I sensed you were near…” she said, she gripped his hand, hard. Her brows furrowed in determination, “Ravio, listen now and listen well. The wizard is magically controlling all the soldiers in the castle.” She spared a brief glance at the captured soldier, “…My father is likely doomed. We must not trust anyone. The wizard is a powerful and formidable opponent. Do you understand?”

Ravio stared, eyes wide. He nodded silently.

“We shall find an escape in the throne room. We will need to go as soon as possible, before he detects us.”

"He-he knows I'm here?" Ravio whispered, panicked. “We have to go into hiding! I have to-”

Hilda shook her head, taking Ravio's hand. "Not yet. Thus, why we must hurry. This way."

Hilda led the way through the Castle. However, whatever struggle she had with the wizard before had clearly taken its toll. Ravio fumbled to push her back to hide from soldiers and tiptoe through the lava-filled halls. He created distractions with hastily thrown objects. The Princess found pathways to direct them.

Finally, they reached the throne room. Hilda took a step back. "We must push this back. I can not do it alone."

Ravio nodded. Straining, Ravio stumbled and shoved against the stone. Hilda pushed her whole body weight into it. The passage opened. He sighed in relief. "Almost thought I'd be too scrawny to help," he chuckled awkwardly.

"You are scrawny." The Princess confirmed, walking through.

Ravio blinked, then stumbled after her.

They weaved through dark passages. When the rats got too close, Ravio screamed and flailed his lantern at them. The rats ran, and the Princess tried not to giggle.

Ravio pulled the lever to open the door, straining.

“Princess! You’re safe!" A familiar voice announced softly. The keeper of the Sanctuary tilted his head as he spotted- "Ravio?”

Hilda stepped forward, “It was Ravio who aided me to safety." She turned to him, "When I was captive the wizard said, “Once I’m finally done with you, the path to the Triforce shall finally reveal itself” she looked down, brows furrowed, “Ravio, we must not let the land of Lorule fall into further chaos. If he releases the seal my family placed on the Triforce, evil power will overwhelm this land. Before that happens… before it’s too late… we must destroy the wizard before he destroys all of Lorule!” Hilda exclaimed.

"But- but how?" Ravio whispered, "I'm just-just a kid."

"You came to my summons, it proves you are the Hero of Legend. You must."

Ravio looked down, frowning.

The Sanctuary keeper grabbed Hilda by the arm. "Good, now that you've found him, nothing can stop Drahnim from bringing the triforce to us."

Hilda hissed, thrashing, "This is madness! You can't truly believe anything good will come of it?!"

"Dear Princess, the royal family has kept the wish-granting powers of the triforce to itself for too long. We deserve our share."

Hilda bit the keeper. He yelled, clutching his arm. Ravio rushed forward to pull Hilda away, and ran.

The pair raced through the rain and dark. The keeper shouted behind them. "We will find you! Don't think you can hide!"

Ravio and Hilda ran and ran. After what felt like an hour, Ravio skidded to a halt and tugged on Hilda's dress. He looked around quickly, before directing the Princess to a small cave. The pair stumbled in, and Ravio quickly collected vines and plants to cover the entry with. Hilda slumped against a wall, sliding to the floor.

"You… you need to find the bow of light. To fight the wizard," she said. She coughed and shivered. "There's three pendants- if you can-"

"I'm not leaving you," Ravio said quietly. He walked over to her, "You're tired, and hurting, I'm not going to leave you alone."

Hilda looked at the ground. "It's our destiny, to protect Lorule."

"As long as he doesn't find you, how much can he do? Right? You're the last part of the seal. You said so. I can't leave you."

She covered her face in her hands, shoulders shaking. Ravio shuffled to sit next to her, pulling his lamp close to warm them. Hilda leaned gently against him, sighing lightly. An uneasy quiet settled over the night. Ravio stared into the dark, musty cavern, as he felt Hilda’s body lax into a fitful rest. He did his best to remain awake and vigilant, looking around intently. Tears slipped down his cheeks. He balled his sleeve into his hand and rubbed at the tears, swallowing thickly.