#pls be kind I am fragile

[indi-glo-archive]

ppl who only conditionally care about child abuse based on whether the victim makes them uncomfy while they're being abused contribute to a real life child's abuse by sending hate asks regularly, attempting to gaslight them, calling them terrible names, accusing them of terrible things, telling them directly how much they hate the characters the child relates to and enjoys talking about, and being generally racist and ableist in a way that seriously might have scarred me for life, making a literal teenager hate their hobbies, favorite shows, and the people who enjoy those things, and ultimately cyberbullying a child out of multiple fandoms because they don't want to think critically or acknowledge their own faults, all while being 35 and really embarrassing themselves because someone half their age has a better grasp on the concept of nuance than them: more at 6

but noooo, y'all "love neurodivergent/disabled people," have "racists/ableists DNI" in your bios, and don't say slurs, which is all you have to do to not be racist/ableist, so *I'm* some psycho black bitch and you're a wittle angel like the fictional character you infantilize

(P.S. I swear to fucking god if people respond to this post with "but he sexually assaulted someone" and ignore literally every other personality trait/experience he had that could've been relatable to a child abuse survivor and the way people mistreated me, a real human being, which Charlie is not by the way, I will start doing the things you wanted to do to Ben)

[consultingsister-a5]

today one of my clients described my writing as “cursory, dull, and with nothing at all to spark anyone’s interest” and im just wondering how long i can wait until i make that my insta bio 

[sophiamcdougall]

You're a reasonably informed person on the internet. You've experienced things like no longer being able to get files off an old storage device, media you've downloaded suddenly going poof, sites and forums with troves full of people's thoughts and ideas vanishing forever. You've heard of cybercrime. You've read articles about lost media. You have at least a basic understanding that digital data is vulnerable, is what I'm saying. I'm guessing that you're also aware that history is, you know... important? And that it's an ongoing study, requiring ... data about how people live? And that it's not just about stanning celebrities that happen to be dead? Congratulations, you are significantly better-informed than the British government! So they're currently like "Oh hai can we destroy all these historical documents pls? To save money? Because we'll digitise them first so it's fine! That'll be easy, cheap and reliable -- right? These wills from the 1850s will totally be fine for another 170 years as a PNG or whatever, yeah? We didn't need to do an impact assesment about this because it's clearly win-win! We'd keep the physical wills of Famous People™ though because Famous People™ actually matter, unlike you plebs. We don't think there are any equalities implications about this, either! Also the only examples of Famous People™ we can think of are all white and rich, only one is a woman and she got famous because of the guy she married. Kisses!"

Yes, this is the same Government that's like "Oh no removing a statue of slave trader is erasing history :(" You have, however, until 23 February 2024 to politely inquire of them what the fuck they are smoking. And they will have to publish a summary of the responses they receive. And it will look kind of bad if the feedback is well-argued, informative and overwhelmingly negative and they go ahead and do it anyway. I currently edit documents including responses to consultations like (but significantly less insane) than this one. Responses do actually matter. I would particularly encourage British people/people based in the UK to do this, but as far as I can see it doesn't say you have to be either. If you are, say, a historian or an archivist, or someone who specialises in digital data do say so and draw on your expertise in your answers. This isn't a question of filling out a form. You have to manually compose an email answering the 12 questions in the consultation paper at the link above. I'll put my own answers under the fold. Note -- I never know if I'm being too rude in these sorts of things. You probably shouldn't be ruder than I have been.

Please do not copy and paste any of this: that would defeat the purpose. This isn't a petition, they need to see a range of individual responses. But it may give you a jumping-off point.

Question 1: Should the current law providing for the inspection of wills be preserved?

Yes. Our ability to understand our shared past is a fundamental aspect of our heritage. It is not possible for any authority to know in advance what future insights they are supporting or impeding by their treatment of material evidence. Safeguarding the historical record for future generations should be considered an extremely important duty.

Question 2: Are there any reforms you would suggest to the current law enabling wills to be inspected?

No.

Question 3: Are there any reasons why the High Court should store original paper will documents on a permanent basis, as opposed to just retaining a digitised copy of that material?

Yes. I am amazed that the recent cyber attack on the British Library, which has effectively paralysed it completely, not been sufficient to answer this question for you.  I also refer you to the fate of the Domesday Project. Digital storage is useful and can help more people access information; however, it is also inherently fragile. Malice, accident, or eventual inevitable obsolescence not merely might occur, but absolutely should be expected. It is ludicrously naive and reflects a truly unpardonable ignorance to assume that information preserved only in digital form is somehow inviolable and safe, or that a physical document once digitised, never need be digitised again..At absolute minimum, it should be understood as certain that at least some of any digital-only archive will eventually be permanently lost. It is not remotely implausible that all of it would be. Preserving the physical documents provides a crucial failsafe. It also allows any errors in reproduction -- also inevitable-- to be, eventually, seen and corrected. Note that maintaining, upgrading and replacing digital infrastructure is not free, easy or reliable. Over the long term, risks to the data concerned can only accumulate.

"Unlike the methods for preserving analog documents that have been honed over millennia, there is no deep precedence to look to regarding the management of digital records. As such, the processing, long-term storage, and distribution potential of archival digital data are highly unresolved issues. [..] the more digital data is migrated, translated, and re-compressed into new formats, the more room there is for information to be lost, be it at the microbit-level of preservation. Any failure to contend with the instability of digital storage mediums, hardware obsolescence, and software obsolescence thus meets a terminal end—the definitive loss of information. The common belief that digital data is safe so long as it is backed up according to the 3-2-1 rule (3 copies on 2 different formats with 1 copy saved off site) belies the fact that it is fundamentally unclear how long digital information can or will remain intact. What is certain is that its unique vulnerabilities do become more pertinent with age."  -- James Boyda, On Loss in the 21st Century: Digital Decay and the Archive, Introduction.

Question 4: Do you agree that after a certain time original paper documents (from 1858 onwards) may be destroyed (other than for famous individuals)? Are there any alternatives, involving the public or private sector, you can suggest to their being destroyed?

Absolutely not. And I would have hoped we were past the "great man" theory of history. Firstly, you do not know which figures will still be considered "famous" in the future and which currently obscure individuals may deserve and eventually receive greater attention. I note that of the three figures you mention here as notable enough to have their wills preserved, all are white, the majority are male (the one woman having achieved fame through marriage) and all were wealthy at the time of their death. Any such approach will certainly cull evidence of the lives of women, people of colour and the poor from the historical record, and send a clear message about whose lives you consider worth remembering.

Secondly, the famous and successsful are only a small part of our history. Understanding the realities that shaped our past and continue to mould our present requires evidence of the lives of so-called "ordinary people"!

Did you even speak to any historians before coming up with this idea?

Entrusting the documents to the private sector would be similarly disastrous. What happens when a private company goes bust or decides that preserving this material is no longer profitable? What reasonable person, confronted with our crumbling privatised water infrastructure, would willingly consign any part of our heritage to a similar fate?

Question 5: Do you agree that there is equivalence between paper and digital copies of wills so that the ECA 2000 can be used?

No. And it raises serious questions about the skill and knowledge base within HMCTS and the government that the very basic concepts of data loss and the digital dark age appear to be unknown to you. I also refer you to the Domesday Project.

Question 6: Are there any other matters directly related to the retention of digital or paper wills that are not covered by the proposed exercise of the powers in the ECA 2000 that you consider are necessary?

Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.

Question 7: If the Government pursues preserving permanently only a digital copy of a will document, should it seek to reform the primary legislation by introducing a Bill or do so under the ECA 2000?

Destroying the physical documents will always be an unforgivable dereliction of legal and moral duty.

Question 8: If the Government moves to digital only copies of original will documents, what do you think the retention period for the original paper wills should be? Please give reasons and state what you believe the minimum retention period should be and whether you consider the Government’s suggestion of 25 years to be reasonable.

There is no good version of this plan. The physical documents should be preserved.

Question 9: Do you agree with the principle that wills of famous people should be preserved in the original paper form for historic interest?

This question betrays deep ignorance of what "historic interest" actually is. The study of history is not simply glorified celebrity gossip. If anything, the physical wills of currently famous people could be considered more expendable as it is likely that their contents are so widely diffused as to be relatively "safe", whereas the wills of so-called "ordinary people" will, especially in aggregate, provide insights that have not yet been explored.

Question 10: Do you have any initial suggestions on the criteria which should be adopted for identifying famous/historic figures whose original paper will document should be preserved permanently?

Abandon this entire lamentable plan. As previously discussed, you do not and cannot know who will be considered "famous" in the future, and fame is a profoundly flawed criterion of historical significance.

Question 11: Do you agree that the Probate Registries should only permanently retain wills and codicils from the documents submitted in support of a probate application? Please explain, if setting out the case for retention of any other documents.

No, all the documents should be preserved indefinitely.

Question 12: Do you agree that we have correctly identified the range and extent of the equalities impacts under each of these proposals set out in this consultation? Please give reasons and supply evidence of further equalities impacts as appropriate.

No. You appear to have neglected equalities impacts entirely. As discussed, in your drive to prioritise "famous people", your plan will certainly prioritise the white, wealthy and mostly the male, as your "Charles Dickens, Charles Darwin and Princess Diana" examples amply indicate. This plan will create a two-tier system where evidence of the lives of the privileged is carefully preserved while information regarding people of colour, women, the working class and other disadvantaged groups is disproportionately abandoned to digital decay and eventual loss. Current and future historians from, or specialising in the history of minority groups will be especially impoverished by this.  

[cherryredstars]

hi! how u doin? could u pls do some angst hcs for Simon?? like how difficult the relationship is for him and his partner, what they would argue about, how the arguments are and whatnot yk i just luv the way u write him it's perfect♥️💋

Pairing: Simon “Ghost” Riley x gn!reader

Warnings: Angst with little comfort

Summary: Struggles with dating Simon

A/N: All the Simon requests in my inbox rn (there are only three) <3

Word Count: 1.5K (Not Edited)

The biggest struggle for you and Simon will always be the time he spends away on deployment. Especially in the beginning of your relationship where insecurity is at an all time high. You always hate when he’s away, the house feeling desolate and cold with his absence. You’re constantly anxious, scared and impatient for the next time he comes through that front door just to leave again. It was even worse when he was gone when something important happened, let it be a wedding or a funeral. It broke your heart that he ended up being away when these special moments occurred. 

You hated how often you showed up to family and friend events, at least one friend asking where Simon was and joking about how you must have scared him off. An extended family member whispering in your ear about how “men like that” only stayed away because something, someone, better made them want to stay. It only served to make your unstable, fragile relationship strain more.

On bad days where you needed comfort or someone to lean on, you grew the slightest bit resentful. It felt one-sided when it came to comfort. You had to always wait around for Simon: Wait until he comes back, wait until he’s ready to talk, wait for him to ask or he’ll feel ambushed, wait until he initiates the physical comfort that he never offers. But it seemed like you were always there for him. You were the one ready to give him kind words when he felt down, you were the one ready with a cup of his favorite tea and a good movie to distract him, you were the one that always had a hand or a shoulder or a hug prepared at a moment’s notice. So, why couldn’t he do the same for you?

Relationships are extremely stressful for Simon. It’s something he was to learn and he can’t seem to pick it up correctly. He always seems to do something wrong. He always forgets an important date even though he has it written down in his notes app, he gets your favorite things mixed up with the things you hate, he’s so unavailable all the time that he doesn’t know what to do when he isn’t. As time goes on, it’s easier to remember these things. He learns mistakes need to be made in order to learn. 

It doesn’t help that his horrible coping mechanisms seemed to find a spot in his relationship. It’s like an ugly stain on a carpet. So, when things get too hard or they become too overwhelming he does what he does best, hides from it. He puts up a barrier. He throws a rug or a piece of furniture over the stain to hide it away. That’s also the exact thing he does in the beginning of the relationship when something goes wrong. You guys fight? He has no idea what you’re talking about because he wasn’t present. Must have been between you and a friend while he was on deployment. Something he did makes you feel insecure about the relationship? All you’re getting in response is, “Maybe you just aren’t mature enough to date a military man.”

With Simon you are very familiar with the concept that words (or lack of words) hurt. He makes you feel stupid without even trying. You hate arguing with Simon because the two of you don’t argue, you argue. In the beginning of the relationship, Simon doesn’t say anything when you confront him. Well,nothing but, “It’s just the way I am”. You argue with him about how distant he is when he comes home? It’s just the way I am. You get angry because all you wanted was at least a bit of comfort after a shitty day that ended up with you crying on the way home and Simon didn’t even ask you what was wrong? It’s just the way I am. After arguments like that, arguments that always end with Maybe you just aren’t mature enough to date a military man, you think maybe he’s right. 

Simon hates himself for the way he treats you. He really does. You deserve better, he should be better. But no matter how hard he tries he can’t. He can’t bring himself to comfort you, or touch you, or love you correctly. It makes him want to find one of his military knives and stab himself where his heart is to see if it’s working correctly. As the relationship progresses, he gets better and better at being your dream man. But sometimes he has moments where he feels like he’s back at square one. Maybe, he thinks, I need a new heart.

Feelings are slightly taboo in your relationship in the beginning. Simon never wants to talk about his and you feel like you can’t talk about yours. But in the late nights, sometime after Simon has had a glass of liquor to sip on during a movie, the two of you will talk in slow whispers. One of those nights Simon asks you how to love you correctly. He asks you why you haven’t left him yet. You shrug and joke, “I guess I’m more mature now.” He will thank every star he sees that you are so understanding when he gives you no real reason to. He thanks every spec of dust that he’s learned how to do the same for you. 

He’s protective of you. He feels like he needs to be. He’s lost so many people dear to him, that he’s terrified he’ll lose you too. So he’s a little overbearing in the beginning. You weren’t initially allowed to pick him up at the airport when he got back, paranoid some spy would see the two of you together and you’d become a target. Wouldn't let you meet anyone on his squad, your name never once spoken around base. Refused to bring anything of yours with him when he went away, scared a stray hair or partial fingerprint would endanger your existence if it ended up in the wrong hands. You didn’t even get one of his dog tags until a few months into the relationship because he didn’t want any physical evidence tying you to him. He only let up after you had told him how insecure it made you feel. How, even though you knew that it wasn’t his intention, he made you feel like he was ashamed to be dating you. Like he wanted to keep you a secret because he didn’t want to be seen with you. God knows how many past relationships did the exact same thing. But, he’s trying to be your dream man. He relents and stuffs one of your favorite pens in his pocket the next time he leaves. When he gets to base, Soap’s first question is about how you’re doing. 

One of the largest struggles is getting Simon used to family life and civilian life again. He hasn’t had a real family in so long, he doesn’t remember how it feels like. He’s a brooding mess the first few times you bring him to a family gathering for the holidays. He’s off to the side, keeping conversation curt. One of your aunts whispered in your ear maybe it was better off when you came alone and he was on deployment. That causes a big fight, full of yelling and defending his honor. On the ride home you are fuming, getting even angrier when Simon apologizes for the way he was behaving. He didn’t want to embarrass you in front of your family. You tell him that’s ridiculous, that he was nothing to be sorry for. Your smile returns slightly when the image of him playing with your nieces and nephews flashes in your head.

One night, when Simon and you lay in bed before he leaves in the morning, he holds you close to his chest and plays with your hair. He mumbles soft words in your ear, rubbing the skin of your lower back softly. “Thank you for staying with me. I’m sorry for all the times I said you weren’t mature enough to date a military man. I was just scared.” You only hum, kissing his shoulder lovingly in response. He goes on a tangent, apologizing for all the things he did in the past that hurt you. He brings up some things you remember vividly, and things you don’t remember at all. At the end of it, he pulls away slightly and turns to his bedside drawer. He pulls it open, a silver band catching the moon’s light before he holds it between the two of you. He doesn’t ask, and you don’t answer. You hold your hand out, and he slips it onto your finger. In the morning, you hand him his thermos of tea and give him a quick kiss before he walks out and door. Even though his heart feels like it’s about to burst, Simon’s sure his heart is working just fine.

Do these suck lol??

[cryptidghostgirl]

Oooo part 2 of Aka Till Death Do Us Part (Alastor x Mad Scientist!Reader) was interesting

Loved it a lot 😭

Just imagining how reader would meet Lucifer (yes I'mma add some short king love) for the first time, whether this the ep where everyone meets him for the first time or he's just visiting is undecided.

Anyways she's a smart gal, she creates viruses, diseases, etc.. in order to destroy the human race (now demon and angel race), so she tries to befriend Lucifer

He's powerful, he could be her ticket out of the deal she was tricked into. Plus Alastor hates him so even better.

Whether the wife collector is befriending her from his hatred for Alastor (aka trying to steal his ex wife) or because he actually likes her or not is also undecided

But they become buddies, keeping her little secret while playing Alastor as this horrid creature that coerced her into a deal

She might not understand how deals function, but just like Alastor she'll find a way out of it. She won't let him interrupt her work for years again.

Another bonus of befriending Lucifer is she can try and coerce him into giving her some samples (blood, hair, skin, etc..) It'll help with the virus she's creating, along with seeing if there's any cell differences between fallen angels and normal ones.

A/N I literally love this idea. It is so on brand for her if she was tuned in with the world around her enough to realize her hanging with Lucifer even made Alastor mad. Also, not you calling Lucifer 'the wife collector,' that made me cackle.

Till Death Do Us Part pt. 3 (Alastor x Mad Scientist!Reader)

Pairing: Alastor x Reader x maybe also Lucifer a little bit if you squint

Previous Parts:

Till Death Do Us Part (Alastor x Mad Scientist!Reader)

Till Death Do Us Part pt. 2

Warnings: I am not a woman nor am I in stem (but an enby in history) so pls be kind about the fact that I don't understand science. Angst, abusive/unhealthy relationship, possessive Alastor. It's not love but its certainly something.

Word Count: 2,176

Master Lists:

Master Lists 

Hazbin Hotel Master List 

Alastor Master List 

Click here and leave a comment if you want to be added to any taglists or send me an ask about it.

Idle hands are the devil's playthings, wasn't that how the expression went?

It had been a month since that fateful day Y/n had struck a deal with Alastor, tying her to his side once again. She railed against it, fought valiantly, but there was no escaping the constraints of the contract. Never allowed a moment to herself, Y/n's life became a series of involvement in group activities she hated and chastisements from Alastor. She sat at his feet, the collar hanging heavy around her neck as a sort of twisted crown in his eyes. The Radio Demon and his wife, his queen, his prisoner.

She was never allowed out of his sight, Alastor even forcing her to stay in the same room as him, to sleep in the same bed. It was nothing Y/n had any sort of frame of reference for. He had never been like this in life, she had never experienced this sort of metaphorical suffocation. Y/n was adrift, the world a confusing blur around her. Every time she tried to make sense of it, thought she had figured out some small aspect, he changed it all again and left her in a lurch that sent her mind spiraling into unformed chaos.

Even when she managed somehow to stole a spare moment, was able to sneak away to her lab of a room, Alastor found her and dragged her out again. Y/n's continual protests and pleas to be allowed to continue her work, for him to hold up his end of the bargain and deliver her an angel, fell on deaf ears or were merely met with a solitary, fragile 'soon.' For all this time, Y/n had thought Hell to be misrepresented. She had found a true Heaven in Pentagram City, a safe haven, a salve. Now, she knew the true meaning of suffering.

It was different than she had expected. To suffer had always been something physical in her eyes. It had been her victims writhing in pain, it had been the sharp oppression of a world filled with human life. Never had she thought being trapped in her own mind like this could be a curse, rather than a blessed moment of reprieve.

Idle hands are the devil's playthings, wasn't that how the expression went? Y/n's hands were most certainly idle, all she needed was the devil to play with them.

It was just her luck when Lucifer showed up at the hotel, intent on visiting his daughter. Y/n was never the most observant but, since being tricked into selling her soul to Alastor, had become quite wary and watchful of him. It did not escape her notice the way his stance tightened and his eye twitched the minute the King of Hell threw himself through the hotel's double doors and into Charlie's arms.

Y/n watched the interaction carefully from where she sat lazily on the table beside Angel Dust and Sir Pentious. There were exactly three thoughts in her mind. The first was that it was useful to know Alastor hated the man. The second was that Lucifer was standing right before her eyes. He was powerful, maybe powerful enough to get her out of the sticky situation she currently found herself to be in. Not only that, but he was once an angel. This was the most important of the three thoughts, completely eclipsing the other two as soon as they reared their heads. Not quite the real deal but, potentially useful none the less. Getting close to him could mean getting one step closer to her goals. Silently, she slipped down from the table and began to approach the grouping of demons.

With a carful step, she sidled up behind them. Softly, she raised a hand to the back of Lucifer's head, to where his hair peaked out from beneath the edges of his hat. The excitement that rose in her chest was quickly stifled as Lucifer spun around.

"Charlie!" he exclaimed, "Why don't you introduce me to some of your other fr- oh!"

Y/n froze, her hand still raised. She opened her mouth to speak but the words caught in her throat once she caught the glare Alastor was sending her way. Letting out a nervous chuckle, Y/n's hands fell to her sides, clasping behind her back.

"Uh..." Lucifer turned to his daughter, his eyebrows raised.

"Oh, don't mind Y/n," Charlie awkwardly tittered, stepping forward, "she is always a bit... odd but, she is actually our newest guest!"

"Uh-huh." Lucifer nodded, his eyes moving back to Y/n and examining her features carefully, "Well, it is nice to be meeting you."

Lucifer stuck out his hand for Y/n to shake but the demon just eyed it warily. The furtive glance she shot Alastor behind his back, and the subtle nod he gave in return, did not escape Lucifer's notice. With another distasteful glance towards his hand, Y/n raised part of her hair up and took it, shaking it firmly.

Lucifer's confusion only seemed to grow as he looked down towards the point of connection.

"Um... okay, then." he hummed in thought as she released his hand.

It was when Alastor went out to solve the problem Mimzy had caused that Lucifer took his chance. All the while, as Mimzy had blathered on to Y/n about the 'good old days' and the shared aspects of their pasts, as soon as the tour of the hotel had ended, she had watched him. Observance was not, however, in her nature. It completely had escaped her notice that, all the while, Lucifer had been watching her as well.

The demon herself was nothing of import. She was strange and unrefined and, to be honest, deeply disconcerting to him in a number of ways. It was the thing lurking beneath it all that caught his attention. There was something going on between that girl and the Radio Demon and Lucifer didn't trust either of them. He may have thought Charlie's dreams to be in vain, known from his own experience how fruitless her project would turn out to be, but that didn't stop him from doing what it took to keep his little girl safe.

Lucifer sidled up beside the girl where she stood, watching the carnage Alastor wreaked with a vague sense of disinterest.

"So, you have a deal with the Radio Demon."

It was a statement, not a question. It was an accusation. Y/n shot into the air in surprise, not having noticed his presence beside her. With wide, analytical eyes, she turned to face him.

"With Alastor?"

"Yep."

"How could you tell?" she asked, leaning forward in curiosity.

"What are you two planning."

Another subtle command that went right over Y/n's head. She sighed, crossing her arms.

"I'm planning world destruction. He wants me to be his wife again and tricked me into this whole..." she waved her hands wildly through the air, "situation."

Lucifer didn't know whether to laugh or to take her out right there. Instead, he shook his head, opting to state in mild shock:

"Married? Again?"

"Yeah. I forced him to when we were alive so people would leave me alone and I'd have some human test subjects for my work. Let me tell you: not my favorite experiment I have ever conducted."

"I..." Lucifer was flabbergasted, struck into silence.

"So he tricked me into a deal. I was hiding from him for decades down here. One little slip up was all it took." she playfully used her hair to hit the side of her head, "Stupid Y/n."

"Where does the again part fit in?"

Y/n raised her eyebrows.

"Really? Why is that the part I have to explain to everyone. I mean, logically, it just doesn't make sense. That should be the question on the bottom of someones list. It shouldn't even be a question."

"Did you get a divorce?"

"In 1930? No. Even I knew that wasn't really an option. I married him to stop people talking, not start it. Besides, he wasn't this much of a bother when we were alive."

"So..." Lucifer prompted after a moment.

"Till death do us part?"

"Ah."

He really did laugh now. Just a light chuckle. Y/n smiled in appreciation.

"There you go. Now, how did you know? About the deal, I mean. Also, why do you guys hate each other so much? I thought you had never met before? And oh! Ohohoh! Also, can I have some of your hair."

Lucifer scoffed, his arms falling loosely from where he had crossed them over his chest to his sides. Charlie had been right, Y/n certainly was odd.

"My hair?"

Y/n nodded her head eagerly. When he gave no response, a concentrated and slightly confused expression flitted across her face. As if struck by a sudden inspiration, she regained her composure once again.

"Oh, yeah. I'm supposed to say 'please' when I ask for stuff. Al always said it was proper manners but I think its just a waste of time to be perfectly honest. It's still the same request, the same outcome. Doesn't really change anything. Why would one word make someone give a totally different answer? I mean, it's just foolish really. Anyway," she cleared her throat, "can I please have some of your hair?"

"I..." Lucifer raised a hand to his forehead, rubbing his temples, "why?"

"Because you're a fallen angel?" Y/n replied as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, "And I want to see what that means?"

Before Lucifer could reply, Alastor stepped back into the lobby, straightening his jacket.

"What a show!" Angel exclaimed, applauding dramatically.

Alastor tipped his head to the side in recognition, his eyes surveying the room. When they fell on Lucifer and Y/n in the corner, his gaze hardened. Y/n payed the commotion no mind. Lucifer, on the other hand, grinned.

"I have a proposal." he hummed, turning back to Y/n.

She narrowed her eyes in sudden doubt.

"You don't like Alastor very much, do you?"

"No...? Of course I don't!" Y/n replied in exasperation, "All he does is keep me from doing my work and drag me around by that stupid chain like a dog. It hurts my neck and..." her voice grew softer and she looked away, fixing her eyes on her interlaced fingers, "and I feel like he's trying to force me into the shape of something I'm not. It's... it's like wearing shoes that are four sizes two small on a twenty mile hike."

Lucifer laughed.

"Well, that certainly is... descriptive. How about we make a deal?"

Her head shot up, her narrowed eyes meeting his once again.

"You're not going to just take my soul like he did, are you?"

"No, of course not my dear. Only lesser demons like him need to do that in order to feel strong, to maintain some sort of power, to get what they want." Lucfier enunciated the last four words sharply, the syllables like needles, "I'm simply offering an exchange."

"That's what he said too."

Lucifer raised his hands to show he meant no harm.

"Look, we don't even have to shake on it. I will give you some of... some of my hair or... whatever... and you will help me get on his nerves, take him down a notch. Who the Hell knows, that might even help you too."

Y/n was silent in thought for a moment. She did want the hair and messing with Alastor seemed all too appealing. Still, there was something eating away at her.

"Would you..." she lifted herself up to Lucifer's eye level with her hair.

Y/n wasn't that much shorter than the king of Hell, just a couple inches. Those couple inches certainly made a difference. Lucifer could have sworn there was a literally electrical spark in the darkness of her eyes.

"You're powerful, yes? King of Hell and all?"

Lucifer nodded.

"Would you be able to help me figure out a way out of this mess?"

It was Lucifer's turn to think now as he mulled the idea over in his mind. Sure, theoretically he probably could but, he had never tried to break another demon's deal and even past that, he didn't know if he wanted to. Y/n was disarming, strange, had mentioned wanting to destroy the world. Lucifer didn't know her well enough to gage if there was any real risk and Alastor seemed to have her on more than a metaphorical leash.

"Maybe." he admitted, deciding on the path of least resistance, the one where he could try and succeed or pretend it was an unknown impossibility all along, "I don't know."

In some strange way, there was something stable about the man before her. Alastor was unpredictable, had sent her life spinning. Lucifer felt safe.

"Good enough for me!" Y/n smiled brightly, "I look forward to working with you."

---

Writing this made me really want to do a Lucifer fic with the idle hands thing.

TAGS:

@willowshadenox @i-love-jafar @elfyeet @reader3 @lazygirlfanfic0-0@kahlan170@wendyphan01203-blog @fairyv-ice @clarakainda @lunaramune @mcueveryday @luxky-aish @peterpankat @corvid007 @marukun @nanami1chu @i-like-potatoes12533 @boogiemansbitch @apenasandorinha @almond-t0fu @mygoldtears @ahellborn @winterisholding @misty-melody @themetalbabygirl @trash-shoot @clarakainda @ladyscorpion19 @dasimp777 @juskonutoh @simpingsohard @sethianaa @gabile18 @slytherin4ever

[netherfeildren]

The Cassandra Complex : Chapter I : Apollo

Series Masterlist

(Din Djarin x F!Reader)

Summary: Enter: A man who is not so much a man, but an effigy, a wound of steel and armor and Creed – secrecy and masked faces, above all else. 

Enter: A girl who is not a girl, but a creature helmed in darkness and spit out unto the galaxy broken and unmoored. 

Enter: The creation of myth.

Content Warnings: Dominant Din Djarin; Unprotected sex; Creampie;Size difference; Size kink; Rough sex; Overstimulation; Spanking; Brat taming; Touched-Starved Din Djarin

Rating: Explicit 18+

A/N: Hello, friends, and welcome to the new story! 

A few notes: We are starting prior to season one’s canon, and I am doing what I want and making it so that Din already knows about the Force and the Jedi. I make free use of canon and the timeline in whatever way I see fit to suit my own horny purposes, sorry. If things aren’t canon or don’t make sense pls don’t tell me. I am naught but a fragile flower who wilts under harsh criticism. 

Please note as well, that I do describe the FMC as having two different colored eyes although I do not specify what color they are. 

Also, I will be updating the tags as we go along so as to avoid spoiling too much too early on. 

Thank you and enjoy!

Word count: 8.1K

Read on AO3

PART I

CHAPTER I : APOLLO

Is it a god inside you, girl?

Anne Carson, Grief Lessons: Four Plays by Euripides

The first time you meet, he’s sitting in the corner of the shithole cantina on the shithole backwater planet you currently find yourself on: Nevarro. Sometimes you were wont to flight – in search of a nowhere place in the middle of a nowhere part of the galaxy to lose yourself. And the barren landscape of the volcanic planet, a broken star of red, the only interruption in the black field of ash, no wind, no life, no sound; it provides the perfect environment for getting lost when necessary.

And then one day, unexpectedly: him. He is a shining, metallic, mountain of a man. 

Mandalorian. 

Whenever you’d felt too suffocated, strangulated, in need of a moment, a breather, a reprieve from the reality of what you were… what you are becoming – this place is enough of nothing to be just the perfect something. When you’re not busy flitting from planet to planet, sector to sector, looking for something to fill the gnawing void within you. Before landing here, you’d been on Sorgan for a time. It’d been… nice… peaceful, or whatever approximation of peace you could partially recognize after an existence such as that which you were currently trying to run from. A temperate climate, kind people, but after a while, you’d happened upon a community one day, and they’d been so… so together, so familiar. Happy, they’d be so openly, unabashedly, uncomplicatedly happy. It was simple, and it had made a terrible lance of poisonous jealousy roil through you. Jealousy and anger and bitterness and a loneliness so painful that you’d had to flee, as far and as fast as you could from the reflection of all your envy and shame. And so you’d come here instead, to Nevarro. A more barren, emptier sort of place – better suited to your ilk. 

“I’ve never met a Mandalorian before,” you croon up at him, smoothly sliding into the booth he’s currently occupying in the furthest dark corner of the cantina, only the gleaming silver crescent of the curve of his helmet visible from the other side of the room. 

This is the first of many lies you will tell him. 

No response. Only the dark, yawning pit of his visor faced slightly away from you. 

The stark curve of his helmet gleams brightly. Beautiful. He looks strong, thickly built. His shoulders, so broad. The armor adorning his torso is beaten and worn, and yet, there’s something so… what’s the word? Lived, perhaps, about the facade of him. This is a creature who has lived – who has seen things, who has battled and survived and most assuredly killed. 

Maybe a little like you, but good. For this you know with certainty about Mandalorians – a flash of a pained scream, beskar crumbling beneath the force of you, for not even what could be considered the most endurable alloy in the galaxy could withstand something of your nature, blood, so much blood, and the sound of such defeat as you do the unforgivable– they are good and honorable and worthy – great warriors. But perhaps, on the surface, with a face of shared, painful history, of survival, maybe there are some things between the two of you which could be called similar. 

“I’ve always been curious, though… Always wanted to meet one.” You sidle closer to him. There’s something about him, the weapons, the breadth of his shoulders, the silence, which starts a chilled little shiver of fear that flashes and coalesces into something hotter and wetter deep in your belly, the closer you get to him. And the feeling of it – of apprehension, of standing in the presence of something other, something that could perhaps best, even you, it is exciting and arousing and different to everything else you’ve ever encountered.

Still no response. 

“You’re hard to come by now. Not many of you left, right?” A curdle of shame and regret hidden beneath your wry tone, “A girl’s got to get extra lucky to find something as interesting as you nowadays… something as pretty too.”

He does react to this, finally, and a little shock of victory fizzes in your belly at the fact that he’s at last deigned to give you even a semblance of his attention, for you are desperately in want of it, as he turns his helmet the fraction of an inch in your direction at the sound of you calling him pretty. So, it seems even a Mandalorian is victim to vanity. 

“Oh, so you can hear under there,” you quip, “I was beginning to worry…”

And then his voice, deep, and of potentially the lowest and smoothest baritone you’ve ever heard, comes through the modulator, “I can hear.” Clipped, and even maybe, a little cold. 

“And he speaks too!” He flexes open the fingers of the gloved hand that lays on the table. You’re annoying him. “How exciting.” You cross one knee over the other, elbow propped up on the edge of the table and chin cupped in your palm, looking up at him. He’s tall, even sitting. Your joint presses into the hard muscle of his thigh, and you feel him scoot just the tiniest bit away from you. You have the uncontrollable urge to snap your teeth at him. You must surely be at least half his size, especially with all that beskar covering him. Don’t act so scared, big, bad Mandalorian. I’m just a little girl. You don’t know what I actually am.

Helmet now turned entirely in your direction to keep an eye on you, he says, “What are you?” Or… whoops, maybe he does know. 

You ignore his question. “You know, I met a whore once – who claimed she’d fucked a Mandalorian. Is it true you just pull out the important bits and get on with it? Seems a bit cold, no? Even for a paid fuck?” He jolts a little at your vulgarity, and you flash him a wide grin, wriggle one delicate eyebrow provocatively. “No game?”

He turns his body to face you more fully now too, his thigh pressing into yours once again as he takes you on directly. Perhaps a warrior's instinct that can sense he is not in the presence of something to be trifled with. The helmet cocks slowly to the side. Silent, silent. Not one for many words this Mandalorian, although, it seems you’ve provoked him now. 

“What are you?” he says again, voice measured. 

“How do you mean?” You let your voice end on an upward lilt, and he shifts minutely, as if agitated at your uncooperativeness. 

“You’re not– I don’t–” The helmet tilts the other way as if inspecting you, and you cut him off before he can finish. 

“Oh, so many things.” You roll your hand on your wrist in a fluttering wave, tapping your fingers quickly against your thumb one by one, flexing a muscle you’ve not allowed yourself to use in a while and repressing it, all at once. You’re watching him so closely you see the small pivot of his neck to glance at your hand, and then back to your face. “Who can keep track anymore? So many strange creatures roaming the galaxy after the fall of everything. The Empire. We’re all just madly careening around as whatever the moment requires of us, aren’t we?” He’s quiet, still inspecting you, and you feel his gaze like a brand on the skin of your face. Like fire, like something that you remember from a nightmare, and that you think should be painful, but now only feels exciting. “So, what are you, Mandalorian? What does the present moment require of you?”

He goes silent again, and you watch the subtle downward tilt of his helmet as he inspects the length of you. You wish you could see if he was ogling the tight swell of your breasts beneath your dark clothes. You tilt your head side to side, smile big at him again, and you’re pretty sure you hear an agitated little huff of annoyance slip through the modulator.

And then: “I’m not interested.” He turns back to face away from you, both fists now firmly planted on the table’s surface, clenched into tight balls of clear annoyance. “Go away.”

Oh, he’s funny too. You throw your head back in a quick laugh, “Did I offer something?”

Silence.

“Dirty mind, Mandalorian.” You drag the vowels out to irk him just that extra bit more. “What? Just because I made one little mention of a whore means that, I too, must be peddling my wares?” And you knock your knee into his beskar clad thigh again. He scoots a smidge away from you, and you follow him, laughing again. Oh, you really should stop provoking him, but it’s just turning out to be too much fun. And you’d been watching him for weeks now, every time he came in here for a new bounty puck. You’d so wanted to talk to him, had snooped around to find out he’s in the Guild, and now you finally are. It was just too much for a girl who had too much time on her hands, and too many ugly thoughts she’d rather forget, roaming around in her mind, to look away from a moment of distraction such as this. 

“Stop,” and it sounds like he’s gritting his teeth. 

You snicker. “Stop what?” in a sing-songed lilt that you know must be grinding his gears. Poor, shiny Mandalorian. 

“Whatever it is you’re doing – speaking to me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you want something from me.”

“What could I possibly want from you?” You bat your eyelashes at him. “Who’s the one peddling their wares now, Mandalorian, hmm?” He says nothing now, and you know you’re pushing him, you can see the vibration of his restrained agitation in the lines of his thick arms, but there is something needling and annoying and obnoxious inside of you that wants his attention, that wants to incite him. And so you make a mistake that perhaps, is not a mistake at all, but a call for something more, for a reaction from him because as you slowly start to lift a single finger up towards the curve of his helmet, you say, “Tell me, what do you have to offer?” At the same time, he pivots and snaps up to grasp the thin of your wrist in a bone crushing grip as you’re about to make contact with the smooth surface of the gleaming beskar helmet. And you know you were asking for it, that you should never have even insinuated that you were going to touch a Mandalorian’s helmet, and that this is only your own doing, but as his harsh strength makes contact with you, so unexpectedly, he’s so fast, that you’re caught almost entirely unaware, you react on pure instinct. A reflex so embedded into the deepest and most poisoned recesses of your mind, that despite the fact that you know this is the last sort of reaction you should exhibit, that above all else you needed to keep this part of yourself hidden and secreted away from the rest of the galaxy, you can’t help yourself when, at the moment that his crushing strength slams your hand back down onto the table, twisting painfully so that you’re crying out in shock and hurt, you weren’t going to do anything to him, you just wanted to touch a little, you can’t help it when you let go of the reins on your power, and you feel the Force snap out of you like a band of rubber, to crack out and wrap around his arm and rip his painful grip away from you. Another inviolable tendril shoves against his chest plate to push him back. His movements, too abrupt, too unexpectedly aggressive to give you a moment to temper your reaction, to give you a chance to remind yourself that this is not one of your painful, dark memories, that you’re free, you’re free, you’re free, and suppress your reaction to not reveal yourself.

The two of you pause for one long moment, him by force, and you in shock and fear and slight nausea as you pant breathlessly. It’s been a long time since you’ve lashed out like this, since you’ve used the Force in front of another person, and the sensation of being perceived, of being seen for what you truly are is disequilibrating and terrifying and sickeningly liberating all at the same time. 

One thick arm of his is held up and pinned against the back of the booth the two of you are ensconced in, hidden from prying eyes, at least. His legs start to shift restlessly, seeking purchase or trying to kick out, and you pin him there too, lest he try and hurt you again. 

“I do not like to be handled so,” you admonish him, clicking your tongue. You can feel the seething fury rolling off him. “I wasn’t going to do anything to you. I am not going to do anything to you.” He’s got a blaster strapped into a holster at his thigh, and you’re sure his vambrace is hiding several other nasty tricks up his sleeve. You eye them both. “If I let you go, are you going to try and hurt me again?”

“No,” he growls out.

“No,” you mock back, but release him anyway, letting an impenetrable wall settle between the two of you. He immediately goes for his blaster, and you block his reach which has him furiously growling and lurching towards you, only to be met by the invisible Force impeding his attack. He spits a frustrated volley of curses in a language you can’t understand, but that you’re fairly certain is Mando’a. 

“Ah, ah, no blaster,” you tut, and he settles, going suddenly, shockingly still, watching you watch him. “You really are quite poorly mannered and surly.” There’s a part of you that is still slightly unbalanced, heart beating painfully against the cage of your ribs, but you’re trying to hide it behind a wry smile and light tone. Echoes of pain and hurt and cruel and unyielding hands molding you into a thing that was just as cruel and unyielding. You cannot tolerate being handled like that anymore, and you feel contrite that you’d provoked him into doing so. Sometimes it is still difficult for you to remember how it is you’re supposed to behave around other people. 

And then something you weren’t expecting, for he says, “You’re a Force weilder. You’re a Jedi.”

You let out a barking laugh. “What do you know of the Force?”

“Are you?” He presses.

“Yes, but no, definitely not that, no.”

“Then what?”

“Nothing. Or… whatever the opposite of a Jedi is, I suppose.”

“The opposite?” He shakes his head, “I don’t–”

“Hmm…” you cut him off, turning to make sure the two of you still haven’t been noticed. “Not anymore. I don’t use it anymore.”

“Oh, no?”

“Well… you’ve gone and ruined that now, haven’t you?”

“You started–”

“All I was trying to do,” you interrupt, “Was make nice. I’d always wanted to meet a Mandalorian,” Lie, “Haven’t you ever heard of a little flirting? And I fear, now, you’ve painted them all in a very poor light,” Lie, “Look at how rude you’ve gone and been, when all I wanted was to be friends,” Another lie, “A shame…” you heave a big sigh, “You really are very beautiful.” Truth. That fist clenches again, and you cock your head to the side, getting one last good look at him. You feel suddenly sad, you don't want to go. You’ve enjoyed this brief moment you’ve gotten to talk to him. Even if you’d gone and pissed him off and ruined it all now. 

“It was nice meeting you, shiny. Even if you were an abominable beast about it.” You give him a nod of your head, and a quick two fingered salute before you’re sliding out of the enshroudment of the booth and slipping out the back of the cantina, into the dark alleyway, leaving him behind. 

The last glimpse you catch of him out of the corner of your eye before the door shuts behind you, is the sight of him scrambling out of the booth and starting towards the door to follow after you. 

A glutton for punishment, then, so it seems. 

You flit through the dark, dirty alleys, scampering from shadow to shadow. The city streets around you, gone quiet now as the sun over Nevarro sets quickly, and you can feel him hunting after you. He’s strong, and you can almost feel the heavy weight of his life force even at a distance, almost as if the goodness and honesty of his character is a presence of its own, sentient in a way. And he’s angry, and you can feel that too, charging after you, provoked, even if he does it on entirely silent and measured feet. You can sense that ravenous curiosity and frustration at being bested and evaded pressing up against you, chasing after you. As if there were some dark red thread connecting the two of you from spine to rib bone, leading him to you, pulling him along your trail. You tiptoe the lines of the shadows silently, making your way through the winding city streets, feeling him getting closer and closer, trying to confuse him, even as he gains on you anyway. 

And then he’s there. 

You feel a massive hand, strong and sure, clamp around the back of your neck, but his touch is measured this time – he’d heeded your warning. His other hand wraps around the bend of your elbow, twisting your arm back behind you, and then he’s kicking open the nearest door, what seems to be some sort of storage alcove, the space dark and humid and mildewed, and pushing you inside. He shoves you away from him once you pass together into the darkness, and you catch yourself on the edge of what feels like some sort of table or workbench.

You laugh breathlessly. Overwhelmed by the thrill of the chase, of the feel of his hands on you, the surrounding darkness, the sound of his own panting breath through the modulator of his helmet. You hope he’s just as overwhelmed, disequilibrated, as you are now. 

“Oh, you again?” you laugh, turning to face him, bracing yourself back against the table. All you can see of him is the silver crescent of the curve of his helmet, the outline of his wide shoulders in the dim light of the moon seeping in through the cracks of space around the door. He is a steel giant.“Did you forget something? Need me to hand your ass to you again, Mandalorian?”

“You’re a fucking brat. Anyone ever tell you that before?”

You gasp mockingly, “Me? Never.”

“Why is it that everything you say sounds vaguely like a taunt? Like you’re trying to provoke me.”

And, oh, he sounds just so unbearably serious and put out by you, that you pout, forced to match his serious tone with one of your own. You force the smile to leave your voice, “Maybe because I am,” and your voice goes quieter, softer, because again, truth. There is something about him that incites provocation, you want him rattled, come undone. “Maybe I want to see what happens when a man made of metal loses control.”

“I can’t – I don’t–” His voice, even through the modulator, is its own flavor of foreplay. “I don’t know…” he says again, whispers it, his tone seeping through the helmet, entirely uncertain, or at war with himself. 

He takes one menacing step forward, made even all the more intimidating by the vast difference in your heights, the sheer breadth of him, the darkness wrapping around him so that all he’s made into are slivers of gleaming silver flame here and there. You feel the whisper of one leather covered finger skim lightly over the outside of your right forearm, another soft touch to the left side of your waist, and you shiver all over. 

“Not a virgin? Your Creed lets you fuck?”

“No.”

“No, what? Use your words.”

Silence. Stubborn, silent, tin can.

“Girlfriend?”

“No.”

“Whores?”

A grunt. 

“Aha! Gotcha.” You start to toe your foot forward, bending your knee to make contact with him when you find his leg, tilting slightly away from the table so that you can slide your thigh between his legs. “Is that what you want me to be for you?”

“No.” Fucking monosyllabic–

“Then what do you want from me? Why did you follow me?”

“I don’t know…”

“Don’t lie.”

“I want to fuck you.” Your cunt goes soaked and tight at his words, because yes, yes yes, this is what you were leading him to. Finally, he’s caught on, and then he’s planting a strong, broad hand to the center of your chest and pushing you back into the table, and pressing the hard, unyielding length of himself against you. He’s hard and swollen beneath his pants, you can feel the thick heft of him against your belly as he presses into you, and you bring your palms up to slide against the unprotected sides of his strong waist, sending him into a full body shudder as you touch him, helmet falling forward on his neck as he hunches over you, hands planted on the table behind. You can hear his labored, panting breath huffing through the modulator as you run your hands along the planes of him. He’s huge, pure muscle beneath unrelenting beskar, and if you weren’t the creature that you are, you’d feel slightly frightened at the unbelievable strength he’s made up of. He is a thrumming effigy of restrained power beneath your hands, different to that which makes you up, and you feel the strength of him once again, humming through the Force. His light burns so bright, almost blindingly. He’s strong. 

You slide one of your hands up his chest plate, tucking your fingers into the top-most edge to bring yourself up and closer to him as he curves over you, bending you back into an arch over the table’s edge. Your other hand reaches for his wrist braced against the table, wrapping around it, so thick your fingers don’t meet, to tuck your fingertips into the space where his sleeve meets his glove, and at the feel of your bare skin on his, just there, just there, he growls, deep and savage in his chest at the same time that you let out a breathy, warbled moan. His other hand shoots up to grasp at the small of your back and press you into him, his fingers digging painfully into your skin. He’s burning hot, sweltering, and he slides his palm lower, tilting your pelvis into his as you hitch one of your knees up the outside of his thigh to his hip, and then your cunt is rocking against the thick length of his cock, and another breathless, pained groan from the both of you as you make contact there, pushing and pulling against each other. You want to taste his skin, his tongue, you want to kiss him, to feel him licking into your mouth. You pull yourself in closer by the hand tucked into his chestplate to press your face into the warm space between his helmet’s edge and the folds of his cowl. He smells so good, like leather and sweat and metal. Something earthy and musky, something that proves to you that despite the beskar, there is only a man of flesh and blood and want beneath. 

His palm slides to grip the lush of your ass, rolling you onto his length harder, pressing deeper as if he could fuck you through your clothes. 

“Are you going to let me fuck you, little brat?” he pants, ending on a stuttered groan as you hook your calf around his waist and press your foot into the small of his back to grind particularly sharply onto him, pressing your clit into the edge of his utility belt, “Please, just– just–” you gasp, head falling back on your neck. And then he’s spinning you abruptly and pressing between your shoulder blades so that you're bent entirely over the table, cheek smushed against the hard surface. That wide palm slides down the slope of your spine, squeezes your asscheek harshly so that you’re moaning out in lust or pain, you can’t tell.

“Was that a yes? Who can’t use their words now?”

“I liked it better when you weren’t talking,” you grouch, but then his fingers have somehow snuck their way up beneath your tunic and under the edge of your trousers, and he’s ripping everything down to leave you bare and unprotected from the sudden onslaught of that huge expanse of leather clad palm cracking down painfully on the soft skin of your ass so that you’re scrambling to find the opposite end of the table to pull yourself away from him. A pathetic little screech claws its way out of you, and he wraps the length of your hair around his fist to pull your head back and up, turning you into his own little bow string, head resting back on the hard pauldron over his shoulder. 

“Where do you think you’re going? I caught you, you’re mine now.”

“Fuck off–” You try, but he clamps his fingers around your jaw, squeezing the fine bones of your face to cut you off, his other hand in your hair gives a sharp tug that makes the tips of your breasts go hot and tight and your cunt clench around nothing. You can feel yourself dripping down the insides of your naked thighs. 

“Open your mouth,” he orders, shoving the thick of his fingers inside to press down on your tongue. You try and moan around him, protest or something, but you can’t help but run your tongue around the digits, tasting the smokiness of blaster residue, the tang of whatever he must use to oil his gloves. “Finally, some silence. I like you better like this,” he taunts you with an imitation of your previous words. He bends his head forward, “Get them wet,” he murmurs, voice soft and sultry through the modulator, and the moan you give him now is all desperation as you let saliva pool heavy on your tongue to coat the leather. 

When he pulls them from your mouth, tugging your head back further so that you can look up into the dark tee of his visor as he slides his spit slick gloves between your thighs to press against your throbbing clit, your whimpered little mewl has a chastising tut filtering through the helmet, “Slippery, little thing.” He starts to press slow circles to the aching bundle of nerves, sliding down on every other swirl to press gentle, teasing pressure to your clenching opening. “Did my chasing do all this? Do you like being hunted, brat?”

“Not–” you moan as he presses down hard on your clit, then back to the mouth of your cunt, giving you just the tip of his finger, “Not a brat,” you struggle to get out.

“No?” He starts to press two fingers inside at once, both of you groaning in tandem. “Maker – fucking tight–” He scissors his fingers inside of you, twisting his wrist to fuck you open, making room for himself inside of you. “Don’t know if I’ll even fit in here.”

“No,” you groan, low and drawn out, and then, yes, whispered breathlessly, one of your arms reaching back to hold onto the wrist of his hand still twisted in your hair, trying to find purchase on anything to anchor yourself with. Because the stretch of just his two fingers inside of you – you can hear the slick squelch of your wetness as he starts to fuck them in and out of you slowly – is so unexpectedly obscene. You had not expected to find yourself in this position with any man, especially not one like this – had not thought you were yet ready to be touched by another person. Not so soon after– “Please – m– more. I want–”

“You think you’re ready for my cock, little one? Have I stretched this tiny cunt out enough?”

“Yes– yes. Just do it.”

“Fuck–” You listen to the wet little pop as he pulls his fingers from you, and the clink and shuffle of his belt and armor as he pulls himself out of his clothes, and then he’s shifting behind you as you brace against the edge of the table. The burning hot blunt tip of his cock skimming against the round of your ass, and you feel him spread his feet wide, bend his knees, and then his cock is there at the slick mouth of your cunt, and he’s thrusting up and into you on the downward roll of your hips, and Maker, he’s deep like this. Suddenly, twin strangled groans of pain or relief ripping from your throats in tandem as he grinds deep, deeper, for a moment. You feel the heavy kick and throb of his cock inside of you, and he is too big, too thick – he forces you to take it anyway. Stretching you in a way you’ve never been before, your eyes smart, forcing your body to make room for his inside of you, it leaves your breath to stutter out in a weak little puff of shock. 

And you moan, using the palms of your hands against the edge of the table to grind yourself back onto him while his hands clamp tightly around your hips, his fingers so long they almost meet at the center of your belly beneath your navel. 

Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. That’s so good.

You can’t tell which one of you is speaking. You can't even tell if you’re still breathing. And then he starts to move. 

You knew he’d fuck hard, from the first moment you’d seen him, you knew.

He pulls his hips back, the slick wet, the grasping walls of your cunt trying to suck him back in, and then the scorching slide of him pressing back in, in, in, grinding again, those long fingers pressing down on your belly so that you feel him from the outside too. 

“Harder,” you beg, because of course you want more. You are a creature made of greed and hunger. You always have been. 

“Quit. You’ll take whatever the fuck you’re given,” but his hips slam back in, a savage growl punctuating the movement. 

He gives it to you almost brutally, without pause or thought, fucking punched out breaths and whines from you. 

“Shut up,” he spits on the end of one particularly deep, harsh thrust that’s followed by a high pitched mewl from you. “You want every piece of shit on Nevarro to find you split open on my cock like this?” Your head lolls back limply on his shoulder, the wet slap of his heavy balls against your clit overwhelming the sound of your thoughts. You can’t speak, your brain is currently being jostled within the confines of your skull by the force of his cock splitting you open. “No? Then be a good girl, and be quiet,” his voice, rough, even through the modulator is almost drowned out by the wet, obscene sound of him pounding into you. 

He brings one of his hands back up to your jaw, turning your head slightly so that your nose is almost smushed up against the chrome of his visor. He wants to look at you. The hard beskar of his chest plate rubs harshly against your back on every push upwards of his hips, and you’re sure that’ll hurt later, but right now you just can’t seem to care. You can feel the humid, warm air of your panting breath, foggy against the gleam of his helmet, and you bring one of your hands up to the wrist holding your face, holding on for dear life, sanity, you’re not sure what. Your other hand twists back into the hanging fabric of his cloak so that you can pull yourself more tightly back into him as he slows his thrusts, making them longer and more drawn out. “Yeah– like that. Settle… good girl.” Your eyes flutter shut. Too much, too much. It should hurt. You wanted it to hurt. Not gentle, you don’t want it gentle.

“Harder,” you whine, plead.

“No. How I say.” He rolls his cock into you over and over, your slick sliding down your thighs, the backs abraded by the plates of beskar over his own legs. He’s so deep, so big it hurts so good. Even if you want it harder, it still hurts so good. The hand at your face slides down to rip open the fastening of your high necked tunic, reaching inside and under your breast band to pull out the heavy aching weight of your tit and pinch your nipple, rolling it between his strong leather clad fingers – more high, desperate mewls that have him groaning deep in his chest. You’re sure if your face wasn't so close to his you’d never be able to hear them through the helmet, low and rumbly and so delicious. 

“Fucking beautiful,” he murmurs low, cupping your breast to plump it up, massaging it in his palm.

“What? You can see?” 

“Yeah– fuck yes, I can see.”

“Not fair,” you whine. It’s so dark in the little room he’d pushed you into, you’re not even going to get to take a good look at his cock before this is all over. 

“You don’t need to see. You just need to be good and take it.”

“Do you ever kiss?” you ask him suddenly. Irritated by the fact that you’ve not gotten to ogle him – or kiss him. If he even does that.

Another deep roll of his hips, a tight squeeze to the swinging globe of your breast, “No.”

“That’s a shame.”

And he responds immediately, voice subdued and even, underneath the helmet, despite the fact that you feel like he’s cleaving you in two. “Maybe next time,” he says. His palm slides down to your belly then, the other pressing down between your shoulder blades to fold you over the table, hands moving to wrap around your hips and lift you up and back onto his impaling cock so that the tips of your toes are left skimming the ground beneath, your fingers scramble and claw for purchase against the wood of the table. You can feel the wide tip of his cock punching against your womb on every thrust in and stars flash behind your eyes, mouth hanging open pathetically. 

There is nothing gentle about the way he fucks you. Like he wants to split you in two, like he wants to make sure the shape of him is branded into the center of your body so that you’d never forget this. The sticky sweet coil of your orgasm starts up low in your belly, and you feel molded in his image for one second, pushed out of yourself to stand on the sidelines and look upon the sight of your much smaller form draped over the table and being fucked into so savagely by this silver blade of a man.

And then: they’re fucking bare, they’re fucking raw, and it has been so, so long since he has felt the touch of another person, someone else’s skin on his that was not bestowed upon him in violence or with the barrier of a sheath between. It is an almost overwhelming feeling, that of your hot, soaking wet cunt pulsing around him, you’re about to come for him, he can feel it. The fluttering of your inner muscles, delicate thing that you are, your thighs shaking as you struggle to push yourself back on to him to get it harder, deeper. He is, almost, made faint with the feeling. And those eyes… you’ve got the strangest multicolored eyes. One enshrouded entirely in darkness compared to its bright counterpart – as if one had forgotten to take that last step into the light. You’re fucking beautiful and–

You snap back into yourself. No, no, no, stay out of his head. Stay out of his head. Focus. You push yourself up again so that your back is against his chest, and he bands one tremendously strong arm around you, gripping your breast tightly. You feel him bend his knees framing your thighs to change and deepen the angle, and then he’s pounding right into that tender, devastating place inside of you, and your cunt twists and floods with your orgasm, electric shocks of pleasure numbing your fingers and toes. You can do nothing more than let him do with you what he will. Your toes aren’t even touching the floor. 

He presses as deep as he can, grinds for a moment, and then he folds you over the table once again and presses down harshly on the small of your back with one heavy palm as he pulls his cock from you and finishes himself off. You listen to the wet thwack, thwack, thwack of him pulling on his cock, and then the searing hot spurt of his come is hitting your ass and the exposed seam of your fluttering cunt, a savage growl ripping through the modulator as he squeezes all of the air out of you with that unyielding hand. You’re like a pressed flower between the pages of a book – wilted and frayed, but still held in the image of that which you once were. At the last spurt from his cock he brings his hand to your ass, spreads you apart to rub his spend into the tight furl of your ass, and then further down into your throbbing, overly sensitive clit. All you can do is cry and whimper weakly, still trembling from your own orgasm. “T– too much, nooo,” you whine pathetically.

“Easy – easy, settle.”

You feel him fall to a crouch behind you, pulling you apart with both hands by the meat of your ass to look upon the sight of your blushed, fluttering hole. Messy, little cunt, you hear him whisper. He rubs his come into your trembling thighs, over your swollen clit again, inspecting every vulnerable inch and crevice of your sex, and then he’s pushing two of those thick fingers back inside of you, the passage made slick and fucked open by your mingled come. “Just one more, little one. Want to see it up close,” he murmurs. You try and wiggle away, tears of oversensitivity brimming beneath your lashes, I can’t, I can’t, you think you whisper, but he’s inescapable. He clamps one hand painfully over your asscheek, keeping you spread apart for his inspection, the other one buried deep inside of you so that his fingers are hooked against your g-spot where he presses over and over, quick and relentless, his fingers almost vibrating inside of you until your vision is going white hot and a buzzing sound rings in your ears, and you’re crying for what you think might sound like mercy or something equally despeerate. “Yes, fuck, yes. Just like that.” Your answering sob does not prompt him to abate, for he keeps his fingers pressed against that spot inside of you until you’re leaking an embarrassing amount of wetness down your thighs, until the rippling throbs of your orgasm have finally settled. You feel his head fall forward, the beskar of his helmet pressing against the space where your asscheek meets your thigh, and he holds there for a second against your burning hot skin, the scorching soothed by the cool metal.

You can’t stop shaking, you feel, suddenly, like you might cry. You were not prepared for something of this intensity, to be touched like this, and now that it’s happened you’re left reeling. You don’t even know his name. And now you’re sure he’ll go away to wherever it is that Mandalorian bounty hunters run off to, and you’ll never see him again, and you’ll have to live with the memory of this forever. And something like this… amidst all the other horror that lives within you, you’re sure that the intimacy, the fervor of this, will make it hurt all the more, even compared to all the rest. 

He uncoils behind you, rising up to his towering height. You listen to the rustling of his clothes, and then he’s smoothing a large palm over the slope of your trembling back and reaching down to pull up your trousers, tucking your breast back beneath your tunic, righting your clothes for you without commentary. When you think you’ve finally caught your breath, or can at least pretend you’ve done so, enough to push yourself up from your position over the table. Your eyes feel pinched and hot, your heart beating so hard, almost painfully, within the confines of your ribcage that it feels as though your bones are rattling beneath your skin, knocking together in the imitation of a death rattle so that he’ll surely know that you feel two paces away from falling apart entirely. 

“You’re… Are you okay? I didn’t hurt you?” Voice stilted.

“No more than I wanted you to.”

He’s silent for a moment, uncomfortable. You can feel the sensation of him pulling away, getting ready to make a run for it. “That’s not–” he cuts himself off. “Do you– do you spend much time on planet?” He’s awkward, uncomfortable now with this unnecessary notion of seemingly required small talk.

“No.” Lie. You like Nevarro, you spend more time here than anywhere else. 

“What’s your name?” It shocks you that he asks, for you know he’d not give you his if you asked it of him in return, but for one infinitely painful, insanely uncharacteristic moment, you want to tell him. You want to give him your real name desperately, tell him who you are. But if you were to do that, then you might tell him what you are. And then he’d hate you, and the memory would be ruined, and you have so few good ones, that this one must be protected at all costs. 

So instead you say that which you have no real desire to say, do what you have no real desire to do, and make sure that he thinks you’re not interested, that you have no desire to ever see him again. Maybe next time. Your heart gives a surprisingly painful pinch, your eyes growing hotter by the second. “This was just a fuck, don’t get all sentimental on me now.” Your voice is so cold, so uncaring. You hate the way you can make yourself sound sometimes. You sense him snap with tense shock, and he nods once, succinctly. “Very well. Thank you… for this. I suppose.”

You lean back against the table, trying your hardest to appear as unaffected as you can. You turn your face to the side, roll your cheek over the hill of your shoulder. “It was my pleasure.”

He turns to go, his cape snapping with the sharp abruptness of his movements, and he pulls open the door of the little storage room letting a flood of moonlight sweep in to shed light on the construction of this memory you’re assembling brick by brick to preserve in your mind for as long as you possibly can. Your eyes sweep over the length of him ravenously, trying to catalog every single detail of him, the incredible breadth of his shoulders, the silver gleam of his beskar helmet, the sweep of his cape, the arsenal of weapons strapped to his body, lethal. He turns back to look at you for one moment, the yawning darkness of his chrome visor, “Don’t get killed, Mandalorian. There are so few of you left now.” And truth, truth, truth, for it would be a shame beyond imagining for a creature such as this, something so strong and beautiful and other, to perish when so few like him remain. He pauses to take you in, as well. You wish you had the courage to ask him what he sees when he looks at a thing like you. The tears are right there, and you hate them and feel weak and disgusted, but also relieved, and you could fall to your knees, in this moment, to thank the Maker that you still possess the ability, the heart, to cry, to succumb to something as trife as tears. You hope he cannot see them. The helmet cocks to the side for one second, perhaps he too is cataloging you to his memory. He nods once, and then he’s turning and gone away into the night. The door snicks shut behind him, and you’re alone once again. 

You pause for a moment, hoping that relief will come. He’s gone, you got what you wanted from him. You should be glad. But there is only the screaming thought of wait, there was still more, there was still more that I wanted from you. 

You let yourself sink slowly to the ground, hand braced against the edge of the table he just fucked you over, lest your shaking legs give out and have you planting face first into the dirt. You fold your legs beneath you, tuck your wild hair gently behind your ears, your movements measured, trying to breathe deep and slow, in through your nose and out through your mouth. Don’t cry, there’s no reason to cry. But shouldn’t we be glad we can still cry? Isn’t it a sign that not all is lost? That there is still a part of us that feels enough to shed tears? This should be a good thing. And so you let the tears fall. You fold yourself over as small as you can, one hand pressed over your hot, leaking eyes, another over your mouth to keep your sounds contained, and you sob as quietly as you possibly can. It was so good and you’re crying and you’re alive and you’re free. You are free, and you should be glad of this. Cry, cry, but cry for your own victory, for your own freedom, for the chance to cry. This is what victory feels like. This is what it is to be alive. 

And so, here is your truth: It is a difficult thing, to shed the facets of the dark side after you’ve lived with it for so long. To be a Sith is to forsake all connection, all peace. There is only passion to strength to power to victory to the Force, but it is always alone. Always against someone or something else. So, yes, it is difficult to shed the facets of the dark side that have made you the thing you’ve been for more than half your life, since the time you were stolen from your cradle, your parents slaughtered, and spirited away into the shadow of a cruel and unforgiving master. What is it to know exactly how your life will play out, to see everything, to be so aware of what you will be – and to still be lost? Part agony, part madness. The pieces of you that are secretive, that like to hide, to run, these are especially difficult to let go of, and you are so, so interminably sad, you live in it. It’s all you feel you are now, after the dark, after the fall of the Empire and the Sith, after escape, after freedom, after you’d so forcibly ripped its claws, that were so deeply sunk within you, out by sheer force of will, by sheer force of desperation, you worry that it’s taken a piece of you with it, your soul. That it had eaten a piece of you. That you don’t have one anymore. 

You don’t even know his name. And even if you’re certain he would not have given it to you, for one moment, you feel an incredible lance of regret that you did not give him yours. 

But then: a person without a soul could not cry. 

And so this must only be proof of the fact that you must still possess yours, as shriveled or weak as it’s been made, you must still have one. You must. You must. 

And you think: I am not unfamiliar with this half life – there is a wound inside of me – dark and putrid and festering. But perhaps my tears will heal me. Seal the wound closed. 

You feel lonely – worse, you feel strange. Once, you were terrible – now you are only yourself. So you cry for the passion of the moment, for the way he made you feel, for the loss of a name, for the truth of freedom.

Chapter II

Netherfeildren's Masterlist

Updates Blog : Follow and turn on notifications for new fics!

[fourthwingfan]

Madness - Chapter 1

Warning: swear language, mentioned childhood trauma, and you know it's a war college so you should be prepared.

Note: I hope you will enjoy this chapter, I'm currently working on ch 2, there will be more excitment as the story goes on, pls bear with me I have so many ideas for this fanfic ;)

A dragon without its rider is a tragedy. A rider without their dragon is dead.

—Article One, Section One

The Dragon Rider’s Codex

„You’re late.” says General Melgren, when I enter his office. He is staring out of the window, and didn’t turn around when he heard me closing the door.

„I apologise, but…” I try to defend myself.

„I dont’t care about your excuses. This is the Conscription Day and you will not fail.” he starts his lecture for the hundreth times.

As if he let me fail. I had been trained for this day since I was born. I am strong, he made sure of that. He doesen’t know the word love since my mother’s death. I never once received a kind word from him. For me he’s a monster, not a father. I hate him.

„Yes, General.” I answer, while I’m tightening my grip on my canvas rucksack.

„Go, and don’t forget what’s your duty. And do not forget that you are a Melgren! Do not bring more shame on this name, that you already had. The Riders Quadrant the only place the suitable to hide your…disfunction.”

What a kind man, I thought. That’s not my fault that I was born this way.

„Yes, General.”

„You’re dismissed.”

With his last word I walk out of the office and I go to wait for Violet in front of her mother’s office. Voices rose from beyond the closed door. They arguing, again.

It’s not a surprise beacuse everybody knows that Violet Sorrengail isn’t meant to be a Rider. She’s small and fragile. The complete opposite of a Rider. Only General Sorrengail is blind to this fact.

Basgiath War College is famous for its cuelty throughout Navarre. Nonetheless thousands of twenty-year-olds waiting to enter their chosen quadrant. I am one of them.

Every Navarrian officer, whether they choose to be schooled as healers, scribes, infantry, or riders is molded within these cruel walls over three years, honed into weapons to secure our mountainous borders from the violent invasion attempts of the kingdom of Poromiel and their gryphon riders. The weak don’t survive here, especially not in the Riders Quadrant. The dragons make sure of that.

I nearly dropped my rucksack when General Sorrengail’s door opened with such a force that’s matching Mira Sorrengail’s temper. She’s Violets older sister by six years.

Mira Sorrengail is the epitome of the perfect Rider. She has short hair to match the standard Rider’s length. She was dressed in black leather and carried her battle worn rucksack in her hand. She was elegant and lethal.

„It seems that General Sorrengail didn’t change her mind about Violet and the Riders Quadrant.” I say when she realises that I was waiting for them.

„No. She’s batshit crazy.” Mira says without a care that the guards might tell her what she said.

„Don’t worry, I’ll be there for her. I can’t guarantee that she will graduate without a scratch, but I will do my best to protect her.” I try to calm Mira.

In this moment the door opened again a whole lot gentler then before. It was Violet.

We practically grew up together, because my father always left me here in Basgiath when he had left to fulfill his duty as one of the most powerful Generals.

Violet was a kind, gentle but sharp tounged woman. She dosen’t fit any of the criteria that makes someone suitable for a life of a Rider.

„Hi Aelin.”

„Hi, Vi. How are you?” I ask her refering to the talk with her mother.

„We don’t have time for a chit chat. Let’s go. We only have an hour before all candidates have to report, and I saw thousands waiting outside the gates when I flew over.” Mira says as she starts walking, leading us down the stone staircase and through the hallways to Violet’s room.

„She’s fucking efficient, I’ll give you that.” Mira mutters

All of Violet’s personal items have been packed into crates that now sit stacked in the corner.

„I was hoping I’d be able to talk her out of it. You were never meant for the Riders Quadrant.” Mira says while emptying Violet’s rucksack to see what she packed that makes it look so heavy.

„So you’ve mentioned. Repeatedly.” Says Violet while she stares at her sister with daggers in her eyes. „And what are you doing? It took me the whole night to choose what I want to bring with me.”

„Sorry Vi, but your pack is almost as heavy as you. It would be impossible to carry it across the Parapet, even for me, and I’m stronger than you.” I wince as she try to catch her books that Mira deemed unnecessary.

„Hey, I want those books. You can’t throw all of them away.” Shouths Violet.

„What’s this for then?” She asks holding up one of the books.

„Obviously killing people. If my memory correct that’s a book about poisonous herbs” I say to at least save one of the books for Violet.

„I’m surprised that you even tried to read a book” Replies Mira not even paying attention to what she says.

„I’m not illiterate Mira. I just have problems with reading and you know that too.” I cringe because I really hate this topic.

„Shit, Aelin I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way.” Sighs Mira, then looks at Violet to divert the subject.

„Take off those horrible boots, they are a death trap. You’ll slip right off the Parapet with those smooth soles. I have a set of rubber-bottomed rider boots made for you just in case.” States Mira while giving the boots and black leather clothes to her sister. „Now, get changed while I sort out the rest of this mess.”

„And you…” She begins and check my clothes if I too need to change them.

„You’re set.” Mira states in a surprised tone.

„Yeah, you know my father. He never let me embarass him by falling off the Parapet beacuse of something this trivial.” I said as I roll my eyes.

„Than at least he did one thing right in his life.” Mira says harshly while she finish packing into Violet’s rucksack.

„Rider black is supposed to be earned. Someone’s going to say we didn’t earn them.” I hear Violet refer to her clothes and mine, when she emerges from the bathroom in her new attire.

„You’re a Sorrengail. Fuck what they say.” Responds Mira while she laces Violet into a vest-style corset over her shirt.

„Here, this is yours. Put it on too.” Mira say and I get a corset that matches with Violet’s one.

„What is this?” I ask while trying putting it on.

„Something I designed,” she explains „I had it specially made for you two with Teine’s scales sewn in, so be careful with it.”

„Dragon scales?” I jerk my head back to look at her. „How the hell? Teine is huge.”

„I happen to know a rider whose power can make big things very small.” A devious smile plays across her lips.” „And smaller things… much, much bigger.”

„How much bigger?” I ask laughing.

„It’s a secret.” She says while motioning Violet to sit in front of her.

„You’re the worst.” says Violet.

„Oh come on Vi, don’t tell me that you aren’t curious.” I tease her.

„Head forward. You should have cut your hair.” Mira says while she pulls the strainds tight against Violets head and resume weaving. „It’s a liability in sparring and in battle, not to mention being a giant target. No one else has a hair that fades out silver like this, and they’ll already be aiming for you.”

„You know very well the natural pigment seems to gradually abandon it no matter the length.” Says Violet with defiance. „Besides, other than everyone else’s concern for the shade, my hair is the only thing about me that’s perfectly healthy. Cutting it would feel like I’m punishing my body for finally doing something well, and it’s not like I feel the need to hide who I am. Besides it’s not like Aelin will blend into the environment either.”

„So what’s your excuse for not cutting your hair?” Mira asks with raised eyebrows. „Because I know you have one too. You two always come up with something to get out of trouble.”

„I won’t cut it. I can braid it tightly to not distract me in a fight, besides it’s not like I resemble the General. My hair and my eyes come from my mother.” I say while looking into a mirror on one of the walls.

It’s true. I’m nothing like my father. I look just like my mother, as they say. She was a beauty and the only person whom my father loved in his life. Unfortunately that caused her death.

When she was in her last months in the pregnency, she was attacked by a group who wanted to eliminate the General using my mother. But she was a warrior and tried to save us by escaping. That was when someone injured her and left her to die. When they found my mother she was dying. Pregnant with me. The healers tried to save her but they are not gods. They can’t bring back the dead. They were only able to save me. These are the only facts that I know because nobody want to speak about my mother in fear to anger the General.

Between the few minutes that my mother had died and I was saved, happened a lot of things to my body. My hair is supposed to be a natural golden color but has strands of silvery white, just like my eyes. They should be golden but there are tiny circular parts around my iris where the silvery white color appears. The healers said that it was due to lack of oxygen. My father can’t even look at me because I remind him of my mother and my unique coloring is remind him of her brutal death and that he couldn’t save her. I think this is the main reason that he hates me. The other is another consequence of the circumstance of my birth.

When I was old enough that the General brought tutors to start my education, it turned out that my brain suffered some damage too. I was dyslexic. It doesen’t mean that I can’t read, it’s just really-really difficult. As if the words are running away from my eyes, everytime I try to read something. It doesen’t matter if it’s a short or long text. My memory is great enough that I can remember a lot of things after hearing it but not everything. That makes studying a whole lot of harder. The General ordered that we keep it a secret, so outside my father, and the tutors, the Sorrengail children are the only ones who know it. This is the other reason why the General said in his office that I bring shame on the Melgren name.

„Well then there’s nothing that I can say to change either of your mind.” Sighs Mira. „Then listen to me well.” As she starts to summarize years of knowledge into fifteen harried minutes, barely pausing to breathe.

„Be observant. Quiet is fine, but make sure you notice everything and everyone around you to your advantage. You’ve read the Codex?” Mira asks

„A few times.” Violet answers.

„I tried but I don’t remember everything.” I shrug.

„Then Violet will help you memorize it once you begin your classes. Then you should know that the other riders can kill you any time, and the cutthroat cadets will try. Fewer cadets means better odds at Threshing. There are never enough dragons willing to bond, and anyone reckless enough to get themselves killed isn’t worthy of a dragon anyway.”

„Except when sleeping. It’s an executable offense to attack any cadet while sleeping. Article Three-„ cites Violet.

„Yes, but that doesn’t mean you’re safe at night. Sleep in this if you can.” She taps the stomach of my corset. „Both of you.”

„There’s hidden sheaths sewn diagonally along the rib cage in your corset. For your daggers.” Continue Mira.

„I only have four.” Says Violet, then she grabs them from the floor and slide it into the sheaths.

„I have four and a sword.” I say to Mira while pointing at them at my ribs and thighs, the sword is strapped to my back.

„That’s fine. You’ll earn more.” She nods „Wear the armor at all times. Keep your daggers on you at all times.” She points to the sheaths down her thighs.

„Someone’s going to say we didn’t earn them.” Violet says. Clearly she worries too much.

„Come on Vi, remember what Mira said. You’re a Sorrengail. Fuck what they say. We will survive no matter what!” I say trying to calm her down a bit.

„Exactly. You’re both famous Generals daughters. A Sorrengail and a Melgren. You can do what you have to do to survive and never forget that.” Agrees Mira with me. „There’s no such thing as cheating once you climb the turret. There’s only survival and death.” The bell chimes – only thirty minutes left. She swallows. „It’s almost time. Ready?”

„No.” Replies quickly Violet.

„My hands are trembling.” I show them that indeed my hands are visibly shaking.

„Neither was I ready.” A wry smile lifts a corner of Mira’s mouth. „And I’d spent my life trainig for it, just like Aelin.”

„We’re not going to die today.” States Violet and slings the rucksack over her shoulder.

The halls of the central, administrative part of the fortress are eerily quiet as we wind our way down through various staircases, but the noise from outside grows louder the lower we descend. Through the windows, I see thousands of candidates hugging their loved ones and saying their goodbyes ont he grassy fields just beneath the main gate.

From what I’ve witnessed every year, most families hold on to their candidates right up to the very last bell. The four roads leading to the fortress are clogged with horses and wagons, especially where they converge in front of the college, but it’s the empty ones at the edge of the fields that make me nervous.

They’re for the bodies.

Right before we round the last corner that will lead tot he courtyard, Mira stops.

„What is – Oof.” I hear Violet’s muffled voice when Mira yanks her against her chest, hugging her tight in the relative privacy of the corridor.

„Aelin, you too. Come here.” Says Mira as Violet makes room for me, and then extends her arms.

„I love both of you. Remember everything I’ve told you. Don’t become another name on the death roll. Both of your lives are equally important. Do everything you can to stay alive.” Her voice shakes, and I wrap my arms around her, squeezing tight.

„We’ll be alright. I’ll be alright.” I promise.

She nods, her chin bumping against the top of my head. „I know. Let’s go.”

That’s all she says before pulling away and walking into the crowded courtyard just inside the main gate to the fortress. Instructors, commanders, and even General Sorrengail and General Melgren are gathered informally, waiting for the madness outside the walls to become the order within. Out of all the doors in the war college, the main gate is the only one no cadet will enter today, since each quadrant has its own entrance and facilities. Hell, the riders have their own citadel.

„Find Dain Aetos,” Mira tells us as we cross through the courtyard, heading for the open gate.

„Dain?” Asks Violet with a smile. I think she has a huge crush on him, but didn’t admit it yet. I don’t think he’s such a good person as Vi thinks, but I was never that close with him. We always avoided each others company. There’s something in his eyes that’s makes me uneasy.

„I’ve only been out of the quadrant for three years, but from what I hear, he’s doing well, and he’ll keep both of you safe.”

„As if I want to go near him” I say silently

„It doesn’t matter Aelin, just stay alive.” Scolds me Mira

„And you. Don’t smile like that,” she turns to Violet. „He’ll be second-year.” She shakes a finger at her. „Don’t mess around with second-years. If you want to get laid, and you should” – she lifts her brows – „often, considering you never know what the day brings, then screw around in your own year. Nothing is worse than cadets gossiping that you’ve slept your way to safety. This applies to you too Aelin.”

„So I’m free to take any of the first-years I want to bed,” I say with a smirk. „Just not the second- or the third-years.”

„Exactly.” She winks.

„Then we should definitely find the handsome ones. This is our first task Vi.” I joke with her, in hope that she at least smiles because she seems a little greener the longer she looks at the wagons at the road.

„Let’s cross the Parapet first Aelin.” Says Violet

„Sure Vi.” I wink at her.

We cross through the gates, leaving the fortress, and join the organized chaos beyond.

Each of Navarre’s six provinces has sent this year’s share of candidates for military service. Some volunteer. Some are sentenced as punishment. Most are conscripted. The only thing we have in common here at Basgiath is that we passed the entrance exam – both written and an agility test – which means at least we won’t end up as fodder for the infantry on the front line.

The agility test was easy with someone like me who had the „luck” to train under General Melgren’s watchful eyes. But the written exam was a nightmare. I barely passed despite the fact that I practiced for non-stop before it. It’s just the fact that I’m not like the other normal candidates. Give me a weapon and I’ll know how to use it. Bring me an opponent and I will figure out how to win. But I just can’t will my barin to function normally. Which my father likes to remind me all the time.

The atmosphere is tense with anticipation as Mira leads me along the worn cobblestone path toward the southern turret.

The majority of the crowd moves to line up at the base of the northern turret – the entrance to the Infantry Quadrant. Some of the mass heads toward the gate behind us – the Healer Quadrant that consumes the southern end of the college. Then I spot a few taking the central tunnel into the archives below the fortress to join the Scribe Quadrant. Violet wanted to be a scribe for her whole life. But General Sorrengail has other plans.

The entrance to the Riders Quadrant is nothing more than a fortified door at the base of the tower, that we rider candidates will climb.

We join the riders’ line, waiting to sign in, and then I glance up.

High above us, crossing the river-bottomed valley that divides the main college from the even higher, looming citadel of the Riders Quadrant on the southern ridgeline, is the Parapet, the stone bridge that’s about to separate rider candidates from cadets over the next few hours.

„And to think, I’ve been preparing for the scribe’s written exam all these years.” Says Violet in thick sarcastic voice. „I should have been playing on a balance beam.”

„Believe me Vi, I’ve been playing on a balance beam for years but I don’t think that’s the same as the Parapet.” I say laughing. „However I’m a little excited about this.”

Mira ignores us as the line moves forward and candidates disappear through the door. „Don’t let the wind sway your steps.”

Two candidates ahead of us, a woman sobs as her partner rips her away from a young man, the couple breaking from the line, retreating in tears down the hillside toward the crowd of loved ones lining the roads. There are no other parents ahead of us, only a few dozen candidates moving toward the roll-keepers.

„Keep your eyes on the stones ahead of you and don’t look down,” Mira says, the lines of her face tightening. „Arms out for balance. If the pack slips, drop it. Better it falls than you.”

„Maybe I should let them go first,” whispers Violet.

„No,” Mira answers. „The longer you wait on those steps” – she motions toward the tower – „the greater your fear has a chance to grow. Cross the Parapet before the terror owns you.”

„Mira’s right and you know it Vi. We will be alright. I’ll be there with you until we cross this damn thing.” I try to cheer her up. „If you want I’ll be the first, than you can watch and copy me.”

„Thanks, Aelin.” Smiles Violet.

The line moves, and the bell chimes again. It’s eight o’clock.

Sure enough, the crowd of thousands behind us has separated fully into their chosen quadrants, all lined up to sign the roll and begin their service.

„Focus,” Mira snaps, and I whip my head forward. „This might sound harsh, but don’t seek friendships in there. Forge alliances. Both of you.”

There are only two ahead of us now – a woman with a full pack, and a man with the woman crying over him. He’s carrying an even bigger rucksack.

I look around the pair toward the roll-keeping desk, and my eyes widen.

„Is he…?” Whispers Violet.

Mira glances and mutters a curse. „A separatist’s kid? Yep. See that shimmering mark that starts on the top of his wrist? It’s a relic from the rebellion.”

„A dragon did that?” She asks.

I nod. „Yes. General Melgren told me once, that it was his dragon that did it to all of them when he executed their parents. Nothing like punishing the kids to deter more parents from committing treason. Most of the marked kids who carry rebellion relics are from Tyrrendor.”

It always seemed cruel to me. Punishing the children for their parents actions.

In this moment the blood drains from Mira’s face, and she grips the straps of my pack, turning me to face her. „I just remembered.” Her voice drops, and we lean in to hear her better. „Stay the hell away from Xaden Riorson.”

That name…

„That Xaden Riorson,” she confirms, fear lacing her gaze. „He’s a third-year, and he will kill you the second he finds out who you are.” She lifts her gaze to Violet. „Both of you.”

„His father was the Great Betrayer. He led the rebellion,” Violet says quietly. „What is Xaden doing here?”

„All the children of the leaders were conscripted as punishment for their parents’ cirmes,” I murmur. Yep, my father was really a monster.

Mira whispers as we shuffle sideways, moving with the line. „Mom told me they never expected Riorson to make it past the parapet. Then they figured a cadet would kill him, but once his dragon chose him…” She shakes her head. „Well, there’s nothing much that can be done then. He’s risen to the rank of wingleader.”

„That’s bullshit.” Violet seethes.

„He’s sworn allegiance to Navarre, but I don’t think that will stop him where you’re concerned. Once you get across the Parapet – because you will make it across – find Dain. He’ll put you in his squad, and we’ll just hope it’s far from Riorson.” She grips my straps tighter. „Stay. Away. From. Him.” She knew me well enough to feel the need to repeat it. I don’t like this whole rebellion relic thing. This punishment is too curel.

„Roger that.” I say to calm her down.

„Noted.” Nods Violet.

„Next,” a voice calls from behind the wooden tablet hat bears the rolls of the Riders Quadrant. The marked rider I don’t know is seated next to a scribe, whose eyebrows rise over his weathered face. „Violet Sorrengail?”

She nods, and picking up the quill she sing her name on the roll.

„But I thought you were meant for the Scribe Quadrant,” he says softly.

„General Sorrengail chose otherwise,” I answer him.

„Melgren?” He asks.

„Yes, my name is Aelin Melgren.” I say then I sign my name on the next empty line on the roll.

„You look so much like your late mother,” He says while sadness fills his eyes.

„You knew my mom?” I ask amazed.

He turned his head to Violet „Pity. You had so much promise.” So he knew my mother, but won’t say a thing. As usual. But I just want to know what she was like.

„By the gods,” the rider next tot he scribe says. „You’re Mira Sorrengail?” His jaw drops, and I can smell his hero worship from here.

„I am.” She nods. „This is my sister, Violet. And this is Aelin Melgren. They’ll be first-years.”

„If your sister survives the Parapet.” Someone behind me snickers. „Wind just might blow her right off.”

„Shut up, idiot. You have a higher chance falling of the Parapet than her. It seems you don’t have a brain to think with, if you don’t know to not interfere in the adults conversations.” I answer angrily.

„You fought at Strythmore,” the rider behind the desk says with awe. „They gave you the Order of the Talon for taking out the battery behind enemy lines.”

„As I was saying.” Mira puts a hand at our shoulders. „This is my sister, Violet and our friend Aelin Melgren.”

„You know the way.” The scribe nods and points to the open door into the turret. It looks ominously dark in there, and I fight the urge to run away.

„I know the way,” she assures him, leading us past the table so the snickering asshole behind me can sign the roll.

We pause at the doorway and turn toward each other.

„Don’t die, Violet. I’d hate to be an only child. And you too Aelin, I consider you my sister so stay alive.” She grins and walks away, sauntering past the line of gawking candidates as word spreads of exactly who she is and what she’s done.

„Though to live up to that,” the woman ahead of us says from just inside the tower.

„It is,” Violet agrees.

„But at least she’s a good sister.” I say laughing.

My eyes adjust quickly to the dim light coming in through the equidistant windows along the curved staircase.

„Sorrengail, and Melgren as in…?” the woman asks, looking over her shoulder as we begin to climb the hundreds of stairs.

„Yep.” There’s no railing, so I gesture Violet to keep her hand on the stone wall as we rise higher and higher.

„The generals?” the blond guy ahead of us asks.

„The same ones,” I answer, offering him a quick smile.

„Wow. Nice leathers, too.” He smiles back.

„Thanks. They’re courtesy of our family.”

„I wonder how many candidates have fallen off the edge of the steps and died before they even reach the Paraphet,” the woman says, glancing down the center of the staircase as we climb higher.

„Two last year.” Violet replies immediately. „Well, three if you count the girl one of the guys landed on.”

The woman’s brown eyes flare, but she turns back around keeps climbing. „How many steps are there?” she asks.

„Two hundred and fifty,” Violet answers.

„Oh god Vi, I love your brain.” I said laughing, then we climb in silence for another five minutes.

„Not too bad,” she says with a bright smile as we near the top and the line comes to a halt. „I’m Rhiannon Matthias, by the way.”

„Dylan,” the blond guy responds with an enthusiastic wave.

„Violet.” Vi give them a tense smile.

„Aelin.” I say and wink at Vi, ignoring Mira’s earlier suggestion that we avoid friendships and only forge alliances.

„I feel like I’ve been waiting my entire life for this day.” Dylan shifts his pack on his back. „Can you believe we actually get to do this? It’s a dream come true.”

„I can’t fucking wait.” Rhiannon’s smile widens. „I mean, who wouldn’t want to ride a dragon?”

„Do your parents approve?” Dylan asks. „Because my mom’s been begging me to change my mind for months. I keep telling her that I’ll have better chances for advancement as rider, but she wanted me to enter the Healer Quadrant.”

„Mine always knew I wanted this, so they’ve been pretty supportive. Besides, they have my twin to dote on. Raegan’s already living her dream, married and expecting a baby.” Rhiannon glances back at us.

„What about you? Let me guess. With names like Melgren and Sorrengail, I bet you were the first to volunteer this year.”

„Yes, I wanted to come here since I can remember.” I say with a smile. „I’m really excited about this. I mean do you see the dragons? They magnificent.”

„I hear ya girl.” Says Rihannon as we high five. „What about you Violet?”

„I was more like volun-told.”

„Gotcha.”

„And riders do get way better perks than other officers,” Violet says to Dylan as the line moves upward again. The snickering candidate behind me catches up, sweating and red. Look who isn’t snickering now. „Better pay, more leniency with the uniform policy,” she continues. No one gives a shit what riders wear as long as it’s black. The only rules that apply to riders are the ones in the Codex.

„And the right to call yourself a supreme badass,” Rhiannon adds.

„That too,” I agree. „Pretty sure they issue you an ego with your flight leathers.”

„Plus I’ve heard that riders are allowed to marry sooner than the other quadrants,” Dylan adds.

„True. Right after graduation. If we survie.” Says Violet. „I think it has something to do with wanting to continue bloodlines.”

„Or because we tend to die sooner than the other quadrants,” Rhiannon muses.

„I’m not dying,” Dylan says with way more confidence than I feel –  however I practiced for this for my whole life – as he tugs a necklace from under his tunic to reveal a ring dangling from the chain. „She said it would be bad luck to propose before I left, so we’re waiting until graduation.” He kisses the ring and tucks the chain back under his collar. „The next three years are going to be long ones, but they’ll be worth it.”

„You might make it across the Parapet,” the guy behind us sneers. „This one here is a breeze away from the bottom of the ravine.”

I roll my eyes. He doesn’t learn.

„Shut up and focus on yourself,” Rhiannon snaps, her feet clicking against the stone as we climb.

The top comes into sight, the doorway full of muddled light. Those clouds are going to wreak havoc on us, and we have to be on the other side of the Parapet before they do.

Another step, another tap of Rhiannon’s feet.

„Let me see your boots,” Says Violet quietly, probably hoping that the jerk behind me can’t hear her.

Her brows puckers, and confusion fills her brown eyes, but she shows her the shoes. They’re smooth, just like the ones Violet was wearing earlier. My stomach sinks like a rock. I know what she will do.

The line starts moving again, pausing when we’re only a few feet from the opening. „What size are your feet?” She asks.

„What?” Rhiannon blinks at her.

„Your feet. What size are they?”

„Eight,” she answers, two lines forming between her brows.

„I’m seven,” Vi says quickly. „It will hurt like hell, but I want you to take my left boot. Trade with me.”

„I’m sorry?” She looks at her like she has lost her mind.

„These are rider boots. They’ll grip the stone better. Your toes will be scrunched and generally miserable, but at least you’ll have a shot at not falling off if the rain hits.”

„Oh hell, don’t you dare Violet Sorrengail,” I hiss at her. „Just minutes ago I promised your sister that you will survive this damn Parapet, and now you want to throw away your best chance? Absouletly no.

„I give you my left boot. It’s the same size.” I say to Rihannon.

„What? No, that was my idea.” Whispers Violet.

„I know, but I will do it.” I reply. „Now hurry up, we don’t have time. It’s almost our turn.”

Rhiannon purses her lips in debate for a second, then agrees, and we swap left boots. I barely finish lacing up before the line moves again.

The top of the turret is bare, the crenelations of stone rising and falling along the circular structure at the height of my chest and doing nothing to obscure the view. The ravine and its river below suddenly feel very, very far. Every trial in the quadrant – including this one – is designed to test a cadet’s ability to ride. If someone can’t manage to walk the windy length of the slim stone bridge, then they sure as hell can’t keep their balance and fight on the back of a dragon.

And as for the death rate? I guess every other rider thinks the risk is worth the glory – or has the arrogance to think they won’t fall.

I breath deeply as I walk the edge behind Rhiannon, and in front of Violet, my fingers skimming the stonework as we wind our way toward the parapet.

Three riders wait at the entrance, which is nothing more than a gaping hole in the wall of the turret. One with ripped-off sleeves records names as candidates step out onto the treacherous crossing. Another, who’s shaved all his hair with the exception of a strip down the top center, instructs Dylan as he moves into position, patting his chest like the ring hidden there will bring him luck.

The third turns in my direcion and my heart simply…stops.

He’s tall, with windblown black hair and dark brows. The line of his jaw is strong and covered by warm tawny skin and dark stubble, and when he folds his arms across his torso, the  muscles in his chest and arms ripple, moving in a way that makes me swallow. And his eyes… His eyes are the shade of gold-flecked onyx. The contrast is startling, jawdropping even – everything about him is. His features are so harsh that they look carves, and yet they’re astonishingly perfect, like an artist worked a lifetime sculpting him, and at least a year of that was spent on his mouth.

He’s the most esquisite man I’ve ever seeen.

Even the diagonal scar that bisects his left eyebrow and marks the top corner of his cheek only makes him hotter. Flaming hot. Scorching hot. Gets-you-into-trouble-and-you-like-it level of hot. Suddenly, I know that I won’t take Mira’s advice that not to fuck around outside my year group.

„See you girls on the other side!” Dylan says over his shoulder with an excited grin before stepping onto the parapet, his arms spread wide.

„Ready for the next one, Riorson?” the rider with the ripped sleeves says.

Xaden Riorson?

„You ready for this, Sorrengail? I think Melgren is fine, but you seems a little pale.” Rhiannon says moving forward.

The black-haired rider snaps his gaze to mine, turning fully toward me, then he looks onto Violet. That’s when I see it, the rebellion relic. It start at his bare left wrist, then disappears under his black uniform to appear again at his collar, where it stretches and swirls up his neck, stopping at his jawline.

„Oh shit,” I whisper, and his eyes snapped back to mine, as if he can hear me over the howl of wind that rips at my secured braid.

„Sorrengail? Melgren?” He steps toward us, and I look up… and up.

Good gods, I barely reach his collarbone. He’s massive. He has to be more than four inches over six feet tall.

I nod once, while a I make sure that I stand before Violet. To my movement the shining onyx of his eyes transforms to cold, unadulterated hatred. I can almost taste the loathing wafting off him like a bitter cologne.

„Aelin?” Rhiannon asks, moving forward.

„You’re the Generals daughters.” His voice deep and accusatory.

„You’re Fen Riorson’s son,” Violet counters behind me.

Xaden sucks in a deep breath, and the muscle in his jaw flexes once. Twice. „Your mother captured my father, and her father executed him.”

„Your father killed my older brother. Seems like we’re even.”  Oh gods Violet, just shut up please, I beg in my mind.

„Hardly.” His glaring gaze strokes over me like he’s memorizing every detail or looking for any weakness.

I hold his glare, as if winning this staring competition will gain us safe entrance to the quadrant instead of crossing the Parapet behind him. Either way, I’m getting across. I promised to Mira that both of us will be safe on the other side.

His hands clench into fists, and he tenses.

I prepare for the strike, if I have to protect Violet. He might want to throw us off this tower, but I won’t make it easy for him.

„You all right?” Rhiannon asks, her gaze jumping between Xaden and me.

He glances at her. „You’re friends?”

„We met on the stairs,” she says, squaring her shoulders.

He looks down, noting our mismatched boots, and arches a brow. His hands relax. „Interesting.”

Fuck, Violet and her big heart.

„Are you going to kill us?” Asks Violet behind me.

„Shit, Violet just shut up please.” I hiss at Vi. „I don’t think it is a good idea to tempt someone throwing us off, who is bigger and stronger then us. I suppose you just have a death wish with pissing him off.” I facepalmed.

His gaze clashes with mine as the sky opens and rain falls in a deluge, soaking my hair, my leathers, and the stones around us in seconds.

A scream rends the air, and we jerk our attention to the Parapet just in time to see Dylan slip.

Violet gasps behind me.

He catches himself, hooking his arms over the stone bridge as his feet kick beneath him, scrambling for a purchase that isn’t there.

„Pull yourself up, Dylan!” Rhiannon shouts.

„Oh gods!” In the corner of my eyes I see that Violet’s hand flies to cover her mouth. That’s when Dylan loses his grip on the water-slick stone and falls, disappearing from view. The wind and rain steal any sound his body might make in the valley below.

Xaden never takes his eyes from me, watching silently with a look I can’t interpret.

„Why would I waste my energy killing you when the Parapet will do it for me?” A wicked smile curves his lips. „Your turn Melgren.”

Fucking handsome bastard.

[fieldofdaisiies]

Azriel x Reader | The Secrets We Hide

type: angst warning(s): this is a heavy topic, please don’t read if you don’t feel comfortable, talk of child loss, potential second child loss, blood; also for personal reasons this is a topic that matters to me a lot, writing it down was hard but this is also why it is very honest and emotional, so pls be kind with feedback word count: 3.1k words request: i had an idea for an azriel angst. one where the reader gets pregnant but doesn’t tell him, so he only finds out later on? but i feel like the reader had valid reasons as well shdjks@moonlightazriel thank you once again for helping me find a name.

-all rights reserved-

A tear slides down your cheek, tasting salty in your mouth. You meet your empty gaze in the mirror, dead, dull eyes staring back at you. The skin around them, red, puffy, swollen. Your throat feels dry, burning with a scream that moments later silently slips through your dry lips. You feel so empty, so worn out, so robbed of life. 

Your hands tremble when you lift them, the blood on them looked smudged through your teary vision.

A ragged sob rips itself free, the thick red liquid such a stark contrast to your white bathroom.

“Please, Y/N. Please open the door.” Azriel’s voice is so soft yet stern, his knocking loud but gentle. 

Air wheezes in and out of you lungs when you try to calm yourself down. It does not work. Your heart beats in your throat, your lower belly aching so terribly bad, it makes you grind your teeth.

“Y/N!” Azriel’s voice now louder, he pounds against the door. When he casts his glance down to the floor, he can see small droplets of deep red blood. His heart started racing, cold sweat breaking out on the back of his neck, on his back, his palms clammy.

“Open!” he pushes again, pounding harshly, loudly, agony and dread colliding inside of him. Horror takes root in his chest when fear and panic seep into every fiber of his body. “Y/N,” Azriel pants, leaning his forehead against the door. “Please, let me in. I just need to see if you are—“ The door slowly opens, making him tumble slightly, but he catches himself, catches you. The shadowsinger wraps his arms around your trembling figure, your body so cold, so fragile in his hands.

Azriel pulls you to his chest, your shoulders shaking, soft sobs leaving your mouth, your chest heaving against his. He is careful to not put any pressure on your front, only embracing you softly while curling his arms around you. The shadowsinger kisses the top of your head, one hand brushing through your damp strands of hair. They are damp with sweat. That sort of liquid that builds up on your skin when you are in a state of panic and horror. 

“I am so sorry,” you whisper against his chest, voice raspy, breaking at the last syllable. Your body trembles in Azriel arms when a shudder courses through you before let yourself fall against his chest. A sharp pain pierces your lower belly, like a bolt of burning fire, and you release a dreadful scream, pulling backwards. 

Your breathing once again quickens when you glance downwards, to the little bump, barely noticeable, and your blood streaked nightgown, the thick red liquid running down your thighs. 

Azriel grabs your upper arms, shock having widened his eyes. They pierce into yours, but you cannot hold his gaze. Tears build up in your own, toppling over the edges, running down your cheeks where the previous tears have just dried. Your eyes burn, your lips are dry, your nose feeling clogged. Just like your throat where another loud sob rips itself free. 

“Don’t apologise,” Azriel whispers, although his heart shatters into a million of pieces. “Madja is on her way. Everything will be,“ —Azriel swallows thickly, his own throat burning, lashes dampening— “you will see, it will all be fine.” He doesn’t know that. And that uncertainty and horror filling every fiber of his body is worse than anything he has ever felt before.

You are carrying his child, god forbid—were carrying his child— and he has only found out about that minutes ago. All emotions of shock about, this sudden knowledge, have vanished, being erased by the feeling of utter and pure pain about what has happened to you just a moment after you have jerked up from bed, screaming from the bottom of your lungs and putting the cards on the table. Azriel has been shocked first but then everything has become a blur, you getting up, you falling, and suddenly there was blood. So much blood and is has been everywhere, is still everywhere.

Your bedsheets are still stained a deep red when Azriel guides you to the bedroom, holding you tightly by your arms, weak steps carrying you over to the bed. He doesn’t want to pick you up, although it would make it easier for you. But he does not know if it would hurt you even more and so he rather supports you like this, helping you climb on the bed on his side, so you wouldn't lie in your blood. Azriel kisses your brow when he pulls the sheets over your lower half.

He does not care about the blood getting everywhere, he just wants Madja to come and her to take care of you. He wants you to be fine. He does not want to see you hurt, in pain, crying.

You wince when icy hot pain fills your abdomen, your fingers curling towards your palms. “Sshh,” Azriel whispers, his hand brushing up your cold arm, over your shoulder until he places it on your neck and leans in.

Azriel’s brows are on yours, his warm breath caressing your skin, his scent and his presence the only thing that calm you at least a little bit.

Pain splits your heart open, cracking it in half, but you try to hard to focus on your mate, on him being here with you and how he holds you. Sweat has dried on the back of your neck, feeling clammy. So do they insides of your thighs and when you think about it you can already feel the burn in your throat again. A sob leaves you, scratching over the insides of your throat like sandpaper. You cry out, tears, although you have thought there were none left, building up in your eyes, rolling down your cheeks. Your hand curls around Azriel’s wrist, the other holding the bedsheet when you weep.

“Please, calm down. Madja will soon be here,” Azriel says, panic and sadness filling his tone even though he tries so hard to be strong. To be strong for you. For the two of you. You are what matters most to him, his number one priority, and seeing you in so much pain is the worst sort of torture he could have ever witness. A small part of himself believes that he might deserve this for all the bad things he has done, but you…you don’t deserve this. Any of this. You are good and kind and warm and something like this happening to you…how could someone do such a thing?

The shadowsinger curses the Mother and the Cauldron but the thought of mother rips his heart into shreds, leaving open a wound which your loud sob rubs salt into. 

And then thoughts bubble up, getting so loud, so unbearable. Only if he had known. Why did you not tell him? Maybe he would have noticed that something was off and could have acted earlier. He has this selfish thought that he hates himself for, but if he had known he would have had time to be happy about becoming a father. It is selfish but it hurts so much, that he wasn't allowed this happiness, after everything that has happened before.

So before he can stop himself, a tear from him falling onto your skin, he says, “Why?”

Azriel swallows around the lump in his throat, his eyes burning, so he clamps them shut while your own open. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

A breathy weep parts your lips and you give your head a little shake. Regret and sorrow and also hate towards yourself fill every fiber of your body, making icy fire blaze through your veins. 

“I couldn’t tell you. I wanted to wait until it was safe that we would not lose another one. I did not want to—”

“Y/N,” Azriel says softly and brushes his hand over your head.

“I did not want to hurt you again. I did not want you to have hopes again and I ruin it. That I ruin it again.”

“Y/N, you are my priority. And yes, I wanted to be a father, but you come first always. You ruined nothing. This wasn’t your fault,” Azriel says and wipes his thumb over your cheek, the skin under your eyes swollen and red, so are your eye lids.

You meet his gaze through a blurry vision, your lip quavering and finding yourself unable to answer. Because you blame this on yourself. Your belly, your female belly, cannot carry a child.

You are a woman who cannot carry a child and this hurts. You can never make Azriel a father, you can never see his happiness about being a father. First you haven’t been able to conceive for three centuries, you have nearly given up until one day the news came: you were pregnant. Both Azriel and you were euphoric and anticipated the birth of your child until the fatal day where your life and happiness and anticipation were crushed like a beetle you step on. You haven’t tried for a child for a long time after that. Until you started trying again. 

And now…now this was all again for nothing?

Your whole body shakes when you draw in a deep breath. You feel like such a failure. The one thing you have wanted so much, to become a mother, it is all taken away from you again? How do you deserve this? How does Azriel?

You feel his lips on your forehead, his thumb brushing over your skin, soothing and slow. 

“I want you to be safe and happy. This is what matters. And if we can’t have children we—“ “Don’t say that!” you say loudly, panic ringing in your voice. You tilt your head back slightly, needing some distance between you and him, between you and what he has just said. What he has suggested. That you aren’t able to carry children. 

“I am sorry. I didn't mean to say that.” The shadowsinger leans over you, kissing your forehead, his fingers intertwining with yours. 

“But you did,” you bubble and bring your other hand up to wipe over your nose. He has said the one thing that has always been locked away behind iron gates in your brain. This one possible knowledge that you might not be able to carry children. That your body isn’t able to do.

And now that he has spoken them out loud, they hollow through the room, through your mind, stretching out and nearly suffocate you. You suck in sharp breaths of air, chest heaving rapidly when awareness downs on you what he has suggested. Azriel has given up. He has given up his hope. He thinks you aren't able to carry out a child, you have failed him. You cannot be a mother but he…he can be a father. With someone else. You would allow him that. You know he wants to be father more than anything else you would allow him—

You barely feel the hands on your chest, on your cleavage, holding you down. Azriel’s voice seems so far away over the blood rushing in your ears, the rising panic inside of you.

Only when his face is mere inches from yours, you can leave your thoughts and focus back on your mate.

“Please, calm down. I didn’t mean to say it like this. I mean that I will love you no matter what. Please, my love, please calm down. I—“ A knock sounds from the door and when Azriel gets up everything comes crashing in on you. You scream, thrash your hands against the mattress, crying and sobbing loudly.

Madja, let in by Azriel, rushes into the bedroom and before doing anything medical related, cradles your face inn her hands and forces you to look at her. “Look at me, Y/N. Look at me. I am here, we are going to fix this.” This is truly the worst kind of torture for Azriel. He slumps against the wall, shoulders hunched, crying, air wheezing in and out of his own lungs. He regards you, how Madja slowly peels back the sheets, examining your legs and wincing only the slightest bit. And even if it was just a barely-there wince, it hasn’t gone unnoticed by Az. And somehow, somehow he knows what it means. What she will soon tell you...

“For how long has the bleeding been going on?” she asks in a calm voice, gentle and empathetic.

You shake your head, having lost ever sense or space and time. Azriel needs to be strong for you, so he comes up to Madja and you, bracing one hand on the bedside table to steady himself. 

“Since half an hour, maybe an hour I would say,” he informs her, his own voice trembling.

“Hm, I see. Please, may I?”

Madja motions for you to lift your hips and even though it causes you excruciating pain you do as told. She peels the bloody piece of undergarment down your legs and places it on the floor next to her, no sign of disgust on her face. Her eyes fall to you centre, only looking for a moment, sometimes glancing at your belly. She presses her lips in a firm line, wiping her bloody hand over a cloth she has brought and then reaching over to the bag that is standing on the bed next to her. 

“Azriel, be so kind and prepare a cloth and a basin with some luke warm water.”

While Azriel hurries of Madja pulls all the tools she needs out of her bag, placing them on the mattress next to her. She softly brushes her hand over your knee, before helping you spread your legs a little further. “I will soon give you something for the pain, I just have to do some checks first.”

You give your head a nod, biting down on lip when it starts to tremble. “Is the baby alive?”

It is then that Azriel returns and Madja blinks her eyes for a long moment. “No!” you shriek.

No answer is also an answer and so you can assume what her silence means.

Azriel crouches down on the floor, next to the bed and you, his hand moving to yours while Madja leans in, softly inserting a tool. 

“I will see about that now, Y/N,” she says and adds, “but I have to warn you, this will hurt now.”

Nothing will hurt more than hearing the words again: I am so sorry, but...

The one hand holding the cool tool inside of you, the other moving over your belly. You cry out, your heels pressing into the bed when your back arches and your bottom lifts. This pain is even worse than what you have felt before. 

“One more time,” Madja says. “And this will hurt like hell, but I can comfort you, the baby is alive.” It is the only thing you needed to hear, the only thing that matters to you. And now that you have this knowledge, all the pain will be fine, all the pain will be alright. You take it all, accept it all.

Your scream of utter and pure pain fills the room, hollowing of the walls. You still feel it seconds after, still as strong and poignant as before. But slowly, really slowly it starts to vanish. 

“The baby is fine?” Azriel asks like he cannot believe it, damp strands of hair toppling over his forehead, his skin covered in a thin film of sweat. He looks between Madja and you, disheveled, broken but starting to heal.

“Yes, what you felt, Y/N,” —Madja removes the tool from inside you, wiping it and then her hands clean on a new cloth— “was a wing.”

She uses the basin with the warm water and the cloth to clean your core, your thighs and your lower belly, softly and carefully running it over you.

“The baby has wings?” Azriel queries, his eyes going wide. 

“Yes, the baby has wings. And one of them got stuck and when the baby wanted to turn the talon, that has already formed as it is usually one of the first things, has cut into your womb, ripping, rather it open. That is where the bleeding and the pain came from. I pushed the wing back in now, it should hopefully stay there.”

You cannot comprehend anything, relief and happiness over this baby inside you still breathing, still living, still developing, eroding every other thought and emotion. 

“You will need quite some medication that I will bring around later and you are bound to the bed for at least a week or so so this all can heal, Y/N.”

You nod at the healer, squeezing Azriel’s hand. “I know you have a high risk of losing your child, but you have surpassed week fourteen, I am almost positive that you are going to bring this child into this wonderful world.” Letting go of Azriel’s hand, you take hers into yours instead, holding her tightly, crying tears of relief. 

The shadowsinger releases a loud breath and bows his head at Madja. “Thank you," both say in union.

With Madja’s help Azriel has managed to change the sheets, she has left then and returned already few moments later to bring you all the medication needed. And although she was positive this time it would work, you still have to risk which means that you should not do anything that would be too exhausting or too strong. 

Azriel carefully heaves your top half onto his chest, his arm curling around your waist, softly placing his hand on your belly that now no longer hurts so badly. It still hurts, but the soft brushing of Azriel’s fingers over the membrane soothes the pain. He hums when you bury your face in the crook of his neck.

“I am sorry for not telling you.” “I doesn’t matter anymore. You are healthy and safe. And so is the baby. That is what matters to me.”

You kiss the side of his neck, your hand moving over his heart. "I love you and you will be an incredibly father, Azriel.”

“And I love you, Y/N. I will continue to love more and more with every struggle we face and once this child is here you will be the best mother in the entire world.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ tags (crossed-out I couldn't tag) : @juulle987 @marimorena06 @danikasthings @younxii @nightcourtwritings @mrofontaine @lunalilyf @whor-3-crux @tired-all-the-time @anni-was-here @ummmmmwat @azbracadabra @j-pendragonx @hollyismentallyillhelp @famousbasementpainter @bsenpai @lena-davina @red-highlady @thesugatoyourtae @azrielsbabyg @aroseinvelaris @moony-thoughts @wrensical003 @cherryjain17 @moonfawnx @crushedcloudsx @devilsfoodcake22  @valeriedarkness @azrielscertifiedslut @mulansaucey @cynicalpotato95 @hanasakr @high-bi-andreadytocry @eerievixen @feyretopia @moonlightazriel @randomness-it-is @brekkershadowsinger @eliieee23 @girasoli-e-sorrisi @illyrianvalkyriecarynthian @kennedy-brooke @highladyofillyria @theworthlessqueen @marina468 @topaz125 @illyrian-dreamer @azriels-mate123

[lampiridaes]

hihihi

can u do a tsukasa x reader reverse comfort pls?

also can the relationship with between the two be platonic but they both like eachother

tyyy

♬ now playing: "persona"

-> to-do list: comfort your friend! (and perhaps change his title to boyfriend?)

chars. tsukasa

notes. hi chat.... this was ... so long ago... do u hate me.... do u wanna bring back public executions... i tried my best to write hurt/comfort but dawg i suck at it.... i am so sorry anon... mwa mwa.... i labyu... pls forgive me and enjoy this... mwa mwa mwa... also ended up posting this late AAAARGRHGRH

notes (2). also i rlly hope that i got the prompt right ??? i assumed that they were friends however had a crush on each other n stuff... a thousand apologies if that's ALSO WRONG... feel free to send another req if i got this incorrect okay? ^^;

contains. mizu-nights writing kinda fell off here, friends to lovers (implied, no actual confession scene sry), open-ending

taglist. @akitosheart , @mintchocaur , @nenes-numberonefan (i literally forgot i am so sorry)

★ single track: tenma tsukasa

tsukasa tenma is your best friend, and for good reason. he's like the bright sunlight after a rainy day, turning a normal boring, dull mood into a joyful and energetic one.

problem is, he's also a skilled actor. it's what makes people adore him, yet it's also what can push people away when he acts... like this.

tsukasa doesn't allow anyone to truly see him when he's vulnerable. he's gonna be a famous star, as he claims, he can't allow something so 'trivial' in his mind ruin his image and let someone see another side to him. the softer, more fragile side.

however, you saw through his facade. perhaps you picked up on it after being friends with him for so long.

"tsukasa," you called out to him when the others left.

you knew that he doesn't like opening up, even to one person. with other people nearby, it'd feel like... some kind of torture.

"[name]?"

his voice went soft. it's like he knew you weren't exactly... okay with his current attitude.

but that's the part that surprised him. you saw through it. saw through him.

"you can always talk to me. i understand if you don't want to talk about it, but as your friend, i don't want to see you hurt like this."

maybe, just maybe, something sort of... snapped inside him. maybe not snapped, but rather awakened.

for once, tsukasa felt like he could completely rely on someone to be there for him. not just physically, but also emotionally, mentally... all the other aspects in life.

and... perhaps he wouldn't mind having that 'aspect in life' escalate? into more romantic territory?

but first, he needs to open up. to you, his closest friend, and the one dearest to his heart.

[star-girl69]

Hi, I've been thinking about this today, Tsu'tey with a fem reader. dreamwalker where he has to teach the reader the ways of people, and he obviously hates that, he always teases her about how fragile she is and then she starts teasing him back saying the other warriors are better than him, so tsu'tey without realizing it starts trying to impress her every day :)

Sharp Edges

—-

a/n: let’s just pretend that tsu’tey and neytiri were never betrothed pls and thank you! also this is so off ask i’m sorry anon 😭 i hope you all enjoy!!

warnings: mentions of animal death, some sensual touching, mentions of bows and arrows, swearing, mentions of death, tell me if i missed anything!!

—-

The two of you were in an undesirable situation, yes? You had long since made your peace with it, and you knew you could be an adult about it.

Having Tsu’tey teach you the way of the people wasn’t the worst thing to happen, but it certainly had its downfalls.

But, you thought he would be mature about it.

You weren’t expecting sunshine and rainbows, but he was a knife. His edge was curved and jagged, and he seemed to point the tip right at your heart. Seemed intent on destroying you, but really he wanted to destroy the people behind you.

The humans, the Sky People, whatever they were.

He hated them, so as a dreamwalker, he hates you.

Each day, he seems intent on handing you a knife and telling you what to do with it, only to laugh when you fall on it.

“Wrong,” he grunts. It seems to be the only word he can say.

“Wrong how?”

“Your form. Raise your arm,” he says, and you follow, the string of the bow becoming taut as well. “Hm. Could be better. But, it would be a shame if that skinny arm of yours broke, yes?” he lets out a dry laugh, eyes drifting from you to the ground.

“Thank you, Tsu’tey. Everyday, you are so kind.”

His eyes meet yours and he smiles, unkindly, more so a sneer. But, regardless of what he thinks, you’ve grown used to his harshness. You may not have had his training, but your skin is steel to his insults and actions.

He seems a little startled when you don’t respond, always so used to you scowling or storming off. But, today, at least, you weren’t going to let him win.

“Let me demonstrate,” he says, and you pretend like it’s the most fascinating thing in the world.

He shoots the bow easily, makes it look natural. His form was perfect, his aim was perfect, and he turns to you with a cocky look, chin held high.

“I am good, no?”

“I’m not sure,” you feign, watch as his face drops. “What would a weak human like me know of all that?”

“You are funny, Y/N of the Sky People.”

“Besides,” you hum, and you know you’re striking low. Will he really even care what you think of him? But you still want to dig in, feel his flesh give in on your side, even if he feels nothing. “I saw Konve shoot the other day. He is good too, no?”

Tsu’tey scoffs. “Not better than me.”

“Of course,” you hum, but you can see the look in his eyes.

—-

The next morning, you follow the crowd to just outside of Hometree, seeing the crowd gather around something. Someone.

You push your way through the thick crowd, wondering what could possibly have everyone so engrossed?

Then, Tsu’tey sits in front of the crowd, high on his pal’i. He takes the world in one hand and carves it to what he likes. He rules it. Bow held in one hand, the other raised out like he is greeting the world- the universe.

Next to him lies the largest sturmbeest you have ever seen. Your eyes flick from him to the dead animal, until voices start to rise up.

“He hunted it! All alone! Killed it, all alone!”

You gasp and look towards him again, only to find his eyes on you. He smiles, smugly, and you can’t help but roll your eyes, hide your smile. He is not as unaffected as he pretends to be.

—-

“Impressive,” you muse when you see him for your regular lesson.

“What?” he asks, but you can tell from by the way his head tilts, he knows exactly what you’re talking about. He just wants to hear you say it.

“Your kill,” you spit, annoyed that he’s playing you like this.

“Oh, nothing,” he says, standing tall with a smug smile.

“You sure?” you smile, like a hunter caught her prey, picking up a practice bow from where it hangs on the tree.

“Sure of what?” he huffs, weary of what you might say.

“Sure it’s not nothing? No reason why you did it? No special occasion, no… special girl?”

“I know no girls.”

“You know me.”

“You do not count.”

You sigh, with and smile, eyes bright as you turn and get into position, ready for him to berate you.

“Whatever you say, Tsu’tey.”

“Fine,” he mutters, before a slow smile creeps onto his face. You ignore it, thinking he has simply come up with a pleasing insult. Tsu’tey has sharp edges, yes, but you have strong walls.

“W-what are you doing?” you gasp, but he simply holds you in place, hands on your hips.

“Sloppy,” he mutters, lips by your ear. “Again.”

“What?” his chin is just above your shoulder, and if he wanted to, if his hands slipped, he could slide them around to press flat against your stomach, hook his chin over his shoulder.

“Your form,” he says, infuriatingly slow, in a low voice, “was sloppy. Again.”

You barely manage to muster up the strength to ignore his warm, big hands, his breath on your cheek, raising yourself back up into the proper form.

He hums, one of his hands splaying across your hip, your waist, the other coming up to run along your arm. Back to his chest, just millimeters away, so tantalizingly close. You won’t pretend to ignore it- Tsu’tey is attractive. A provider. He would be not only a good mate, but a strong father, a talented hunter.

“Better,” he says, hand wrapping around your own, fingers over yours on the bow. He leans back up to your ear, so close you can feel his breath, hear something in his voice. “Shoot,” he bids.

So, you do, let the arrow fly, let it fall and sink into target. Still off, by a few inches, but close enough to where he lets you go. While the arrow falls, maybe he sees you fall too.

—-

Falling for Tsu’tey is an exhausting thing. You think about him too much, not enough- he overwhelms you.

You try your best to tease him like teases you, but while he gets more bold, hands wandering more, you shrink up. Your insults are barely insults. They hold no fire behind them, no emotion other than your flustering.

You feel stupid and foolish, like a teenager with a crush, and he seems only to enjoy. Tsu’tey seems to only enjoy sinking his sharp edges into your skin.

You barely bite back a sigh, cursing yourself for thinking you could have one nice night. It was a hunt festival- you thought he would give it up. At least for one night.

But, no, he had instead inserted himself into your conversation, pulling everyone’s in the groups attention, all while he would smirk at you occasionally.

He is like the eye of your storm, the bane of your existence.

Finally, you manage to slink away from the conversation, into the corner, waiting for the night to be over. You watch as Tsu’tey arm wrestles with some other warriors, staring at you after he wins.

One night, you think to yourself, could I not be free for one night?

Finally, after the fourth round he wins, you give up. You need air. You need space.

The woods provides the perfect cover, a place to hide and gather your thoughts, slink away for just a moment. Maybe you can even rip your foolish crush out of your chest. But then you might have to rip out your entire heart, and you don’t want to die.

Just as you manage to take a seat on a fallen tree trunk, take one, two, three deep breaths, a twig snaps from behind you.

“Fuck!” you shout, whipping around with no weapon in sight, only to see a worse fate.

He looks amused at your fear, your embarrassment, and anger rises in you.

“You will get hurt out here all by yourself, dreamwalker.”

“Then I get hurt,” you mumble, complacent and bored, turning away from him. He stops in his tracks, the sounds of leaves crunching stopping.

“What do you mean?”

“What do I mean? I mean leave me alone, Tsu’tey. I will be fine. And if not, then why do you care?”

He scoffs, and confusion rises in your chest, but you ignore it. You can’t even see his face right now, too scared everything will all come down, and you’ll let him kill you with his sharp edges.

“I put so much effort into courting you the human way, and all you can do is scorn me?”

You swear your heart stops, hope bubbling in your chest like a volcano, threatening to spill over and burn you. That what it feels like, when you’re with him. Like you’re burning from the inside out.

“What?” you breathe, looking of your shoulder. He has no sharp edges right now. Only softness, like sea glass.

“The humans. This is how they court? The- the teasing?” you can tell the word is odd for him, but in this moment, why would you even care about that? Not when the world is in front of you, when Tsu’tey is telling you he was courting you. “I wanted to impress you, the Na’vi way. But- the humans- I did it their way, too.”

You let yourself sink, let yourself stand and fall into him. You only come a step closer, but his hands fly to your waist like he’s scared you’ll run. Like he has to keep you there. Has to keep you with him. You let him. You like it.

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

He frowns, fingers twitching into your sides. “Is that not what the humans do?”

“I-” you gasp, overwhelmed by everything, by him, by the feeling of air in your lungs. “No,” you choke out. “That’s not- I thought you hated me?”

“I did,” he hums, unbothered by it. “But then… you spoke about Konve, about how he was better and I- I did not like it. I didn’t even realize I wanted you until I realized I wanted to impress you. I- I would like for more, Y/N. I want more of you.”

It’s odd, to hear so many words come out of his mouth at once, especially so heartfelt, but it makes you sing and burn on the inside and feel like the most precious piece of treasure.

“I want more of you too, Tsu’tey,” you breathe.

And you’ve learned that Tsu’tey will have what he wants, so he places his lips on yours, let’s you fall into him, and you let his sharp edges sink into you.

You let him sink into you, and it hurts, it burns, buts it’s good.

—-

[hyunjins-orange-slice-too]

Send this to a stay! Have them describe themselves and see who their followers would “Ship” them with in the group! <3

oh gosh, “ship” me with? i’m curious because i honestly can’t ship myself with any of them. 😅 i am in no way good enough for a ship with them. but this could be a fun way to tell yall more about me. :)

(update after writing: this turned rambley and is probably waaay more than you wanted. im so sorry 😬 also, this is the most i’ve ever said about myself on this app and it’s scary. so be nice to me pls, im fragile)

let’s see.. are we doing physical or personality traits? or both? this is hard! 😭

♡ i’m a shy, quiet person. i’m also very anxious. (diagnosed anxiety/depression, unmedicated {hence my unhinged posts on here sometimes}, i’m working on it. lol)

♡ chronically online (tiktok, tumblr, yt)

♡ i like all kinds of music (favorites are skz, ateez, palaye royale)

♡ i love to watch movies (marvel, ghibli, harry potter, etc. but 80s movies are my favorite) even better if we’re seeing it in theaters with popcorn and candy 😋

♡ i like to read- tho i haven’t done it in awhile apart from this app

♡ i like to write (would love to write a book one day but we’ll see lol)

♡ i would much rather stay inside and watch a movie or a kdrama (currently watching Lovely Runner and it’s wrecking me) as opposed to going out. (the anxiety, yk?)

♡ i like video games even tho i suck

♡ i like cars (mainly drift cars)

♡ i’m an aquarius if that means anything to you, i don’t know much about astrology but i find it fascinating.

♡ i’m an only child with daddy issues (hence the chan bias)

♡ i have a cat

♡ my favorite color is black, or pink, or light blue hehe

♡ i have to have my cow squishmallow named Connor to be able to sleep at night

♡ i like to play D&D with my friends on saturday nights

♡ i’m terrified of severe weather- thunderstorms i can handle, tho i get scared. but tornadoes will send me into a full on panic attack

♡ i was born in ‘95 (i’m gonna be 30 in january and i don’t want to talk about it)

♡ i rely too heavily on comfort audios on yt (aka boyfriend audios- tho i hate that term) is it cringe? yeah kinda, but it makes me happy and it helps me sleep and the asmr tickles my brain good (if you really wanna know, idk why you would, but david from audiogasm is my favorite and pretty much the only one i listen to- hello parasocial relationship)

♡ blonde hair, blue eyes, chubby. 😘

and i can’t think of anything else! which is probably a good thing because i already wrote soo much. anyways, who would you “ship” me with? 😂 (pls say chan or ill cry hehe jk)

[le-roi-soleil]

Also I'd like to talk about this weird_targaryen_relationship and incestual matrimonial traditions.

First what we see in hotd is Viserys and Aemma deeply in love with each other. Let's just n.b. that Aemma Arryn wasn't his sibling (cousin she was). This marriage seems to be working amazing.

Next would be Daemon and Rhaenyra. Daemon is her uncle, so he is older, and as for me most important - they grew up separately. Yea, Rhaenyra knew her uncle since her childhood, but as she claimed in s2, he'd always been a challenge for her: so close yet so distant, a mystery man.

/I'm not gonna talk about Rhae's fascinating marriage with Laenor, thanks/

And here we come to Aegon and Haelaena. Why didn't it work? Mostly because targtower branch of the family surely had never seen true love between their parents. Viserys kept loving Aemma until his death, Alicent being far from That Woman to him. Alicent put her life to the marriage with the King, not the man she had chosen herself, and it surely becomes an issue, separating her from her kids.

Oh, the kids. Aegon understands himself being a father's disappointment in that scene on the training yard with Cole, Strong and the boys. Also remember Viserys truly loves Rhaenyra and her strong boys, and we feel that shit in Aegon's mind: i am not enough for them to love me. Sad but true, babe. And he says this exactly while driving to his coronation: he never wanted me to be the king, no one needs me, do you love me, mum?

You imbecile.

Aemond's case is much worse. Being treated weird by Aegon and their cousins, he had no background at all, because Aegon must have been the most important figure in his life, but bro is just too stupid to understand. And when this little guy loses his eye, his father never protects him, even worse, he is trying to get the subject of the fight from King's position instead. Yet there is no empathy or pity at all (man, your son has just lost a fuckin eye, pls be a parent for someone else except Rhaenyra). So Aemond tries to find protection in his mother's arms. And Vhagar's. That is why his dragon means so much: it's not just a weapon for the Targaryen.

Haelena is always invisible, but she is the only one visibly loved by her momma and even Rhaenyra, which makes her the most empathetic sibling, but unfortunately she also is a prophet, not being understood seriously by brothers. And now imagine some weird situation: you are thirteen, and you are getting married to your sixteen years old brother whom you've grew up with for the entirely all your lifetime.

Must be such a weird feel. Even for the Targaryens this kind of relationship... Well, they are not delusional and they know perfectly that in Westeros this kind of thing is not ok. And now you have to be married, make heirs and be a couple, and you are just 13 yo. Jesus. With Aegon also, spoiled and lack intelligence. Maybe this stuff works when you are crazy in love with eachother, just like Jaime and Cersei are, but for Haelena's marriage, where she and her brother-husband were so distant, the scenario went horrible. And now I understand why Aegon came to her drunk - maybe not just being alcoholic, but trying to blind himself enough for making love with his small sister, trying to create another heir. And probably this worked until Jaehaerys' death, which finally destroyed a fragile balance between them.

[literallyjusttoa]

idk, but i want to here more about apollo x aither no this is not because of the ship tournament okay it is very much about the ship tournament

more food pls

also you are making me unironically ship crack/rare pairs like polldona and i don't know how to feel

Ok this is sooo late but I am always down for more Apollo crack ship stuff so here you go!!!

Primordials cannot be comprehended by mortal beings, but Aither really wants to meet Apollo's kids. Because of this, he's been experimenting with his form in secret so he can surprise Apollo with a mortal friendly look. It hasn't worked yet, but sshhhh he'll get there eventually.

Both Apollo and Aither are made of pure light, and sometimes they just wanna be pure light together. They make little light shows above Olympus whenever they do this, like fireworks. Think the romantic flight from HTTYD but instead of a dragon it's two shooting stars.

Sometimes, Aither will suddenly decide that he misses his boyfriend a Whole Bunch, and just pop up wherever Apollo is, no matter what Apollo is doing.

Aither has this idea that Apollo is kind of fragile, since gods are so much weaker than primordials, and also Apollo is turned mortal so much, and that can't be healthy. Because of this, he insists that Apollo needs to regularly go to the doctor and get his energy checked out and all that self-care stuff. When Apollo tells Aither that he's actually banned from visiting the only godly doctor (Asclepius) Aither says nuh-uh and just brings Asclepius to them. Tearful reunions ensue and also Apollo finally visits a doctor.

+ here's a messy little doodle I made of the two of them.

[boabelboo]

Dear Reader, I implore you to take a moment to reflect on my words. Your compassion and support could be the lifeline that saves my family from despair. 💔🇵🇸🍉 My name is Muhammad Musa, and I am a 26-year-old father living in Gaza. I find myself in an unimaginable situation, having endured the horrors of war. My wife and I welcomed our first child into this world amidst chaos, a moment I had long awaited but which turned into a struggle for survival. 😢 For the past 10 months, we have faced relentless adversity. We have been uprooted from our home more times than I can count, fleeing without adequate transportation. With only a few belongings and the bare essentials, we sought refuge wherever we could find it. I had to make the heart-wrenching decision to have my wife give birth in a shelter, without the basic necessities—no diapers, no milk, just hope and determination. 💔 Now, with our home destroyed and our dreams shattered, I am reaching out for your help. I have created a donation account to secure a better future for my wife and our newborn son. Your contribution, even a small amount of $20, can make a significant difference in our lives. It can provide us with the means to escape the dire conditions in Gaza and protect my son from the epidemics and diseases that threaten his fragile existence. Every dollar counts, and your generosity can be the beacon of hope that leads us to safety. Please consider donating to our cause; your kindness could save my family from the brink of despair. Thank you for taking the time to read my story. Together, we can make a difference. With heartfelt gratitude, Muhammad Musa [Donation Link: https://gofund.me/25affbbb] 🇵🇸🍉 https://www.tumblr.com/dlxxv-vetted-donations/758752953204113408/this-campaign-is-vetted-by-association-through?source=share It might help if you shared it.

ofc ^^

pls do anything u can to boost their campaign! reblog/donate!!

[grubloved]

birde have you made focaccia. it eludes me. I am struggling how will I feed my italian husband

i have and i will!!!!! and here are two really good recipes for him. one is frm my fav baker peter reinhart and is more compliated; the other is from king arthur and is much simpler and very solid. one of these will guide your arrow straight. pls also remember that focaccia is a high hydration dough -- high water-to-flour ratio -- and therefore is FRAGILE and EASILY BRUISED post rise. be kind to her do not PUNCH. be gentle!!!!!!! make sure your yeast isnt out of date also this is a reason for many failures and weeping

here is the peter reinhart:

here is the king arthur:

[drowninginredink]

WIP List

I always like it when people talk about their WIPs. I live for that. So it's my turn. But I am a one-shot writer at heart with way, way too many ideas, so here is a list of everything I'm toying with. For the record, some of these don't even have a single word written yet, and none are that far along, so don't get your hopes up too high.

Smosh One-Shots

"Feelings are so fragile" — Platonic Shaymien thing where I project really hard onto Damien. (Yes it's for the aro collection)

"Most euphoric I've ever been" — A spetney fic based the fact that yes, they're technically a m/f couple... But like, no. Put them together, you've got nonbinary lesbian vibes. Sorry Spencer, you're getting your gender transed because there's no way you and Courtney are straight.

"But what's a home?" — A Damian QPR fic. Damien/Ian is already such an interesting rarepair and then you make it a QPR and it's like... They end up living together just temporarily because Damien's housing falls through and turns out they both really miss when they used to be living with their best friends and look I know everyone likes romance but do you know how good QPR fics can be? I love the idea of them as a QPR so much?

A thing for @aro-soulmates-fest about Anthony getting all his tattoos to hide the fact that he doesn't have a soulmate one.

A murderverse one shot about Arasha because God I fucking love gang AU!Arasha

A vampire!Spencer fic where Shayne plays the role of Johnathan Harker

"And I lie like the right thing to do" — me taking @generaltrashshecox 's whole "Anthony sleeping with Damien to cope with unrequited feelings for Ian thing that I love so much and just doing my own version of it where I lean into the angst so hard. With permission from bun, don't worry

A (platonic) nintendogs fic where I decide to do a little bit of own voices stuff on the fact that The Chosen is suuuuuuuuper schizo-coded

I bought a new ray and it's time to use it. Let's make Ian aplatonic this time.

"Then it's done." Killing off Spencer. Very one-sided Spommy.

A lil smut based on Anthony asking Tommy to choke him.

Hey @generaltrashshecox infected me again and now aro4aro Antmien needs to exist

This post into a real fic

Smosh not a one shot but also kind of a one shot?

14. "Once in twenty lifetimes" — A no smosh AU that's going to go through all the different ways Ian and Anthony could have ended, choose-your-own-adventure style. And as the title suggests, only one of them is the reunion. Most are things falling apart. And also to fit the title, it's going to be in twenty chapters (although that does not mean 20 endings. I don't hate myself.). So it's multichapter, but also it'll all be posted at once so it'll basically be a one-shot. It's going to end up as kind of an epic and God I hope it turns out as good as it is in my head. Inspiration for the good endings is "Cardigan" by Taylor Swift, and for the bad endings and a lot along the way is "San Cristobal" by Mal Blum.

15. Partners (in crime) — my Changela QPR fic that was supposed to be a one-shot right up until I wrote the thing, and actually wrote a chapter one. Not sure how long that's going to be, but I like it so far.

Smosh Multichapter

(The fact that my very one-shot oriented self has multiple of these is such a problem)

16. "Puppy Love" — I don't need to say anything about this. There are already 5 chapters on AO3. Either it's extremely your shit or you're wondering what the hell I'm doing and why I'm writing this extremely specific concept. If you're wondering why I still haven't posted chapter 6, it's because that has sex in it and I fucking hate writing sex scenes so I'm procrastinating really hard.

17. "I'll use you as a warning sign" (aka the evil fic, so named because chu-tea thinks I'm evil for coming up with the plot) — yeah so what I planned for PL was just a straightforward kind of fluffy ianthony piece. And then a certain friend of mine (*cough* chu *cough*) accidentally inspired me to think of a different ending that is such hardcore angst and hurt that I absolutely needed to make it happen and have been obsessed. It's interesting when you've already made the bad decision to start a long project and then oops, now you just really want the next 6 chapters to be done already so you can write the alternate ending. This one will *really* not be everyone's shit because I will rip your heart out in 6 different ways. But God I'm obsessed. Anyway, if you want details... I'll just say "major character death" and leave it at that. Oh and rarepair.

18. "I've come back changed and I can feel it in my bones" — an AU where "what if Anthony left because he got psychosis." Basically very hardcore projection on my part. This is on the back burner for a while because obviously when I have projects that aren't going to be emotionally gutting to write, I'd much rather work on them.

Non Smosh Stuff

(I'll be honest, I'm so deep in the smosh obsession that you should not get too excited about any of these. I know myself, so I know the smosh flame will eventually burn out but these are based on things I will be obsessed with until I die. So I know they'll happen. But not for a long time)

19. A Phantom of the Opera one-shot for @aro-soulmates-fest. This is the one thing I will actually write within a reasonable amount of time, because it's due March 17.

20. "Baby, please don't bore me" — A Series of Unfortunate Events — Sunny (well, Sorrel in this version because oops I transed their gender) teams up with Olaf to find their siblings after years of separation. I find them to be a very interesting chaotic, morally gray, bantery duo.

21. "Because the same night awaits us all" — ASOUE — A Klaus/Lemony fic that I swear I will write someday. Very morally gray, very much a codependent relationship, very leaning into the age gap. Basically they're together because they do not have anyone else in the world. It's just so delicious a dynamic that I will explore I swear.

22. ASOUE — I'm still not entirely convinced I'll ever be bothered to actually write this one, but I might do a Kit/Fernald FWB thing. I'm not sure where on earth the idea of that came from, but it's been living in my head for a long time now. Long enough that there's an early one-shot version of it that I don't really like anymore on *gasp* fanfiction.net

If anyone actually bothered to read all the way to the end of this long-ass post, you deserve a medal.