#reluctant bride

[imagine-darksiders]

Eden's Heir - Chapter 1

Worm-holes.

Strife x Reader. War x Reader Summary: A wedding day is supposed to be the most magical day of any bride's life. But even a on a perfect day, accidents can occur. Time and space can tear themselves open, at just the right moment, to send you spinning into a world of giants and demons and angels who struggle to believe that you're a human, because humans are not like you. Of course they're not - you're 40,000 years removed from them, sucked into a faulty worm-hole and spat out in the past, on another plane of existence. The Universe, after all, was never created to be free of imperfections, and not even a Creator is without flaws.

---

The lone, black taxi trundles lazily to a stop just outside the church gates, the purr of its engine rolling across a quiet graveyard and disturbing one, solitary crow from its perch atop a crumbling headstone.

Poised awkwardly inside the cab, stuffed in alongside an excessive amount of taffeta silk and lace, you gaze through the window, watching the crow flap into the air and soar away from the churchyard with enviable ease.

If only it were that simple for you.

“Here we are then, Miss! Ope, soon to be Missus,” the cab driver announces, twisting his mirror down to catch your eye in the rear-view, “Couldn't've asked for better weather, eh? When I married my old lady, it was piddlin' down.”

You can't deny he's right about the weather. Your fiancee, Cain, had chosen this Saturday in early September, and the cloudless sky that hangs above the pretty, sandstone church seems to bathe the whole world in warm, comforting azure.

There's no wind either - a stroke of luck that will no doubt please your soon-to-be mother-in-law if she insists on wearing that wide-brimmed, ostentatious hat atop her perm.

“I'm sure it was lovely, regardless,” you reply absently, straining to reach over layer upon layer of ruffled train to reach the little window divider and slide a fifty through the slot, “Here. Keep the change.”

The cabbie swivels about in his seat, taking the proffered note and giving it a quick once-over before he lets out a long, slow whistle. “You sure, Miss? Meter only says thirty five!”

Leaning back in your seat, you turn to face the outer window again, peering through the glass at the uneven, cobblestone path that will inevitably lead you to your groom.

Painted lips tug up into a rueful smile and you tell the driver, “Trust me, I'd rather give you a fifty than spend five hundred hiring a Fiat from some guy who slapped a white bow on the bonnet and called it a wedding car.”

At that, the cabbie throws his head back and lets out a loud bark of laughter, exclaiming “Economical! Your fella's a lucky man!”

You bite back the instinctive urge to impress upon him that you're the lucky one, really.

“Go get 'im then, love!” he exclaims, casting a final glance at you over his shoulder, “And try not to look so nervous, yeah? This is the most magical day of your life!”

Perfectly manicured fingers slide around the door handle and you pause just long enough to toss the driver a tenuous grin before pushing open the door and letting the excessive train of your wedding dress all but explode out of the confined space you've bundled it into.

You have to brace both hands on the open doorway in order to haul yourself out onto the pavement, grunting in a decidedly unladylike manner from the effort. But once you're out, the poise returns, you step away from the taxi and begin languidly rearranging your wedding dress, feeling in no particular hurry to begin your march. White silk sparkles in the bright autumn sunlight and a full length skirt cascades down to the floor in a waterfall of layers and embroidered tulle. It's quite beautiful - as well it ought to be with your own mother at the helm, dressing you up in the sort of extravagance you wouldn't have even glanced at if not for her.

But, she'd offered to pay the dress's rental fee and... well... it is a Westwood....

Cain will no doubt be impeccably dressed, as always, standing at the alter beside the best man in his tailored, black suit, sending a winning smile out at the throng of guests who have crammed themselves inside the church. You imagine there'll be an eclectic myriad of people attending, from his extensive family and friends to a handful of your own relatives, and four bridesmaids, all hand-picked, of course, by the Maid of Honour – Cain's sister.

They're all lovely girls, from what you could tell in the little time you've actually spent with them.

Your new sister-in-law is.... wilful. But she was good enough to appoint herself your Maid of Honour, ultimately saving you the trouble of having to choose one yourself, so you should really be grateful. She'd also been so kind as to pick out the flower arrangements for you, and you'll admit, during the rehearsal, the church's interior had looked absolutely stunning with black dahlias and vibrant, yellow carnations winding around the pillars and pews with loose petals scattered across the glistening, marble aisle.

Behind you, the taxi revs its engine and sputters away, leaving you to stand by yourself at the gates, twisting your engagement ring around and around on your finger, casting little flecks of light across the ground when the sun shine through the sizeable diamond sitting inside the band.

You take a moment to lament the absence of your father, but the hospital staff had made it quite clear that if he were to remove his IV lines and pumps to walk you down the aisle so soon after a stroke, he might not live long enough to see the vows. Your father had been willing to risk it. You, however, were not. Oh, certainly, it would have been lovely to have him hand you over to Cain, if only so you don't have to enter that church alone. You can live without that particular tradition, while your father might very well lose his life carrying it out, the stubborn old bastard.

Clenching your jaw, you draw in a lungful of fresh air, hoping against hope that it might be enough to clear away the heavy clouds fogging up your brain.

Your father's illness aside, everything is so, so close to perfect. Any bride would call it a win. Any bride would be lucky to have a wedding day like the one you're about to have, and any bride would be over the moon to marry a man like Cain Cox -Valedictorian, entrepreneur, home-owner and eventual heir to his father's lucrative business.

You're lucky.

You should feel lucky...

… Frankly though, you'd probably feel luckier if a pigeon flew by and dumped all over your nice, shiny wedding dress.

You're the only thing about this wedding that isn't perfect.

You're the freckle marring the day's otherwise spotless complexion.

You're the feckless idiot who can hardly stomach the idea of walking down that detestable aisle to say 'I do,' to your own fiancée.

But it's too late to back out now. So, with your heart pounding against your ribcage like a prisoner beating the bars of their cell, you begin to wobble your way up the uneven, graveyard path on your dainty heels, reaching up to flick your veil down over your face.

Perhaps you can muster a smile before you reach the alter.

Your fingers twist apprehensively around the strap of a silver bag that you plan on leaving somewhere near the entrance to retrieve later. Every step that brings you closer to the church feels like walking towards the precipice of a bottomless pit, which you're fairly sure isn't a feeling that brides are supposed to have on their Big Day.

Halfway up the path, you catch movement ahead in the large, wooden doorway.

One of the ushers has been watching for you, and he's just just dashed inside, no doubt signalling your imminent arrival.

Sure enough, seconds later, the air is suddenly filled with the melodic, easily-recognisable Wedding March, blasted from a pipe organ sitting high above the narthex inside.

Each resounding chord boxes at your eardrums and you wince as they seem to quiver in your head, leaving you digging your nails into the palms of your hands to refrain from trying to cover your ears.

The church looms over you, casting its great, unassailable shadow across your face, you hear a hush sweep over everything just as you reach the entrance, and then... without missing a step, you simply turn to the left and veer off the well-worn path, your heels sinking into the grass as you retreat past stain-glass windows and disappear underneath the darkness of the bell tower.

'Well, that was unexpected of me,' you muse blankly, tucking yourself in between two pilasters at the rear of the church and slumping down the stone wall until your backside hits the dirt, wide eyes glistening as you stare out across the graveyard beyond. One hand comes up to clamp over your mouth, stifling the rapid, uneven breaths that leave you in gushing bursts. Your other hand, in the meantime, you set on the grass at your side, fingers burrowing aimlessly into the grass and muddying up your perfectly manicured nails.

'Just need some air,' you tell yourself firmly, 'It's pre-wedding jitters... That's all.'

'Jitters...' another part of you scoffs contemptuously. There's cold feet, and then there's the icy crawl of dread that bites at your spine and leaves you feeling vulnerable and frightened and paralysed where you sit, not quite at the stage where you're bursting into tears, but there's a definite sting behind your eyelids that makes you glad you'd elected to wear false lashes over your waterproof mascara.

“God,” you sigh raspingly, peeling your hand away from your mouth and letting your skull thud backwards against the stone behind you, “What the Hell am I doing...?”

You seem to have been asking yourself that same question more and more of late.

Cain is waiting faithfully inside, probably wondering where on Earth you are by now, along with the rest of the wedding party.

Already, you can hear the awkward crunch and slide of heels on gravel.

“Where the HELL are you!?”

Ah. There's his sister, Delilah, likely furious with you for disrupting her brother's big day.

You suppose you deserve her wrath. But right now, you aren't sure you're brave enough to face it.

And isn't that the plain and simple truth?

You're a coward.

You were too cowardly to tell Cain you didn't like him as anything more than a family friend who could only boast that title because his father was an old buddy of your own. You were too cowardly to cause a fuss when he invited you to his mother's sixtieth birthday party and thought it would be a good idea to propose to you as a gift to her, in front of his entire family.

Even now, you can still remember how you told yourself, 'I'll say yes now, and avoid an upset. But later, I'll take him aside and tell him the truth.'

Of course, by the time you'd mustered up enough courage to mention your... reservations, you got a call from your mother.

She'd just heard the news from Delilah.

She sounded so... so happy on the end of your phone. She'd even cried, you seem to recall.

“I've been worried to death about who'll look after you when your father and I are gone,” she'd gushed, unwittingly plunging a white-hot blade into your stomach and giving it a vicious twist. Later, you'd realise that knife had opened you up for panic to get in like a parasite.

“I'm so happy,” she'd added, “Cain is such a good man!”

You heard it often. That seemed to be the general consensus, and the more you heard, the more you found yourself wondering what any of it had to do with him being a good man.

'He works so hard.'

'He has fantastic prospects.'

'He's got money, with a view to come into even more when his parents eventually pass away.'

'He's the perfect match for you!'

… So why couldn't you fall in love with him?

You'd given it the old college try, of course, to appease your family and your peers. And besides, 'sometimes these things take time!'

Well, you'd given it time. You sucked up your reservations, you swallowed down the bile that rose into your throat whenever he kissed you sloppily after a night of drinking whisky with his boys, and you dealt.

The situation only proceeded to get a whole lot worse.

You can't remember who the first person was to mention the pitter-patter of tiny feet, but you know you hate them. So very much because not long afterwards, Cain started talking babies. You hadn't even married the man and he would stroke your belly whilst you lay with your back to him in bed, whispering about how many you were going to give him.

That, at least, you had the guts to shoot down.

“Bit early to start talking kids when I don't even think I want to have any.”

There had been an eerie silence following your reply, hanging over the bedroom like a suffocating cloak of unease.

You couldn't see his face with your back to him, but after a while, you felt his warm breath slide over the shell of your ear and he'd chuckled boyishly, crooning, “Whatever you say, darling.”

You'd hoped your refusal would be a deal-breaker for him. You kept up with it, repeating over and over to anyone who'd listen that you don't want children, always in the hopes that Cain might be the one who calls off the whole marriage and save you the trouble.

The wedding was already looming by the time it really hit you.

He wasn't backing out.

You started to get overwhelmed. You could see a dark, dizzying spiral coiling downwards right in front of your eyes and you were too anxious to do anything about it. You started thinking that while you might not have loved Cain at first, you could grow to love him through even more time and effort. He's a good man, after all, and you'd be an idiot to throw away the security and safety that marriage brings.

Looking back now, while you listen to the crunching footsteps round the side of the church in your direction, you can't be sure you ever really thought it would get this far.

Well. It did, evidently. So, more fool you.

The sight of the church, the sound of the organ drifting out through a heavy, wooden door... it's as if it's only just occurred to you that this is going to happen, and instead of nervous excitement that most brides attest to, your stomach is as cold and barren as an icy tundra.

Oh, you imagine you'll inevitably still go through with this whole debacle. Aloud, you can chalk it up to pre-wedding jitters, you'll get married, and then you'll focus on falling in love with him. There are too many people in that grand, open room to let down if you get cold feet now.

And his family really have sunk a lot of money into this thing.

All that wasted cash doesn't sit right with you at all.

The first tear finally escapes the confines of your eyelid and blazes a trail through the powder on your face.

Resignation, at last, begins to sink in.

This is happening.

“Y/N!” Delilah hollers, so close now that you're certain at any moment you'll catch a strong whiff of that Dolce perfume she seems to favour.

All you need is five minutes to yourself. Just to regain your composure, to get your head back on straight.

To breathe.

But then, this is your fault anyway, isn't it. You should have said something when you had the chance.

Now, you're going to have to lay in a bed of your own making.

And cope.

With a noisy sniffle, you swipe a finger under your eye and flick away a tear before you gather your feet underneath you and heave yourself up onto unsteady legs. All around you, the dress tumbles down in intricate folds and rustles audibly as you take a faltering step forwards, ready to face Delilah's ire and subject yourself to the scrutiny of hundreds.

But in taking that first, tentative step, you suddenly encounter an unforeseen problem.

Your silver heel doesn't even hit the ground.

“Wha-!” is all you manage to blurt before your shout of alarm is cut off and your foot simply disappears through the grass, and never once makes purchase on anything solid beneath it.

It's as though you've stepped off a bridge into thin air. You suddenly find yourself in a disorienting free-fall straight down through the earth that you're certain had been perfectly corporeal only seconds ago.

Nothing about the ground itself has changed. It still looks solid, from the brief glimpse you manage to catch of it as you descend. Instant terror steals the air from your lungs and you desperately throw your arms out to try and catch yourself on an edge of some kind.

It's decidedly odd being able to see a solid object right in front of you, and yet being utterly incapable of placing your hands upon it. Nothing ceases your rapid descent into the very fabric of the Earth.

You choke on a shriek, clamping your eyes shut instinctively when the ground rises up to meet your head...

There's a loud whoosh that sucks your eardrums inside out.... and you pass right on through an invisible worm-hole, into a world of darkness and rushing wind.

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

There are those who believe wholeheartedly that nothing happens by accident. Every choice and outcome is predetermined by some great, omniscient being or higher power. The Universe, according to some, does not make mistakes.

Those people, sadly, would be wrong.

Sometimes, accidents do happen, even on a cosmic scale, even to space-time itself. Sometimes, there are pockets of magic on Earth that have remained hidden from humanity for thousands of years, portals placed in random locations by a species so ancient that their name has long been lost to history. Sometimes those portals, much like human electricity, can experience an extreme fluctuation, or a power surge.

The Universe, after all, was never created to be free of imperfections, and not even a Creator is without flaws...

---------

The Void....?

'Damn. Why the Hell would Samael whisk us off to such a gloomy in-between?'

The great magic of the demon Prince's portal fizzles and dies out as it closes behind a pair of titanic figures, leaving them stranded and seemingly alone on a vast, floating rock that hangs over a bottomless abyss.

The slightly smaller of the figures straightens up from his hunched position, still caught a little off balance after taking an impromptu trip through the fabrics of time and space.

Strife, one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, cranes his helm back to gaze up towards the foreign 'sky,' or lack thereof.

It's all mist, as far as his sharp eyes can see... Just mist and floating rocks that stretch on endlessly into a wide, open nothingness.

“Welcome to the Void,” he drawls sardonically, turning about to check on the youngest yet ironically the largest of his four siblings, and the only one who has accompanied him to this lonely place.

War, an armoured behemoth even by Nephilim standards, is already on his feet with his favoured, blood-red hood pulled low to cast half of his pale face in shadow. Though even that extra effort isn't quite enough to hide the thin, blazing brand that stretches in an arch across his forehead, glowing with a soft light as if there's a layer of searing lava flowing just beneath the surface of his skin in lieu of blood.

If he hadn't already seen War bleed during battle, Strife would probably believe that his brother's insides consist of nothing but the liquid fires of a planet's core.

The Red Rider casts his narrow glare around the plateau they've found themselves stranded upon, and Strife has no doubt that he's scouring their immediate surroundings in search of an ambush, but when he finds nothing waiting to leap out at them from the shadows, his absurdly immense shoulders slowly drain of their tension and his hand twitches away from the grip of the broadsword strapped to his back. Chaoseater's bloodlust will have to be sated another day.

“Samael must have sent us here for a reason,” War announces, his booming voice ricocheting between the islands of stone and echoing back at them several times over.

Strife makes a mental note to yell into the Void later to test that echo, but for now, finding out why they're here takes priority.

Although to be frank, he's not exactly sure how eager he is to meet an associate of Samael's.

“C'mon,” he sighs, resigned, “Let's go find Sammy's pal and see what's what.”

Without another word, which is surprisingly rare in the older rider's case, Strife leads the way across their rocky platform. There doesn't appear to be any clear-cut path around the Void, and though the realm is bathed in a mystifying, if dim teal light, neither Horseman can determine its source when they surreptitiously throw their gazes about, both curious about their unfathomable surroundings, yet neither willing to admit to the fact.

Together, in silence, the brothers make their way along the most obvious 'path,' listening to their heavy footfalls bounce around between the suspended debris until they come upon a short, curved staircase.

Once they ascend to the top and emerge onto another flat, open plateau, Strife abruptly draws to a halt and lets out an obnoxious groan as War clomps up beside him and quirks a slender, white brow down at his fellow Nephilim.

Ahead of them, in the middle of the island, is a wide, circular dais, and at its centre sits a pool filled with some kind of viscous liquid that throws out a brilliant, cerulean glow. Carved into the stone around the pool's edge are foreign symbols, each emanating the same hue, neither Demonic nor Angelic in origin, nor are they reminiscent of the language pertaining to the Old ones.

Strife huffs beneath his silver helm. Death, the eldest of the Four Horsemen, would probably be able to read them... the brainy bastard...

Aloud, he throws his head back and gripes, “Ugh! Serpent Holes... I should've known.” He stomps closer to the humming pool and eyes its placid and shimmering surface distastefully, planting both of his gauntlets squarely on his hips.

“You are familiar with these?” War asks, stepping up next to his brother and sliding his eyes over to the trio of statues that encircle the pool, each depicting massive snakes coiled into a striking pose.

Sighing roughly, Strife drops his chin and grumbles, “Unfortunately, yeah. They belong to a... a guy I've heard of.”

“Samael's associate?” War guesses.

The other Horseman nods in reply. “If so, it sure would explain a few things...”

War's brows draw into an impervious line across his forehead and he gives his brother a serious look, lowering his voice to ask, “Can he be trusted?”

Strife's short bark of laughter leaps out of him before he can swallow it down, earning himself a withering glare from War. The older rider knows exactly why he's asking, but to question whether this guy can be trusted is like questioning if an angel can be funny.

The answer, categorically...?

“Uh no,” he chuckles, clearing his throat, “Absolutely not. In no way possible.”

Rankled from being laughed at, War nonetheless gives a resolute hum of understanding.

“But,” Strife adds as he swivels his helm around pointedly, “I don't see another way out of here. So, what're we waiting for?” With one, gauntleted hand, he gestures to the mill-pond in front of them. “Let's hop in.”

Dubious, War squints down at the puddle, his scowl somehow growing even deeper than its usual profundity as he asks, “Is it our only option?”

Shrugging one of his armoured shoulders, Strife replies, “We could just wait right here...” A pause, and then, “... forever.”

The larger Nephilim's lips purse and he seems to come to a decision rather quickly. Moving aside, War gestures down at the pool with a dismissive flick of his prosthetic wrist. “After you.”

“Such a gentleman,” Strife mutters under his breath, moving closer to the Serpent Hole and sparing it a quick once-over.

These things are a means of travel he's never made use of before. There are supposedly countless portals just like this one, spread across every corner of every world, like an insect hive with millions of entrances and exits, all converging in this one, shrouded realm.

The smooth and glassy surface looks stable at least, so it seems safe enough, or as safe as any portal leading to an undisclosed location can be.

But then... when has Strife ever concerned himself with safety?

Stepping confidently onto the dais, his golden eyes slip shut as that familiar, disorienting sensation sweeps his legs out from underneath him and an ancient magic pulls him down through the rippling surface and into the conduit's 'throat,' sensing War's presence close behind him.

At an impossible speed, the Horsemen's atoms are flung through the fabrics of space, hurtling them on towards the connecting portal.

Between one breath and the next, Strife's ears suddenly catch a strange, faraway noise, a high-pitched ringing that seems to grow from ignorable to downright earsplitting in a single blink.

'What the....?'

Solid ground materialises beneath the Horseman's boots and he's just about to peel his eyes open and search for the source of the noise when all of a sudden, something small and squidgy crashes into his torso and sends him staggering backwards off the Serpent Hole, tripping over the lip of the well and sprawling onto his backside with a shout and an almighty clamour of metal striking stone.

… At least the ringing has stopped.

The first explanation that springs to mind is that he's being attacked.

There's a weight tangled up against his chest and the tickle of hair or perhaps fur brushing the underside of his chin.

With lightening speed, Strife snaps a hand down and wrenches Mercy - one of his infamous pistols - from its holster, his blazing eyes enraged, and his lips curled into a snarl, ready to tear his unexpected assailant to pieces for daring to knock him on his ass.

The Horseman cranes his neck down at an awkward angle to look this coward in the face so he can give them his own, personal farewell.... only to freeze in his tracks, his eyes growing round and wide.

The snarl is wiped off his mouth as swiftly as it had appeared.

There's a... a person in his lap, clothed from head to toe in immaculate, white garb. Their hands – and, Creator, those are some tiny hands – are splayed out across his armoured chest plate, each finger tipped by an unnaturally pink nail. There's some kind of sheer, lacy veil poised daintily on top of their head, flipped back to cascade down the length of their spine.

Stunned into rare silence, Strife can only gawk as the person weakly pushes themselves up, using his chest as a prop and groaning in apparent pain.

A face rises from his dusty, old cowl, turning upwards, and all at once, the breath catches inside his throat when two eyes - each framed by thick, ebony lashes - flutter delicately open and lock onto his like a magnet to metal.

----------

Somebody must have hit you with their car. That's the only explanation your poor, frazzled brain can come up with when all motion ceases in a flash of brilliant, white light, and a jarring thud knocks the wind right out of you and causes your teeth to clatter around inside your skull.

After peeling your eyelids apart, it takes you a few, dizzying seconds to make sense of what you're looking at.

Everything is still spinning, the whole world is little more than a blur of greys and blacks until finally, you give a hard blink and focus on two pinpricks of golden light hanging side by side within a beclouded, silver blob.

With immense effort, your brain chugs into gear and you squint, face screwed up in exasperated confusion. Beneath your hands, you gradually become aware of a warm, solid surface moving steadily up and down.

Unfortunately for you, you're given no more time to try and decipher just what it is you're laying upon.

Without warning, something hard and unforgiving grabs a fistful of your dress's neckline from behind and your ensuing yelp is strangled out of you as you're torn away from the golden lights and hurled through the air. A split second of gut-churning free-fall occurs before you hit solid ground again with a hard 'whumph!' rolling several times over across an uneven surface and getting thoroughly tangled up in your skirts until you finally skid to a somewhat painful stop on your spine, eyes screwed shut.

You dimly make a note to get the plates of the god damn semi-truck that must have just ploughed into you... as soon as you can see straight, that is.

“Brother! Are you injured!?” a voice booms out, too loud for your pounding head to cope with.

It takes considerable effort just to roll your neck over until your cheek is pressed against the wonderfully cool stone underneath you.

Heaving out a weary groan, you pry your eyelids apart and squint through the strange, dull light to see a pair of... figures, you suppose, standing several yards away from you, slowly coming into focus. Blinking, you attempt to raise your head to get a better look at them, your neck straining from the effort.

One of the figures is leaning down and hauling a slightly smaller one onto their feet, only to have their efforts rewarded by being shoo-ed away by the latter, who huffs, “M'fine, War. Relax. She just caught me off guard.”

A beat of silence follows, and then... “She?”

The pair of them turn in your direction, and as they do, you promptly feel the blood in your veins run thick with cold.

Eyes. Those golden pinpricks of light you'd been staring into mere moments ago had been eyes.

The pain in your neck dissipates as your brain catches up with the situation and a neural pathway clears to make room for alarm and mounting horror.

What... happened? Who are these people?

...

… You need to get up...

Gritting your teeth so hard that your jaw begins to ache, you roll yourself over onto your front and push against the ground, bullying your battered body up onto trembling hands and knees as the familiar weight of your shoulder bag slides down your ribs and lands on the ground with a 'clink.' Thunderous footsteps shake the tiny stones beneath you, and, still in the throes of a daze, you watch them skitter about, wondering how large the approaching figure could possibly be that he might cause the Earth itself to quiver.

Stinging pain on your arms briefly draws your focus to a crosshatch of scrapes and grazes that litter the skin from wrist to elbow, though you don't have long to inspect them before that same, rough hand is snatching you up by the collar of your dress once more, this time tearing a yelp from your lips as the ground falls away and you're hoisted into the air, your shoes dangling several, alarming feet off the ground.

It abruptly occurs to you that you might be lobbed again, so, with unparalleled haste, you throw your arms out and tear your eyes off your wedding shoes, raising your head and blurting, “Wait! Wait, don't, ple-...!”

Whatever plea you'd intended to make is forgotten in the blink of an eye.

It is immensely disconcerting to find yourself hanging clear off the ground and still having to look up into the fierce, arctic eyes of a bonafide giant.

A crimson hood cloaks half of the strange man's face in darkness, but his teeth gleam starkly in contrast as he aims a snarl at you that could rival an angry lion's. With deliberate ferocity, his almighty jaw is pried apart, causing you to instinctively brace.

It swiftly becomes apparent that you were right to do so.

“What is the meaning of this ambush!?” he roars, and a blast of heat slugs you squarely in the face, forcing you to clamp your eyes shut and try to hunch into your shoulders before you're able to blink tentatively up at him again once the warmth recedes.

You can't think fast enough to formulate a response.

The man holding you aloft – though you hesitate to call him a man at all – has to be something straight out of the fantasy novels you read as a child. He's built like an ox on steroids, an almighty, armoured brute with shoulders as broad as a truck and a face like chiselled granite. He glowers down at you from beneath his crimson cloak with eyes that lack any kind of iris or pupil. Instead, you find yourself trapped by two, white-blue pits of light that burn the same colour as a roaring gas fire.

Your impromptu study is interrupted when the man peels his lips back even further to expose sharpened canines and he gives you a rough shake, as though you weigh no more to him than a dollar bill.

“Speak!” he demands, “Before I decorate this wretched abyss with your innards!”

Somehow, you don't think that's an empty threat.

Thoroughly jostled, panic bubbles up inside your chest like acid and your mouth turns as dry as a desert when you peel your tongue from the roof of it, parting your trembling lips and sucking down a lungful of stale, musty air.

If this man had been expecting a coherent response, he's about to be sorely disappointed.

“AAAAAAHHHH!”

The ungodly shriek that explodes past your teeth has the stranger's head jolting back, his brows unfurling by a fraction to give away his surprise.

Like a mouse caught alive in slowly closing jaws, you begin to thrash and struggle, twisting yourself from left to right and even bringing your legs up to paddle uselessly at his armoured stomach, screeching, “LET ME GO!”

The only indication that he's even noticing your efforts is the single, snowy brow that makes a steady journey higher up his forehead.

“Ha! What've I always told you, War?” another robust voice echoes across the platform and into your ears, momentarily drawing your focus away from your pitiful escape attempt.

'War? What kind of a name is that?'

The second figure emerges from behind the first - smaller and slighter than your captor, but still leagues bigger than you.

Boldly, he leans an elbow against his companion and cocks his head at you, drawling, “You sure have a way with the ladies.”

Jesus, there isn't an inch of this one that isn't strapped up in gleaming armour, gunmetal grey in the seams and dulled silver everywhere else. Even his head is obscured by an avian helm made entirely from metal, save for two, angular hollows carved into the front, from which a pair of eyes peer out at you, entirely featureless as well. These, however, spark with intrigue rather than rage, glowing gold like a freshly struck match.

The larger of the two has yet to take his own eyes off you. He ignores his friend's jab, instead jutting his square chin at you and growling, “What do you make of this, Brother?”

Brother?

“Whaaat the shiiiit?” you whimper breathlessly, reaching up and feeling for the back of your dress to tug feebly at the unyielding, steel fingers as if you ever had a hope in Hell's chance of loosening the giant's grip.

This has to be some kind of prank, or a hallucination - a full, auditory and visual hallucination. Tactile as well, apparently, though you've never heard that such a thing is really possible. But what other explanation is there? Perhaps that taxi driver had somehow drugged you through the... god, the air conditioning, or something.

All you know with any certainty, is that whatever terrible dream or trip you're having right now, it's a thousand times scarier than any stupid wedding. What you wouldn't give to be walking down that aisle now instead of dangling helplessly in the clutches of a man who's much too large to be human.

The silver figment of your imagination tilts his helm down, then slowly brings it back up, and even without any recognisable detail in his eyes, you just know he's giving you a thorough once-over.

“Mm,” he grunts, cocking a hip and folding his arms across a proud chest, “Can't be sure. Maybe some kind of... fashion-forward angel?”

“Then where are her wings?” the one holding you speculates.

“Ah. Right, right, right.... Mmm, glamoured demon?”

'War' is quiet for a time, narrowing his glare at you before he blinks and offers a pensive nod. “... A fair assumption.”

On the verge of losing your breakfast, you whip your head back and forth between the two of them, bewildered by a conversation you can't possibly hope to follow.

“Although~,” the smaller one starts, and without warning, reaches down to pluck the front of your dress between his fingers, tugging the fabric up to inspect it and inadvertently revealing the wedding garter on your thigh, “This seems a little excessive for a disguise.”

For a split second, your unparalleled fear is abruptly overwhelmed by a rush of indignation, and before you can come to your senses, you aim a vicious kick at the silver gauntlet keeping your dress aloft. “Hey! Hands off!” you bark.

To your surprise, he actually lets go and raises his hands in mock surrender.

“Woah~! Feisty little filly, isn't she?” he chuckles.

The indignation doesn't last for long after that.

Receiving another sharp glare from the man holding you hostage, you gulp audibly and stop trying to kick out, turning limp in his grasp and ducking your head to escape his scrutiny.

“What business have you here, demon?” he spits the last word through his teeth like it's poisonous, “Are you Samael's associate?”

“Sam-eye-who!?” you squeak, a far cry from your earlier bite, “I-I don't know! I'm not.. I'm not a demon, for god's sake, I'm a human being!”

Anyone would think you'd just spoken the magic words.

Your enormous captor's eyes fling open wide and all at once, the pressure around your chest goes slack and you're unceremoniously dropped in a heap onto your backside, your dress fluttering down after to pool around your legs.

A jarring pain shoots up your coccyx and you wince, trying desperately to ignore the fact that that sort of pain would definitely wake you up if you were dreaming. Moments later, you're kicking and pushing yourself backwards across the stone, away from the looming titans.

An eerie change seems to have come over the pair. Now, they're both staring down at you in dangerous silence, at least until the silver one begins to stride after you, prompting a squeal of alarm to escape your lips. He catches up to you easily and plants one, immense boot down on the train of your dress, jerking you to a sudden halt and preventing you from retreating any further.

“What did you just say?” he utters slowly. Dangerously. There's none of the jocular lilt in his tone that had been there only moments ago.

Your chest heaves, your mind races... What did you say? What did you say that could have prompted such a change in their demeanour?

“Wh-what?” you splutter, “What, that I'm a human? I'm not a demon!?”

Why does that matter? You thought it was pretty, damn obvious.

The pair of them stare down at you in silence for several, uncomfortable seconds until you're sure you're going to burst if the tension grows any thicker, when all of a sudden, the smaller one throws his head back and lets out a sharp bark of laughter, successfully giving you a tiny heart attack. “Ha! Good one!” he snorts, extending a clawed thumb and flicking it between he and his companion, “Hey, you know what. Me and my brother are actually makers who got hit by a shrinking spell.”

Swallowing your heart back down your throat, you breathlessly ask, “What... the Hell is a maker?”

The pair of them share an odd look before peering down at you again. “It... was a joke,” he says slowly, regarding you as if you're being deliberately dense.

At last, he removes his boot from your dress and steps back, glancing at his brother. “Hey... You don't think...”

“No,” 'War' retorts with an air of inarguable finality, “She cannot be human. Listen to her. She speaks the Common tongue. Humanity's language is.. abstract. They still rely on visual communication.”

Incredulous, you stare up at him as if he's now the one being dense.

His brother meanwhile, gives him an impressed up and down, drawling out, “Well, look at you, brushing up on your human history.”

“They are not exactly a difficult species to understand,” the first scoffs.

If you weren't so busy trying to crawl backwards as stealthily as possible, you'd probably take offence to the slandering humanity.

As it is, however, you're more preoccupied with how they're referring to humans in the third person. You don't much like the implications of that.

There's a lot you don't really like about this whole situation, actually. Your brain feels like its firing all cylinders as it tries to make sense of where you are and how in the world you got here. Who are those two people? Is this real, or is it all happening in a dream?

Sniffling, you swipe the back of a hand underneath your nose and begin the arduous task of shambling backwards on your rear, keeping your eyes fixed upon the two strangers before at last swallowing a gulp of bravery and tearing your eyes away, flinging yourself over and scrabbling up onto your heeled feet.

Your plan, unperfected though it may be, is simple.

Run like Hell and hope you can out-pace the pair of heavy-weight brutes behind you.

Your own folly is that you'd been so busy watching them, that you have yet to catch a glimpse of your surroundings, a decision you instantly regret when you face forwards and have to slam on the brakes at once. “SHIT!” you yelp, your arms pinwheeling desperately as you slide to a sharp and clumsy halt right at the edge of an enormous, flat-topped rock.

Chest heaving, you let out a shaky breath and tentatively inch your neck out to peer down over the ledge.

Nothing waits below you.

Literally nothing.

There's only a thick, gaping abyss that plunges down, so far down until the ambient light fades and turns into pitch-black darkness.

You can even see the bottom of the rock you're standing on.

This, you think, must be what astronauts feel like, floating in the great expanse of space with no idea of what's out there, nothing above you, nothing below you... You could drift forever if you take a single step forwards.

It's a harrowing thought.

Sweat beads on the nape of your neck and you take a very slow, very careful step backwards, away from the ledge. Your head swings like a periscope from left to right in search of a way off this stupid boulder. There's nothing about this place you recognise, not from any book, or documentary or map. You have to look away when you spot a veritable mountain levitating in the distance, nothing to support it but the open air.

“This is a dream...” you mutter to yourself, “Surely to god, please let this be a dream...”

“You should watch your step.”

Your shoulders jump and you whip around, reeling your bag back threateningly, only to find the silver-clad man standing a little too close to you, regarding you curiously from several, meagre feet away.

God... even stood at your full height, you doubt you'd even reach the bottom of his sternum.

“Y-you stay away from me!” you stammer, trembling like a leaf in a hurricane, “I mean it! If you come any closer, I'll... I'll-!”

Cocking his helm to one side, the stranger helpfully suggests, “You'll... make us regret it?”

Borderline hysterical, you latch onto his proposal at once, jabbing your bag at him. “Yes, yes! Exactly. Oh-ho! You would not believe what I've got inside this thing!”

Lipstick, tissues, tweezers and tampons. Truly, you're a formidable opponent for two hulking brutes with guns and a sword that's taller than you are.

“Okay,” you admit, deflating like a popped balloon, “Okay, I.. I don't know what you want from me, but, you should know, my family... we aren't very rich, so if you're going to ask for a ransom-”

You start to feel your lip wobble, but before the waterworks really hit, the stranger squints down at you incredulously and asks, “Lady, what the Hell are you talking about? You're the one who crashed into us!” He pauses to share a brief glance with his brother. “Well, specifically me. I think the real question is, what do you want with us?”

Your hands fly up and you splay them out in front of you, waving them frantically from side to side. “Nothing! It was an accident, I – I didn't mean to, I just... I...” Trailing off, your arms slowly draw close up against your chest and you drag your eyes down to the stranger's boots, aimless in their venturing. “I'm supposed to be getting married right now! I just want to get out of here.” Wherever on Earth here is.

Good god, your mother... She'll be so disappointed that you didn't turn up, after all the work she put into your own wedding. And your father! Watching you from a screen in his hospital bed, expecting to see his daughter walking down the aisle, only to see... nothing.

The thought hits you like a punch to your roiling guts.

Pressing a hand over your mouth, you thoughtlessly turn your back on the two men, ignorant of the way the largest bristles in offence.

Perhaps it isn't especially intelligent to expose your fragile spine to these... people. But nothing stabs or shoots you in the back for several minutes, so you turn your focus to a more pressing matter – retracing your steps and figuring out how you ended up in this otherworldly place.

Strife eyes the 'human' uncertainly.

It's odd, he thinks. You don't act like a human, you don't sound like a human. Heck, you barely even look human. There are hardly any hair follicles embedded in your skin and your jaw isn't nearly robust enough. And humans, so far as he knows, don't wear those clothes. They wear leathers and furs - sturdy things meant to protect them from the world they've recently made their home. Not stark, white silk that looks like angel-made fabric.

And yet... Well, you're either a demon who also happens to be the Universe's most convincing actress, or you really believe you're a member of the human race.

… Huh...

“Brother?”

He perks up at the sound of War's voice, casting a glance over a shoulder to see his brother has moved away and is standing at the foot of another stone staircase, watching the woman through narrowed eyes. “It is clear this... creature is not of sound mind.”

“But, she-”

“We have our orders from the Council,” he continues pointedly, cutting his brother off, “We've tarried for too long.”

“...Right...” Strife exhales softly through his nose. Their 'orders...'

With a pensive furrow to his brow, he spares a final look back at you.

One of your arms is wrapped securely around your middle, the other bent up at the elbow to press bone-white knuckles firmly against quivering lips, and those intricate, pretty eyes glisten in the dim light of the Void as they dart around at the ever-changing landscape.

Of its own accord, Strife's mouth stretches into a lopsided grin.

You sure are a weird little creature. Or misshapen angel, or glamoured demon, or... whatever in Creation you are.

And where had you even come from, if not from here?

He muses on it for a moment longer before War none-too subtly clears his throat, reminding Strife to get a move on.

Typical War... always more interested in upholding his honour than succumbing to even the barest sniff of curiosity.

'Still,' Strife supposes, heaving a one-shouldered shrug, 'shepherding wayward souls is Death's area of expertise. Not mine.'

… This soul does have a particularly wayward look about it though...

Strife wrenches his focus away and turns his back on the little 'human,' giving his helm a brusque shake to clear it of any lingering intrigue.

You are not his problem.

He reaches the steps and looks up at War, who gives him a steadfast nod before turning on his heel and lumbering on towards the apex of the staircase.

Tempering his curiosity by focusing on the grim duty they've been set by the Charred Council, Strife follows along at a lackadaisical pace, but just as his boot hits the fourth step, a timid sound drifts across the rocky landscape and twitches at his ears, just loud enough to slow him to a standstill once more.

It's a sound he seldom hears, but for all its rarity, it's recognisable nonetheless.

To begin with, he starts to think he must have imagined it, perhaps it was nothing more than an ambient sound cast by the Void itself.

But then, he hears it again, and there's no pretending for a second time.

It's the conveying of despair and worry and fear all wrapped up inside one, little vocalisation.

A wet, hitching, 'sob!'

'Oh no...' The rider squeezes his eyes shut and wills himself to take another step forwards, jaw clenched in defiance of his own, wretched heart.

Damn him, he's a Horseman now. A Horseman of the Apocalypse, no less. Hell, he's a killer, a genocidal maniac, a dashing if not puckish scoundrel. The Horsemen weren't created by the Charred Council to solve trivial matters such as escorting strays back home, after all. That would be laughable.

What was it they had decreed him? Endless Spirit of timeless unrest. All that is unsettled in the hearts of that which lives and breathes...

Yeah. Something along those lines.

… He's a good-for-nothing...

Strife's head twists around ever so slightly and he catches a glimpse of you over his shoulder.

That flouncy, white garment trails through the dust behind you as you pace back and forth across the platform, head tipped to the sky and your chest heaving in and out with long, overcompensating breaths, none of which seem enough to fill your lungs.

In a word, you look... terrified.

When you turn to the side, his sharp eyes immediately zero in on the glistening shine on your cheeks.

They're wet? But... how could they be? There isn't any...

Oh...

Gently, the Horseman's gaze slides down to rest on the holster strapped to his left hip. Mercy rests inside, patient and pliant, always standing ready in the event that its master needs it. Gah, he must've been feeling particularly sentimental when he named the damn pistols...

Slumping on his haunches, Strife blows out an exaggerated sigh, defeated by his most tenacious opponent – himself.

“War?” he utters, resigned.

The younger Nephilim pauses his ascent and twists his torso around, cocking a brow down at his brother and finding his helm fixed unwaveringly in your direction.

“... I don't think she's a glamoured demon...”

War's shoulder pauldrons clank softly as he raises his head and glowers down at you, his eyes narrowing to thin slits. “What makes you so sure?” he asks after a beat.

This time, when Strife speaks, he starts to venture back down the staircase, never once looking away from you. “Demons don't cry,” he explains quietly, more to himself than to War, “They can't. Their frontal lobes are the smallest of any species. They literally don't know how to cry...”

“Your familiarity with demon biology is noted, but what are you getting at, brother?”

Reaching the bottom of the steps, Strife doesn't respond, prompting War to call out to him, slightly louder, “Brother?!”

But the older rider's attention is now solely fixed upon the small, unassuming stranger who'd quite literally barrelled straight into his life.

He approaches slowly, much like he'd approached his flighty steed, Mayhem, not so many weeks ago.

You turn towards him just as he draws within a few feet of you and when you spot him looming above you, you jump back, choking out a cry of alarm.

His fearsome stare trails from your head all the way down to your shoes that sit hidden beneath the hem of the wedding dress. “What is it?” you try to snap, grimacing when it leaves you as a pitiable squeak instead, “What are you staring at?”

If Strife were a more mannerly Nephilim, he might have recognised that it's rude to not only ignore people when they address you, but to stare at them so openly and unabashedly that they feel the need to cover their chests to preserve some modicum of dignity, or privacy.

But as it is, he isn't mannerly.

His name is Strife, for Creation's sake. Not Harmony.

The Horseman snorts at his own little joke, electing to save that one for later when he feels the time is right. War is sure to hate it, if nothing else.

Good.

But as for the matter at hand...

Strife has met some wolves trussed up in sheep's clothing before, but here he sees a wolf with no teeth, no claws, no weapons or magic.

In fact, aside from that unusual satchel you keep slung around your waist, you haven't raised a single weapon against them, and unless you have something hidden away beneath those frills and skirts – which he highly doubts – you've come here, to the Void, completely and utterly...

“Unarmed,” he muses aloud, appraising you in a new light.

Hardly even a wolf at all, then. Perhaps more of a sheep in lambswool.

You're defensive. Not aggressive.

What a jarring change of pace from their usual company...

And... you're still crying.

Unleashing a deep sigh that seems to emanate right from the darkest depths of his soul, Strife lifts an arm and cards his fingers through thick, black hair that sticks in an unruly mess from the back of his skull, more akin to a demon's spines than the soft, lustrous locks of angel hair.

“Look,” he pushes out, dropping his gaze from your face at last, “I, uh.. I'm not sure what you are. Or where you came from. But, I can't help noticing that you don't have a way to defend yourself...”

His eyes are on you again as soon as you shuffle away from him a little further, freezing you solid. After several seconds pass and you realise he isn't about to attack, you swipe at your damp cheeks and lower your stare to his pistols.

'Well, duh,' you want to scoff, 'Of course I'm not armed. I'm not a psychopath who brings guns to her own wedding.' Calling the gun-toting juggernaut a psychopath might not go down so well. Then, belatedly, you think, 'It isn't a shotgun wedding, after all.' But something tells you the humour wouldn't be well-received either by anyone except yourself.

...Cain would have hated that joke.

'Good,' a tiny, vindictive part of you whispers, deep within the most secretive corners of your mind.

At your prolonged silence, Strife mirrors your stance, bringing his much beefier arms up to fold them pointedly across his own chest. “Well, if that's the case,” he huffs, “Then you're either really brave, or really, really stupid.”

Pursing your lips, you slide your gaze to one side, apparently unwilling to divulge which of the two you believe yourself to be.

“You're in the Void, kid,” he presses, sweeping a hand out to the world around you, “This is no place for a vulnerable little speck like you.”

He's admittedly proud that he manages to put an affronted scowl on your otherwise fear-stricken face.

“And if who I think is here, is here...” Falling silent for the sole purpose of building suspense, he lowers his arms to his sides and drops his pitch, uttering, “Then you're in more trouble than you realise. We're here via invite. Can't say the same for you...”

At long last, you find your tongue. “Uh, what're you... getting at?” you say falteringly, retreating another step only to suck down a whimper when he simply closes the distance again in a single stride.

The stomping approach of heavy footfalls alerts you to the larger man returning grumpily to his brother's side with a face the very picture of exasperated irritation.

You shrink in on yourself when his shadow falls across you.

“Well,” the silver man pipes up, “You keep telling us you're human... And now, y'see... I'm kinda curious about that... Cause me and my brother can't exactly leave you here when you're supposed to be back on Earth.”

His words cause your brain to sputter for a moment before it kicks into gear again. Very carefully, you ask, “What do you mean, 'back on Earth?”

Disregarding your query entirely, he simply states, “You're comin' with us."

Your response to that is about as abrupt as they come.

You balk, stumbling away from them again on shaky heels. “I most certainly am not!” you blurt out, feeling your panic spike to its apex, “Frankly, I'm still not convinced that you two, or any of this-!” You throw your arms away from your chest. “- aren't just some kind of fucked up hallucination brought on by the stress of this stupid wedding!”

Strife's eyes crinkle with amusement, a stark contradiction to War's, who's own glare is so cold, it would give Death a run for his money. Nothing you say makes any sense. It's actually quite enchanting.

“...What... is a wedding?” War murmurs to him from the side of his mouth.

Shrugging, his brother replies, “Beats me. But, we should probably get this show on the road.”

“Agreed.”

“You thinking what I'm thinking?”

War scoffs. “The day I think like you, brother, is the day I shall finally ask Fury to cleave my brain out with her whip.”

Strife's grin turns sharp and pointed. “Ha,” he says flatly, “Funny. I was actually gonna ask if you wanted to do the honours.”

At once, your whole body goes rigid and you dart a suspicious look between them, bumbling, “Honours? What honours? What do you mean honours?”

The glare War is subjecting his brother to is nothing short of murderous, but after a moment of stillness, his cinched jaw works itself loose and some of the stiffness dissipates from his shoulders. Stoic, utterly impenetrable, he turns his hooded face to you and holds you still with a mere look of warning, eyebrows locked at the centre of his forehead.

Then, without a word, he marches forwards, and in one smooth motion, bends down and snakes a monstrous arms around your hips, sweeping you effortlessly into the air and slinging you across his shoulder like a sack of especially mortified potatoes. You slot neatly into the space between his hood and the solid, metal shoulder pauldron to your right.

At once, your palms slap down on the gigantic expanse of his back and you let out a bleat of terror when his metal palm lands on the seat of your dress.

Even through layers and layers of fabric, you can still feel the heat his appendage exudes.

“What do you think you're doing!?” you shout, kicking your legs and clawing at his armour to try and pull yourself free, “Put me down, right now!”

The silver man steps up to War's back and tilts his head at you, meeting your flabbergasted gaze with a coy wink.

“What? Not comfortable enough for you, Princess?”

Sparing him a distressed frown, you sag against the shoulder you're laying across and bleakly croak, “Why're you doing this?”

“I have to concur with the female, Strife-"

You yelp again and hurry to wind your fingers into the crimson cloak beneath you as War abruptly swings around to face his brother, adding, “-Why are we doing this?”

For a few seconds, the smaller Nephilim simply watches on in amusement as your comically diminutive shoes flick and flail helplessly through the air, poking out from under all those layers of white fabric until one wayward heel almost grazes War's cheek, prompting the Horseman to rumble out a low growl and raise his other hand to capture both of your ankles in one palm, keeping them secured.

“Don't suppose you'd accept, 'because it's funny' as an answer, would you?” Strife poses.

The Red rider's lip curves up and this time, he growls at his brother, and the strength of it causes your teeth to clatter around inside your jaw.

At the display of aggression, Strife simply snorts and spins on his heel, making for the staircase again as he beckons over his shoulder for War to keep up.

With an aggravated grunt, the youngest Horseman trudges unhurriedly along behind him.

“Fine," Strife sighs in mock exasperation, "We're doing it because if she really is human, then I wanna know how we missed an evolutionary jump this big, and if she isn't...”

A shadow falls across his visor and he drops back until he's stalking along just behind War's heel, a sudden ice to his tone as he watches you struggle about on his brother's shoulder.

“If she isn't human,” he murmurs dangerously, sending fingers of ice brushing up your spine, “Then I plan on finding out just why she thinks she can lie to the Horsemen, and live to tell the tale...”

[crocsanddocs]

[katie5000]

So I wrote something.

First of all, I'd like to apologize for how freaking cringe it is. Secondly, I wasn't originally going to share this on here, but my husband kind of talked me into it.

I wrote this last summer when he was still a boyfriend and I had marriage on the brain. I also decided to write it as a x reader, because Legato doesn't really have any and for some reason part of me wants to fix that. But be warned: he's probably going to be somewhat out of character in this. Turn back now if that makes you angry.

I had the 1998 version of the character in mind for this.

Content: SFW, x reader, x female reader, reluctant bride trope

[snufkins-boot]

Dc x dp idea: time travel yaaaay

Danny, Sam and Tucker get back from fixing some errors in the time line in France just before the French Revolution.

And sure Danny got mistaken for a French aristocrat that had died the day before they got there but it wasn’t to bad, it only made their jobs easier. It won’t be a problem for them.

Meanwhile Constantine, Batman and whoever the fuck else (imma say Hal, I love that green bitch) are exploring an abandoned manor in France after there being reports of strange, violent activity, and with their latest teammate Phantom not picking up their calls Constantine had to pull these two with him instead.

“Hey guys, Phantom’s a ghost, right?”

Hal sounds hesitant as Constantine replies

“Yes, why?”

“I think I found a picture of him living.”

and there on the wall is a picture of a long dead french aristocrat, with black hair and blue eyes but every other detail the same as Phantom’s

There on the wall sits a photo of Daniel Nightingale, a teenager who was possessed by a demon and killed two servants, then himself.

[enragedandy]

The Reluctant Queen

[srnk1]

the original painting has nothing in common with this show but whatever . this image just appeared in my mind i couldnt control myself

[debbiedart]

'The Reluctant Bride' but it's the Nargothrond trio 🌹✨ • prints!

[peach-tea-leaves]

On The Fear Of Love (And Loneliness).

Excerpt from Osamu Dazai’s “No Longer Human” / “The Reluctant Bride” by Auguste Toulmouche / Excerpt from “Red Doc>” by Anne Carson / “Apollo and Daphne” by John William Waterhouse / “First Love/Late Spring” by Mitski / “It’ll Pass” by Lilli (Ratsandlillies) / “The Archer” by Taylor Swift / Scene from Little Women (2019) Dir. Greta Gerwig / “Hunger” by Florence + The Machine

[vankelmod]

[i-am-just-a-girli]

Women? Women.

Cleopatra (John William Waterhouse) || A Stolen Glance (Eugene de Blaas) || The Accolade (Edmund Blair Leighton) || Unknown || The Reluctant Bride (August Toulmouche) || Head of a Young Girl 1777 (Jean Baptiste Greuze) || War Pieta (Max Ginsburg) || Lady Elizabeth Keppel (Joshua Reynolds) || Joan of Arc (John Everett Millais) ||

[ferhog]

Nothing quite says "I OBJECT!" like crashing the wedding in a freaking Gundam.

One of the great flaws of Witch From Mercury is that it didn't give us a scene like this.

[lunamond]

Based on The Reluctant Bride by Augustus Toulmouche

[saym0-0]

i really don't expect to finish this so have a UDAD hades, persephone and cerberus redraw of this painting (the reluctant bride by auguste toulmouche) because the idea wouldnt leave my brain lol

[albanianpsycho]

[metatheatre01]

the reluctant bride, august toulmouche / lila cerullo, my brilliant friend

[livenowforever]

Auguste Toulmouche (1829-1890) was a French painter known for his beautiful paintings of upper middle class Parisian women in domestic settings.

Pictured here is

- The Reluctant Bride (La Fiancée hésitante), 1866

- In the Library (Dans la Bibliothèque), 1872

- Sweet Do Nothing (Dolce far niente), 1877