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inthedayswhenlandswerefew · 2 years ago

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Comet Donati [Chapter 2: Story Of My Life]

Series Summary: Sex, drugs, boy bands. You are a kinda-therapist recruited (via nepotism) to help Comet Donati through a recent crisis. Things are casual with Aegon, very not-casual with Aemond. Loosely inspired by One Direction.

Chapter Warnings: Language, references to sexual content (18+), drugs, alcohol, smoking, mental health struggles, cryptic song lyrics, tattoos, motorcycles, pretentious veganism, the return of the Cookie Monster pajama pants.

Selected Chapter Quote: “I’m not interested in therapy. But I’m somewhat interested in you.”

Word count: 6.9k.

Link to chapter list (and all my writing): HERE.

Taglist: @doingfondue @catalina-howard @randomdragonfires @myspotofcraziness @arcielee @fan-goddess @talesofoldandnew @marvelescvpe @tinykryptonitewerewolf @mariahossain @chainsawsangel @darkenchantress @not-a-glad-gladiator @gemini-mama @trifoliumviridi @herfantasyworldd @babyblue711 @namelesslosers @thelittleswanao3 @daenysx @moonlightfoxx @libroparaiso @burningcoffeetimetravel-fics @mizfortuna @florent1s @heimtathurs @tclegane @poohxlove @narwhal-swimmingintheocean @heavenly1927

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Under the stars, under the canopy of incandescent string lights, you tilt a Salty Dog against your lips: clinking ice, rosemary, a wedge of grapefruit, salt on the rim. The indigo wind raises goosebumps on your arms. From the speakers flow notes muffled by car horns and ambient conversation: Coldplay, Life In Technicolor ii. The Missouri River is a snake in the distance, twisting and glimmering, silver scales built of reflected moonlight. It is one year before you fly to Rome. It is the prologue of a book you never thought you’d write.

“I hope you’re not cheating on anybody,” you say to Aegon. Your voice has that drowsy, unguarded honestly that follows good sex with someone you might have the capacity to love under the right circumstances. His does too.

Aegon snorts and shakes his head. There is sunburn on his cheeks like a stain of spilled wine; summer in the Lower Midwest doesn’t agree with him. It’s too hot, too primal. It’ll bite you if you’re not careful. “No. There’s no one.”

“Is there ever?” you ask. “I remember seeing paparazzi photos of Jace and Luke with their girlfriends, Aemond with Shelby, Cregan with…plentiful, interchangeable Victoria’s Secret models. But I don’t think I’ve ever seen you attached to anyone.”

“Look, can I be honest for a second? I mean, I don’t want to offend you. But you seem cool, you seem like you might get it. Can I be real with you?”

“Yeah. Be real, I’d like that.”

“I love what we’re doing right now,” Aegon says. He takes a swig of his Salty Dog, your suggestion. His blond hair, nearly shoulder-length, whips in the night breeze. There’s something about Missouri that feels old, prehistoric almost, and you know because you’ve left it and come back: untamed, unrefined, brown recluses and black bears, copperheads and water moccasins, droughts and floods and tornados, humid and buggy like the earth the dinosaurs knew. “And I loved what I was doing last week in Boston and Philly, and I’ll probably love what I’m doing a few days from now in Houston. But if I knew I had to do it, I wouldn’t love it anymore, you know? That’s just how I am. It’s not a reflection on anyone but me. I can’t handle obligations, commitment, chains. I feel the weight of expectations settling on me and I run.” He rests his chin on his knuckles as he gazes at you like a distant constellation. “I don’t think my worth is determined by who or how I fuck. I don’t think yours is either. I think there are sluts who are angels and virgins who are demons. And I think to believe otherwise is not just archaic or puritanical or ignorant. I think it’s deeply, catastrophically harmful.”

You’re smiling; tears brim in your eyes. “Thank you, Aegon,” you say softly.

He is mystified. “For what?”

“Nothing. Never mind.”

Coldplay recedes from the speakers. Next—for no less than the fourth time this evening—is the Weeknd’s Starboy. Aegon groans and drums his Salty Dog on the tabletop. “Oh my God, this song again?!”

“They’re obsessed!”

“They really are.”

“It’s for you,” you tease. “You’re the big star. The boy band star. The Starboy.”

He takes your right hand, flattens your palm, and lays it against his chest. Through his t-shirt—Nirvana, grey, short-sleeved, from Target—you can feel muscle, bone, rushing blood. “Starboy,” he tells you, grinning. Then he presses his own palm to your heart, beating calm and slow beneath your dress the color of emeralds. “Stargirl.”

“Oh no. Wrong. I’m definitely a nobody.”

“You’re not,” Aegon says. And then again, to make sure you’ve heard him: “You’re not.”

~~~~~~~~~~

“So I only have to talk to two people?” Rhaena says suspiciously, like she’s waiting for you to pull the lever of a trapdoor.

“Exactly.” You take another bite of your carbonara, an Italian invention that would be at home in the Midwest: heavy, cheesy, lots of pork products. “At the meet-and-greet before the show tonight, I want you to pick two people. Just two. And they can be anyone you want. 13-year-old girls, frat boys, soccer moms, grandmas, whoever. And I want you to chat with each of those two people for two minutes. That’s four minutes total. And then you’re done!”

“I’m really done? You promise?”

“I promise.”

“Okay. Two people, two minutes. I can do that.” Rhaena turns to Luke, who has bits of lasagna all over his shirt and one wayward shred of a noodle in his dark curly hair. “I can do that, right?”

He nods encouragingly. “You can totally do that.”

Aemond is watching; you can see him on the periphery of your vision, short blond hair and a black t-shirt. He wears a lot of black, few accessories, like he’s trying not to be noticed. You look across the table at him. The band is enjoying a late lunch—everyone sleeps in until at least 1 p.m.—on the patio of a restaurant that overlooks the Palatine Hill. Intense midday sunbeams stream, in threads like tinsel on a Christmas tree, through the gaps in the pergola of grapevines, climbing roses, and ivy. In the daylight, Aemond’s scar is jarring—red, wrathful—and his sightless blue dreamscape of a left eye all the more peculiar. He fixes his gaze on you, daring you to flinch away, to be disgusted, to wilt like something parched and dying. You stare steadily back. Aemond sips his white wine, half-smiling, and twirls spaghetti onto his fork. You have white wine too. You keep choosing whatever drinks he does.

“You came all the way to Rome only to order the most basic, fifth-grader version of pasta imaginable?”

“It has marinara sauce,” Aemond replies. “I’m a vegan.”

“Uh oh,” you say. “For health reasons or the environment, or…?”

He shrugs, like it’s obvious. “I just feel that the world has enough suffering in it already without me contributing to the mass torture and execution of sentient beings.”

“Okay. Pretentious.”

Aemond chuckles, covering his mouth with one hand so he can chew his spaghetti with dignity. “What do your parents do in Kansas?”

“Missouri,” you correct, like a reflex.

“I know, it’s so confusing,” Aegon tells him. He’s wearing aviator sunglasses and a salmon-colored tank top that matches his sunburn. “It’s Kansas City, but apparently it’s in Missouri, not Kansas. But there is a different, smaller, much worse Kansas City in actual Kansas.”

“It’s confusing for your little hamster brain,” you say.

Aegon holds up a dark green bottle of olive oil that he’s been drenching his salad with: lettuce, tomatoes, black olives, skinless boneless chicken. “This is healthy, right?”

“Yeah, it’s really good for you. Antioxidants and anti-inflammatory properties.”

Jace snickers. “Dude, that has like 100 calories per tablespoon.”

Aegon frowns dejectedly down at his salad. “Fuck.”

Aemond asks you: “So what do your parents do in Missouri?”

“They have a farm just outside the city.”

“Oh. Nice.” Some apprehension now. “What do they raise?”

“Beef cattle.”

The rest of the table bursts out laughing. Aemond’s cheeks—one smooth and pristine, one cut in two by a rust-colored cord of bitter corporal memory like barbed wire—flush pink. He is happy in a way that he hasn’t been in a long time; you can see that in the warmth that glows on the others’ faces. He is alarmingly, breathtakingly beautiful. He has the sort of features that belong carved into marble, in myths, in museums. “I mean…I’m sure they do a great job.”

“You should visit one day. You can help brand the herd.”

“Absolutely,” Aemond quips.

“Nothing gets one’s deepest, darkest revelations flowing like hard labor.”

“I’m not interested in therapy.” He peers around the table for the basket of bread. “Jace, can you pass me some of that?”

Jace picks up a piece of crunchy Italian bread and lobs it through the air. It goes sailing right past Aemond, at least a foot from his fumbling, futile hands.

Aegon is exasperated. “Jace, bruh, you know he’s got no depth perception!”

“It’s fine,” Aemond says quickly, like he wants the conversation to be over.

“It’s not fine.” Aegon stands up and leans across the table to jab his index finger menacingly at Jace. “Have some consideration for anyone besides yourself. Have some fucking respect.”

Jace is more entertained than intimidated. “I’m sorry, I was under the impression that I outrank you now.”

“Yeah. And how’d you get there?” In the uneasy quiet that falls over the table, Aegon—quite tipsy already—lurches inside the restaurant to use their bathroom.

Daeron slides the basket of bread over to Aemond. Luke studies him sympathetically without knowing what to say. So much of what settles in us—accumulating like radiation, cooking malignancies into our bones—are things we cannot speak of. This is the great supposition of therapy. It’s what first inspired Sigmund Freud to get that fateful ball rolling in the latter half of the 1800s, before television or radio or record players, before airplanes, before Alaska or Hawaii were added to the Union.

Criston sighs loudly and stabs at his carne alla pizzaiola. Cregan stares indifferently out over the Palatine Hill: the Palace of Domitian, the House of Tiberius, the Temple of Apollo, ruins of gods and men. He slips a minibar-sized bottle of Absolut Vodka out of his sweatpants, empties it into his San Pellegrino, and gulps it all down. Jace has one arm slung across the back of his girlfriend Baela’s chair. She whispers something to him, clearly irritated. He replies briskly back. They have the look of a couple that has spent more time trying to claw their way back to a good place than they ever spent happy to begin with. Jace steals a glimpse of you, smirking. He turns away as soon as you notice him watching. His arms and chest, visible through his unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt, are a mosaic of tattoos: the Eiffel tower, cherry blossoms, Christ the Redeemer, an alligator, a pair of dice.

After a few minutes, Aegon returns to the table, noticeably more peppy. He starts collecting everyone’s silverware and piling it on a plate for when the servers clear the table. He sorts the utensils by type—forks, knives, spoons—and then by size.

“What is on your face?” Criston demands.

Aegon feigns innocence. Badly. “Huh? What? Face? Huh?”

“Your face. What the hell is all over your face?”

Aegon touches his fingertips to his nose. They come away dusted with white residue. “Um. Donuts.”

“What?”

“Powdered sugar donuts.”

“That’s what you were doing in the bathroom? Eating donuts?”

“…Yes.”

“Aegon,” Criston says sternly.

“They’re called zeppole here.”

Criston claps his hands together and rises from the table. “Okay, time for soundcheck!”

There are groans and complaints, but the band obeys, mopping stray sauce from their lips with cloth napkins and then heading for the black Escalades parked outside the restaurant…everyone except Aemond. He sips his wine leisurely, like he hasn’t heard Criston. You don’t leave either.

Criston regards Aemond with fatherly concern, a hand rested on his shoulder. “You okay?”

“Yeah. We’ll catch up with you later.”

“Really?”

“If memory serves, you don’t need me for this part anymore.”

“Right,” Criston admits awkwardly. “Well one of the Escalades will be waiting out front whenever you’re ready.”

“Sounds good.”

Criston and the rest of the band vanish towards the front of the restaurant. You can hear the slamming of doors and Criston shouting: “Get in the car…get in the fucking car…put your seatbelt on…Aegon, right now, put it on—!”

Aemond takes a pack of Benson & Hedges cigarettes out of the pocket of his dark jeans, puts one between his lips, ignites it with a small square metal lighter—vintage? heirloom?—and then throws the glittery gold pack onto the table. “Okay. Go ahead.”

You smile at him, bars of shadow and sunlight across both of your faces. The restaurant speakers, breaking the spell of the ever-ancient Roman mirage, are playing Foster The People’s Pumped Up Kicks. “I thought you weren’t interested.”

“I’m not interested in therapy. But I’m somewhat interested in you.” He exhales smoke like a dragon. “So go on, ask your questions so I can theatrically unburden myself and emerge from the wreckage like a phoenix, all shiny and redeemed.”

You gesture broadly. “How did this happen?”

“This?”

“You getting kicked out of Comet. Daeron being added to the lineup, Jace being promoted.”

He speaks nonchalantly as if discussing ancient history or the weather, like that’s just the way the world works, a morally ambiguous eventuality. Every once in a while a tsunami or a mudslide comes along and gobbles up a couple thousand lives, but the planet keeps on spinning. “The label made the call. An executive decision, they said. A boy band is a fantasy. It has to be light, fun, erotic without being scandalous or threatening. No one wants to watch some mutilated, half-blind guy strutting around a stage trying to reclaim some long-gone, better version of himself.”

You are at once immeasurably vengeful on his behalf, but you can’t show this. “That must have been difficult. To be treated mercilessly when you were vulnerable. To realize that something you poured your heart and soul into was so transactional.”

He shakes his head, smoking, not looking at you. He gazes out over the Palatine Hill instead.

“Aemond?”

“What do you want me to say?” he answers abruptly. “That I’m angry? I am. That I wish the accident had never happened? Yeah, I wish that. I wish it every goddamn day. But there’s nothing I can do about any of it. Of course I’m furious. Of course I’m resentful. I built this band. I got us together, kept us together, wrote virtually every hit we ever had. Comet was mine. It was my whole life, my past, my future, my legacy. And they took it from me. You want to know how I really feel about that? I couldn’t tell you in words. I’d have to hit something until my knuckles split through the skin.”

He puts out his cigarette in the ashtray with trembling hands, then he drags his fingers—long, uncalloused, dexterous, though you wish you could stop staring at them—through his hair. He glances at you, embarrassed. You look calmly back.

“Jesus Christ,” Aemond says shakily. “I don’t know where that came from.”

“The band was yours,” you agree. “So you’re the one who named it?”

“Yeah.”

“Comet Donati. The first comet ever photographed. 1858.”

He is impressed. “You’ve studied astronomy?”

“Well…I Googled it,” you confess, and he laughs. He’s relaxed again, he’s sunny like the sky. “But I really like it. A disproportionate number of astronomers are from the Midwest, you know.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. Because there’s nothing to do there, so people watch the stars instead.”

He nods, thoughtful. “Better than livestock farming or teen pregnancies, I guess.”

“What is it about the comet that inspires you?”

Aemond lights himself a fresh cigarette. His last name is etched into the side of the steel lighter, you see now: Targaryen. “It has an orbital period of 1,740 years. That last time Comet Donati clipped by Earth, Abraham Lincoln was watching it from the front porch of his hotel. It won’t come back until the late-3000s. I’ll never see it. You’ll never see it. But it’s always there. And to me, there’s something really beautiful about that. So many things in life are invisible, silent, unspoken, unacknowledged, unknown, misunderstood. But that doesn’t mean they’re not real.”

You recall the woman you’ve seen standing beside him in countless paparazzi photos: an actress and influencer, 20 million Instagram followers, California blond, Ibiza clubs and Met Galas. “Where’s Shelby?”

“Not around anymore, obviously.”

“She left you or you left her?”

He flicks away ashes, vague, evasive. “She couldn’t handle it.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.” It isn’t, that’s clear. It’s marked him somewhere deeper than the flesh.

“No, Aemond.” You reach across the table to take his free hand, his left hand, in your own. “I’m really, really sorry.”

He’s watching you, but he isn’t just watching; he’s a little bewildered, and little captivated, a little impishly proud like he’s won a bet. When you release his hand, he says: “Don’t worry about it. I don’t want someone who’s repulsed by me. Or worse, someone who can only see me as something damaged and pitiful. I don’t want to be fucked out of pity.”

Oh no, you think, gazing helplessly at his face, his fingers, his wrists, the slope of his throat. Oh no, I don’t think pity would be anywhere in my mind, not even a whisper of it, not even a ghost.

Aemond notices. His lips pull up at the edges into a sly smile…and then he grows solemn again. “Are you going to ask me about what happened at the Budokan?”

“No. I don’t want to talk about the past anymore.”

“Why?”

“Because I think what happened to you was horrible and senseless and unfair. And the worst part isn’t that you look different. It’s that you are different. You can’t ever unlearn how people treated you afterwards, what their true motivations were. People who discarded you, people who forgot about you. You didn’t deserve that. You were worthy then and you’re worthy now. I don’t want to talk about your past. I want to talk about where you’re going next.”

“I have no idea. When I said the band was my whole life, I meant it.”

“You’ll figure something out. And maybe I can help.”

“Maybe.” He takes a long drag off his cigarette, intrigued. “What made you want to be a therapist?”

That nervous drop in your stomach; a sensation like falling. You disguise it expertly. “No no, I’m asking the questions here. I’m the one with the master’s degree.”

“Now who’s pretentious?”

You’re giggling, and then Aemond is too, like mirror images of each other: sipping white wine and averting your eyes—those so-called windows to the soul—towards the Palatine Hill before they can reveal too much.

~~~~~~~~~~

When Comet Donati performs now, Aemond isn’t on stage. But he never misses a show. He paces around with a black notebook and a white gel pen—Luke learned that from him, you realize—jotting down suggestions and critiques to share with the others afterwards. You follow him, trailing soundlessly like a shadow, through hallways and down aisles and across sky-high catwalks like ancient aqueducts. You’re wearing the only dress you brought from home: short, black lace, cold shoulders. Unconsciously, Aemond takes your hand to make sure you don’t fall behind. Wordlessly, he points out things that make you laugh: Aegon repeatedly slipping on a puddle of beer that he spilled, Daeron’s improvised dance moves (the Mailman, the Beached Whale, the Reckless Uber Driver, etc.), screaming middle-aged women flashing Cregan, Luke giving little crochet stars and planets and comets—handmade by Baela and Rhaena—to children in the audience. But Aemond rarely acknowledges Jace.

As you and Aemond lurk just offstage, the band is performing A Song I’ve Never Heard, the lead single off their first album and an enduring fan favorite.

“If you disappear, I’m going under

Telling you right now, there is no other

Who could ever replace you, no need to wonder

Your name is a song I’ve never heard before.”

“They’re really good live,” you shout, barely audible over the noise. You stand on your tiptoes and lean against Aemond’s shoulder so he can hear you. You are struck by the dormant power beneath your palms, his tense muscles, his radiating heat. You can’t help but imagine what sort of rhythm you might fall into together.

“Yeah,” he says distractedly.

“They’d be even better with you.”

Aemond turns, startled, then smiles. He passes you his notebook and gel pen so you can read his comments and add any of your own. You skim through his scribbled, pearlescent observations.

Cregan – Good smolder. Pay attention to every fan in the crowd, not just the fuckable ones. Thumbs up and high fives for kids. Fist bumps for dudes. Wear less clothes, maybe? If you’re cool with that.

Luke – Don’t be afraid to move around the stage more. Weave. Prowl. Pretend you are a shark.

Aegon – Wrong lyrics during Space-Time Continuum. And Lake Effect. And A Girl Named After A Car!! And The Worst Way To Be!!!! Please for the love of God the words are on Genius.com if you don’t know them.

Daeron – Really great overall. Missed verse during If You’re Summer I’m The Rain. Beware of handshakes with crowd, they could pull you in. Invent a new dance move, something inspired by Kansas City. The Tornado Watch? The Oppressed Beef Cow?

You write at the bottom:

Aemond – Cultivate at minimum one (1) hobby not directly related to Comet Donati. Or pretentious veganism.

You hand the notebook to him, and then he scrawls back:

Already have it. I’ll show you later.

When the concert ends, Aemond leads you backstage to reunite with the band, along with Baela and Rhaena who spent the past two hours dancing and shrieking in the front row.

“I did it!” Rhaena trumpets when she sees you, eyes alight and hands waving in the air. “At the meet-and-greet before the show! I talked to people for four whole minutes and then I got to sit in the corner and drink champagne all by myself and it was amazing!”

“That’s so great!” you exclaim, hugging her. “See?! We knew you could do it. But next time you have to talk to people for ten minutes.”

“Ugh,” Rhaena says, but she’s still beaming. She knows she’s capable of it. It might hurt, but it won’t kill her. And that’s true for a lot of things, isn’t it? The trick is figuring out which of our brains’ frantic doom-signals are misfires, exaggerations, genetic malformations…and which are warnings of something actually lethal.

Everyone piles into the Escalades for the short journey back to the Anantara Palazzo Naiadi Rome Hotel. You and Aemond end up sharing a car with Aegon, Luke, and Rhaena. Luke sits right next to Aemond, wants to see all his notes, wants to rehash every detail of the night with him: Did you like this little move I came up with? Was I too extra when I did that? Am I too low in the harmonies? Did you see how psyched that one kid was when I gave him a stuffed comet? As you watch them, streetlights passing by overhead like miniature suns, it occurs to you that Luke is the only person who still treats Aemond like he’s an essential part of the band, not a progenitor to be paid occasional pennies of homage but a heart or a spinal cord, something that can’t be excised without killing the host.

Aegon is lying on his back across the floor of the Escalade and scrolling through his phone. “Oh my God, guess who else is in Rome right now!” he gasps.

“Who?” Rhaena asks, but she rolls her doe-like eyes in a way that tells you this happens a lot.

“Selena Gomez!”

“Great,” Aemond says. “I don’t think she wants to see you.”

Aegon is typing manically with both thumbs. “We’re about to find out.”

Back at the hotel, a force like gravity—stringless, unthinking—pulls everyone towards Jace’s suite. The lights are low, the air smokey, the drinks misty with condensation, the balcony door open as people—friends and roadies and label executives—drift in and out of the starlit night breeze, the music loud and rumbling, lots of bass, Lifestyles Of The Rich & Famous by Good Charlotte. Crowded together in one corner of the room, illuminated by an end table lamp, are Jace, Baela, Daeron, Cregan, and Criston, who is observing with arms crossed over his chest and an exhausted, long-suffering sort of disapproval. There is a tattoo artist getting set up on the coffee table, laying out the needles and ink cartridges, latex gloves, sanitizer, a squeeze bottle of green soap.

“Get the Pantheon!” Baela is telling Jace. She’s sitting in his lap on the white leather couch, his arms locked around her waist but his eyes roaming around the room. “Or laurels, maybe. Or an eagle.”

“Get a gladiator!” Daeron says.

Baela grimaces. “Please don’t.”

“Get the Colosseum!” Luke says as he hurries over to join them.

“What’s going on?” you ask.

“He gets a new tattoo for every city we play in,” Daeron explains.

“Some are better than others,” Baela adds. “There were so many gorgeous possibilities for Miami and you chose an alligator?!”

“Every single city, huh?” you say to Jace. “You must have a lot of tattoos.”

He grins crookedly up at you through locks of dark, messy curls. He’s wearing a black and white striped shirt that is mostly unbuttoned. Aemond’s gaze flits anxiously between you and Jace. “I do. But believe it or not, we’ve never been to Rome until now.”

“Get the Leaning Tower of Pisa!” Aegon says.

Criston snaps: “Really? The one that’s in Pisa? Which is a completely different city? The one that’s four hours north of Rome? That Leaning Tower of Pisa? That one?”

“Well fuck, don’t let me inconvenience you with my presence!” Aegon thumps a fist against Cregan’s brawny shoulder and they disappear together, peering down at their phones, faces painted by the white-blue glow of the screens.

“What should I get?” Jace asks Aemond. It sounds like a loaded question.

“Julius Caesar. A usurper.”

Jace winks up at him, arrogant and taunting.

Baela rubs Jace’s bare, ink-adorned chest. “Baby, don’t.”

“I want the Pantheon,” he declares suddenly. “Right here on the back of my right hand. Prime real estate. I won’t be able to do anything without remembering this city, this show.” He turns to Aemond, victorious. “They were filming, you know. They’re going to make it a Netflix special.”

“I’m aware,” Aemond replies, flat, cold.

The tattoo artist is nodding agreeably at Jace. “Si signore, I do the Pantheon all the time. Tourists love to have a picture to take home with them. Nessun problema. You want it on this hand? You are sure? Va bene, place it here on the table. Si, si. I will clean the area and then we will begin.”

Soon the needle of the humming tattoo gun meets the skin: metal, blood, Jace hissing in pain as black lines spring to life across his metacarpals. Baela passes the time by chatting with you. She is clever and kind like Rhaena, but louder, tougher, beautiful yet barbed like a lionfish. She can talk to anyone and never drops her eyes. It amazes you how siblings, built of the same genetic Legos, can grow up to be so different: Baela and Rhaena, Jace and Luke, Aegon and Aemond and Daeron.

When Jace’s tiny Pantheon tattoo is complete and his hand bandaged, he goads you: “Now you’re getting one too, right?”

“Sure,” you say, and you are delighted to see the shock leap into his face.

“What?!” Baela cries.

“You’re joking,” Aemond says uncertainly. “She’s joking.”

“No, I really want one.”

“Get a gladiator!” Daeron bellows, jumping on top of the couch and flexing his muscles like Hercules.

“Get my name on the side of your face like Post Malone,” Jace says. And then, when Baela and Aemond glare at him: “What?!”

“I definitely don’t want that. But I do want something.”

“I will do whatever you like, signora,” the tattoo artist says, changing out needles.

“You’re actually serious?” Aemond asks. And what he means is: You don’t have to do this. It would be reckless. It would be permanent.

“Yeah.” You smile up at him. “I want to remember this little adventure. When I’m back in Kansas City…in a few weeks, or a few months, or whatever…I want to be able to look in the mirror and know that it wasn’t all something I made up. A fantasy, a dream.”

“You should get Comet lyrics,” Luke says excitedly. “Aemond’s lyrics.”

You tap Luke’s notebook: black paper, white gel pen, just like Aemond’s. “Absolutely. Help me choose them.”

Within ten minutes, you’ve settled on a design that Luke has sketched in starlight-colored ink and a location: upper back, equidistant between your shoulder blades, someplace you can easily conceal it when you’re working. It will be a small, minimalist comet—nucleus, coma, and tail—with cursive lyrics from a hidden gem off the band’s most recent album encircling it like the rings of Saturn:

I’ll come back for you if it kills me

Comets clip by again after eons and so can I

Somewhat clumsily, you manage to unzip your dress, shimmy the top part down to around the line of your bra strap, and then lie on your belly across the couch. Baela and Rhaena giggle at the way the men bashfully avert their eyes…all except Aemond. He is speechless, blinking, fascinated. He shakes it off and turns away when he realizes he’s been staring.

“I’m sorry, is this too unprofessional?”

“No, you were perfectly clear,” Daeron says. “You’re a therapist, but not our therapist. So feel free to walk around in just your bra anytime.”

“For real,” Jace adds.

Baela shoos him away: “Go, get us more drinks. Go! Bar! Now!” And Jace reluctantly retreats.

Using Luke’s rough sketch as a reference, the tattoo artist begins working once he’s thoroughly cleaned the area of perfume, shining perspiration, invisible fingerprints, tobacco, other remnants of life’s general untidiness. The pain is bad but not overwhelming, worst when the needle nears your spine. Aemond sits on the floor beside you and observes thoughtfully, sipping a rosy-pink Bramble. Aegon and Cregan wander back into the suite—white powder on their palms, more on their shirts, their pupils dilated and glassy—and are extremely amused by this turn of events. They stay for a while and then are gone again, forever both here and there, comets zooming around their elliptical orbits, Schrodinger’s cats.

“How’s it look?” you ask Aemond as he studies your back. You can’t see anything; you can only feel it.

“The tattoo, or…?”

You laugh and shove him away with your very limited range of motion; then, when you wince at the stinging pain, Aemond grips your hand in his. “I know I’m being pathetic. I know it’s not that bad.” Not compared to what you endured: blunt force trauma, partial blindness, your face stitched back together, your life’s work stolen from you.

“You’re not that pathetic. Louis Tomlinson probably would have cried.”

You laugh again, louder, and the tattoo artist scolds you: “Signora, per favore! Stay as still as you can, I beg you. We are almost done.”

Aemond’s iPhone rings and he glides it out of his pocket with his free hand. His ringtone is Mr. Brightside. “Oh. I should take this.”

“Go ahead,” you tell him. “Go, I’m fine.”

“Who is it?” Criston asks Aemond with curiously intense interest.

“It’s my mom.”

“Does she want to talk to me? To see how the tour is going?”

“No, Criston.”

“Fine,” Criston says testily. “I’m gonna go make sure Aegon isn’t on the roof or something.”

He departs from the crowded suite, momentarily parting the miasma of cigarette and cigar smoke like Moses split the Red Sea. Aemond goes out onto the balcony. Baela and Rhaena take his place next to the couch, fawning over your almost-finished tattoo and showing you their own: Baela has a ring of roses around one ankle, a quote from her grandmother across her ribs, and a compass on her forearm; Rhaena has a tiny L behind one ear for Luke. Even over the buzzing of the tattoo gun, the reverberating music, the chattering of new friends and perfect strangers, and the backdrop of traffic noises outside on the winding streets of Rome, you can hear chaos: yelling, banging, the pounding of sprinting footsteps.

When your tattoo is completed and bandaged, you fix your dress and follow the commotion out into the hallway. Several doors down, you find Criston in Aegon’s suite. He’s standing on top of the mattress and attempting to handcuff Aegon to the bedpost. Aegon, thrashing and yowling and shirtless for some reason, rips away from him.

“Give me your hand!” Criston roars. “Give me your fucking hand! You want to act like Motley Crue, you’re gonna get treated like Motley Crue.” He finally clicks a cuff around Aegon’s left wrist, fastens him to the bed, and then doubles over gasping for air.

You say from the doorway: “This is not what I, personally, would call effective conflict resolution.”

“Oh good, you’re here.” Criston wipes fat beads of sweat from his forehead with the back of one hand. “You talk to him. Meditation, yoga, hypnosis, a lobotomy, read him bedtime stories, get him a shock collar, I don’t care what you do, just give me fifteen minutes of peace. I need a goddamn San Pellegrino.” He stomps out of the room and is gone.

Aegon sighs listlessly. “I’d like to say I don’t deserve this, but I probably do.”

“Hey, Aegon?”

“Yeah?”

“What was up with your salad at lunch today? And the skinless boneless chicken?”

He smirks, an expression you can’t quite read. Nervousness? Cynicism? Shame? “I’ve gained like twenty pounds since last summer.”

“So?”

“So almost none of my tour wardrobe fits.”

“Can you not afford new clothes? Have you snorted that much coke?”

He chuckles, but his large blue eyes are sad, defenseless, watery. “The label doesn’t want a chunky popstar. Girls won’t spend thousands of dollars on tickets to see me anymore.”

“Yes they will. And I would too. In a hypothetical alternate universe where I was rich.”

He smiles, for real this time. “You wanna stay? I still have one hand free.”

“That’s a super tempting offer, but I think I’ll pass.”

He blinks up at you with groggy, drunken realization. “You got your eye on someone else, Stargirl?”

“I didn’t say that.”

He’s grinning, toothy, playful. “You didn’t have to.”

There is a knock against the doorframe. When you spin around, Aemond stands there. “Hey,” he says. “Found you.”

“How’s your mom?”

“Fine. Do you want to see something?”

“…Okay?”

“It’s outside.”

“Oh, no way,” Aegon tells him, still handcuffed to the bed, cackling. “No way is she gonna be down for that.”

“She might be,” Aemond replies evenly.

“You still got a second helmet?”

“Of course.”

“Helmet…?” you venture.

Aemond smiles, nodding towards the hall. “Let’s go.”

Aegon waves goodbye with his free hand. “Good luck, Stargirl. Hope your last will and testament is in order.”

“Like I’d leave you anything.” You set several bottles of water and a box of Nutella snacks on the end table where Aegon can reach them.

“Wait wait wait!” he cries when you are about to depart. “Bring me a trashcan too.”

You are puzzled. “Why?”

“So I can piss in it, obviously.”

“You’re an animal.”

He howls like a wolf, rolling around on the mattress. You supply him with a trashcan, as requested, and then follow Aemond out into the hallway.

“Stargirl?” he asks once the two of you are alone in the elevator and headed down.

“It’s a the Weeknd reference. It’s hard to explain.”

“And you and Aegon are…” Aemond raises an eyebrow, the scarred one, the one that’s cut in two. “Friends?”

“Yeah. Friends.” You’re worried your voice will squeak, but it is traitorously steady. Aemond seems mollified. And is that really such a lie? What would be closer to the truth? Yes, Aemond, your brother and I are friends. But we’re less than that, and we’re also more, because I’ve fucked him but somehow that was the very least of it. He looks at me and I feel understood like a language the rest of humanity has forgotten. I look at him and I see someone who I care for deeply, irrationally, who I could fall in love with in a slightly different world. But that’s not the world we live in. And in this world, the real one, you’re the person I’m falling in love with.

Aemond takes you all the way down to the ground floor and then out front to the entranceway, fountains, cobblestones, taxis, Ubers, stars. He speaks to the valet and within minutes, they ferry it out of the garage for him, growling and puffing like some kind of mythical beast, a dragon or the Minotaur or the Cerberus. The valet lowers the kickstand and then hands the keys over to Aemond.

“What is that?!” you exclaim.

“It’s a 1960 Gold Star, made by the Birmingham Small Arms Company.”

“Alabama?”

He is amused. “No, the English Birmingham. The original one.”

“Oh. Right.” The valet brings two helmets and two jackets. “You travel with a motorcycle?”

“It fits on the jet,” Aemond replies casually.

“You are so freaking pretentious.”

Aemond offers you a helmet and jacket, and he’s trying to keep the fear from his face but it’s there, because he keeps waiting for the spell to break, for the illusion of who he thinks you are to shatter like glass and reveal that all along you’ve been disgusted by him too, that you misunderstand or patronize or pity him. He surveys you with two eyes, one wary and clear and searching, the other a cloudy planet of misty blue like Neptune. And he waits for you to ask one of those fateful questions—Can you really drive this? Is it safe? Can you see well enough? Can I trust you?—and look at him with bleak, sympathetic skepticism.

Instead, you look at the motorcycle. There are extra mirrors on the left side, you notice, capturing angles that he would otherwise miss. He doesn’t need to be reminded of his maiming. He couldn’t forget it for a second. You don the helmet and jacket and say: “Are those leather seats, Mr. Vegan?”

He beams and straddles the motorcycle. “Shut up and get on the bike.”

You climb on behind Aemond, your arms around his waist, your lungs capturing pieces of him to absorb into your bloodstream: smoke, cologne, hair gel, gin, molecules that become your own. He starts the engine, flicks on the headlight, and steers his Gold Star out into the late-night traffic.

You fly through a nightscape of car horns and streetlights and babbling tourists clustered together on the sidewalks like prey animals, ancient landmarks whirling by like comets: the Piazza Navona, the Trevi Fountain, the Arch of Constantine, the Pantheon that Jace now has inked irrevocably to his flesh. The sky is freckled with constellations you couldn’t name. The moon is full and brilliant. There is a black limo cruising nearby full of hooting, half-naked frat boys and blaring Coldplay’s Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall. At stop signs and red lights, Aemond reaches down to rest a palm lightly on your bare thigh, just an inch or two above the knee—his wrist brushing against the black lace of your dress—but enough to pillage your mind of anything else, enough to rip the door to your skull off its hinges and build a home there in the web of neurons and flashbulb surges of electricity that we call memory, emotion, instinct, desire. When you close your eyes as the wind rushes by, you can imagine that you’ve always known Aemond and that you always will. When you press yourself against him as hard as you dare to, you can feel everything else dissolving away: pasts, futures, doubts, every other person on this planet, scars that mar the soul with jagged rifts and knots as red as blood.

In the abandoned, golden halls of the Anantara Palazzo Naiadi Rome Hotel, Aemond walks you back to your suite. His hands are in his pockets, his head down, his steps swift. He doesn’t speak. Neither do you. Your thoughts are deafeningly loud with clattering impossibilities: Me? Aemond? Lust? Love?

You arrive at your door, swipe your keycard, and open it. You stand at the threshold, but you don’t vanish inside. You don’t want to be apart from him. You gaze up at him, dazed with longing, resting your head against the doorframe, fresh ink burning between your shoulder blades.

“Hey, Aemond?”

“Yeah?”

“I wouldn’t fuck you out of pity.”

There’s satisfaction on his face, there’s pride, there’s hunger, but there’s trepidation too. He hesitates in the doorway. “Look, I, uh…” He sighs, resigned, perhaps warring with himself. “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Okay.” But he doesn’t leave.

“Are you lost? Need a map back to your room? I can try to draw one for you. We could get one tattooed on the back of your hand.”

He laughs, marveling at you. “No, I’m good. Thanks.” He makes it halfway down the hall, glances back, shakes his head to himself, keeps walking until he’s disappeared.

You shut the door and say to your empty suite: “I don’t even like him that much.”

But I do. I do, I do, I do.

“Oh no,” you moan, covering your face with both hands. But you can’t stop smiling.

You take a shower, pull on an oversized Backstreet Boys t-shirt and your favorite Cookie Monster pajama pants, then crawl into your hotel bed: scratchy comforter, a mattress that’s too firm, pillows that are too squishy. You turn on your laptop, open YouTube, and start searching for Comet Donati performances before Aemond left the band, scenes from a different lifetime under the same stars.

#aemond x you #aemond x y/n #aemond targaryen x reader #aemond targaryen #aemond one eye #aegon x reader #aegon ii #aegon targaryen ii #aegon ii targaryen #aegon targaryen

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theboywithburninghands · 1 year ago

Text

Hello yes hi I’m not dead. Sorry, I got tangled up in playing Kingdom Hearts III and my birthday along with the usual mental struggles… But I got a new story. It’s longer than the others, and it also dabbles in another ship that I’m quite fond of along with Funnybunny. I enjoy Buttonblossom as well, I’ve always been of the opinion Pomni is bisexual. Not me projecting… anyway, this one is a little bit more dramatic. But I like it, even if it’s got a ton of ellipses, but it’s also got a big snake in it. Big snakes are cool. Enjoy, hopefully.

Jealousy, Thy Name is Rabbit

Today was a game of capture the flag set in a virtual jungle, girls against boys (boys and Zooble, just so it was 3 on 3). On the girl’s side, Ragatha was elected flag guard on account of being the tallest and widest, not that she had much in the way of competition from either of her teammates. Pomni and Gangle were the scouts sent to find the boys’ (And Zooble’s) flag. Pomni had spent the last half hour on all fours, clambering through some cartoony underbrush. The various brambles may have been gaudy shades of orange and purple, but their thorns still hurt to climb through. Caine really needed to focus less on hazards and more on… well, fun.

Pomni: OW! F@&$! *Pomni covers her right eye as a stick jabs into it* Urgh… Gangle? Where are you?

Pomni poked her head cautiously out of the canopy of plants. Her teammate was nowhere to be found. Had they already gotten separated?

Pomni: Peachy…

Pomni ducked back down into the underbrush and continued to crawl forward as best she could. Her coxcomb hat kept getting tangled in the briars, and leaves and bits of twig stuck to her hair. Caine had even gone to the effort of including irritating little bugs the size of pinpricks that crawled on her face and buzzed in her ear, which she routinely had to stop and swat. Thank god she had no nose or one of them definitely would have crawled up it by now. She peeked out from the underbrush again, spotting a small clearing up ahead. It looked like it could be the entrance to the enemy base. If she crawled, she could get there in about 10 minutes. Then it was a matter of getting past whoever they had guarding it, then getting back to her base and ending the game so they could go home. Apparently there was some sort of reward for whatever team won the round… Knowing Caine it would probably suck hard.

Pomni took a deep breath and dove back into the brush. If Jax was the flag guard, maybe she could convince him to give up the flag peacefully in exchange for some extra “alone time” that night. It was surreal to think that she had gone from hating the rabbit’s guts to him being one of her closest friends… just friends. Just friends that kissed and hugged and cuddled. Friends could do that. It had been Jax’s idea to not use any words like “relationship” or “romance” or “love” to describe what… whatever they had going on, in case of disaster. And they were both free to have “alone time” with other performers… at least that’s what she assumed. Not like Jax was close with anyone else.

Pomni came to a large, fallen tree, black and flecked with neon colors. There was no way around it without adding several minutes to her already onerous trek, so she rolled her eyes, stretched, and began to clamber over the tree. The trunk was oddly squishy, it must have gotten soft from the moisture of the jungle floor. That was a pretty impressive detail for Caine to add… As she slid over to the opposite side, her bare legs touched the trunk. The texture was odd as well, smooth and oddly bumpy… no… scaly?

hhhhhhhhssssssssssccchhhhh…

Pomni: Oh sweet f$&@.

The “tree” slid forward on its own, a good twenty feet of shiny, technicolor-on-obsidian mass emerging from the underbrush, a stone’s throw from where Pomni was just crawling. The snake turned its refrigerator-sized head to look at Pomni. Its fishbowl eyes were different colors, each appearing to slowly change hues, its left eye yellow shifting green and its right eye purple shifting brown. It flicked out its tongue, pink with electric blue stripes and thick as Bubble Tape.

Pomni: Nonononononono-

Pomni took off running towards the clearing, but found herself hopelessly slowed down by the overgrown floor of the jungle, brambles snagging her legs and tripping her to her knees every few steps. The giant snake slithered up beside her before lazily, yet gracefully gliding in front of her and cutting her off, forming a loop around her with its body.

Pomni: -nonononononoNONONO! NO! NO! NONONONO!

Pomni tried to climb over the snake as it began to pull right around her, but only succeeded in sticking one arm out before the rest of her puny body was squeezed into immobility by the black rainbow serpent. She was so small that the snake barely needed to wrap around her once before she was trapped.

Pomni: NOOOOOOOO! NOOOOOOOO!!!

Pomni screamed blue murder. The panic of being cornered by a large predator and her phobia of being touched formed a cocktail of primal terror she hadn’t experienced since first arriving at the circus. She shrieked and pounded on the snake’s body with her one free hand, even trying to bite into its flesh, anything to get it to stop squeezing and let go. The snake’s scales were far too hard to bite through, even chipping one of her teeth, and the reptile continued to squeeze tighter and tighter and tighter. Pomni felt her body begin to flare with pain as it was constricted to its limit… if she still had bones they probably would have been crushed into splinters by now. She didn’t even have enough room left to scream, only managing a choked rasp…

And then there was a reverberating crack.

Voice: Let her go! I said let her go!

Another smack against the snake, and it hissed irritatedly this time. Pomni saw a faint purple and red outline out of the corner of her watery eyes, coming into clearer view as it strafed around the serpent.

Ragatha: Y-You want to lose an eye, Jafar?! Let her go, I said!

Ragatha had a sturdy tree branch in her hands, twigs sticking out of her hair and her dress stained with dirt. She took on the stance of a major league player and swung her makeshift bat with all her strength, cracking the snake on the chin. The reptile hissed, revealing fangs of all colors, and struck at Ragatha, who managed to stumble out of the way with a hair’s breadth between her arms and the snake’s teeth. Ragatha put one hand at the top of her branch and the other in the middle and wound back.

Ragatha: I’m sorry-!

Ragatha drove the branch into the snake’s right eye, and it snarled, thrashing about in pain. Its coils loosened enough for Pomni to squirm free, landing on the jungle floor with a dry plop and scrambling backwards. The snake threw its head about a few more times before hastily slithering away into the jungle, frustrated but trounced.

Ragatha: Yeah! Get out of here! I’m sorry, but get out of here! *much quieter* I’m sorry… *she stiffens* Pomni! *She looks about before finding Pomni seated on the ground, and she hurries over to her* Pomni, hun- are you okay?!

Ragatha crouched down to Pomni’s level and looked her over. The jester was breathing rapid, shallow breaths, her usual red and blue roulette eyes replaced with black squiggles.

Ragatha: Pomni…! *she puts her hand on Pomni’s shoulder, but the jester reacts like she’s been shocked and slaps her hand away*

Pomni: NO!

Ragatha: Woah heyheyhey! Pomni, it’s me, it’s Ragatha! It’s gone, the snake is gone! You’re safe..!

Pomni: Do-Do-Dooo-Don’t touch me, don’t… don’t touch me…

Ragatha: Okay sweetie, I won’t touch you, but are you hurt? Did it bite you?

Pomni: N…..No….

Pomni’s eyes, though now back to their usual colors, soon swam with tears and she buried her face in her gloves, beginning to sob. Ragatha, resisting the urge to hug the poor girl, took a moment to check on herself.

Ragatha: *examining her arm* Ohhh, I must’ve popped half my stitches… I hope I don’t lose any stuffing… *she turns back to Pomni* I can’t imagine how scary that must have been for you… are you afraid of snakes?

Pomni: *in between sobs N-N-No… I… I uh… I… I don’t… I-I-I-I-I-

Ragatha: Hey… hey… match my breathing. Are you ready? In. *Ragatha takes a long, deep breath in* Out, like you’re blowing on a dandelion. *she lets her breath out.* Not too hard, right? Try it with me.

Pomni managed to slow down her sobs long enough to match Ragatha’s breathing exercise. It didn’t make her feel any better, but it at least helped her get her words out

Pomni: Thank you… *sniffle* You-You… I’m sorry I didn’t… save you…

Ragatha: Save me?

Pomni: On my first day… w-when Kaufmo…

Ragatha: *smiles* Oh, hun. It’s okay. It was your first day. I would have done the exact same thing in your shoes.

Pomni’s eyes welled up with new tears.

Pomni: I-I’m sorry… I was so… I didn’t… I didn’t deserve to get… saved…

Ragatha: Nooo, no, Pomni, don’t say that! We’re all we’ve got… I wouldn’t let you or anyone else get eaten, okay..?

Ragatha placed a hand on Pomni’s shoulder unconsciously, and the jester girl flinched.

Ragatha: Oh shoot, I’m sorry! *she takes her hand away* I forgot-!

Pomni: …N-No… if it’s just… I-I calmed down… I can… handle it… I-I just I wasn’t… I wasn’t expecting it, I… I… I’m sorry…

Ragatha: …Can you handle a hug? It’s okay if you can’t, but- OOF!l

Pomni threw herself into Ragatha, wrapping her arms around the ragdoll woman and hiding her face in her chest. Ragatha smiled and hugged the newcomer back, rubbing the back of her head.

Ragatha: Don’t worry now…

They remained like that for a while. Pomni had never actually touched Ragatha before, and it was… odd, but pleasant. She felt much the same as a cloth doll, dense and tightly-knit fabric wrapped around a soft filling like cotton or polyester. But she was unmistakably warm, the same way Jax was. Although Pomni still felt sick with fear, the sensation of a friend holding her helped ease the churning in her belly.

Pomni: …Thank you, Ragatha.

Ragatha: What are friends for, right…?

The two performers locked eyes. Both of them became acutely aware of a not-unpleasant heat glowing on their cheeks. Ragatha broke the pregnant silence by chuckling nervously.

Ragatha: Hahaha… soooo…

Caine: CON-GRATULATIONS TO TEAM ZOOBLE!

Out of nowhere, Caine exploded onto the scene, a neon-marquee sign emerging above him that wanted to spell out “congratulations” but appeared to malfunction and sputter, spelling out “crodulates” instead.

Ragatha: Oh no, the flag… I completely forgot!

Pomni: *automatically* Who gives a s#%@…

Caine: THAT’S RIGHT, RAGATHA! WHILE YOU WERE OUT HERE, JAX ESCAPED WITH THE FLAG YOU WEREN’T GUARDING! AND POMNI! *he points his cane at her, causing the jester to flinch* CONGRATULATIONS TO YOU FOR FINDING ALGER, THE RAINBOA CONSTRICTOR! I was wondering where he went…

Pomni: It has a name…?!

Ragatha: Uh yeah, Caine, about that snake-

Caine snapped his fingers, and all of a sudden, the six performers were back in the tent. Zooble, Jax and Kinger looked about the same despite some odd leaves and sticks stuck to their clothes. Gangle landed with a wet slap beside Pomni and Ragatha, groaning and dripping wet.

Ragatha: Gangle, there you are… where’ve you been?

Gangle: I-I fell in the river and got washed downstream…

Caine: SO, FOR WINNING THE GAME, TEAM ZOOBLE WINS…!

There was a drumroll that went on for far too long. Pomni made eye contact with Jax, but neither of them smiled. She was still getting over the encounter with the Rainboa Constrictor… but what was wrong with him?

Caine: ……………AN ALL DAY PASS TO THE DIGITAL AMUSEMENT PARK!

Zooble: Yippee-skippee. Not like we haven’t gotten that prize at least three times before. Can I go now?

Ragatha: Yeah, Caine, I ripped some stitches, can I go back to my room…?

Pomni: *to Ragatha* Are you okay?

Jax: Oh yeah, I’m sure she’s fine. You got a pretty close look back in the jungle, didn’t you?

Jax’s usual brand of sarcasm came out as oddly venomous, not even sporting his typical snarky grin.

Pomni: What are you talking about..?

Jax: I don’t know. You tell me. Anyway, f@&$ you all. I’m going back to my room.

Jax walked away from the group, stunning even Caine into silence. Jax almost never swore.

Caine: Boy, you give a guy a pass to an amusement park and he thanks you like that.

Bubble emerged from Caine’s hat with a toilet brush

Bubble: We should wash his mouth out, Caine!

Zooble: Whatever, dinner without Jax sounds good to me.

Gangle: Uh… h-has anyone seen Pomni..?

—————————

Pomni marched down the hallway to Jax’s room, pounding on his door.

Pomni: Jax! Open up!

Silence.

Pomni: …Oh for… *deep breath, gentler tone of voice* Jax, it’s Pomni. Can we talk?

Silence.

Pomni: …You’re going to make me say it, aren’t you? Fine. “Oh great Jax, may I please enter your…” *cringes* “…your humble abode.” Eugh… *she glances around to make sure nobody heard that*

Still more silence.

Pomni: Okay, he must be somewhere else if he’s not responding to that…

A voice came from behind the door

Jax: It’s unlocked.

Pomni: Oh. Then why the h@&$ am I knocking? *she opens the door* Jax! What was… that…

Pomni’s anger trailed off as she saw Jax laying in bed, covers pulled all the way up to his chin. He faced away from Pomni, looking at nothing in particular.

Jax: Come on in.

Pomni: …What… Why did you blow up like that back there?

Jax: You really don’t know?

Pomni: No..?

Jax: …That’s fine. I guess I’m being the irrational one.

Pomni: Yeah, you are. I was attacked by a snake… A huge f@&$-off snake that almost squeezed me to death!

Jax: What?

Pomni: Oh, did you miss that part?! Lemme say it again. *shouting* A! BIG! SNAKE! NEARLY!-

Jax: *shouting right back* ALRIGHT! I DIDN’T KNOW ABOUT THAT, BUT- I saw you with Ragatha.

Pomni: *genuine confusion* What?!

Jax: In the jungle, stupid! I saw you and Ragatha!

Pomni: …She saved me from the snake. You heard Caine talking about it… she saved me!

Jax: …You were blushing.

Pomni: Who cares?! I- wait you were watching us for that long?

Jax: You were right outside our base.

Pomni: …Oh my god. You’re jealous.

Jax: What..?

Pomni: You’re jealous! You thought me and Ragatha were- OH MY GOD.

Pomni laughed incredulously, which made Jax shoot up in bed like a snapped wire.

Jax: Don’t you laugh at me!!!

Pomni: I’m not-! I never thought you’d take it seriously!

Jax: What, my first relationship?! Yeah, I can see how that would be HARD to take seriously?!

Pomni: What are you- wait. I’m your first?

Jax: …

There was a long period of silence before Pomni swallowed.

Pomni: Well… look, you said you didn’t want a relationship, so… I mean… I didn’t mean to make you mad, but I was attacked. So I’m not going to apologize for hugging Ragatha… she helped me.

Jax: Okay.

Pomni: …Um. But… it’s… it’s okay. To be mad… I guess? I don’t know. I guess you thought I was cheating…? Right?

Jax: I guess.

Pomni: Well, I wasn’t.

Jax: You were blushing, though.

Pomni: Yeah, so what? She’s… *swallows and turns slightly pink despite herself* She’s pretty. For a ragdoll. It doesn’t mean you’re any less… nice to be around. Or look at. For a rabbit.

Jax: …What are you, gay?

Pomni’s words caught in her throat as she looked at Jax, who had finally managed his usual toothy smirk.

Pomni: *small snort* God, shut up…

Jax: …I’m sorry though. I didn’t know about the snake.

Pomni: You didn’t hear me scream?

Jax: You scream a lot.

Pomni: …Yeah. I guess so. So… this is more than just a… “friends who kiss” thing, now? It’s a…

Jax: Nah. We’re still just “friends that kiss.” But if you want to go be “friends that kiss” with Ragatha… at least tell me before you do, okay?

Pomni: I will. I’m sorry.

Jax: Relax. You didn’t do anything. Apart from almost being snake food. …Do… you want a hug? Or something?

Pomni: …Uh… honestly, not really? I-I’m kinda iffy on being touched anyway and the snake squeezing me like that… it really screwed with me. But uh…

Pomni closed the distance between them and planted a kiss on Jax’s lips, having to lean on his knees and stand on her tiptoes to reach the lankier rabbit’s face.

Pomni: *blushing* It’s really sweet to know you take this seriously. I’ll see you later, okay..?

Pomni headed back to her room, shutting Jax’s door behind her. The rabbit licked his lips. He then laid back down on the bed, staring at the door.

Jax: You hugged Ragatha.

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#funnybunny #jax x pomni #tadc #tadc jax #tadc pomni #the amazing digital circus #oh no cringe #tadc ragatha #pomni x ragatha #buttonblossom #bisexual #tadc gangle #tadc zooble #tadc caine #tadc bubble

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mynamesaplant · 2 years ago

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When Worlds Collide

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Preface: 100% honest up front, I'm not a huge fan of Star Wars anymore. I enjoy it from time to time, I loved it when I was younger, but I just don't have the same spark for it anymore. However, I put that aside, listened to like five different 20-hour audiobooks to get myself into the Star Wars headspace, and got writing. Also, sososososoooooo many tabs for Wookieepedia open on my computer… Jedi is not my OC and, tried as I might, I just couldn't find much info on him on Blue's socials. I dug through Twitter as best I could, trolled through all the associated Tumblr blogs, and tried to get on other socials to find more while still being stealthy about a secret holiday gift. So, to you Blue, I apologize if Jedi is OOC, I swear I really did try to find something about him and did use your Star Wars blogs, but I couldn't find written content about him so I could write this fic. I will admit that I know the timeline for Jedi is off solely for the fact that you mentioned somewhere that Jedi has Anakin's lightsaber (which in all honesty, I thought Luke had), but I wasn't sure when anything was taking place. I am also notoriously bad about reading fics. Unless its an audiobook, I just find it hard to sit and read, but I took the time to read ABYS to try and get a sense of how Blue writes Emmet and Ingo. I doubt I nailed it. I'm not the best at emulating the styles of others - but I wrote this with a lot of good intentions and as much research as I could muster between school, work, and my life. If you celebrate any holidays around this time of year @ingo-ingoing-ingone, enjoy them, and if you don't, I hope this will be a nice gift nonetheless.

Don't want to read it here? Read it here on AO3.

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Summary: Coruscant still has trains? Yes, for a variety of reasons, it still does. Is it the most efficient means of travel? No, not always, but you certainly meet a lot of different characters on the train.

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Blending in was not exactly Jedi’s style – not when he towered over others. There was a lot about Jedi that stuck out like a sore thumb, but oddly he was right at home in the Uscru District on Coruscant. It was all eccentric outfits and bright lights; his feathers and glowing cyan markings didn’t stick out nearly as much in the loud atmosphere. Even if he was not home amongst the bars and clubs, even if there were dangerous beings to be found lurking around the district, Jedi did not mind. He could see the harmony in the chaos in this place.

His night in this hazy technicolor dream was at its end. He didn’t go to Uscru for leisure, he merely enjoyed roaming the high walkways that overlooked the endless city. Through his observations, he realized it was not too unlike a jungle, and he had always preferred seeing the jungle from the canopy. That was why he enjoyed his short time among the Wookies on Kashyyyk prior to his escort mission for an ambassador on their council.

Jedi was to guard the Wookie Ambassador Drrlysh as they traversed the Great Kashyyyk Branch to Umbara and on the planet’s surface. The Umbarans wanted a neutral party involved – meaning they didn’t want more Wookies than necessary on their planet. Once there, talks would begin about trading wroshite, the hard dark gray crystals woven between the roots of wroshyr, for doonium, one of the hardest metals in the known galaxy. He had been told the details at one point about what the metal was to be used for by the Wookies, perhaps for particularly durable bowcasters but the exact reason escaped him now. Both were hearty materials, and Mee Deechi found a particular interest in the wroshite, which was the only way he was willing to trade Umbaran doonium.

Jedi had spent the days leading up to his mission among the people of Kashyyk, climbing just as nimbly as the planet’s native inhabitants and perching in the tops of the towering conifers, staring into the mist shrouding the surrounds like a thick blanket made of wampa pelts. It was a scene that had been achingly familiar- but also alien to the Jedi. So much like home and yet not. He would return to his quarters each night and meditate on that feeling, reaching out through the Force to find an inner peace he worked to maintain.

It was not always easy, mental disciple was always more of a challenge than physical in some regards – especially for his species. However, Jedi prided himself in his training, allowing the Force to flow through him, not for feats of physical prowess, but for contemplative moments that required him flex his mind and soul like they were the lithe musculature that made him such a formidable opponent.

Although his phosphorescent gleam from his stripes grew all the brighter on the dark station platform, Jedi waited for the transport line that would deliver him to the temple in relative peace. A few giggling Czerialan on the opposite side of the platform, holding each other up despite the acute lean. Their diaphanous gowns reeked with the pungent smell of ale, wafting off them in waves which was enough to make Jedi’s acute nose twitch with distaste. Three meters to his left a Volpai and Morseerian were holding a heated debate over a game of Pazaak that the latter insisted their companion had lost their credits to. The Volpai was very clearly intoxicated, belligerent in their belief that it had been the Morseerian who had lost them.

Jedi’s ear flicked toward their voices, the four-armed Volpai slurring their words to their shorter companion, the Morseerian’s icy responses were accompanied by the mechanical hisses and clicks of the ventilator obscuring their face. Although there was clearly some aggravation at their combined loss, he felt no imminent reason to intervene. Nothing indicated that it would come to an exchange of blows or blasters, quite possibly thanks to the prominently displayed lightsaber which Jedi had subtly brought to the duos’ attention when he hissed with a feigned frustration and began to rummage with the pack slung around his torso.

When they quieted, Jedi’s attention returned to in front of him just as the transport rolled in – which was odd in and of itself as not many vehicles rolled on Coruscant. This one was a remnant of earlier times in the Republic. It linked major locations like the Jedi Temple, the Senate Building, the Galactic Museum, and the University of Coruscant that had been on the planet for generations. As the metropolis grew, swallowing up the planet in its entirety, all its outmoded infrastructure came under scrutiny, but the rail lines were kept for various reasons.

Some of the local politicians thought it would be good for the tourist, others thought they could be repurposed for moving supplies, and still others fought for the trains to keep the exactly purpose they were built for, a cheap and efficient way to move the near trillion residents of Coruscant.

Since hovering vehicles clogged the sky and Jedi found that many of the Coruscanti incapable of driving without distraction, this was his preferred mode of transportation. The hypnotic effect of the lights blurring into a simmering rainbow beyond the train’s windows was beautiful and very few people took the trains in the evening. Jedi crossed the platform in a few short strides when the cool automated voice announced for new passengers to board, ducking his head with the feathered crest atop it flattened in anticipation for the ride.

Settling in for his long ride through the canyonlike levels of the planet to return to the temple, Jedi allowed his gaze to become unfocused and the extraneous noises of his fellow passengers to fall into the background. Breath in… Breath out… Use this time to extend his mind and exercise his other senses. What was it that Master Yoda was always telling the padawans and younglings? Concentrate and-

“ALL ABOARD!”

Well, it was hard to concentrate when he had hypersensitive ears attuned to the minute sounds of light footfall in the underbrush. Jedi jolted in his seat, his auditory sense assaulted by two overlapping voices. The call made his ears ring unpleasantly and the flexible cartilage twisted backward and pressed flat against his head, his feathered crest puffing up in response and his pupils shriveling to the thinnest sliver. He took a deep breath, the ruffled plumage settling back. The words were still echoing off the walls as a figure nearly as tall as him strode the length of the platform, scanning for stragglers, which they kindly held the doors for, before entering the car. Four gray eyes taking count of the passengers inside and two mouths, one smiling and one frowning, relaying different information as they moved through the wide aisles.

“Please have your tickets! Tickets!”

“Yep! Tickets out please!”

It was not unusual to see an alien species with multiples of any limb really. There was so much diversity to be had in the galaxy, but Jedi had never seen a human that looked quite like this before. Two torsos erupting from the hips. Two heads. Four arms. Four eyes. Very clearly human though.

He broke his stare, recognizing that it would be rude, and fumbled in his pack for the data pad that contained his ticket information. There was an agreement between the government of Coruscant and the Jedi Council that all who trained at the temple received free passage on all public transport on the planet in exchange for protection that the presence of the Jedi provided simply by being present there at all.

“Thank you!”

The one in black on the right said, pressing a scanner to the data pad and removing it when it beeped. Jedi nodded, cocking his head with curiosity, which seemed to catch the attention of the humans.

“Is something wrong?”

The one in white on the left asked, mimicking Jedi’s motion unintentionally. He shook his head.

“I take this transport often and I have never seen you before. That is all.”

Basic had always presented a little trouble to him. It was often pointed out to Jedi that his speech was heavily accented, some of the grammar and syntax a little off from time to time. He had learned to speak Basic slowly for the sake of others on Coruscant just to avoid the reaction of polite annoyance - the rolling eyes when his gaze shifted, and they thought he didn’t see. Didn’t they understand that it was just as tedious as it was for him as it was for them? He at least bothered to try Basic for their sake, he was rarely offered the same courtesy. Around the temple, everyone seemed indifferent to his less than perfect Basic, taking most of his conversational cues from his expression rather than speech.

“Ah, that is because we were new to this route and shift! A last-minute schedule change that we are perfectly happy to cover for a fellow conductor who has fallen ill. A rather nasty case of Knytix Pox on a trip to Thyferra.”

“Yep. Covering a shift. Those pox are verrrrry contagious.”

Jedi replied with a wordless nod, looking them over with a casual eye and listening with a polite half-smile. Their clothes were what caught his notice. Tailored with extreme care and consideration for their condition. He admired the coats idly while stowing away the pad, only to find them still standing before him with looks of equal part curiosity and awe on their faces.

“Is something wrong?” “No – We’ve just never had the honor of running into a Jedi before. That is all.” Jedi blinked but beyond that did not permit his confusion to show. His lightsaber was out of sight, how had they – The man in black raised left hand as if to stop Jedi even before he said a word. “We overheard the gentlemen over there mumbling something about a lightsaber and looking your way.” “Mhm,” the white one hummed, grin widening into something bordering on mischievous, “They seemed concerned.”

“I see. I did not mean to cause a problem.”

Jedi trailed off, his ears twisting on top of his head as if to hone into the hushed conversation that the two aliens across the car seemed to be having about him, before falling silent when they were caught giving him furtive glimpses, and his glowing eyes connected with theirs with a hint of withering distain.

“You have not caused any problems at all! My brother and I are relatively new to Coruscant, there are not many Jedi roaming around Unova. We just moved from the mid-rim at the request of our employer.”

Jedi’s eyes returned to the humans in front of them with another faint smile. He liked their combined enthusiasm for their work.

“Cor-Union, right?”

“Yep! We worked on the trains in Nimbasa City.”

Jedi had never heard of Unova before, but there were countless planets in the mid-trim, far too numerous to be familiar with each and every one of them. He tilts his head, still offering them a cat-like smile – he considers asking about it simply because their enthusiasm is infectious, but he did not wish to interrupt their work.

“I wish you luck here on Coruscant. It can be quite the adjustment for some.” “Ah, yes. Our friend Elesa said the same thing!”

Jedi was delighted to see the man in black mirror his own expression. It was not quite a smile because it didn’t seem as though the man could smile – a sort of paralysis? – but it was the same smile that Jedi could manage that didn’t involve teeth. Others usually found his maw of teeth quite frightening. The humans’ gray eyes crinkled fondly with the mention of their friend, the man in white bearing a similar tenderness at the name.

They bid farewell with a synchronized tip of their hats and made their way down the car, asking for tickets to scan. Jedi would have just returned to watching the scenery, but one of the Czerialan – the one that smelt most heavily of alcohol from what his nose told him – decided that, instead of producing her ticket, she asked with a shrill cackle,

“What’re you? Half Troig or something?”

She clearly thought she was being hilarious, only strengthened by the fact that her companions also laughed.

“No.”

The one in white hissed, his smile not betraying just how he felt about the situation, but his tone was.

“Ticket, please.”

The other man said, whatever warmth in his voice from his conversation with Jedi turning ice cold and jagged with impatience that bordered on snarl. This was something they clearly were asked a lot, and something, Jedi had to suspect, that became more tedious to answer over time. He did not always understand humans, many of the knights or members of the High Council were human, like Masters Windu, and Kenobi – but human Jedi were not like other humans. Not all humans could tap into the Force, so what little reference that he had also intersected with something they were all intimately aware of and felt on a cellular level.

These men looked different than most humans, in some regards, as the Czerialan woman had said, they looked a lot like the Pollillus natives. Not the exact same orientation, but that hardly mattered to the intoxicated mind. They had just told him that they were from Unova. They clearly didn’t act, look, or speak like Troig would, so this woman seemed to be asking out of cruelty or at the very least insincerity.

It was easy to pick on outsiders.

Jedi knew that.

And he promised himself a long time ago that he would come to the aid of those experiencing such cruelties. The Jedi Order was supposed to protect and serve the people of the republic and the galaxy at large, but these were macro problems. There were many little problems in the galaxy. So much suffering and screaming that his satellite dish ears were able to pick up – All of it he just wanted to solve!

Master Yoda always warned about allowing emotion to override all else. Emotions were not inherently a good or bad thing, but they were delicate and could lead to irreversible consequences. Master Fisto, although distant with the younglings and padawans, had spoken to Jedi at length when he noticed how he teetered between his principles and the adherence to the code all the order were meant to follow.

When Jedi was offered private training with the Jedi Master, he jumped on the opportunity. Kit Fisto was a superior swordman within the order, some even rumored that he rivaled that of Master Yoda in terms of technical proficiency. The training was invigorating and exhausting all at the same time. It was not only training with the blade and of the body, but also of the mind and the Force.

“Injustice is injustice, no matter the size of the conflict – we can all acknowledge that. It is admirable how passionately you feel about these injustices and to what lengths you will go to aid those who face them.”

Jedi barely had time to parry the blazing green blade of Master Fisto, the heat of the plasma from the kyber-crystal nearly singeing his white fur and uncomfortably radiating up the metal that was his right arm. In this moment of distraction, his body was pushed back, his own lightsaber was knocked from his paws, and he landed flat on his back. Utterly defenseless even with his own natural weapons at his disposal.

“Emotion is a wonderful thing, but it can cloud the mind. It can interfere with your connection to the Force and leaves room for the Dark side to seize hold. Never stop your crusade of justice, young one. Let that fire inside you burn hot and bright, but never allow it to overwhelm and strip all else away… Do you understand?”

At the time, Jedi could not say he understood Master Fisto in his entirety, but he did now. Take control of those emotions, use them for good, and do not let them get out of control. Be passionate but balance it with perspective and reason. That was why he was told to discipline his mind.

Jedi took a slow breath through his nose; he did not think it was appropriate for him to step on their toes in this situation. Some people didn’t like the Jedi butting into their business, so he watched and waited for the appropriate moment where he might have to step in. The Czerialans continued to laugh, their tickets not out, and digging into the two conductors mercilessly with questions that would make anyone uncomfortable. It appeared as though the two men were attempting to ignore the questions, the one in black loudly exclaiming for their tickets over and over again only to be blatantly ignored.

“I am Emmet. You will have to get off.”

“He is right. If you have no valid tickets, we must ask you to get off at the next station or have a security droid remove you. Now, tickets, please.”

Jedi’s ears pinned back. How unfortunate that unruly and rude people were making their jobs so much harder. Soundlessly, he rose to his feet and approached the group, watching as, one-by-one, the Czerialans fell silent. He stood to his full height, his fur and crest fluffed out in a not-so-subtle intimidation tactic. A threat with no words.

“My apologies,” he managed to say in his silkiest Basic, “is there a problem, conductors?”

The two men shot him quick looks out of the corner of their eyes, Jedi noticed their eyes glowed like his. A wordless exchange passed between the three of them in the space of a heartbeat. Jedi recognized it as thanks for stepping in on their behalf as a sort of moderator before things had to get ugly.

“These passengers will not produce their tickets.”

The one in black said, his gaze moving back to the group of women seated before them.

“No ticket, no passage.”

Jedi nodded at the one who referred to himself as ‘Emmet,’ before addressing the Czerialan.

“Do you have tickets?” “Y-Yes!”

One of them squeaked, the ringleader, shrinking in her seat when all Jedi did was offer another nod and said coolly,

“Give the conductors your tickets, please.”

A moment later, the tickets were out and promptly scanned. Jedi returned to his seat without another word and the conductors took their leave toward the head of the train, only offering a silent double tip of their hats to him before the car door closed behind them.

It was about an hour later and the train was only a few stops away from the temple. He was alone in the car, all the other passengers having disembarked long ago, and Jedi was staring past his reflection to the skyline. The sky would have been a velvety black had it not been for the light pollution. The fused urban areas and megalopolises that made up the whole of Coruscant did not offer much of a view of its nighttime sky, just the bellies of looming ships that hung above the planet. The closest facsimile to stars and comets that the Coruscant natives ever saw were the twinkling flashes from orbiting satellites and the red and white streaks of landing lights through the air.

His mind was fuzzed out by the steady rhythm of the train gliding over the tracks, clacking with the same consistency of a metronome. It was mesmerizing. Listening to sounds from inside of the snaking metal beast, Jedi had the luxury to just allow his muscles to relax one by one and all his thoughts go quiet.

The car door opened, and his silence was instantly shattered.

“Master Jedi!”

His ears, already twisted to the new sound, flattened against his head and he inadvertently gnashed his teeth. Jedi knew they did not mean any harm, but conductor in black was so loud.

“The temple is the next stop.”

The one in white, Emmet, he had called himself, informed him with a pleasant smile. Jedi nodded acknowledgment.

“I am not a master but thank you for letting me know about my stop.”

He was quite aware his stop was fast approaching, but it was part of their job to make the passengers aware as they had done with the previous passengers in the car. He rose to his feet, expecting them to head back the way they came, but they remained where they were, looking a bit sheepish as they shifted on their joint feet. Jedi’s brow rose in question, waiting for them to volunteer, and Emmet cleared his throat,

“Thank you.”

“Yes, we wanted to thank you for intervening. The transition to Coruscant – ah…. It has its upsides and downsides. Most cannot wrap their head around our condition. Cor-Union usually keeps us on the dayshift to avoid situations such as this. Regardless, we appreciate your assistance.” “Of course.” Jedi said, understanding more than they could know. “It is my duty to help those in need.”

He was inexplicably charmed by the two, the small smile on his face genuine, as the train slows with its approach to the platform. Jedi easily remains upright, his tail acting as a counterbalance, as do the conductors, probably used to it from years of riding the rails.

“I am Emmet. Thank you for riding with us tonight!”

“We hope to see you again soon. Please, enjoy your evening.” “Likewise…”

Jedi pauses, waiting for the man in black to supply his name in the hanging silence.

“Ingo! Ingo Grey! This is my brother-”

“Full stop! Allow me to introduce myself, Ingo.” Emmet says with a furrowed brow, nudging his brother lightly in the rib which makes Ingo’s mouth twist up at the ends, a snort almost making it past his lips until he slapped a gloved hand other his mouth. “I am Emmet!” “Jedi.”

He replies with a little nod, which only earns him two slightly perplexed looks. Emmet and Ingo looked at each other briefly, their glowing eyes falling back on Jedi while they ushered him out to the platform. The temple rises beyond them, a mesa that stood tall around the neighboring buildings.

“What do you know, a Jedi named Jedi. Never seen that anywhere in the galaxy before.”

Ingo said, scratching his head under his hat. Emmet nodded. It was a long story and Jedi did not have it in him to explain at the moment, so he raised a paw in farewell.

“Emmet and Ingo Grey… It has been a pleasure to meet you both. May the Force be with you, good conductors.”

They offered a simultaneous nod and tip of their hats. Thanking him once more for the assistance, they look up and down the platform for any other passengers, call their signature, ‘All aboard!’, and clamber back into the car. The train whistles once and it hums with energy, but it darts off and out of the station.

#pokemon #submas #star wars #sw #jedi oc #not my character #secret santa

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activate-shadow-of-the-window · 2 years ago

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Day 6 of No One Except @mr-orion Asked November (NoOneExOriAskNov). I’m really coming to appreciate the ‘auto’ edit button on Apple devices.

Five and a half of the Hermit Civilizations in my Horizon au, because I’m tired as hell. From top to bottom, there is Bdubs’ Land of Livingstone, Cub’s Climbing Spires, Doc’s Maw, False’s Umbra, Gem’s Evergreen, and unfinished Scar’s Technicolor City.

I kinda just chose random sections of each hermit’s aesthetics and building styles to make these civs.

I’m gonna draw these places a lot more for landscape and building practice, of which I have almost none.

In-depth descriptions below the cut. They’re what I based these sketches on.

There are two great hills, steep and rocky, that surround the vale at the center of the Land of Livingstone. Straddled by two great bridges of white rock and creeping vines, their arches swirl with carvings and gradients. Similar odd shapes dot the valley, anchored into the sides of the hills: rusted buildings of metal and brick, adorned with half-crumbled chimneys and long shut doors. Nature has reclaimed this place, as the flower forest grows closer every year, and even the great bridges look as if they are about to buckle. But the ancient buildings persist, unwilling to yield to the land. Some still halfheartedly belch smoke, spooking the birds into flight.

The sun is hot and inescapable in the southern realm of Climbing Spires, its beams blanketing the red sand and enormous rock formations that give this kingdom its name. Adorning these spires are buildings, spindly and delicate yet sturdy enough to cling to the colorful rock. Perilous staircases and thin walkways of metal and wood are contrasted by robust columns and arches of sandstone and brick. What little fresh water can be found here is carefully shuttled about through pipes and waterfalls, adding a sense of movement to the otherwise eerily still architecture.

Whether the Maw got its name from the great spines of ice on its surface or the toothlike rocks of its underground is unclear, but wherever it came from, this land has a fitting name. Icy and inhospitable, the surface is deceptively barren of buildings aside from a few circular boreholes reinforced with iron. But these are no mere pits; they are the entrance to the subterranean complex below the snow-covered landscape above. Practical and brutalist, the underground buildings of this land are home to many strange machines that farm food without light and produce material in seconds, making this underground world one of the Land of the Sunrise’s best kept secrets.

The simple name for the land of Umbra is fitting; forested and shady, the thick canopy of trees hide the incredibly advanced yet eerily dark civilization whose inhabitants are almost never seen. Smooth buildings of dark stone and tinted glass manage to be imposing in their small size, draped with strange foliage that glows unnatural colors of red and blue. Towers that mimic trees and doorways like metal cave mouths are obscured beneath years, if not decades, of underbrush. This realm is closed to most outsiders, and not even traders may come any closer than the upper canopy.

True to its name, the queendom of Evergreen is completely forested in pine, spruce, and fir trees. The deep green canopy is broken by tall castles, their pale tiled spires and dark wood halls evoking a sense of regality and wonder. Thin, arcing bridges connect stone tower to stone tower, allowing their inhabitants the ability to cross rivers and valleys without ever touching the earth. Below these great structures is a dark, fertile ground from which mushrooms and sweet berries readily grow, a thick layer of undergrowth that houses foxes and wolves alike.

Too big to be called a city, yet too small to be an empire of its own, Technicolor City seems to have been plucked straight out of a painting. Every building is unique and colorful, yet they all perfectly meld into a skyline that seems to be made of jewels, aided by perfectly swooping hills covered in flowers and trees. Wide boulevards share space with quaint streets and footpaths, each and every one lit day and night. Every inch of the city seems to reach out in welcome to all comers.

#no one asked november #horizon to horizon au #hermitcraft au #art for my fic #sketch #pencil

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quietbydesign · 2 months ago

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light filtered. edges blurred. nothing loud.

it’s not a forest. it’s the memory of one. leaves, light, layers — folding into each other like sound under fabric.

Shadowed Canopy is a quiet tangle of branches and light, spread across 8 acoustic panels. a wall that looks like calm, and feels like it too.

available in seven moods: 🎨 full color – natural reds and greens, softly glowing ⚪ grayscale – clean light and visual stillness 🖤 black and white – bold contrast, almost sculptural 🔁 inverted – negative space turned poetic 🟤 sepia – warm and faded like an old photo 🟫 brownie – deep shadows and grounded tone 🌈 technicolor – surreal saturation, all edge

for bedrooms, studios, hallways, conference rooms— anywhere that holds sound and deserves better.

🔗 Shadowed Canopy – Decorative Acoustic Wall Panels

#acousticpanels #botanicalart #decorativewallpanels #soundabsorbingart #homedecor #quietspaces #moderninteriors #moodydecor #floralabstract #statementwall #functionaldesign #softmodern #officedecor #workspaceinspo #interiorstyle #organictextures

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velvetburroughs · 1 year ago

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posted another prose poem on medium!! a little departure from modern reality <3

#academia #academia aesthetic #dark academia #poetry #writing #creative writing #medium #poets on tumblr #prose #light acadamia aesthetic

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maytheoddshq · 2 years ago

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134th BIANNUAL HUNGER GAMES ARENA: 18th CENTURY CARIBBEAN ISLANDS

You're off the edge of the map, mate. Here, there be monsters. — Hector Barbossa

Description below the cut

Arena

The Arena is not very large, modeled after the Caribbean island chains. There are white-sand beaches, palm trees, thick jungles, and lots of flora and fauna. But the tributes have also been blasted back in time, to the era when pirates ruled the seas, sailing from port to port, attacking ships and each other, and searching for lost treasure.

There are four main locations: three islands and a shipwreck. All are very small, and tributes can either swim or take rowboats between them. They will need to move from one place to another to avoid a variety of threats — and each other.

The weather is hot and muggy with thick humidity that doesn’t dissipate overnight. The average temperature during the day, when the sun is high and bright, is 90°F/30°C. At night, it dips only to about 75°F/23°C.

Island 1: Jungle

This island greets tributes with glimmering white sand beaches and palm trees with high-up, hard-to-reach coconuts waving cheerfully at them in the breeze. Just beyond the beach is dense, verdant jungle in full tropical bloom of fruit blossoms and hibiscus. Some tree branches bend under plump, bright fruits, each a novel variety that come in Gamemaker-engineered flavors — some delectable, others despicable, though all are edible. Vibrant birds sing brightly in the treetops, and the shade beneath the canopies promises cool reprieve. The island is deceiving and packed with threats. Any tribute who stands still for too long on the sand on the West shores will feel something shift and give under them. Without warning, large pincers clamp down on tributes’ toes, and the heads of large, scarlet centipedes poke from the sand. If a tribute manages, their four-foot bodies can be pulled free from the sand, but not without a fight and agonizing pain from the bite. Quickly, they will swarm. The only thing that will curb their attack is fire, which will send them skittering back into their underground nests.

The notorious box jellyfish inhabit the waters of the East shore, a creature infamous for its sting so painful that victims beg for death. The Gamemakers only chose to alter the usual size of its population (higher, of course).

Tributes may choose to swim in safe waters along the technicolor reefs in search of prey or seaweed, but while many of the fish are perfectly edible, the stonefish, master of camouflage and completely still, lurks along the ocean floor and will sting even if brushed against. This too will cause immense pain.

In the jungles lie new threats: tributes will have to hack through thick underbrush and attempt to make sense of direction; sight of the beach is quickly lost. There is the usual fare of tropical Caribbean wildlife: ants, beetles, snakes, mongoose, crabs, birds, and a few crocodiles. Each pose their common dangers, but a few stand out with Gamemaker alterations.

Tributes may find that the colorful parrots that inhabit the island chains are more than they might have bargained for — the Gamemakers have them listening in on every conversation, and they are liable to fly to another part of the Arena and repeat particularly inconvenient information to other tributes in a stunning impersonation of the speaker’s voice. They are unreliable on what they’ll echo, however, and tributes should beware pieces of conversation taken out of context.

Emerald green anacondas twist through the trees and brush by night, seeking to incapacitate with their many rows of backward-facing teeth and squeeze the life from their prey of any size. Giant snails slog through the dirt and up plants — but their mucus is infected with a bacteria that will spread an infection into a tribute’s brain and spinal column within twelve hours.

A canoe is tethered to a weathered dock to the South, encrusted in barnacles and wood going to rot, but usable for now if tributes can fashion a makeshift oar. The only things in the boat are three dirty, empty green-glass bottles that presumably once held an alcoholic drink, and a pair of well-worn, tall, leather boots.

Pros: Hiding, food, shelter, canoe

Cons: Lots of dangerous animals including mutts, no drinkable water (except coconuts, which are hard to get)

Food: Gamemaker fruits, coconuts, crabs, hibiscus flowers

Water: Coconuts only

Shipwreck & Atoll

In between the first and second islands is an atoll, a small ring-shaped coral reef that encircles a blue lagoon. On it are sandy beaches and a thin line of trees and shrubs, and it is at its widest just forty meters across. It’s enough, though, that the Poseidon’s Jewel, an eighteenth-century brig, has washed up on it, right in the center, having been swept into the lagoon and run aground during a storm. The hull of the ship cracked in half on the reef and over time, the back part of the ship which was in the lagoon has been broken down and swept away, leaving an exposed half of the ship on the sandy shore.

The ship is tilted on its side, but one mast still sticks up in the air at an angle with a tattered sail hanging on and blowing in the breeze. The crow’s nest is on this mast and is accessible to tributes who are able to shimmy up or perhaps use a weapon or tool to climb it. This creates a great advantage to look out at the other islands and perhaps spot smoke from fires or even other tributes on the beaches.

Tributes can get onto the ship either by climbing the rope ladder that dangles off its side or by climbing up into the broken part of the hull, though the latter method is likely to get you splinters or worse. On the ship, everything is tilted to the side, but the items on board remain mostly untouched since the wreck.

On the main deck are thick ropes and wooden boxes. Most of the boxes are empty or simply contain more rope and cloth. Some of the boards are loose and if a tribute isn’t careful on deck, they may step in the wrong place and have the floor fall out from under them.

Below deck, which is accessed through a staircase from the main deck or by climbing up into the broken hull, there are treasures galore, though few will be of use to the tributes. Barrels and boxes containing jewels will be less interesting for hungry tributes just trying to survive, but if they find the barrels that contain ropes, cloth, or even looted weapons, they’re in luck. A few barrels contain potable water and tributes will find a few canteens floating around below deck as well in the sleeping quarters, which is in a corner of the ship and is very simple, just several hammocks draped from wall to post.

As for the looted weapons on the ship, tributes will find eighteenth-century muskets and pistols. They’ll also find cartridge and bullet boxes nearby, and particularly savvy tributes who can figure out what the black powder inside the cartridges is will be able to load their guns with it by pouring it down the barrel and then dropping in the bullet, tamping it down with the ramrod attached to the gun, and pulling the trigger to fire. (Some Gamemaker intervention has made these guns easier for tributes to figure out than real-life eighteenth-century guns.) Beware, though — these guns have exceedingly poor aim, and the bullet hardly ever hits what the user is aiming at.

Tucked away below deck is also the Captain’s Cabin. The door will swing open to reveal a reasonably ornate space with a large oak desk and chair, a chest, and red velvet curtains across the back windows. Next to the desk is a bed with ornate covers, clearly pilfered somewhere along the way from a much finer ship. On top of the chest is a model of a ship, and in the chest are more jewels and fine fabrics.

On the desk is a journal, only partly filled. The first few pages detail a journey, setting out from port on calm seas. The last page, though, written in cursive ink, reads:

I fear the Curse may have caught up with us. We had faith that it was nothing but a tale created to stop others from searching for the treasure, but today a mighty storm whipped up. The ship’s hull has been bashed on a sand spit. We have provisions for another fortnight, but beyond that, I fear what fate may have in store for us.

In the corner of the Captain’s Cabin is a wooden chest embellished with gold. Tributes who open it have a 50/50 shot of getting either an item your tribute identified in task 7 or having a dangerous mutt from one of the islands crawl out — send an ask to the main for a random drawing. A positive item will remove your tribute from the draw once and a negative item will add them once.

Pros: Hiding, shelter, weapons, supplies

Cons: Difficult to escape if cornered, no food

Food: none

Water: Canteens & water barrels

Island 2: Mountains & Oasis

This island can be traveled to and from via rowboats attached to an old, dilapidated dock on the island’s south side. However, tributes should be wary of the mangrove forest that grows against the east side of the island, which can easily cause small boats to capsize. If a tribute were to attempt swimming to the island through the mangrove forest, they would find plenty of places to hide among the roots. However, dangerous piranha mutts have also made homes among the mangrove roots, and these aggressive mutts will take nasty bites out of tributes if given the chance.

The beach on this island makes up only a narrow strip along the edge. The sand is very coarse, quickly turning into rocky soil at the tree line. A layer of dense trees and thick vegetation make it very difficult for tributes to venture deeper into the island. There are no brightly colored flowers or fruit bearing trees here. Tributes must navigate densely twisted vines connecting a forest of trees, and thick, slippery moss is abundant. Within this vegetation, light barely reaches the ground.

It makes a wonderful hiding spot for a tribute looking to come in off the beaches of the islands, but it also makes a wonderful hiding spot for dangerous, lurking mutts. Venomous spiders are eager to crawl out from under stones or down from treetops. Paper Wasp nests are hidden among the trees and shrubs. Neither are aggressive or deadly, but if disturbed, they will leave tributes with red, swollen bites or stings and an excruciating burning pain that will last for several hours without an antidote. The dangerous boa constrictors inhabit this island as well, ready to make their own meal out of unsuspecting tributes.

If a tribute makes it past the thick vegetation, they are met with an even more difficult challenge. Steep mountains cover the majority of this island. At lower elevations, there is some vegetation, but the higher you go, the more rocky it is. A skilled tribute may choose to climb the face of the mountain. While potentially faster, tributes should be aware that this will take enormous strength and endurance, and falls can easily prove deadly. Should a tribute opt for a safer route, they will have to go in search of one of the few paths carved into the mountains’ sides. These paths are narrow and winding, and they will take several hours to traverse.

Within the mountains, tributes may find caves — a few of which serve as potential short cuts through the mountains. Some of these caves are tunnels that pass completely through to the other side of the mountains, while others are deep dead ends. Tributes have no way of knowing which type of cave they’ve entered until they reach the other side, or else, find they can travel no farther. The mountain caves also quickly become pitch black as tributes make their way deeper. These caves can act as a shelter for tributes needing a place to hide, but they are not without dangers of their own. Colonies of bats hang from the ceilings of some caves and will dive at tributes who disturb them. A tribute can survive a few bites, but within hours they will experience fever, headache, and fatigue. A tribute who has sustained several bites will have symptoms that progress to paranoia, aggression, and hydrophobia. If a tribute receives enough of the bites, it will be fatal.

Inside a shallow cave on the northern face of the island is a dead-end. There are no bats, and inside is a lone skeleton — a sailor from long ago who tried to take shelter in the cave before meeting his demise. In his hand, he clutches a note. A tribute who finds the note will read:

On this quest for buried gold We ignored the tales we have been told And searched every cranny, nook, and bend Now surely, we shall meet our end For though we searched with all our might Our reward was only blackest night Be warned, be wary of these lands No good comes to greedy hands

Beyond the mountainous rings of the outer island, tributes will find the small middle to be very hospitable. At the very center of the island, the gamemakers have hidden a beautiful oasis. The oasis is wide open and gets plenty of sunlight. The island’s mutts do not venture into the oasis, and instead, tributes will be met with small pools full of edible fish and low-hanging trees that bear an abundance of tasty fruits. The largest pool at the center of the oasis is crystal clear and perfectly cool, and a towering, hundred-foot waterfall pours down the side of the lush mountain into it. The water in this pool is fresh and safe for drinking. Tributes will also find that after spending time in this pool injuries and ailments seem to improve. Bites and stings that would otherwise require a gifted antidote are soothed in its waters, and wounds become smaller. While the oasis has much to offer tributes, it can be a risk to spend too much time there. The abundance of resources may serve as a big draw to crowds, and there is no shelter and nowhere to hide within the oasis, leaving tributes exposed.

Pros: Plenty of shelter and places to hide on the outer rings of the island, oasis area in the middle that provides food and water, as well as healing properties

Cons: Difficult to navigate, dangerous mutts around the outside of the island, dark and dead-end caves that may contain bat mutts, no food or water outside of the oasis

Food: Fish and fruit at the oasis

Water: Fresh, potable water in the center pool of the oasis

Island 3: Dead Island

In stark contrast to the other portions of the Arena, this island is a desolate landscape devoid of any signs of life or natural elements. Once a tribute reaches the shoreline, there is a distinct silence, as if all natural sound has been sucked into a vacuum, save the distant mournful sound of the wind. Waves no longer lap at the shoreline and tribute-made waves are cut short right on the edge of the shore.

On the island there is a decrepit port-town; once a bustling hub, promising maritime activity, now stands a ghostly reminder of an era long past. The facades of the houses are all rotting away, the wood covered by the salty sea air one too many times. Notably, each house is empty — the doors creak ominously in the wind, an occasional loose shutter flaps or wind may whistle between the shattered glass of the houses and the empty village streets. The docks of this port town are waterlogged and so weak that they creak under the pressure of any weight on them.

Amidst the already unsettling energy ebbing off of the island, there are dolls of varying eras strewn about the island, tied to the walls of homes, wrapped around the legs of the docks, and so on. Some of the dolls are modern, some appear to be from an era long passed with cracked porcelain and barnacles growing over their small frames. The eyes of the dolls seem to follow anyone who walks by. If a tribute looks away from the dolls for too long, they will notice that they, in fact, are being followed around the island by them. If the tribute stops to look back and catches the dolls, they will freeze in whatever position they were found in.

A more attentive tribute may be able to catch sight of an outline of blue ghostly figures known as sea sprites. The sea sprites don’t seem to care one way or another about any singular passerby unless they are provoked. When provoked the sprites will begin to fly at whoever has attacked them and chase their attacker off the island. More and more sea sprites appear as another tribute dies. At the stroke of midnight, echoes of mournful sea shanties echo throughout the island, though the origins of the voices are not clear. One can only presume that it is the sea sprites, the chorus growing louder and louder as more deaths pile up.

Pros: Shelter, no physical threats

Cons: No food, no water, creepy dolls watch you sleep, hard to sleep with the singing

Food: none

Water: none

#134 #arena

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unhappy-house-of-horrors · 2 years ago

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Question 5 for everyone? Or at least everyone who wants to answer

¢Well…¢

¢Bones can say the pledge of allegiance in French.¢

¢Inky can whistle with his hands for bird calls.¢

¢Barbie can walk a 5 inch heel.¢

¢Mèngo can spell long odd words.¢

¢And I can barely draw!¢

¢As for the others, I don’t really get to talk to most of them, so most info comes through Bones themself!¢

#unhappy house chat #unhappy haunts #headstone text #art of horrors #depArted #for the departed #your ghost host #technicolor canopy #malibu #fruity drink

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blinky-of-an-eye · 6 months ago

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✒️Hi friends!! We have a couple of updates here, sorry it’s been a while-

Firstly, the system’s grown and changed over time! Main system mostly, but also our own area!

Tootsie and Cadbury spend most of their time fused/blended nowadays, they’re called Honeybun like that, isn’t that cute??

Sofaipilla has a fusion/blend with Sans Manatale (yes we call him his full name sometimes) called Magic Shell aka Maggie. They don’t spend a lot of time blended, as Sans is a part of the main system and not our little subsystem.

Haven’t heard much from Blue or Blinky lately, which worries me, but then again, I haven’t been conscious for a good while either, whoops ^^;; not that I could control that, though, that’s not how it works…

Anyway, it’s great to see you all and I can’t wait to get things up and running again!! 🫰<3🖋

#technicolor canopy #inky #winks #typety typewriter

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houseofbrat · 2 years ago

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After watching the technicolor version of Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation, I no longer understand the conniption fits people are having over morning dress versus white tie. Most of that won’t be seen on the footage of the ceremony anyway.

The peers were never going to be a major part of the ceremony as they were in 1953. Most of the peerage is not even attending anyway. Did people miss the changes to the House of Lords before the millennium? Why would all of the peerage show up in jewels at the coronation when they’ve been politically sidelined for more than twenty years?

When I watched the actual ceremony, most and all of its pageantry will be coming from the Church of England, not duchesses in tiaras. I would expect all of the participants to be wearing ceremonial dress.

I do not buy rumor that Camilla’s grandchildren will be holding up a canopy. However, if you told me that her grandchildren will be holding up the train for her robes, then I would buy that. Will Camilla even be wearing a robe with a very long train? I don’t know. I imagine it would very difficult for her to walk in something like that at the age of 75, almost 76. Remains to be seen.

After watching the 1953 ceremony, I suspect those who are in the carriage procession--the Wales & their children, the Edinburghs (just Ed & Sophie), the Princess Royal & Sir Tim, the Gloucesters, and the Duke of Kent & Princess Alexandra--will be sitting in a version of the “royal box,” just as the Queen Mum and Princess Margaret did in 1953. Those in the “royal box” will be wearing tiaras and ceremonial dress.

The difference between the Gloucesters & Kents versus Beatrice & Eugenie and James & Louise is that Richard, Edward, and Alexandra were born princes & princess and will die as princes & princess. Same with their HRHs. They are literally the grandchildren of George V, and Charles will allow them to keep their titles & styles because of that.

However, Beatrice, Eugenie, James, Louise, Archie, and Lilibet are not the grandchildren of George V. They are either the grandchildren of Philip Mountbatten & Queen Elizabeth II, or they are grandchildren of Charles III. None of those six will ever be working royals. They have no actual use for titles and styles in the future, and King Charles does not need to allow them to have those titles and styles. Hence, those six that currently have them will cease to have them after the coronation. All six will be styled as the sons and daughters of a duke, which they all are.

#operation golden orb #titles 'n shit #tiaras #House of Mountbatten Windsor #King George V #King Charles III

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wanderlustwayadventures1 · 2 years ago

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Cape Cod Trip added bonus Maine and Rhode Island

4 Day & 6 Day Adventures

Trip 1 Cape Cod, Plymouth, P-town, Martha’s Vineyard

September Trip 2020 4 days

Stayed in an Air b&b at Yarmouth

Day 1 Plymouth Rock and Pilgrim Memorial State Park.

When the first settlers first stepped onto land here, they did so because of the protected bay. Early in the 18th century, nearly a century after the landing, one of their descendants identified a certain rock as the place of that first landing. The famed rock, which has been broken, moved, and put back together, now sits at the seashore protected under a classical columned canopy.

The Mayflower II the tall masts of Mayflower II rise above her decks, a reminder of how this all started. Built in England during the early 1950s, the ship arrived in Plymouth in 1957 and today serves as an important way to relate the tale of European settlement in America. As well as can be determined, the ship is a full-scale replica of the original.

Day 2 Martha’s Vineyard Daytrip

Steamship authority vineyard: ferries to Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard.

We started at Oak Buffs were we rented an e-bike. The six-mile bike ride from Oak Bluffs to Edgartown is known for being a gorgeous and manageable ride, including riding over Jaws Bridge!

Oaks buff is known for its distinctive Victorian architecture with 300 colorful cottages designed to look like gingerbread houses.

We continued to Edgartown, with its quaint harbor complete with an 80-year-old lighthouse. A former hub for the whaling industry, admire the stately Greek revival mansions built by ship captains.

We Traveled along the idyllic countryside and small fishing villages. We then took a taxi the technicolor cliffs of Aquinnah.

The Aquinnah Cliffs – formerly known as Gay Head – is one of Martha's Vineyard's most-visited tourist spots, with bus and bike tours congesting the paved roads in the peak summer season. But the epic clay cliffs, which were carved by glaciers millions of years ago, are worth the trek. Visitors can explore the lower beach paths to see the cliffs up close and stretch along the sands at Moshup Beach. Or take the upper trails to the top of the cliffs to catch a glimpse of Gay Head Light and nearby Elizabeth Islands.

The Aquinnah Cliffs are part of the island's Wampanoag reservation and under special environmental protections to deter erosion.

Day 3 Cape cod waterways boat rental on swan river. Swan Pond River is Located right on the banks of the Swan River Cape Cod Waterways boat rentals offer four different boat models to choose from: Kayak, Stand Up Paddle Board, Canoe, and Pedal Boat rentals!

The Pilgrim Monument in Provincetown, Massachusetts, was built between 1907 and 1910 to commemorate the first landfall of the Pilgrims in 1620 and the signing of the Mayflower Compact in Provincetown Harbor.

Provincetown

Provincetown is at the northern tip of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. P-town is known as a longtime haven for artists, LGBTQ. Numerous galleries plus restaurants, nightclubs, cabarets and specialty shops are clustered on and around lively Commercial Street.

Long Point Lighthouse 5mile Trail

Begin at Pilgrim first landing park, walk over a jetty for a mile towards long point. Follow the shoreline towards a lighthouse. The first light was built in 1827 and became automatic in 1952.

Day 4 Pilmouth Plantation

Plimoth Patuxet is a complex of living history museums in Plymouth, Massachusetts founded in 1947, formerly Plimoth Plantation

The largest of which is the 17th-century English Village. On ground carefully chosen to reflect the topography of the Pilgrims' original settlement, and following the same street layout, the village authentically recreates the reality of those hard first years in the Plymouth Colony.

The following year we did a 5 day trip in July 2021

Trip 2 Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard, Gloucester, Cadem Hills State Park, Arcadia, Rhode Island (Newport).

July trip 6 days 2021

Day 1 Yarmouth July 10

Plymouth Rock, Provincetown and Plymouth first landing

MacMillan Wharf, 450-foot-long MacMillan Wharf. Aside from setting off on ferries and sightseeing tours, it is a picturesque spot to amble along and gaze out over the bay, boats and coastline.

Day 2 Martha’s Vineyard July 11

Ferry/bus we took the bus to the bridge that was made famous by the movie Jaws. We rented kayaks and stopped at the bridge to view locals and tourists jumping of the bridge.

Day 3 July 12 Whale watching Trips to Stellwagon bank marine Sanctuary

It encompasses 842-square-miles of some of the most productive ocean waters anywhere in the northwest Atlantic.

While the frequent presence of Humpback whales, Finback whales, Right whales and sometimes other endangered whale species no doubt gives the sanctuary its public appeal and worldwide recognition, this marine sanctuary was created in order to protect all of the great diversity of marine creatures that depend on these waters for all or part of their life cycle.

The sanctuary was named after its principal geologic feature: a shallow, underwater sandbar known as “Stellwagen Bank.” There is more to the sanctuary than just Stellwagen Bank, however. The sanctuary encompasses many other equally important areas; most notably “Jeffrey’s Ledge” which is just to the north of Stellwagen Bank itself.

You can think of Stellwagen Bank as a huge, underwater sandbar that it is about 24 miles long, 3-5 miles wide at its northern end, and just under 14 miles wide at its southern end. It rises above the surrounding seafloor to a height the equivalent of an 11-story building, with waters on top of the Bank ranging between 65 and 120 feet in depth and surrounding waters being between 250 and 350 feet deep.

Geologically speaking “The Bank” is an underwater extension of Cape Cod and this can clearly be seen in maps of the seafloor. As you can see in the map below, Stellwagen Bank is situated directly between Cape Ann and Cape Cod, a location that led many fishermen to refer to the area as “Middle Bank.”

Cadem Hills State Park camp out

Located a few minutes north of Camden on U.S. Route 1, the park offers year-round trail activities and camping. Winter camping, in a rustic shelter, is also offered and available by reservation by calling the park. 1.1 out and back trail, renowned for the panoramic view of Camden Harbor and Penobscot Bay from the top of Mt. Battie, which inspired Edna St. Vincent Millay's poem "Renascence," the park still inspires wonder in visitors today.

Mt Battie

Day 4 July 13 Hike & Acadia National park

After camping in Camden State park we stayed at an Air b&b right in town in southwest harbor, Me. It was 25 mins from Acadia National Park.

We did 2 trails, the first was a simply path along the coast call Ocean Path.

Ocean Path Distance 4 Miles out and back length of time 1.5-2.5 hours.

The second was Beehive loop Trail it is 1.4 miles , Strenuous hike, Length 1-2 hours. I do not recommend this for beginner hikers or young kids there are sections of narrow cliffs ledges and non technical climbs up metal rungs. My son was 5 at the time but we hike rock scrambles so he was trained well for this one. Def an amazing hike for advance hikers!

Day 5 July 14 Rhode Island

The next day we went back to Rode Island we stayed in an air b&b on a boathouse with such an amazing night view.

Day 6 July 15 Sunset mimosa Sail Newport

The next dat we drive 45 mins to Newport for a 75-minute sail highlighting 5 different lighthouses at the southern end of Narragansett Bay. few other points of interest around Newport Harbor and lower Narragansett Bay. We boarded the Schooner Adirondack II 80 foot turn of the century style pilot schooner.

For lunch we had reservations at the The morning Restaurant to enjoy New England Lobster. The Restaurant was located right in the wharf, with breath taking views of the harbor. I highlight recommend this restaurant!

Back home

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an-unlikely-poet · 4 years ago

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I still wander city streets and wilderness trails alike. Neighborhoods in technicolor dreamscapes. Canopies in other dimensions. Each step forward a tattoo, while some forgotten, others bold and outlined for posterity. However brief the longing for other places, the line was never straight. This the destiny of nomads without a tribe

~The Stranger

#photographers on tumblr #poetselixir #poets on tumblr #poems on tumblr #poetslife #nightphotography

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spiltscribbles · 4 years ago

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you did the mini fic way i loved you (which was amaaazing) but how about champagne problems where remus says no to sirius' proposal because he gets spooked by a couple of purebloods :(

~Notes: Nonny babe! I can’t believe you made me write such angst😩😩😩 This isn’t quite that but I hope you like it anyways🥺🥺 ILU!!!

A Reblog Is Worth The Sexiest Bottle Of champagne! | The Way I Loved You FIC | Send Me A Prompt/Song??💜

“I’m afraid of a lot of things, but mostly, most sincerely, I am afraid of being completely unraveled by you, and you finding nothing you want in here.”

—L.M. Dorsey

When Remus’s father leaves for the final time three weeks before his tenth birthday, his Mam spends only two days in bed before she drags out an old bottle of Dom Pérignon and pops it open, pouring them each a glass with a smile the wrong side of worn as she beckons him forwards with an indulgent bend of the knuckle. “Come along, mon amour. Just this once, just to say farewell.”

As he thumbs the skinny tumbler bubbling with the amber liquid that’s been his mother’s favorite ever since growing up in her Northern French town on the outskirts of Paris, Remus wonders if he’ll ever forget the words his father spewed before leaving— the declaration that they must be cursed if their first child turned into a monster and their second came out stillborn. Wonders if he’ll ever forget the livid, borderline murderous expression that spilt over his mother’s delicate features before she screamed at him to leave for the final time. Wonders if he’ll ever not feel so weary— So destitute.

“’S all just champagne problems mon petit lapin,” she says in that airy way of her’s that somehow still radiates a knowledge beyond his reach. “None of it ever matters, not truly. Not ever.”

Remus eyes the dark circles smudged against her pale skin, and the way her caramel curls fall limply from her bun. She’s always been the most beautiful woman in the world through his eyes but he now thinks she might be the strongest too. So strong that she’s sitting there, right in front of him in their small kitchen— and she’s pretending that her tiny son, her first and only born, hasn’t brought absolute ruin to her life that should’ve been buoyant and lovely for such a pretty, quick witted Muggle girl.

“Yes, I know Mam,” he says instead of the truth, because if he’s being at all honest he’s always been a bit of a coward and a bit too desperate for some semblance of normality.

It becomes a mantra of sorts to Remus as he stumbles into adolescence. He calls every inconvenience in his life, champagne problems, and drinks the hurt away in a secret nook off the astronomy tower that he purposefully left off the map he and his friends had created with a sheer pulse of brilliance and adventure and a need to leave their marks on this stupid sodding castle. A castle that’ll inevitably kick them out on their arses from it’s relative safety with such cold indifference. A castle that will soon be brimming with a new generation of students sullying the same spaces, same corridors they once spent their days laughing and jeering and frolicking about— creating mischief in it’s hallowed halls. The one and only time that Remus was able to hold his breath and wrap himself in warmth he never knew and will never know again, not ever in the same sort of youthful ignorance— One that he only feigns to hold when around his friends because he thinks he’s never been young, not the way they are. Remus reckons he aged a century and a half after the bite and a century more after his father had left, and then a millennia when his mother was diagnosed with third stage breast cancer when he was a fresh fifteen. A death sentence dressed up in bows of apology by the doctors and shiny wrapping-paper of potential hope if the aggressive treatments they employ make a difference. And soon enough the ever green that was his juvenescence will turn brittle and gray and awash with memories of hopelessness, only adorned sparingly by memories of Peter’s quiet companionship and James’s affable grins. Lily’s easy laughter and Sirius’s searing snogs. Instances of respite that were eventually drown out by the shitty Wizard champagne he’s able to finesse after sucking off the twenty something who works night shifts at the Hog’s Head.

But it doesn’t matter.

All of his issues are inconsequential at the end of the day; from a paper cut, to his worst transformations to the time his first boyfriend sneered at him with pure distain after he had snubbed his wanting to go further subsequent two months of furtive touches and inconspicuous dates. It’s all just a load of shit, a collection of champagne problems just like his Mam had said all those years ago.

Even that incident the morning in fifth year when he found out that his best friend— the boy he would’ve done just about anything for, anything only just to see him smile— had weaponized his most hated form. When Sirius nearly made him into a murderer, into a beast, when he nearly proved true the self fulfilling prophecy that every werewolf is as dark as creatures can become. The charms of veelas, combined with the insatiable cravings of vampires and the wily natures of goblins. When Sirius had nearly turned Remus inside out, made him everything he hates.

But no. That doesn’t matter. It doesn’t. Because paper cuts heal, and the full moons set, and James hexes a legion of boils to sprout up all along Quintin’s face. And at the end of the day, he’ll always love Sirius first and last and the very most. He’ll always forgive him any indiscretion because when Sirius’s hand— soft palms and callus fingers— caresses his side, Remus feels close to whole, close to alive, close to something real. And God Remus loves him so much it aches in his chest and creeks in his bones.

So when he comes back to Hogwarts the night after his mother’s funeral— two months divorced of that incident, two months of painful quiet and empty arms and heart wrenching need— Remus lets Sirius collect him into his embrace, and lets them cry together under the canopy of night fall, and when Sirius begs him to come back to them, to forgive him, to let him inside the most protected nooks of his mind once more, all Remus says is “yes,” and “All right,” and “I never stopped.” He doesn’t tell him that he doesn’t think he’s ever ben there’s in the first place, doesn’t think he’s ever been here or anywhere. He doesn’t tell him that sometimes it feels like he’s some faded sepia photograph come to life in the form of his too skinny body and too large eyes and too gangly limbs. He doesn’t tell Sirius that he doesn’t think he’s ever been anything meant to last on this plane of existence, but he does let Sirius kiss him and hold him and fuck him because it’s the first time since Sirius left Grimmauld back in December the he looks something close to at peace. And Remus knows that he never wants to be someone who makes him frown with that protruding vein on his temple. Someone like Sirius— Someone so beautiful, so vivid, so alive— deserves a life painted in technicolor. And Remus refuses to be the person to drain the vivacity from his every breath. To scuff out his lust for life.

The first time Sirius asks Remus to stop gulping down the champagne and gin and Ogden’s finest by the fist fulls, it’s their final night of their final term and after Remus barbs a little too forcefully that their dingy little dormitory is the one place for him after Lily jokes that it’s a madhouse.

“It’s gonna bloody kill you Remus, it’s already doing it for fucks sake. You can’t even walk straight most mornings damn it!” He shouts in the quiet of their room while James and Lily are ensconced in her own bed on the other end of the tower and Peter is off snogging his Hufflepuff girlfriend in some deserted third floor closet.

“All right,” Remus tells him after swallowing down the last of his champagne, words pouring out his mouth like warm molasses and arm slugging languidly when he tosses the empty bottle to the side before patting the empty end of his bed for Sirius to lie down besides him. He doesn’t want to fight, doesn’t have the energy for the shouts and accusations and hurt that they always fling at each other during these more heated moments. He supposes he doesn’t have much energy for anything at all anymore.

Sirius stilts from where he’s looming above him, tongue poised for another verbal lashing. But he must see something in Remus’s face, or probably just feels exhausted in similar ways, because he only breathes in— tension melting from his shoulders— and slinks off his jacket before shuffling into the comforter besides him.

And in the future Remus will wonder whether if he remembers it correctly that it felt like everything was standing on an axis as Sirius rode his cock— slow and steady and minutes that feel like decades. Or maybe he’s just recalling it differently because he realized for the first time that night that for every inch of him that loves Sirius, the other boy feels that same sort of enthralling passion. Only difference is that Sirius’s always been the greedy sort, the once and future king of all or nothing. Remus is the contrary of that. He’s lived with nothing before and he’s perfectly fine with living that way again, had never really expected much from his life anyhow. But Sirius deserves to have everything and Remus knew then— will always know, that he could never give him that.

The year following their graduation is beautiful in that way that transitional periods always are. A turning of an age eclipsed by sunlight and laughter and kisses that makes Remus feel like they’re melding into one another, becoming indelible parts of each other’s very skin and bones.

But it’s also a time when Remus realizes just how helpless his condition has made him, how despite his top marks in no less than seven NEWTs, he’s always just a werewolf in the eyes of the Wizarding world. So while Lily studies in St Mungos and Peter takes up post at the ministry and Sirius joins James in the Auror’s academy, Remus works days at a quaint bookshop with a doting elderly woman who makes him soup when she thinks he’s looking peaky, and a gay night club with a handsy boss that leers at him with an intrusive air and asks regularly if he’s still with that boyfriend of his.

Remus feels like a fraud.

So when he gets that letter from Dumbledore sent to the flat that Sirius insists is their’s but Remus only ever calls his— he replies with a hasty scrawl on the back of some spare parchment, telling him that of course he’ll do anything to help the Order. Tells him that he understands the discretion that’s required of such a mission. He tells his past headmaster that he grew up collecting secrets like school children collected friends, so this won’t be an issue. He doesn’t tell him how it’s a practice so ingrained into him that sometimes even he doesn’t know who the fuck Remus John Lupin is most days, doesn’t know the seams that string him together like a pair of tattered trousers. He doesn’t tell him that he’s only afraid of one thing and it’s his boyfriend’s dedication, because Sirius is the sort who loves unadulteratedly and without conditions. Sirius doesn’t yet understand that the boy who he’s let inside the most intimate parts of him, the boy who he shares a bed with night after night is the same monster a younger him— in a spur of passion— had planned to deploy as a means of destruction.

Sirius doesn’t understand how foolish it is to intwine his life with Remus’s, even if he thinks it’s some sort of challenge, if he looks at it with the romantic lends that he could love the monster out of someone. And it’s positively idiotic to think as much, like Sirius’s tender hands and sweet whispers can be Remus’s cure.

It’s so fucking stupid! And occasionally Remus wants to bash his head into a wall, but instead kisses him with devouring intent before he could.

The owl nips at his finger for the last remnants of the stale biscuit Remus had offered it in thanks and he watches it soar away like he could never do.

The first time Sirius tells Remus he loves him, it’s in the bathroom of the Longbottom’s small cottage— amidst panting breaths and thrusting hips and grappling hands as they try to get one another off as quick as possible before someone finds them in such a compromising state.

Remus has just spent three weeks in a werewolf camp in the south of Glasgow, and came here to find Sirius as soon as he can home. And while they get lost in one another in this cramped loo he forces himself not to think of how Sirius had been chatting up and chuckling with Emmeline Vance.

Emmeline Vance, who is a beautiful blonde witch with vibrantly green eyes and a full smile that isn’t even slightly crooked like Remus’s own. Emmeline Vance who is the pure blooded daughter of the Swedish Minister of magic, and who came here to London because her country has never discriminated against half bloods or muggle borns— even if they brand their dark creatures with tattoos and lock them up in cages whenever they try to speak up against their lack of human rights.

Emmeline Vance who is the perfect complement to Sirius’s dark brooding and pale eyes and charisma that radiates off of him like the leading man in a novel written during the generation of disillusioned artists who had survived the first great war in the Muggle world. And Remus sometimes feels like Sirius’s gaze is trained on him like Gatsby towards the green light he watched every night thinking of his beloved. And sure Lupin and Daisy might be a pair of flowers but one is poisonous and the other is bright with life and Sirius has always been the sort to pick the worst option because he’s a glutton for punishment, and sometimes Remus thinks that’s all he is. Sirius’s warped way of punishing himself for being born into such a fucked up family— fettering himself to a poor, halfblooded, halfbreed, as some sort of declaration that he’s not the heir of the House of Black any longer, that he rebelled against them with every fiber of his being. That he’s the precise antithesis of their values even if he shares the same eyes and imperious air and steadfast beliefs on top of his effortless genius— even if they are beliefs that juxtapose against his family’s blood supremacy.

And Remus hates these sorts of contemplations, hates how they make him feel like a trader to the love between them. But he forgets about it all when he remembers how Sirius glanced up and caught his gaze when he first stepped into the living room, amiable expression morphing to one of pure wanting the second he spotted him, coldly disregarding an extremely glum looking Emmeline, as he strutted towards Remus and dragged him to the only empty spot and kissed the moonbeam scars that litters his skin and calls him beautiful despite it all— Maybe even because of it.

The eleventh time Sirius asks Remus to marry him, it’s the night of Regulus’s funeral, when his limp body was found slashed against the grounds of the Hampshire woods after three weeks of being declared missing.

It’s spoken in a voice that’s so raw and primal and demanding that it makes Remus curl into himself when he hears it, getting lost in the sensations all around him— Sirius’s hot breath skirting the back of his neck, and Sirius’s large hand clenched around his dick, and Sirius’s length pounding into him with such force that their headboard smacks against the wall. And when they’re done, Sirius slides out of him amidst a round of peppering kisses along the ridges of his spine and expanse of the shoulders and on the hinge of his jaw. It feels like not an apology so much, but a plea. And Remus knows that the last year has been rough on them, on their relationship. Knows how difficult it is that Remus has been spending nearly as many nights spying on the wolves as he has in the flat. That Sirius wants to know where the fuck Dumbledore is sending his boyfriend, that he hates Remus only slightly because he’s so tight lipped about it all.

He’s argue that James tells Lily what he’s up to, and Remus would remind him that they’re married, and then Sirius would get a look on his face that’s so betrayed and so pained and so furious that Remus spends the night on the sofa instead— Well he would if Sirius didn’t have a habit to coax him back into his arms with mumbled apologies and gentle caresses and barely their kisses before the night ends.

So Remus lets him do the same now, and he ignores the questions about where he was all this time and shrugs off the way Sirius tries to reason that none of them know how long they have left living, how he wants to spend the rest of his days as Remus’s husband. And he watches Sirius flutter his eyes closed and waits for his breath to even out.

He never tells Sirius that he wants to wed him so badly that it’s cutting against his heart like a knife licked with flames, even if he’s been in love with Sirius for practically half his sodding life. Ever since he had jauntily invited him to sit in the cart with him and a bespectacled lad, along with another that was a bit plump and eager looking.

No. Through all the shouts and begging and sneers of tonight, Remus never dared tell him that. Remus knows Sirius, and if he had said as much, then that would’ve been it for him. Sirius would have fought for Remus with every inch of his being. He would’ve made sure that Remus excepted his love, that he would have utilized the ferociousness and ferocity and indignation that breathes in his every vein and what makes up the marrow of his bones as the beautiful and brilliant and incandescent scion of the ancient and most noble House of Black— would’ve done so until Remus gave into his demands.

Remus promised himself a long time ago that he’d never be the one to scuff out the light that shone in Sirius’s very soul. He’d never watch himself turn Sirius into a burnt shell of anything bright and fluttering and lively that ever existed in the spaces of his ribs and the valleys of his chest. Not like what he did to his Mam— eventually killing her. Not like how he drove his father away because the dread was too heavy of a burden to carry.

Remus would rather Sirius hate him then watch him suffer through that.

Anything but that.

So Remus quietly packs his few belongings in the same trunk he’s had since first year with a flick and swish of his wand. And he pens Sirius a missive that he just doesn’t feel the way he had when they were in Hogwarts. And he tells him that his missions have him traveling all over the continent and it’s too much work to constantly be coming back home. Tells him that he knows about the brunette Muggle boy he had fucked back in August when he thought Remus was fibbing about his whereabouts and he lies that it’s all right because he tells him that he’s been shagging a professor from Beauxbatons named Benjy for the past six months whenever he was sent to France under duress of Dumbledore. Even if the truth is that he refuted his every advance because his love for Sirius will always sing the loudest in his heart.

He sets the goodbye on the dresser that is only piled with Sirius’s things now, and doesn’t let himself sneak one last kiss while Sirius continues to doze. Tries to imprint the image of him— so gorgeous and so so human— in his mind’s eye, hopes he’ll recall the precise slope to the small of his back and the flyaway strands of his ink black hair and how he breathes in two beats longer with every third exhale. Knows that he’ll never memorize just how jutting his cheekbones really are, or how his lashes kiss the top of them with such grace that it’s close to angelic. And he’ll never again feel the neediness Sirius could evoke with his fingers and tongue and cock, but maybe that’s all right. Maybe Remus got his time in the sun and now he has to repent for steeling that snatch of heaven for all these years.

Nothing could’ve kept the flame between them flickering for long, and that’s a truth Remus knows as inherently as his knowledge that Sirius was the great love of his life— But Remus was always destined to either spare him or burn the golden tapestry that made up the picture of Sirius Black until it was nothing but ash.

So he leaves and he tells himself that it’s the right decision for both of them.

~My Wolfstar FIC Masterlist~

#wolfstar #REMUS LUPIN #SIRIUS BLACK #SIRIUSXREMUS #REMUSXSIRIUS #MARAUDERS #HARRY POTTER SERIES #I'm sure no one will like this lol #sigh #spilt ink

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isuspectyouhavefantheories · 4 years ago

Text

The Crossroads to the Sun 🌞

Takemura/Female V

Rated: M for mature themes and explicit content NSFW 18s only

Trigger Warnings: Themes of death, suicide, gallows humour

Part 1 of ???? “The Sun Series”

Link to part two :

https://isuspectyouhavefantheories.tumblr.com/post/641314624666468353/search-for-the-sun

Will eventually be posted on my AO3 account when I get this beta’d. 🤟

———

She had decided she wanted to be away from night city when she pulled the plug. If anything, she wanted it to end under the blanket of the starry skies, part of her hoping they would guide her into the next world safely. Driving through the neon jungle felt like a technicolor funeral procession. Or perhaps a walk to the gallows? She was thankful she still had most of her senses as she pulled herself from her morbid reverie just in time to avoid a badly placed bollard on a sharp turn straight down the road heading towards the city limits. She swore under her breath but continued. The pain was dull, but festering in her mind, less so than before, but enough to keep reminding her of the internal ticking clock that was getting louder with each passing hour as it neared to zero. She breathed deeply though her nose and steeled herself. But more doubts began to drift through her, like a slick fog encircling her mind she thought of all the people she would be leaving behind and hoped they wouldn’t hate her after tonight.

Goro’s name flashed up on her biomon and it took her a minute to register. She nearly rear ended a truck at a traffic light before finally answering.

“Yes?”

“Where are you?” His voice was gruff, demanding and her eyebrow crinkled in irritation.

“What’s it to you?”

“Let me help you V. Just take the deal with Hanako, we make this right and you get back your life. If I were you, I would not waste the chance.”

“You mean you get back your life.” She spat, Takemura went quiet on the other end for a moment, his eyes flinching at her tone. “Don’t try and pretend this is concern for my well-being and as far as making this right goes... You really still think you and Arasaka can fix this? Goro I know when I’m beat. Nobody can fix this. I’m done for and it’s time I just fucking faced facts and made my peace. I’m done. I’m calling it.” She hadn’t realised how hard she was gripping the steering wheel until she felt the alloy begin to crunch lightly under her guerrilla cybernetics.

There was a long pause and she thought for a moment he had hung up until she heard the shuffling of erratic, hurried movement on the other end.

“Where are you V?” He demanded, his voice was direct, to the point, no room for nonsense, no room for anything but answers.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ve left a data chip with Misty. It contains all the relevant evidence, via brain dance, you need to get the vindication you so desperately require.”

“V, tell me where you are right now. ” It was sharp this time.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help more. Goodbye, Goro. It was a pleasure to have known you.” She hung up and looked down at her phone, closing her eyes a moment only to be jolted by Takemura calling again. She took a deep breath before turning it off and throwing it in the passenger seat and popping into third gear as she trolled though the gates past the city limits to security. She was quickly flagged through with little bother from security. They seemed more interested in what was coming into the city that what was going out.

It took her an hour to get to where she needed to go. The edge of the badlands. The final touch stone before she headed further in, back to all she ever knew. Just another busted down prewar gas station covered in sand, nature already claiming back its land. She parked her car outside and managed to pry open the front door after digging some accumulated sand from the way.

—————

She woke to the whistling of the desert storm on the shutters, the dilapidated old outpost rocked shakily. She almost felt as if she was in the belly of a ship at sea being pulverised, to and fro, by an onslaught or roaring waves.

She sat up, listening to them a while, until eventually the weather died down to a gentle lulling breeze. She stepped outside for a moment and thanked whatever powers that were out there that the sky was clear enough to see the moon and a dim scattering of stars. She climbed from her make shift cot and stepped outside.

“Still think you made the right call? Those Saka assholes might have fixed you up all nice.” Johnny flashed back into her peripheral vision, sitting on a bench under a busted canopy with his guitar slung across his lap.

“I dunno. I guess we’ll see.”

“Val.”

She looked up at him with narrowed eyes.

“They were just going to extract you and dump me the moment it suited them. What, you think I was just gonna put my head in a hungry lions mouth and just hope everything would just sort itself out? For all I know they would have just cut me open the minute they got me up there. I’d rather die out here, on some dusty ass terra firma in the wastes than lose my mind up in some space prison.” She flipped out Evelyn’s cigarette case, only three left in place making her sigh before pulling out one and lighting it up.

Johnny groaned at the sensation of the nicotine flooding her system from her first drag. It had been a while since she’d allowed herself such little pleasures, but for the first time in months she wasn’t on deaths door, bringing death so someone else’s door or trying to kidnap an heiress, so exceptions can be made.

“Weather out here huh? Never notice it in the city but, fuck. Mother nature sure is a feisty broad.”

“You have no idea.” She chuckled.

“Pretty good we got here before the worst of of the storm hit earlier. I would not want to be the sorry sack of shit that had to drive through that.” Johnny chuckled.

—————————

It was about 5am, sun already shining and blistering the ground, she had scavenged a few things from the outpost to keep her and Johnny going long enough to get to the Aldecaldos

Or just long enough. The thought of kicking it just before saying goodbye to Panam and Saul and the others churned uncomfortably down into the pit of her stomach but she attempted to occupy her mind, busying herself with prep work and repairs on her gear. She was going to try at least.

Before she could think of the next task, Johnny materialised again, already on edge.

“Someone’s coming.”

“Raffen? Cops? Arasaka?”

“Can’t be sure. I’d get ready if I were you.” He was gone again, and all she could think to do was get back to the gas station and ready herself for the visitors.

A Herra Outlaw that looked as if the chemical desert had taken a shit on it, genuinely one of the most out of place thing she had ever seen in the badlands and that was saying something, pulled up with a soft screech as the brakes engaged and the engine shuttered off. The pop of the car door made her grip her baseball bat tighter as she edged closer to the door, so as to be on the hidden side when it opened.

The door flung open, nearly ramming her in the face had she not hugged the wall so closely, she held her breath as a darkened figure entered the room, but the rasping baritone that filled the air made her freeze.

“V?” Takemura’s voice cut through her and all she could do was stare in disbelief.

“What the fuck?”

He whipped around like lightening, his wild searching gaze landed on her and his eyebrows all but flew up into his hairline and his eyes widened in disbelief but seemed to relax after a moment, a wave of relief washing over his features as of up until this moment he had been in a panic.

It was all a blur, he pulled the rusted metal door closed, nearly wrenching the door off its screeching hinges before his arms suddenly reached for her. He pulled her forcefully into his chest into an embrace that should have shattered her spine with the implants this man had. The newly back online ones, she noted.

She scrunched her eyebrows incredulously at him when he pulled away, his fingers tracing down the length of her arms until they still rested on her shoulders as he continued to look at her as if he was afraid the moment he took his eyes off her she would disappear into thin air.

“What are you doing here?” She breathed, still struggling for air after the uncharacteristic ribsplitting hug.

He looked down now, almost sheepish in his manner but he did not waiver when he returned his gaze to her.

“Stopping you from making a foolish choice.”

She sighed deeply.

“And since when do you have any right to tell me what I can and can’t do?”

“I do not. But I can try at least to make you see reason.” He wasn’t budging, she wasn’t budging.

“Goro...” she pinched the bridge of her nose and temple in an attempt to quell the newly forming tension migraine.

“You could have your life back. You would be good as new, Arasaka would ensure it if you testify at the board meeting. Arasaka always rewards loyalty.”

“I know that’s some rhetoric you’ve been spoonfed your whole life but unfortunately I have a very different opinion on the subject of ‘who Arasaka serves’ and it most certainly isn’t people who have a history of stealing from them.” She dead panned, making Goro groan.

“If you would just listen to me you would know that is not the case. Hanako-sama has extended this life like to you V do not waste it.”

“I’ve been listening. And watching. From the very start. I’ve seen them from an angle you have yet to even comprehend and part of me fears even then you wouldn’t see the truth.”

“They are-.”

“Only in this for themselves. I won’t argue with you about this, there is nothing you can say that will change my mind. I’m not selling my souls to the fucking devil, man, I’m sorry but that’s how this situation feels to me. I know there is nothing anyone can do for me, not you, not Arasaka, not Hellman, not even Alt fucking Cunningham’s AI ghost from beyond the Blackwall knows how to undo this so fuck this. I refuse to spend the last days of my life scrambling for answers only to whither away to nothin and die anyway. I’m leaving this hellhole on my own fucking terms. So just let it go. Just forget about me and go back to your cushty little life as Arasaka’s cheerleader or body guard or whatever the fuck it is you do.”

She couldn’t remember how, but during the course of their verbal spat, he had pushed her against the adjacent wall from the door and upon hearing her retorts he snarled in frustration and slammed his hand into the wall beside her head, denting the already disintegrating plaster, sending a cloud of dust in the air around them. The pluming cloud fluttered and caught the small rays of morning light seeping through the crags and cracks in the windows and walls of the abandoned gas station. She managed to push him off with a forceful shove only to have him lunge back to her. His martial arts clashed with her own brand of badlands fist fighting. She was flexible, contorting her body out of his reach before rounding on him with a left hook followed by a hasty jab aimed for his face. Unfortunately, he had reach, countering her wild strikes with a wave of his arm and tugging her to him. She lifted her knee between them to vault herself from his grasp but lost her footing at the end and it took only a single low sweeping kick to her other leg that sent her off kilter, but Goro followed her to the ground where he pinned again, this time on the floor with both her hands above her in each of his. She struggled against his vice grip, twisting and squirming beneath him to roll him off but he refused to be moved barely even flinching as she thrashed beneath him, awaiting her to finally stop. She roared in frustration but refused to give up. If she couldn’t knock him with her strength then she could knock him with her words.

“Hanako knew!” She spat at him, the intensity of her glare ripping though him.

“Knew what?” He asked with narrowed eyes.

“She knew it was Yorinobu who murdered her father. She knew you were telling the truth, that you were being framed and she still let you go down. Then guess what the kicker here is?” She laughed bitterly. “Saburo’s not even dead. He’s being kept as an engram, he’s been planning something with Hanako this whole time and they were going to let you go down regardless!! They were going to discard you, who served them faithfully your whole life, for their own fucking agenda. So tell me, why you think for one fucking second that they will actually help me?” Takemura was quiet, his hold on her waining enough for her to flip them, her hands balled into his shirt begging him to look at her but it was as if something had been shattered in him. They both were panting from their verbal and martial exchange, but they were far from done.

He suddenly reached up, his hand cupping her cheek gently, tracing the cybernetics of her face with the tips of his fingers before pulling her down to him without warning, his lips finally met hers in a heated kiss.

She gasped into his mouth, giving him the chance to shove his tongue in to explore her. He didn’t know when he would get the chance, if he ever would again after this. But she had yet to bite his face off so he took that as a good sign. In fact she had nearly gone limp from the shock of his sudden advance. He pulled away slowly, his face still inches from hers but his eyes bored into hers with a renewed intensity.

She pulled her hand from his now loosened grip and reached down gently and placed a delicate hand on his cheek, only for him to lean into it with closed eyes. He pressed his own hand over hers and took a deep calming breath.

“Goro, look at me.”

His eyes opened again, staring down at her with so much hope yet one word from her could shatter him into a thousand shards. And fate was a cruel mistress.

“I’m going home.” He looked down at that, his brow tugged in an unreadable expression but she chased after his gaze and held his chin so he had no choice but to stare wordlessly at her.

“I’m going home. To the people I love. To say goodbye. And maybe... maybe, for once in my life just try to do some good in this world, not for eddies or cred or some fucking illusion of grandeur, but just to do something worthwhile. I want have something real. Before I... before I can’t anymore.” She stroked his cheekbone with the back of her knuckle. “I don’t expect you to understand. But it isn’t up for debate.” Not what he had wanted to hear, but the finality in her words left him no room to argue. And so he was then left to stare down the inevitable horribleness of a world with no V.

He rested his face in the crook of her neck, her soft sun kissed skin, slick with sweat from the desert heat.

“Then let me have this at least.” He whispered against her, causing her to shiver under the weight of his words.

He returned his lips to hers, an even more energised passion driving his need and to his surprise she returned it, hands cupping his face gently. She then pushed him back down on his back and dove back to his lips. He began unbuttoning and loosening her clothes as fast as his hands could allow him. He pulled off her tank top and stopped a moment to admire her perky little breasts before pulling her back to him and lavishing her chest adoringly with bites and kisses that made her mewl against him.

“You have been taunting me since the day we met. Not wearing anything but that tight blue netrunner suit.” He growled against her chest, biting at the underside of her breast, his eyes primal and burning hers with an unspoken need to be closer.

“I’m a net runner you gonk, ah-!” He bit a little harsher around her nipple at the comment but lapped at it gently afterwards. “I-it was for practicality’s sake.” She shivered against him.

“It was to torture me.” He chuckled.

He lifted them suddenly, his hands under her thighs again as he deposited her on a near by countertop, her legs wrapping around his hips as he ground himself desperately into her while trailing his lips from her ear lobe to her jugular and back before biting then tugging sharply causing her to yelp softly.

“Maybe a little.” She gasped, casting him a delighted grin which elicited a growl from deep within his chest. He leisurely ran his hands along the hem of her jeans, tugging at them slightly before slipping his hand down underneath to grab a handful of her ass, squeezing it appreciatively before moaning at how soft and pliant her skin was under the extra sensitive touch of his cybernetic hands. He allowed himself to become lost in her for a moment. Mapping her every contour in his mind, committing each breathless sound that fell from her lips to memory, savouring her sweet breath on his tongue and wondering if he would ever again taste something so perfect as her. He felt her pull away lightly, a few centimetres from his face to gasp for a breath and still his lips chased hers. It was as if she could read his mind sometimes, she was looking at him with those confounding purple eyes, her smile faltering as if she could see how banefully torn he was.

“This won’t change anything.” She whispered sadly against his lips .

His brow creased under the weight of his anguish, another growl, not so carnal as before but instead a roar of frustration and he attacked her body with a new found, punishing fervour. He pulled her up effortlessly once again and threw her into the cot, her body’s weight caused the springs to groan and he had managed to discard his shirt fully, then turned to her. She was now only in her underwear, her golden skin glistened in the low orange morning haze. Her body was lithe yet athletic, her skin tantalisingly smooth to the touch yet disturbed by stray scars scattered about her person. Her years of fighting for her survival in this hellscape had shaped her and moulded her into this picturesque model of strength and beauty. He kneeled before her, nipping his way down her navel to the hem of her panties that he then quickly slid off in one fluid motion. He dove between her legs, basking in the sweet gasps she made as he drove her wild with his tongue. Her hands twisted and twined themselves into his ebony and silver locks, pulling his bun loose to let his hair cascade down his shoulders, grazing her nails over his scalp delicately. He introduced a single finger to her and pumped deeply inside her yet at a controlled pace, eliciting another quivering gasp that made him smile against her.

“Goro...” the way her breathless lips formed around his name drove something in him. She was able to bring out the strangest and most wonderful of feelings in him.

He was sure from her cries she was nearing her climax and before she could taste the sweet precipice of her release, he rose up to kiss her. Her taste on his lips had a lewd yet arousing effect on her, but her climax, once so tantalisingly close was now receding and the heat biting and curling in her abdomen made her squirm against him. She pulled away after a moment and gasped a quick breath.

“You ass.” He pressed his face into her neck again and she felt the rumble of his chuckling. He continued to kiss her neck and his hands pinched and rolled her nipples in a torturously teasing manner. She writhed under him, a mewling mess.

“Stop teasing me.” She pleaded, her own hands cupping either side of his face to pull him from his ministrations on her neck that she was almost certain would be bruised to absolute fuck in the morning.

He nudged her legs to open and she obliged eagarly.

He teased her entrance lightly running his tip up and down coating himself in her essence before sliding steadily inside of her. He had to stop half way and swallowed a guttural moan. She was so tight. Like a warm vice pulling him further inside her and dragging him impossibly closer to her. Her legs had wrapped around his hips, her thighs quivering around his girth. He took another moment to make some experimental, shallow thrusts and groaned once more at how deliciously slick she was.

“Oh... V...” his forehead pressed against hers and his grip around her hips tightened.

“Don’t.... stop...” she was barely above a whisper, which made Goro want nothing more than for her to be louder.

He took this as his moment to flip her onto her stomach against the cot.

His right hand held both her arms behind her back, folded and solidly trapped there. His left hand was holding her hip, dragging down to guide her over his girth once again. He rather enjoyed the view of her at this angle, he was so lost in the way she bounced against him, the feeling of her walls rubbing so exquisitely against his length, that he was sure he wouldn’t last long. The thought of having their tryst cut so short however did not appeal to him, the feeling of being fully encased by her was so unequivocally amazing he never wanted it to stop, so he forced himself to slow down to a languid yet laborious pace, favouring drawn out leisurely strokes.

“Jesus Christ...” she gasped, arching her back in a way that made him want to go back to pounding her within an inch of her life but he was controlled, no foolish young man driven by a cardinal need, but a mature and tentative lover who wanted to make his partner see the stars before this was over.

He reached around, dragging his hands from the underside of her bellybutton to glide along her ribs, up and over her breast, giving it an appreciative squeeze before cradling her throat gently and turning her head to look back at him as much as she could in the position which granted wasn’t much. He leaned forward, still thrusting inside her at a restrained pace, and ravaged her neck, suckling the flesh at the junction of her shoulder and neck before trailing his bites to the underside of her jaw, then to her ear where he nibbled her lobe gently.

“Tell me what you want.” He breathed against her, the lewd sound of their bodies meeting in their primal dance and the soft gushes of wind rattling the shutters were all she could hear above their own crescendo of panting and haggard moans.

“Don’t... be a dick...” she gasped, earning her a sharp smack on her ass cheek.

“Tell me.” He thrust inside her, harder but not hard enough to satisfy her fully, leaving her trembling for more.

“Ah... fuck! Please...” she breathed, trying to shove her own hips back into his for more friction but his hand migrated back to her hips, a solid anchor, preventing her from getting her way.

“That’s not what I asked you.” She could hear the underlying cockiness in his tone and it pissed her off almost immediately.

How could this man illicit such polarising reactions from her, she thought. One moment she wanted him to bend her over a desk, the next she wanted to snap him in two. But the sentiment remained, she wanted him.

“Please... Goro... fuck me... harder...” he hummed in satisfaction and released her arms from his vice grip.

“Then I suggest you hold onto something.” He had leaned forward his lips against her ear, the vibrations of his bassy timbre tickled her in an irresistibly tantalising way.

But her inward musings came to a hault when he began his unforgiving pace, she could feel him hitting her cervix with every thrust and she cried out, hands barely holding on to the edge of the cot as her body rocked against the force of his hips.

His hand came down to tease her slit, circling her sensitive nub in a maddeningly delicious way that caused more mewls to erupt from her lips.

Goro stared down at her, enraptured by every twist and twitch she made. Her arching back defining her musculature and he’d be lying if he was doing any better than her right now. He was holding on for dear life, dragging this out for as long as he possibly could. But eventually, the warmth and curling in his abdomen could not be ignored and he quickened his circling around her clit to drive her to her end. She screamed softly into her hand as her release rolled over her in wave after wave, his continuing thrusts helping her ride out her climax to its fullest. He followed her soon after, nearly collapsing on her, his forehead resting between her shoulder blades as he struggled to regain his breathing. She recovered before Goro and pulled him further onto the cot where they crumbled into it. He curled around her, his arms pulling her flush against him as he savoured the feeling of her skin on his. He pressed his nose and lips to the top of her head, inhaling her scent deeply, attempting to sear these details into his mind for a later date. He tried his best to keep his eyes open, but she began to stroke his chest in a soothing circle, and before he knew it he was out like a light.

——————

He woke with a jolt, the room now completely darkened by the night and a sudden anxiety disquieted his mind. He reached for where V had been but his hand grabbed nothing but empty space.

“V?” He called, sitting up and listening for anything, then scanning the area. He could see from his thermal scan she had been gone from his side for nearly two hours.

He pulled himself up, dressing quickly and wrenching the front door open to see that her Thorton was gone, whatever tracks that were left had been swallowed by the desert wind and he stood in silence.

“This isn’t going to change anything.” Her words echoed in his mind and he clenched his hands into fists, a slight shake evident from his barely controlled emotions on the cusp of breaking through to the surface.

“They were going to discard you, who served them faithfully your whole life, for their own fucking agenda.”

He tried to quell his anger, his hurt, his inescapable feeling of betrayal. He fought to keep his composure but the memory of her touch was seared into his mind and body yet it did nothing but only make him ache to have her back in his arms. He would never feel that again, never experience that intense, intrinsic connection to another human being. The thought did nothing to disquiet his mind. Eventually he broke and turned to punch his hand nearly completely though the wall of the garage as he breathed in ragged and strangled chokes. Unshed tears burned in his eyes and he wrenched his arm back to completely break through the wall altogether with the force of his strike. He didn’t stop. He pummelled the wall until his cybernetics were scuffed and cracked. Warning signs flashed in his peripheral vision but he ignored them, slumping to the ground he cradled his head in his hands and roared in futility. He stayed there a moment, still, quiet and thoughtful. He raised his head with a thud against the nearly dilapidated wall and he looked off into the distance. On one path, the further reaches of the badlands, down another was the fluorescent and blinding lights of Night City, beaconing him back with a curled finger.

And not just night city, but the ominous red looming glow of Arasaka Headquarters illuminating the night and further banishing the stars. The only life he had ever known was within Arasaka’s ranks. All he had ever been was a vassal, a loyal one at that. Traded his life and limbs for them. Let them carve him into an instrument of their empire from the moment they had deigned to elevate him from the slums, only after he had skinned his fingers to the near bone scrubbing his clothes in the chemical sickened canals. He had given Arasaka his life.

Yet Hanako knew he was innocent. Not only her but Saburo, his lord tono, his idol. He had known. It stung him to his nucleus, like nothing ever had. He was stilled, inaction gripping him to his core. He found his gaze always defecting back to the badlands. To her lands. He didn’t make a choice so much as follow an instinct.

He rose from his seated position and opened the door to his car, looking back at Night City one last time, not saying goodbye to the city, but farewell to all the possibilities it held. They were not meant for him. A defiant grin stretched over his lips before a determination set in his eyes, looking back to the badlands. He dove into the front seat and revved the engine before backing out to the edge of the main road and quickly pivoting into position then tearing out onto the dusty highway, sending a plume of dust in his wake as he made for the badlands, his spirit lightened and rejuvenated. He undid his top shirt buttons, ripping off the front Arasaka logo to his cybernetic neck plates and throwing it with a quick flick out the car window, then looking down at the Arasaka patch logo on his arm which he also tore from his jacket then sent it too flying out the window. With each metre he put between him and the city, the younger he felt.

“I’m coming V.” He whispered under his breath as he pressed harder on the gas.

#goro takemura #cyberpunk 2077 #takemura x v

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