#the amount of grief she gets for grieving her mother in any way she can is ridiculous

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Whumtober 2023, Day 10: "You said you'd never leave."

fandom: criminal minds | characters: spencer reid (centric), diana reid, derek morgan, aaron hotchner, jennifer jaraeu, penelope garcia, emily prentiss | ship: past spencer reid/elle greenaway | trigger warnings: parent abandonment, depression, grief | content: spencer reflects on the people who have left him over the course of his life and grieves | word count: 1.3k.

“The five stages of grief,” Spencer says, standing in front of his geographical profile addressing officers on a case, “is a model developed by Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, and became famous after she published her book On Death and Dying in 1969. Kübler-Ross developed her model to describe people with terminal illness facing their own death, but it was soon adapted as a way of thinking about grief in general. 

“We believe this unsub is not grieving death in his life, but rather, great loss in general. The five stages are often mistaken to only be relevant to death, because of the term grief. But in fact, you can grieve many things, and you can go through the stages in any order. This unsub has been left by so many people - his mother, father, siblings, partner and only close friend because of his sociopathic tendencies, and he is grieving these losses like they’re death. We believe he is in the anger stage, hence his violent behavior.” Spencer turns to look at Rossi, who takes point from there, going on to describe what the officers should be looking for. Once they’ve dismissed the locals, Spencer excuses himself. 

Once he’s out in the fresh air, he takes a huge, shaking breath in, and raises a trembling hand to rub at his eyes. Penelope had relayed a list of people who had left this unsub to them over the phone, and Spencer had found himself growing more and more uncomfortable as each name had been read off the list. It’s only been a few weeks since Hotch left to go into witness protection, and though Spencer knows there was no other option, he can’t help but feel betrayed. It’s torn open old wounds for him: the amount of people that have left Spencer is laughable. He’s only ever had a handful of people he’s let in close see his vulnerabilities, and it feels like it always ends with them leaving. 

Spencer’s brain knows none of the people who have left him because of anything to do with him. 

Spencer’s heart aches with loneliness and grief, and always finds a way to make it his fault. 

Denial

“Spencer, what are you doing? It’s nearly midnight,” Diana Reid says, shivering and pulling her dressing gown around her tighter. She approaches her twelve year old son, who sits in the living room, staring out the window that watches over their driveway. 

“Sometimes when Dad leaves, he forgets his keys. I’m just making sure he doesn’t get locked out if he comes back,” Spencer says calmly. Diana sighs and takes a seat next to her son. 

“Sweetheart,” she says, “look at me.” 

Spencer turns to face his mother, eyes wide and tired behind his too-big glasses. 

“We’ve been over this. Your father isn’t coming back,” her voice quivers and cracks. 

“But you don’t know that,” Spencer argues gently. “You don’t know that for sure.”

“I’ve known your dad for a long time, Spencer. When he makes a decision, he sticks to it,” Diana says sadly. 

Spencer shakes his head stubbornly and turns to look back out the window. 

“You don’t know that for sure.” 

2. Anger 

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Spencer says, his voice low and gruff. Morgan is taken aback by his friend's tone. He’s known Spencer for close to two years now, and he’s never heard so much anger in the young man’s voice. Spencer is by nature incredibly gentle, and he’s surprised at the sudden turn in emotions a week after Elle has left the BAU. 

“I get that. But you seem - well, really tightly wound. And I thought talking might help. I know you and Elle were… close-,”

“You can just say we were fucking,” Spencer snaps, and now Morgan is really concerned. The Spencer he knows would never use such colloquial language to describe the sort of relationship he and Elle had, let alone snap like that.

“I-,” 

“There’s nothing to talk about, Morgan,” Spencer says tightly, clenching his jaw. “I thought she trusted me enough to talk to me about what was going on, and I was wrong. She’s gone, she’s not coming back, end of story.” Spencer walks away, fists tightly balled at his sides. 

3. Depression

“I thought I might find you here,” a voice says, and Spencer looks up sharply from where he’s sitting, curled in the corner of the living room of Gideon’s cabin. He swipes at the tears on his face and sniffs, trying to pretend he hasn’t spent the last four hours sitting here, shivering and crying like a pathetic little kid. 

“S-sorry, did - do we have a case?” Spencer says, his voice shaky and hoarse. 

“No,” Hotch says, lowering himself to the ground in front of Spencer and watching him carefully. “No case. But I went to check on you at your apartment this evening, and you weren’t there.” 

“You came to check on me?” 

Hotch sighs. “I know what Gideon meant to you. And it seemed to hit you very suddenly yesterday that he isn’t coming back.” 

Even just hearing Hotch say it makes Spencer’s heart ache. His lower lip trembles, and he’s furious that he’s doing this here and now and in front of Hotch nonetheless, but he can’t help it. The tears spill down his cheeks suddenly. 

“It’s okay to be sad,” Hotch says gently, in a voice reserved only for Spencer’s lowest moments. “Allow yourself that.” 

“I feel like he took a piece of me with him,” Spencer sobs. 

Hotch reaches out and squeezes his hand. “I know. I’m sorry.” 

Spencer squeezes back. “Please don’t leave me too,” he chokes, and Hotch sighs shakily. 

“No, Spencer, I won’t. I won’t ever leave you.” 

4. Bargaining 

“But now that I know,” Spencer argues, “it’ll be easier for her to come back. She’s opened up to me and I understand why things were difficult for her, and if I just tell her that I’ll be able to help her through it, that we’re all supporting her-,” 

“Spence,” JJ sighs, “I know it’s hard, but Blake made her decision. We have to respect that.” 

“But if I just talk to her,” Spencer says, not taking in a single word JJ says, “I can help her understand. I can help her come back and feel comfortable.” 

“Spence,” JJ says again. “I know your relationship with Alex was unique. I know you trusted her quicker than  you’ve ever grown to trust anyone. She felt the same way about you, that’s why she told you about her son. But that’s all the more reason to trust that she’s made the right decision for herself.” 

Spencer is quiet for a moment. Then - 

“But if I just call her…” 

5. Acceptance 

“I miss him,” Spencer announces, entering Penelope’s office and flopping down on a chair beside her. “I miss Morgan.” 

“Me too, sweetpea,” she sighs, offering him a cookie from the tin she keeps on her desk. He shakes his head in response. She pulls one out and begins to munch on it. 

“I’m happy for him, you know? Like, really happy. I’ve said that, right? I told him I was happy for him?” 

“Only a million times,” Penelope says through a mouthful of chocolate chips. 

“But I still miss him. And I still wish he was here. Is that horrible?” 

“Oh Spencer, no,” she says, swallowing and smiling at him sadly. “You’re allowed to be sad. I’m devastated, but I’m still buzzing with joy over the fact that there’s a little baby Derek running around. It’s okay to feel both, you know.” 

“Yeah,” Spencer says, sadly. “I suppose it is.” 

6. …

Emily announces Hotch has gone into witness protection, and it’s like the wind has been knocked out of him. He knows Hotch doesn’t have a choice. He knows Hotch will do anything to protect his son, including staying in witsec however long he needs to. But emotions still flood him, overwhelm him, kick and scratch and punch him. His face burns and hot tears threaten to spill down his cheeks. He squeezes his eyes shut against the tsunami of grief. 

“You said you’d never leave,” he whispers  to the empty conference room. Everyone’s gone, and now it’s just Spencer and the ghosts of all the people who have once sat in this room and chosen to leave him. “You said you’d never leave.” 

[illunicae]

You Can See the Stars

I've wanted to do a part two to When the Lights Go out since I first published it and I finally got around to it. Obviously this will have so much angst, but there is a little fluff mixed in there at the end. Also I might do more stories sent in this timeline so I'm calling the collection There's Always More to Lose. (Also found on Ao3)

Pairing: Rise Donatello x Female Reader

TWs: Semi-graphic description of wounds, Character death, The Kraang apocalypse, Mentions of past character deaths, Blood and injury, Death

The days passing were a hellish blur. You never left your room: there was nothing for you out there. You hardly ate: the soup Mikey had brought you earlier sat abandoned on your bedside table. Your skin was dull: you were withering away. Your eyes never shown with that once familiar youthful spark: what light is left in your life? Tear tracks were a permanent feature on your cheeks, even after your tears stopped falling. 

The photo clutched in your hands made your heart twist in a devastating way, yet you couldn’t look away. You were frozen. The picture wasn’t that old, only taken a year ago by a stealthy Michelangelo determined to document the fleeting moments of peace in this world. 

A young Lenore sat on her father’s shoulders, the brightest grin on her face as she waved to her mother. Her mother was sporting her own carefree grin as she looked up at her daughter. One of Donnie’s hands was wrapped around Lenore’s ankle to keep her balanced while atop his shoulders; the other was extended toward his wife, where she grasped it in her own hand. The glow of pure admiration in his eyes as he looked at his wife went unnoticed by her in the moment. 

The scene was pulled slowly from your hands and you're brought back to your desolate bedroom. Only this time you're not alone. Your eyes rose to meet Leo’s worried gaze. In his large hand he held the photo like a delicate flower petal, his gaze only flickered to it momentarily and his heart broke more. 

Leo and Mikey were extremely worried for you, hell the whole resistance  was worried for their commander. The blue branded leader understood your grief, but only to a limited extent. When they lost Donnie, he was there with you while you grieved for a husband and he for a brother. But now you lost a daughter, a child. He knew he could never truly grasp a mother’s grief.  Leo wanted to fix things. He wanted to take away your pain, your grief.

He wanted to carry it for you, but that was an impossibility. All he could do was make sure you didn’t fall apart. 

The bed dipped as he sat next to you. You hardly moved. Leo thumbed the delicate photo before he sighed. 

“You need to eat.” When he didn’t get any indication of a response he continued. “I know it’s hard. I’m not going to sit here and say I understand, because I don’t. I could never understand the type of grief that hurts you. But I do know that neither of them would want you to waste away like this. Hidden from the people who are here to help. So please, (Y/n). Eat something, just a single spoonful.” Leo’s voice trailed off, a slight desperate edge to it as he gestured to the warm bowl of soup Mikey brought in, though you never noticed. 

You shakily exhaled. Your stomach twisted into an ugly knot both repulsed by the idea of food and craving it. How long had it been since you ate?

Eyes unseeing, you looked at the bowl. 

“Just one bite, for her.” Leo spoke, softly urging you to take it.

Shaking hands reached for the bowl. Leo felt relief wash over him as you brought it back to your lap and lifted the spoon with a shuddering hand. Your lips touched the edge of the spoon and the small amount of soup disappeared. Once again you exhaled shakily. 

“Thank you.” Leo whispered with relief. It was a start, so he let you return the bowl to your bedside table. He wasn’t going to let his best friend fall apart.

“Leo.” Your voice was scratchy from disuse, raw from nights of long sobbing, and soft from fear of disrupting the small bout of silence. Leo almost didn’t hear it. He wouldn’t have if he wasn’t paying such close attention to you. 

“I’m here, (Y/n).” He looked at the side of your face as you were still facing the far wall, not looking at anything in particular. 

Tears you thought had long since dried up began bubbling at the lip of your lids. “I failed.” You uttered, soft, raw, and scratchy.

“What?” Leo held the photo a little tighter. 

“I failed!” A gasp burst from your lungs as a few tears rolled down your cheek. You turned to look Leo in the eye and he could see the pain, despair, and grief swirling around. “I promised him I’d protect her. I promised HIM!” You sobbed.

Leo understood then.

He had made a similar promise.

Your body shook with forceful sobs as you fell forward. Leo lurched to catch you. Your head hit against his plastron, but you didn’t seem to care. His arms came up to wrap around you as you cried.

“She was supposed to be safe with me. I was supposed to keep her safe.” Tears poured more freely down your cheeks as you repeated your phrases and sobbed. Leo held still, offering himself up for whatever comfort he could provide. His flesh hand rubbed circles onto your back as your tears wet his chest.

“It’s not your fault.” He whispered. “You did what you could.”

You pulled away enough to look him in the eyes but not leave the embrace. You shook your head. Leo cupped your cheek with his hand and wiped a tear with his thumb. You grabbed his wrist with one of your hands, the other rested atop the photo Leo was still holding. 

“Who am I if I couldn’t protect her?”

✧*

The pair of you had stayed like that long into the night. Leo didn’t want to leave you alone, and you didn’t have the strength to insist you wanted solitude. When you finally decided to leave your room, Leo helped you when your legs refused to hold your weight. 

“One step.” Leo had instructed softly. “Take it one step at a time.”

You sighed and after a moment you were able to walk on your own, but Leo still kept close to your side as you wandered out into the hall. The few resistant members you passed whispered to each other, but you didn’t hear it. You didn’t want to hear it. You had seen it all before, when you lost Donnie and everyone treated you like you were delicate glassware. You supposed you looked even more fragile now without your little light by your side. 

Few of the members held a bit of hope in their eyes seeing you up and about again. They didn’t say anything, but their silence spoke plenty. You didn’t spare anyone a glance, you were determined to get to the mess hall where Leo insisted he get you some proper, warm food. 

Unfortunately your path took you past the memory wall. 

Seeing it out of the corner of you eye, you froze. Leo stiffened beside you. He knew they had put up new photos for everyone they lost in the battle four days prior. He could see the photo they put up for Lenore from where he stood in the hall.

You were looking into the room, your eyes unfocused.

“You don’t have to go in there. Don’t force yourself. We can just walk away.” Leo reassured with a gentle hand on your shoulder. 

You took a deep breath and stepped toward the wall; you had to face the wall at one point or another, you couldn’t hide from it forever. And while Leo had said not to push yourself, something was calling you. There would never be closure, not truly, but you had to start somewhere.

You’ll start with the photos on the wall.

Leo trailed after you slightly worried, but he did not stop you.

Looming ominously, lit up with a dozen candles, the wall towered over your form. It seemed to stretch on for miles, but you knew that was impossible, deep down you still had hope to believe you hadn’t lost enough people to fill miles of walls with photos though your grief surely felt limitless. 

It’s a well worn arc, your eyes drift across the wall. You looked at it countless of times. Your eyes first landed on the pair of expertly crafted sais to your right perched on a small shelf with a red ribbon and four candles. Your gaze traveled up the wall slightly to the various photos pined. Raph was smiling brightly in the first pic, his grin sharp and his eyes warm: he’s younger there, not as worn down with scars and still filled with inextinguishable hope. The next photo was of Casey: in typical Jones fashion, her grin was a little crazed as she wielded a titanium hockey stick high above her head. A second, smaller picture was pinned right under it of a tired Casey holding a small bundle in her hands. You couldn’t look at that photo for long and quickly avert your gaze to a very familiar object.

The violet battleshell was hung up on the wall, unused.   

Breath catching in your lungs like every time, you could only stare at the shell. Sometimes your fingertips would brush the smooth surface, but this hour your hand was heavy at your side. You could still feel the heavy clasps on your shoulders, a phantom weight that followed you constantly. Tensing your shoulders got rid of the feeling momentarily as you moved your gaze on. You could feel the sting as you looked at the photo of Donnie, he’s half asleep with a makeshift mug in his hand, maybe there’s coffee in the mug, you don’t actually remember. Coffee was a delicacy in the resistance. 

The next few photos are new. 

Pain pricked your eyes. You brought yourself there, you had to look. A soft exhale passed your lips as you lifted your gaze to look at the new photos. The first photo nearly pushed the tears over the lids of your eyes. Lenore bore a bright smile while sat at the edge of a roof. The desolate landscape stretched behind her, you could almost make out what remained of central park: a sad sight really, but the way the sun was setting made it glow almost ethereally and Lenore herself was haloed with golden light. She was so happy in that photo, almost carefree.

What life would she have had? In a world not ruled by grief and terror, would she have gone to school? Make lots of friends? Sneak out of the house to go to parties?

You blinked, there was no use worrying about questions with no answers. Twisting painfully, your heart thudded against your ribs as you saw the next photo, smaller than the first and nestled next to the battle shell. 

Lenore wore a lab coat, like her father. Both had goggles perched on their heads as they leaned over a piece of tech. Not just any tech, a battle shell–to fit a smaller shell, to fit Lenore. Lenore was biting her lip excitedly as she helped move tech into place. A proud smirk rested on Donnie’s lips as he watched his daughter work. Neither seemed to notice the camera. The photo was taken only a day before Donnie’s death. It’s the last photo you have of the two of them together. 

A tear slipped down your cheek as you stared at that photo, you hadn’t even realized you were crying again. 

They never finished the battle shell.

A strangled gasp broke the silence as you could do nothing more than stare. Leo’s warm hand came down to rest on your shoulder, a silent reassurance that he was there. You leaned into the small bit of comfort. 

“How am I supposed to go on?” You asked, your voice soft and distant and broken.

Leo swallowed, “You take the future one day at a time. One hour, one second if you need to. You keep moving forward, one step at a time. And know that everyone here will help you.”

✧*

You were in the lab. It wasn’t the first time you'd been in there and you hoped it won’t be the last. You had spent a lot of time in here after the death of Donnie, but you kept moving forward, for your daughter. Now you sat alone in the dim lab.

The unfinished battle shell still laid out on the table where Donnie and Lenore where once working on it. Lenore couldn’t stand the thought of finishing it without her father, even if it meant she would have been still standing here next to you. A thin layer of dust had collected on the tools left exactly where the pair had put them down when you had come to fetch them for dinner. None of you knew in that moment that it would be the last night you spent as a whole family.

If you looked hard enough you could still see your husband and daughter sitting around the table, muttering technical terms back and forth. 

Your thumb brushed over the cold metal, clearing some dust from the small engraved logo on the shoulder of the small battle shell. It’s been about a year since you lost Lenore, and a little over since you lost Donnie. Four short months was all it took for you to lose both the love of your life and your precious little light. 

“For you, my little light.” You mumbled softly. You looked around at the various screens and tech piled in the lab. “For you, my love.” Squaring your shoulders, you turned and left the lab, pausing briefly at the doorway to look over the empty space. 

Taking a deep breath you turned, letting the doors close and lock behind you. You'll be back. That’s what you kept telling yourself, but deep down you knew. Tomorrow is your last stand against the Kraang. 

You’ll either win or lose.

You don’t believe you’ll return to that lab again, but you’ll go into battle with determination. You will give it everything. If that’s not enough, then you'll see your husband and daughter again.

Muscle memory brought you to the rooftop exit of the base. It’s not a very tall building you've holed up in, but the roof still provided a half decent view. You didn’t care much for the horizon though, your eyes were always on the sky. Looking for the stars you so loved. 

But the world was too broken. The stars were hidden away. Though some nights when you couldn’t sleep or the eve of battle, you liked to pretend that you could still see them when you sat up there on the roof of the base. Usually you sat alone, wishing for something different: for a world not torn apart by a war, a world where your daughter could just be a kid, a world free from this pain. 

On a rare few occasions, Donnie would join you and you'd lay on your backs just staring at the red sky trying to catch a glimpse of the beauty beyond. Your hands would interlock and you would think back to that night you first showed Donnie the stars. 

You were 14. You were young and the world hadn’t been destroyed yet. You both had no idea what was waiting for you in the future, but it didn’t matter because all you cared about was there and then. You didn’t even know how much you mattered to each other yet. Your hands sat only an inch apart as you laid on your backs staring at the sky. Both of you wanted to slide your hand across to bridge the gap. Both of you were too afraid to do it. How little this moment would matter in the coming future. How many times you would return to this night.

You exhaled softly, you mind peaceful as you admired the sky above you. The glittering stars illuminating the field you found yourselves in. The city noise was only a distant hum.

“You know why I like it out here?” You asked softly. Donnie hummed and turned his head to glance at you. You were still watching the sky and he could see the stars reflected in your eyes. He could see your smile as you explained. “When all the lights go out you can see the stars.”

✧*

“Commander (Y/n), you’re hurt!” CJ shouted worriedly. 

The slash across your shoulder and above your heart throbbed painfully. Blood was gushing from the wound, staining your cloak a dark maroon color. You waved the boy off. “I’ll be okay.”

You weren’t sure how much of that was the truth. You and Leo shared glances, and you took notice of the blood pouring through the fingers of his prosthetic from a wound in his side. 

The howl of a kraang hound broke the two of you from your small stare off. You reacted quickest and sliced the hound deep with your sword, leaving the beast as a twitching pile of gore at your feet.

“Come on. We gotta move.” Leo instructed, and you all began sprinting up the hill. 

Leo stumbled, but CJ was right there to throw an arm over his shoulder and help Leo. You kept your palm on your own wound as you kept pace with the boys. 

All around them death and destruction ruled. You tried to keep focus as you sprinted. Briefly your mind wondered where April ended up. Oh you hoped she’s okay. Your head spun, the blood from your shoulder seemed like a river. Stay awake. Stay awake. 

You made it to the top of the hill. But you were far from done. You stumbled as did Leo and CJ in front of you. You could hear the kraang hounds behind you all. You all flinched, bracing for pain that never came, instead a familiar voice shouted.

“Bad doggies!” With relief you looked and saw familiar glowing golden chains protecting you all.

“Impecable timing little brother. Very dramatic.” Leo appraised. You could only dryly chuckle in relief as you let your head fall back against the red dirt ground.

A few feet away the boys were talking, but you couldn’t hear any of it over the sound of ringing in your head. Until Leo uttered the words you grew to fear: “That’s it. The Kraang won. The resistance failed.” 

A tear slipped down your cheek. So that's it? Was it all for nothing? 

You whimpered in pain as you sat up, across the way you made eye contact with Leo. The two of you seemed to speak with only your eyes. There was still a dim glimmer of hope. An impossibility really. One final shot.

When he spoke up there was resolution in his voice. “It isn’t over. We still have a ninja’s greatest weapon: hope.” Leo turned toward his younger brother. A smile on his face despite the circumstances. “That and a badass mystic warrior. Mikey we need a time gateway.” Leo requested, falling serious and somber once again.

Mikey’s eyes widened slightly at the request. “It’ll take everything I have.”

“I know, but this is our last chance. It’s our only chance.” Leo stated. You three adults all shared glances, each weighing the request in your own minds.

Mikey didn’t ponder the request for long before he nodded with determination and flew over toward an open spot to summon the gateway.

“Wait, what’s going on? Where’s he going?” Casey asked as you all watched Mikey.

“CJ you have to listen to us.” You said as you rose to kneel next to CJ and Leo. “The Kraang first came to our planet through a mystic doorway.” You explained.

Leo placed the picture of his family he was looking at earlier face-down on the ground and picked up a charred stone. “The key to open the doorway looked like this.” Leo sketched the image on the picture before picking it up and handing it to CJ.

“Why are you telling me this?” CJ asked, a worried edge cutting his voice.

“Because Mikey’s about to send you back in time to the day that the key was stolen.” Leo stated.

“Wait, he’s gonna what!?” Casey exclaimed in disbelief, his eyes were wide with thought of the impossibility. 

You placed your non-bloodied hand on CJ’s shoulder, he’s young and this is a lot to put on the shoulders of someone his age, but it’s your only shot of giving another timeline a chance. “The people who stole the Key opened the doorway for the Kraang. You have to find it before that happens.” You said softly, that day all those years ago flashing memories in your mind. 

“Find the Key. Stop the Kraang.” Leo’s voice was stern as he looked at the young teen.

CJ pocketed the picture with a frown, “But sensei–”

Leo cut the boy off with a hand to CJ’s shoulder. “Say it!”

“Find the key.” CJ repeated solemnly. “Stop the Kraang.” Both of you gave the boy a soft smile as you leaned back. CJ looked to be on the verge of tears as he looked between the two of you. CJ clutched the wrist of Leo’s prosthetic arm desperately. “I don’t want to lose you.” He mumbled.

With a soft sigh, Leo shook his head, “Casey, it’s not about me–”

The sentiment was cut off as a bright red light flashed down upon you like a spotlight from hell. Three large Kraang mechs loomed over you injured rebels. CJ jumped to his feet, revving his chainsaw hockey stick. You and Leo followed suit, but at a slower pace due to your wounds.

“They found us!” CJ shouted as he got ready to fight off the army. You could feel your heart shattering. You were out of options. 

Another light shone down on you from a mech crawling over the mountain of debris you were just using as cover. You were surrounded. This wasn’t a fight you could win. Realizing this Leo looked toward his brother, “Mikey.” 

The situation was daunting, Mikey only spared a glance at his arms cracking apart with golden light. With a shout, he willed more power to the portal. 

Noticing what was happening, CJ shouted. “Master Michelangelo, no! You're gonna—” He reached his hand out as Mikey glanced over his shoulder. Mikey winked with a smile before throwing the last of his strength into the gateway. The light was blinding. Your heart ached for you friend who was there one moment and gone the next in an explosion of brilliant golden flakes. The specks of light drifted past you remaining as you all stared in varying levels of grief. 

 Stark against the desolate landscape, a golden mystic portal beckoned you closer. It flashed and pulsed with Mikey’s magic. You took a deep breath. This was it. 

“When you’re done saving the world, do us a favor.” Leo set a heavy hand on CJ’s shoulder. “Grab a slice!” He shouted and threw the teen toward the portal. CJ stared wide eyed as he watched the two of you get farther from him. You and Leo offered one last reassuring smile before turning your backs to the portal.

“For them.” Leo stated with a tight grip on his sword.

“For all of them.” You repeated and you two dashed in opposite directions to protect the portal so no Kraang followed CJ to the past. Your wound screamed at you, blood pouring free of obstruction. But you didn’t back down. This world may be done for, but thanks to CJ another timeline may have a shot. 

You choked on air as something slammed into your back. Leo had looked over with wide eyes full of horror and grief. Glancing down revealed the sharp claws of a kraang mech jutting from your stomach. You tried to take a breath but couldn’t. You couldn’t feel the scream that ripped from your throat as the kraang threw you across the battle field, blood spilling in an arc following your trajectory.

When you finally stopped rolling, you looked up just in time to see the portal blink closed. You did it.

Your eyes locked with Leo’s before a blinding red light descended on both of you. You expected pain, but there was nothing. When you opened your eyes you felt nothing. Your body didn’t feel heavy.

You could rest now.

You looked up at the sky. You laughed without breath as you took in the beautiful sight. The battle field fell away, replaced with ribbons of color dancing and weaving through the sky. You sat in a thin layer of water. Was this the after life? It didn’t matter. 

“Mama!” A familiar voice shouted.

Your eyes flew wide as you turned to look, standing there was Lenore. She was glowing as she smiled, actually glowing as her ninpo surrounded her like a thin aura. You immediately jumped to your feet and ran toward your daughter. Lenore giggled excitedly as she too sprinted toward you, water splashing with each step she took.

The two of you collided roughly, but there was no pain, only relief and you hugged your daughter tightly. “My little light. My lovely Lenore.” You murmured as you cried and held your daughter close. 

“I’m here mama. I’m here.” Lenore hugged back just as tightly.

You sobbed with relief as you couldn’t say anything more than a few inaudible murmurs. Lenore was the first to pull away, much to your dislike, but when Lenore gestured to the figure standing nearby your heart leapt into your throat.

“Don?” Your voice whispered.

He smirked, a familiar sight. “Hello, love.”

You ran to him, heart soaring. He caught you as you leapt through the air. His arms caged you to his chest as he spun you around. “I love you.” You sobbed into his shoulder as you stopped and just stood in your embrace. 

“I love you to darling.” He responds, running a hand up and down your back in a soothing manor. 

You peeked to the side and pulled away just enough to reach your arm out and pull Lenore into the hug as well. “I missed you. I missed you both so much.” You said as you held your family close.

“We missed you too mama.” Lenore squeezed both you tightly.

“We’ll never have to be apart now.” Donnie stated as he pulled away slightly to cup your cheek and wipe away your tears. Lenore removed herself from the hug to smile at you both before rushing over to greet her uncles. You stayed glued to Donnie’s side as you saw Leo and Mikey surrounded by Raph, Splinter, April, and Casey. 

With a soft grin on your face, you looked back at your husband. He was already staring at you with a look full of admiration. His thumb rubbed idly across your cheek as he smiled. 

“You know why I like it here?” Donnie asked softly. You raised a brow in question. He just grinned. “When the lights goes out,” the dancing lights faded from the sky as Donnie lifted your chin slowly to get you to look at the sky. Your eyes widened as the lights were replaced by thousands of stars all glittering and twinkling. “You can see the stars.”

[bakingwithjaiden]

TW: death, funeral

“Would you like to say a few words?” 

Jaiden had shaken his head when the priest had asked him that question, receiving an understanding nod in response. He feels…lost for lack of a better word. Not literally but more in the sense of he’s not sure what he’s meant to be doing.

Well that’s not completely accurate, his eyes flickering to the pew across from him. Her name is…Chloe? He thinks it’s Chloe at least, one of his mother’s best friends who's currently sobbing so loudly he almost can’t hear the priest’s sermon. The women that are next to her are equally teary eyed and comforting her. Tuning back in he catches statements about how passionate his mother was about being a nurse, brow furrows in confusion at that statement. He’s not sure that’s the right word, she’d told him more than once it was just a job that let her travel on occasion. 

This whole funeral had him feeling thrown off, his professors had offered him extensions and let him know he could take as much time as he needed. His university had offered him the guidance counselor to discuss his grief and he’d politely decline. He wasn’t grieving, he wasn’t even particularly upset over his mother’s death. Couldn’t remember the last time they’d spoken to each other ever since he’d gone off to university.

Maybe a phone call? Even when he did go home during the holidays, he stayed in Dawson’s family’s guest room. He’s more than a little tuned out when Dawson nudges him and he realizes it’s over. Standing up he almost wishes they hadn’t come, people keep shaking his hand and touching him.

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

He knows he’s supposed to say thank you and hates it. This isn’t his loss, other than needing to handle her affairs this hasn’t had much impact in his life. But Dawson said he’s not allowed to say that, so instead he accepts the condolences and unwanted touch.

When he feels his phone vibrate he almost lets out a sigh of relief, they’ve now been here for what seems to be an acceptable amount of time. More than ready to head out and get started on the list of things that need taken care.

Pausing on his way out with Dawson, he looks at Chloe who is no longer sobbing, leaning against who he assumes is her husband. Hesitating before walking over to her, clearing his throat to gain her attention, “If you’d like to stop by at some point this week for any of her belongings you’re more than welcome to. I’ll be cleaning out her apartment this week.”

He’s not sure what part of that statement turns out to be incorrect, maybe it’s the fact his voice is monotone and his face is blank. What he is sure of is he’s made some type of mistake based on the look she gives him. 

“Your mother dies and you’re worried about cleaning out her apartment?”

He can feel Dawson moving closer to his side as he tilts his head, brow furrowing in confusion, “Well…it needs to be done. I’d like to be finished before the end of the week so that I can return to my school work.”

It’s barely a few seconds before it feels like his ears are ringing and his head has whipped to the side. There’s warmth on his cheek and he slowly turns back, sound rushing at him less than a moment later. 

Chloe is yelling, her husband trying to pull her back and keeping one arm up to keep Dawson back who is now also yelling. It takes longer than he likes for it to register; she'd slapped him, just in time to catch Dawson’s fist connecting with Chloe’s cheek. Now he’s quick to react, grabbing Dawson and heading out, the warmth on his cheek now starting to sting. 

They’re back at his mother’s apartment a drive later, boxes ready to be packed. His cheek is still red and Chloe’s hysterics yells over calling him a monster still echoing in his head.

“Hey I’m sorry I got us kicked out…just couldn’t let her get away with that,” Dawson mumbled clutching a couch pillow to their chest.

Shrugging, Jaiden slowly shook his head, “Don’t be…thank you for defending me,” even if he’s not completely sure he deserved it, he still appreciated them for it.

When he feels Dawson grab his hand he squeezes back catching their gaze when they smile at him, “Anytime.”

[god-of-this-new-blog]

13, 14, 16, 18!!!

Yaoigami, my dear dear friend, I will be breaking up this post because I can not ever say something quickly. Skipping 13 because I’ve already answered it!

14. That one thing you see in fics all the time

A thing I LOVE to see is Light being so sooo repressed. It’s real, and painful, and hot. Love.

A thing I HATE is Sex God Light tm. Those who know me know that I hold the firm belief that Light is a total nightmare to bed. I love this about him and refuse to believe that he could be some super confident dom right off the bat. However, I see SO much fic where Light is super experienced and confident and just fucks L like its nothing asking to be called Sir or Kira or something. No. This type of fic also tends to have L as a super shy virgin that can’t even look Light in the eyes. L is 25 and the richest person in the world—I think he’s had sex before. Light, however, is newly in college, straight laced, disgusted by impurities, and living at home. He even has a throw away line about his mother cleaning his room if I’m remembering correctly. However. This is a take everyone knows I have… I’ll try to think of a more obscure one.

Oh I HATE innocent Misa. Misa is scary, she gets Light to agree to date her under threat of death from a supernatural being. Misa is not a good person. She is obsessive with Light and I think she scares him at time. Her demands to be physical with him should not be taken as funny. She is demanding sex under threat of physical violence. Light knows that if he really displeases Misa that she will have him killed. What’s more, Misa makes it clear that this will go on for the rest of his life. Yes Light is cruel to her too, but if at any time Misa decided that she’d had enough, she could have Light killed so easily. And the thing is I am WAY more compelled by this Misa. I want her to be frightening and I want her to push Light in upsetting ways. Misa is demanding, wildly selfish, often manic, needy, and so so lonely. She is grieving her parents and grief makes her terrible and blood hungry and incapable of being alone. And yet she is still doing something horrific to Light. I just like my fiction just dripping with conflict and confusing power dynamics.

One more! I HATE When Light’s family is depicted as totally abusive or perfectly lovely. I think Light is a product of his family—they are well off, he is a cop’s son, he is the first born son. Light is very very privileged. But he is also held to unreasonably high standards. He is also under an incredible amount of pressure to be perfect, to continue to hold his grades, to continue to be special. It’s easy to be special when you’re 5 and reading chapter books before you’ve been enrolled in kindergarten. It’s much much harder to be special at 20 when everyone has started to catch up. When you are in first place, second place looks terrifying, it looks like failure. I think Light’s family has inspired a deep sense of fear in Light and I think he doesn’t understand this. I dislike openly abusive Yagami family because well… Light would get it. He would know where his fears and displeasure come from. Perfect family just… bores me. It feels untrue—speaking as someone who was raised “gifted” (stupid word, but it defined all of my early life). I think his father yelled at him while he was learning his times tables, I think his mother seemed to love him more when he was bringing home prizes. I dont think he was ever hit.

[100dayproductivity]

93/100.

Grief Days 10-14.

Two weeks Tumblr! It's been exactly two weeks since I had to say goodbye to my cat forever. I have made it through these two weeks okay and I feel I should acknowledge myself for that.

Let's take stock.

I've gotten over the initial deep sadness of seeing my cat take his last breath. I am starting to get used to him not being around. (Just starting to; I still have a long way to go.)

My other cat is also grieving in his own way. I've noticed that he has been more clingy, wanting to be around me almost all the time. He is not generally a cuddler, never wants to be in your lap, but these past two weeks he settles down beside me as close to me as possible without actually being in my lap. He and his brother napped together all the time, always cuddling up to each other, especially during the winter months. So I think he definitely misses the company of his besty. I am trying my best to reassure him and make him feel safe and loved, and that helps heal my heart.

I've gotten over the initial deep sadness of my eldest leaving home for university. It seems that a community of her fellow students already started to form in the two days before classes even started, so she has not been feeling alone as far as I can gather. She has unpacked and settled into her little dorm room, sent me a video of what it looks like, so I can picture what her mornings and evenings will look like as she studies and relaxes, and this gives me comfort. We have texted almost daily, usually in the evenings before bed, and we will soon fall into a new rhythm of communication as she settles into her class schedule and establishes her daily routine.

My youngest got through his first day of high school without any pomp or circumstance. I asked whether he was nervous or excited and he said he was neither, so I think he will quickly adjust to the new school year. During the couple of days between his sister leaving home and the first day of school, we spent some nice quality time together. It was a different dynamic without his sister present. Different but nice. I can see how he is quickly maturing and how I am quickly adjusting to being a different kind of mother to this boy who is becoming a young man. I am still grieving the end of being a mother to little ones, but I'm beginning to feel joyful about being a mother to adults. I will still have moments of deep grief, I'm sure, but maybe less intense and less often with time.

Still looming on the horizon is my ex's wish to move my son overseas with him. I have received encouraging counsel and support from my lawyer, so I'm tentatively hopeful that things will work out without any raging battles.

I've just realized that another thing weighing heavy on my heart right now is my living situation. I'm beginning to feel like it's time for me to move house. The location and size of my house was amazing when my kids were little, but more and more now I'm beginning to wonder whether it still makes sense for me to continue living here. If I was awash in wealth it wouldn't be a question, but I'm not, and it's getting less and less affordable for me to live here. Did you know that moving is among the most stressful life events? It's right up there with death of a loved one and divorce. So yeah, yet another facet of this grief I am feeling. The challenge for me here is that I have a lot of clutter. The thought of having to move gives me a huge amount of anxiety. It would be less if I got organized and cleared stuff out. Which actually is the initial reason I started this blog. But the need to declutter and clean up has felt more urgent these past two weeks.

All of this and more is what makes me feel on the verge of a panic attack. Still going to continue with the increased anxiety medication dosage!!

[therubyreader]

My Review of Legendborn by Tracy Deonn

See a full list of my book reviews here

*Disclaimer: there will be spoilers later on in the review*

Review Word Count, non-spoiler: 824 Review Word Count Total: 1,432

So, I caved. After seeing all the hype that Legendborn was getting both on here and on TikTok I was finally convinced to read it despite the fact that I’m not a fan of Arthurian legends or really anything medieval for that matter and honestly, it does live up to the hype. Especially if you’re like me, and were weirdly obsessed with that Disney Channel movie, Avalon High, back in the day, this book has the same exact vibes and a very similar premise. Also, sidenote, I was Googling the movie to make sure I was remembering the title correctly, I found out it was originally a book written by Meg Cabot, aka the author of The Princess Diaries, so do with that information what you will. 

The book introduces us to Bree Matthews, a 16-year-old girl grieving the loss of her mother after she died in a tragic car accident. Her grief drives her away from home and to UNC-Chapel Hill, a university that has an early college program for promising high school students. On her first night there, she witnesses a flying demon that feeds on human energy get taken down by a group of teenagers, called Legendborn (roll credits), decedents of the knights of King Arthur with incredible abilities. When one of the teenagers, a Merlin, tries to wipe her memory of the night and it doesn’t work, Bree remembers this same magic was used on her the night her mother died. Realizing that there is more to her mother’s death than what she was originally led to believe, she infiltrates the Legendborn society on campus with the help of Nick, a self-exiled Legendborn, as they discover the secrets of the society while on the brink of a magical war between the demons and Legendborn. 

Like I said earlier, this book is great, definitely worth the hype it’s getting, it’s a great modern interpretation of Arthurian legends with a good amount of diversity that is treated respectfully and realistically. Of course, the most obvious one is Bree, a black girl, who is not only going through this magical adventure but being black and navigating the world and the magical adventure. Not to give too much away outside of the spoiler section but Bree’s background and the history of black people as a whole in the US is a big part of the plot and Bree’s journey which I think is beautiful. As a non-black POC I think that part of Bree’s story was done so well, and I can really sympathize with her despite not being able to explicitly relate. There’s also a nonbinary character in the book named Greer and I honestly didn’t fully realize they were nonbinary because they were so seamlessly integrated into the story that I didn’t bat an eye at the use of they/them pronouns. And there are also queer characters who are unapologetically queer, and happy, and just being people, their identities are very much a part of their character but not their whole character.  

And, for being the author’s debut novel, it honestly isn’t written like one, the writing is good and easy to follow so you become immersed in the world very easily. I will say the prologue is written a bit like a 2010s, Wattpad story and some of the rest of the book has the same vibes from time to time but it honestly isn’t a big deterrent. I will though, complain about the love triangle because I hate almost all love triangles and think they’re bad. I might’ve said this before, but I think most love triangles are a cheap way to make your plot more exciting (which this book did not need at all, it’s exciting enough as is) especially when one of the potential partners is a genuinely nice person and the other one is very obviously a POS. Honestly, the whole book could’ve done without it, the writing and story were compelling enough to where a love triangle wasn’t needed to fill in any spots that were lacking and I was going to talk more about why I specifically don’t like certain characters as love interests but I noticed that this fandom is violent about shipping so I will keep it to myself.  

Overall, I do recommend the book to anyone who’s looking for a fresh take on Arthurian legends or YA fiction and can stomach your standard amount of blood and violence. There are descriptions of violence experienced by slaves and general racism so be warned. Besides the aforementioned love triangle beef I have, and the fact that there is some Welsh that doesn’t get translated into English which was a pet peeve of mine even more so now that I have made a Welsh friend after I returned the book to the library, so I’ll just never know. I will give this book an it’s very good and worth all the hype out of ten. 

Spoilers Below!!

Ok, let’s talk a little bit about the love triangle. I will preface this with the fact that Bree is 16 and hasn’t really experienced any romantic attention up until this point so she’s acting how a regular 16-year-old would act in that situation, and I know full well that 16-year-old me wouldn’t have been any smarter. That being said, I honestly think that Sel is a bad choice based on his actions in this book alone (yes, I have read the second one but I’m not going to talk about it here). This man literally spent the majority of the book trying to kill her and sent literal demons after her, but they slow danced once, and he called her “cariad” now y’all are foaming at the mouth. This isn’t hate towards Sel as a character, mostly, but like, come on. That’s all I’m saying because this fandom is violent, and I like living.  

Moving on to things that don’t make me mad! Let’s just take a moment to appreciate Bree’s root. I absolutely loved how the author wove in traditional African and African American spiritual practices into a world where the knights of the roundtable were magical beings and the contrast, chef’s kiss. We have root where the users give back the magic they use, make offerings, and talk to their ancestors regularly versus aether which is just taken. There is a great metaphor here about colonialism and world history as a whole, but I’m not going to go deep into that and get too radical in a book review so I’m going to let you all just think on it.  

Another thing I really liked about the book was how real the characters felt, all of them were unique individuals with distinct personalities and motivations. Not all the characters were necessarily good people, some were honestly horrible and evil, but you can understand where they’re coming from even if you don’t agree, a la “cool motive, still murder”. I did like that in the story the villain wasn’t evil just because, he had a reason to want to be evil, but it honestly made for a more enjoyable story especially when you contrast Nick’s dad with the demons who are evil just because. Also, just a side note on Mr. Davis being the villain all along, that was so unexpected but made so much sense when he explained his evil plan, I think it was a fun surprise that I hadn’t predicted in the beginning.  

Of course, I have to talk about the twist at the end where it turns out that Bree is Arthur’s scion and not Nick, mind blowing. There’s something, I don’t know how to describe it, but karmatic about a black girl being the king of the round table after her ancestor was raped by the scion of Arthur all those years ago. That old slave owner couldn’t have ever predicted that his disgusting actions would one day see a black girl as the head of his secret organization, so take that horrible man. On top of that, the organization as a whole is pretty racist, just the way that it’s all white and how they treat Bree and Sarah’s dad, so double take that racists, a black girl is your king.  

Moral of the story, read this book for a YA adventure mixed with serious real-world topics and a lovable cast of characters. Everyone who is hyping this book online is correct and I highly recommend getting your hands on a copy especially since there are rumors that the last book in the series will be released sometime next year.  

[fvrsaeken]

NEW MUSIC FRIDAY — JULY 7, 2022: judith grimes has released her third studio album, the second under her label freebird records, a division of Campbell Worldwide Media. Throughout the week, Judith had been in New York City, visiting radio stations and being featured on various late night shows including The Late Show with Stephen Colbert where she performed marjorie live for the first time and Late Night with Seth Meyers.

During her interview with Seth Meyers, Judith talked about how this album really helped her solidify her sound as an artist. "It was nice actually, after spending so long kind of hiding away making all of these things happen, all while grieving the loss of my girlfriend Hannah and grappling with almost losing my brother, everything fell into place. In the thickest part of my grief I wrote the second half of delicate and actually most of afterglow, almost like I could make the grief lighter by writing." Seth then asked about her lead single for the album. "So you chose... not only did you write a song for your mother named marjorie, but you made it the lead single. Why did you change her name?" Judith took a moment before responding. "I didn't get a lot of time with my mom, she and my dad divorced when I five and she died when I was seven. But whenever I went to write the song, I just... for some reason having a song named after her felt too hard to write, but having it be written for her was easier if that makes sense. Kind of like how I wrote dorothea from my best friend Gracie's perspective about a friend who gets famous and moves away, I wasn't going to have it named after myself. It's easier once you remove a small portion of the personal aspect." She explained. "No I get it, you take out the part that makes it almost too unbearable to do, and you make it a little easier to swallow." Seth agreed. "Yeah exactly! And who knows maybe someone lost a loved one named marjorie so they can relate to the song."

The next night, while on The Late Show, before her performance, Judith sat down with Stephen and began with: "Okay, so because you were with Seth Meyers last night I won't ask you specifically about marjorie, which by the way we are all very excited to see you perform." He paused as the crowd erupted into cheers and applause. "I will say, this is one of your first performances in quite some time. Was this a personal choice or did it just not work scheduling wise?" He'd asked. "Thank you for that amazing fanfare by the way, gonna keep that moment in my back pocket forever. But um, it was kind of both. My first album came out and then life was kind of just like: "surprise, we're gonna actually throw you the largest amount of curveballs." so that kind of derailed any plans I had to perform." She explained. "Around then, you also... kind of famously went public with calling out Interscope Records for how they treated your brother, what was going through your head that day?" Now this question did make Judith visibly uncomfortable prompting Colbert to add: "Whatever you're comfortable with sharing of course, I know this is probably a still healing wound for you and your family." Judith gave a grateful smile before continuing: "The main thing going through my head was: I'm about to ruin a career I just started, but at least I'm going to go out on my own terms. Up until that day that I almost lost my brother, I had tried so hard to get his team to notice something was wrong, I tried to get him to notice but it's hard when you're barely seventeen and no one really wants to take you seriously. No one around him saw what was happening, or if they did see then they didn't care and I didn't want other artists, especially young artists like my brother go through that. I wanted them to know what happened, and family before fame every time." Which was met with some awww's and cheers from the crowd.

On the morning of Friday July 7, Judith sat down with Michael Strahan on Good Morning America to promote her album. "Congratulations! I can't believe it, this is your third album and you... you just turned twenty is that right?" He asked her. Judith laughed and nodded along before saying: "That's true I just turned twenty last month. It's been a wild ride." Michael agreed with her saying: "I can only imagine, you and your brother both have had very busy teen years, and in your brother's case early twenties. I'm sure that you've had this question but with both of you being famous, what does your dad think about it all?" Judith paused for a second. "Oooh I don't think I've actually had this question before, maybe Carl has but I mean I'd hope that he's just happy that his kids are doing something they love. You know we get to do really cool things for him, my brother and I. He gets to travel with us and see the world, although I'm pretty sure he's seen New York City more than anywhere else." She paused her answer to wave to her dad who waved back earnestly. "I didn't know he was here with you! I guess that makes sense, okay so let's ask him, Rick how do you feel about your kids being famous? What do you think of it all?" Once the PA had made their way to Rick with a microphone, the father of two answered: "I mean I really am so proud of both of them. They worked hard to get where they are, overcome more than their fair share. To be able to watch them both grow and flourish in their own ways in the same industry is incredible." The answer moved Judith to tears as she was seen grabbing Kleenex once the camera cut back to her. "We definitely couldn't have done it without all of his support, and I think Carl would be okay with me saying that for both of us."

[hereliesbitches--me]

:V: A New Hope:

:V: A New Hope (Star Wars):

Hey there, and thank you for checking out my verses! 

My Star Wars verse is primarily an independent story that's obviously influenced by the events within the canon universe. My characters are primarily alien; thus they are able to be adapted both into the prequel movies as well as the modern Rey saga movies. I primarily set the story within the Skywalker storyline but am more than happy to adapt it over. Here, you'll find the general info about each character, the antagonist, and the major story plot points which we can integrate for interactions. Enjoy the read! ❤

▪︎ The Prequels:  The Skywalker saga 

( Taking place from the clone wars all the way to the fall of the Empire) 

♡ The Jedi that never was: Rosie Valentine 

Personality:

Once kind and painfully optimistic, Rosie is still young and has grown paranoid and jaded because of the stress of being alone as a young mother. She is distrusting and overprotective of her lone cub, a haggler that will use her influence in the force to persuade others in getting what she needs. Once her walls come down and she begins to trust you, it can be seen that she really is just a tired and scared girl. She’s grieving the father of her child who promised her safety and trying to navigate the world that wants to hunt her down. Her family among the jedi have been killed, her homeworld of Atrolize has been overtaken and used for its resources and its civilians taken hostage as slaves or breeding cattle for their versatile genetics and the abilities that come with it.. Her father, the senator, was assassinated like many others who wanted a movement for peace in order to end the war. She suffers in a void of loneliness and grief she doesn’t know how to handle while burdened with the responsibility of being a parent and teaching her cub how to survive. When relaxed, she can be affectionate and snarky like any feline, and incredibly protective of her allies. Spite her or wrong her in any way however, can result in her blatantly resorting to eating you or completely crippling you. At this point she is not averse to killing for the sake of self preservation.

She is a jedi no longer – really, she never was.

Abilities:

 Duel Saber wielding 

Style: Ataru, Shien/Djem so, and Jar’kaiSlowed aging

Force healing /Draining (Able to heal others or herself, usually in extreme cases by stealing the lifeforce of another if she lacks the energy herself)

Animal Bond

Force push/Pull (Rosie is able to take on much larger weight using the force than she would by her raw physical strength alone. Under enough stress, she would be able to hold down an escaping ship for a period of time or hold up the weight of crumbling infrastructure on top of her just long enough for people to escape)

Force Scream (an involuntary attack when she has become enraged and overwhelmed, it normally comes in the shape of an outburst of grief or panic while trying to protect someone else. The use of it can burn her out as its not measured in the power she puts behind it)

Kinetite (Force lighting, instead of uncontrolled streams of lighting , it is concentrated into a solid ball of energy which can be thrown, then expels the energy upon impact with a surface. Can be deflected back with the use of defensive force abilities)

Lesser Force Destruction (a weaker variation under the same concept, Rosie is able to concentrate a mass amount of energy within herself and then expell it in an anergized wave strong enough to send people flying, but it cannot burn anyone the way a true sith could)

History:

Rosie is of a race of anthropomorphic animal beings known as Atrolians.  Born in 46 BBY, Her father was a senator that represented her people, this was her initial meeting with the jedi order. Vassago, an ancient jedi master  in league with Yoda (hailing from a naturally force inclined race known as seraphim),  is good friends with Senator Roland, and sees the force potential early within his young daughter. Because of the growing unrest behind the scenes of politics and world affairs, coupled with the fear of what his emotional daughter could do with her untrained abilities, Roland deems his 8 year old daughter would be  safer in the hands of the jedi and his oldest friend. Rosie is then recruited into training as a youngling, to eventually become a padawan under vassago – despite the council’s concerns regarding Rosie's unnaturally strong pull between the light and dark with her emotional ties.

As a padawan, Rosie specialized in duel wielding sabers which could be connected at the hilt to form a double ended saber. Her fighting form specialized in utilizing her inherent animalistic abilities of her species, thus she is most efficient in Ataru, Shien/Djem So, and Jar’kai with her duel sabers. Being a big cat creature possessing strong legs and a prehensile tail, Rosie equally utilizes her natural physical attributes in battle against enemies as well. Her tail allows her to wrangle the limbs of her opponent to throw them off balance, while her thick claws on her feet and hands could easily tear through skin and leathery armor with ease. Being a feline makes her incredibly agile, which makes her throw her weight around and bounce off surfaces to confuse her enemies.

Despite her efficiency in close combat, her control on the force was not up to par. She was easily overwhelmed by heavy negative emotions when she became frustrated or distraught, which could often trigger a suffocating outburst that hurt allies and foes alike. Accidents led to a fear of using the force, to which vassago gently coaxed and encouraged her to let emotions flow. Unfortunately, the state of the galaxy escalating into the clone wars did little to help her case. Because of her instability, despite her age, Rosie remained a padawan under Vassago well into the clone wars. Her eventual salvation by chance came in the shape of the enemy, a bounty hunting mandalorian they crossed paths with while providing aid on a planet holding back pirates and droids. Rocky, the mandalorian, sought after the young padawan he felt an impulsive attachment to in an attempt to befriend her. Going so far as to remove his helmet and meet her in secret. Rocky, a seraphim like her master, promised her safety and encouraged her to escape this war that was not her own to fight.  She was too young to be burdened with the responsibility of a peace keeper for a galaxy that doesn’t seem to want peace. She deserved better. The mando’s promises struck her in the place of longing, and she agreed to go with him. With the support of her master, she abandoned the jedi order to escape with the Mandalorian and his brother in arms… Which saved her when Order 66 was executed only weeks later.

Grief stricken by the crippling sensation of death and pain that overtook her, it traumatized her, however there was no way of returning home.

Traveling with Rocky, Guts, and their third brother Erron, Rocky taught her the essential survival skills in utilizing her force abilities, being able to scrap and rebuild, and fight the street way if she wanted to survive. All was well for months until she wound of pregnant;

The breaking point of the brothers. Erron, feeling Rosie had imposed herself into their lives and his brothers in arms took her wellbeing as more sacred than their own, broke off without a word. Much to the grief of Rocky and Guts.

Months later, Mia is eventually born on the ship and cared for deeply between the three of them. Deeming it unsafe to lugg around an infant on mercenary missions, Rosie and Mia were left on a safe base established on a thick forest planet that would keep them well hidden from the empire even if they had come looking. Mia was 2 years old when her uncle Guts and Father went on a recon mission, but her father had not returned home. Without Rocky, Rosie had no choice but to strike out on her own, unwilling to burden Guts with the needs of herself and her daughter when she felt responsible for tearing the brothers apart to begin with. At the time, her master had been killed in order 66, but Vassago’s strong connection both to the force and his padawan allowed him to linger to her and continue her training in truly mastering the force from both the light and the dark side

Pets: 

Silus (an Anooba)

Kordath (A Massif)

♡ The Cub: Mia Blagrove

Personality:

Happy-go-lucky, optimistic, mischievous, likes shiny things, loves being groomed and fitting into tight spaces she doesn't belong. She likes talking and hunting small animals. Not the biggest fan of training but she knows she has to if she wants to be strong like her mom.Abilities:Force Persuasion Animal Bonding Force Push/pull A crossbreed between a Seraphim and an Atrolian, Mia is predominantly feline while bearing the body feathers of the seraphim like her father. A combination of two highly force sensitive beings means Mia has a powerful predisposition to use the force – fortunately, unlike her mother, she is more inclined to positive happy emotions and uses her abilities for harmless antics. Mia, like the kitten she is,  often gets herself in trouble by going into places she is not supposed to. Including baggage and cargo bays or pulling off wall panels and crawling into the cozy space among wiring. Her need to make friends means she perfected her art of force persuasion to get what she wants or to at least make people stay and talk to her. She is a fearless little warrior in the making with a weakness for salty meat, sweets, or shiny things. She is naive and her mother often keeps her only a tail length away with their tails knotted together.

♡ A Mando far from home:

Rocky Blagrove

Personality:

Sensible, patient, charismatic and a natural born leader. He’s fairly easy going and hides his emotional pain well under the guise of being laid back. Rocky is the understanding friend despite the cold streak he can turn into when on the job. He doesn't hesitate to kill, but he does have a moral standing about killing innocent civilians or children. He runs by the rule that if you raise your arm first it's a death sentence. His most notable quality is the smile gun : if you're upset, he shoots up a finger gun and compels you to smile. His own smile, if you saw his face, is infectious. Its a real shame he stopped taking off his helmet

Abilities:

Flight (wings)

Plasma resistance (his feathers and wings, at least in terms of his outer feathers, are resistant to the super heat of a plasma blast and have some durability against low caliber bullets. Beskar makes up for the weaknesses)

Air Manipulation (utilizing the force to manipulate the air around his wings provides extra propulsion needed to shoot through the air beyond simple takeoff and gliding)

Deadly marksman

Blade specialist

Adept close range combat

History:

Born 56 BBY, The prodigy child of his family clan, Rocky would meet his future brother in arms, Erron, after the boy was found and taken in with the other mandalorian children in training. Naturally talented with the force, he hails from a species of winged aliens known as Seraphim, who utilize the force to manipulate the air around their bodies and wings to make them superior fliers and fighters even in the air. By extension, they have an affinity for animals, but they excel most as warriors.

Trained since he was a child and expected to become the next clan head, Rocky's flaw was own dislike of the burden of responsibility– he played the part until he was 17, old enough to break off on his own with all he had learned from his guild. Taking with him an adoptee he's call his brother, Erron. Together the two of them made a name for themselves as Skeiron and Big mouth in the Galaxy as elite bounty hunters, with Guts (a mandalorian of a separate guild who has also broken off on his own) joined their brotherhood as the armorer and weapons master. All was well for the three men, up until Rocky took a fondness for a jedi padawan in the middle of the clone wars.

His action to take Rosie away from the battle and teach her among his brother causes a severe rift, primarily with Erron who envied the attention Rosie received from his brother and despised her for being a jedi, until Erron finally completely abandoned their little guild without a word upon Rosie's pregnancy announcement. Heartbroken, but responsible for paying a new life for his future child, Rocky keeps it together with the help of Guts. Rocky never believed in the by the book formality of traditional mandalorian traditions, especially in regards to showing his face or the requirement to force a child or partner into the life of a mando by extension of being with them. He holds true to the honor system of battle, but that is about the limit to what he follows

▪︎ His "Death"

3 years following the end of the clone wars and the rise of the empire, Rocky and Guts follow a bounty hunt that unknowingly leads them into a crossfire between imperial clones and a group of fallen jedi taking refuge among civilians that are caught in the crossfire. Rocky, with his ultimate undoing being his morally obligated heart, abandoned the bounty hunt to aid in the civilians evacuation and the hopeless jedi. The decision, without Guts to help him, fatally injured Rocky as the masses overwhelmed even a sharpshooter like himself, but provided a good enough distraction to allow the imperial targets to escape. Bleeding out, Rocky was saved only because of the Jedi who were able to heal his condition to a manageable state, however he required nurturing and augmentation provided by the civilians.

Unable to find his brother, only his blasted helmet and scraps of broken armor in a puddle of blood, Guts can only assume the worst fate for his brother and returns to give Rosie the bad news.

Rocky remains in the care of locals for nearly a year, unable to contact his brother or his family with his communicators damaged from the battle. He lost an eye, a leg, an arm and a few fingers that have all been replaced by beskar steel recycled from his previously damaged mandalorian armor. When he was finally strong enough to move on his own, Rocky returns to the safe base he and his brothers established for their family, only to find it raided and burned down. With no other evidence to point to life, Rocky relives the second devastating blow to his heart and completely hides in his armor to separate himself from the world. Unable to really live and unwilling to die, he takes to never removing his helmet or armor and joins the rebels against the empire to avenge the death of his family

Rocky specializes in training of new recruits, but primarily scouts out Intel and useful allies to recruit. He has lost any hope of finding his brothers in this endless galaxy, though he hopes to hear circulating rumors at the very least. He's melancholic but without seeing his voice, his charismatic confidence is infectious.

♡ The Lone Wolf Survivor:

Guts 

Personality:

Introverted, painfully loyal to a fault, self sacrificing , but a brutal mercenary when it comes to battle. Guts does what he must to get the job done but he has an inherent soft spot for women and children, especially those caught in the middle of the galactic mess. Guts usually keeps to himself, not usually one who starts the conversation but maintains it by only keeping up with vital information. For all his gruffness, Guts is very well capable of being compassionate and gentle despite what may be perceived as stoicism when hes hidden behind his helmet. Above all else he honors his brother's memory by taking care of his niece and Rosie. Nothing matters more to him than family

Abilities:

Weapons specialist

Armorer and Engineer

Sharpshooter, beskar sword wielder

Loth wolf shifting

Heightened sense of smell, hearing, taste, and eyesight

Superior strength to his build

History:

He was born within a prestigious mandalorian clan, one of the last bastions of loth wolf shifters long believed to have died off. His father is the clan head.

Like most children of mandalore, his childhood was one of harsh instruction and training from the moment he was capable of walking and wielding a weapon. As the only son of the Clan head and the future heir, he was treated with excessive cruelty from his father to assure his son would surpass all other children within his rank and older. To be the best warrior the clan had ever produced to take his father’s place.

Guts, then named Vessten, excelled beyond expectation with a talent for not only combat, but the engineering of weapons and armor as well. It was in his adolescence that his mother Diandra,the clan armorer born within the clan just as his father had been, refused to see her boy destroyed any further by  his father and escaped the clan with her son.

Guts, always loyal to his mother far more than his father, continued his training and honing his skills as taught to him by his mother. Excelling in the realm of bounty hunting, earning the title of Black hound, he would eventually go off on his own and form his own small guild with his future brother in arms, Rocky(Skeiron) and Erron(Big Mouth).

Guts had served in the same role as his mother before him, as the group's armor and weapons specialist on top of serving as a heavy artillery warrior. Interpersonally, Guts was a constant voice of reason and logic in comparison to Rocky’s laid back nature and Erron’s impulsive arrogance. He is haunted by a level of guilt for his inability to pick a side when tension formed upon Rosie’s addition to the group. When Erron left, He did attempt to find him for a short while, until he decided Rocky and Rosie needed him more. When Erron was ready to show himself, he would do so

Upon Rocky's death, Guts vowed an oath of protection to Rosie and her cub in honor of his brother, with an underlying love he secretly held for a woman he could never have. Guts regularly travels the cosmos on bounty detail and returns to bring a wage back for Rosie and Mia, wherever they may be hiding at the time.

Guts deals with heavily bottled emotions and guilt ; He struggles heavily in showing emotions and using the right words to show support and comfort. Oftentimes he is more of a man of action to show his care, which gives way for him to meet many people in his travels

The Antagonist: 

♡ The Tyrant Warrior: Balrog

The father of Guts and the leather of the loth wolf guild, Balrog is a scourge to some and a messiah to all those his guild has recruited and empowered from the poverty left behind by war. The guild has grown in number and power that proves to be a nuisance for even the empire and the first order, well known for their cruelty to their enemies and the iron fisted hold they have on shipping lanes and planetary trading posts. Nobody passes through territory without payment in goods or useful information – all those who don’t comply are typically met with a grizzly fate of fire, dismemberment, cannibalization,  and heads showcased on pikes to mark off territory points.

Temperament wise, Balrog is cool and collected, proud and confident in his skill that very little phases him. His inner circle is composed solely of loth wolf shifters to preserve their heritage, but all other clan members are treated with the same kind of brother and sister in arms love. Among his clan, Balrog takes no excuses, but he is compassionate and kind to his kinsmen. He sees to it that his people are taken care of across the galaxy, and offers a hand to those suffering to empower themselves by joining his league (if he sees potential strength that could be utilized by the clan).

Outside of the clan, Balrog is a bloodthirsty creature of malice to anyone deemed an enemy. He does not take shit from any group, and is quick to make exampled of them for all others to not make the same mistake. With Loth wolf’s inherent skill and connection to the force, it makes him an exceptionally formidable enemy with the combination of combat skill , lethal weaponry, and dark force abilities to aid him.

The betrayal of his late wife and son prove to be a sore point from him ; He is still determined to find the traitors and reprimand them – but most importantly, to keep them where they belong.

♡ The Wolf in sheep's clothing: John Shaw 

A shady lothwolf shifter that had no place in the clan, John (preferring to go by “Shaw”) simply goes with the winning side that offers him the best deals in terms of lifestyle and payment. He has no loyalty, but his sociopathic specialty of masking makes him surprisingly charismatic and ideal for negotiation and spy work. This charismatic nature hides his underlying sadistic pleasure in the suffering of others and his narcissism.

On the surface, John goes where the money goes and he likes the little pleasures he can gain from the galaxy’s suffering. You usually find him in the slimy city underbellies from planet to planet, gambling and swindeling crooks out of their wealth and drowning in the warmth of a sex worker.. Or whatever poor thing he can rob, rip, and dip. Having force abilities does help a lot in the persuasion aspect..

After all, who’s gonna fuck with a giant dog man?

♡ The Imperial Daughter:

Pandora 

A Child born within the empire’s rule, she is the product of an admiral’s lust with an atrolain slave that was later harvested and indoctrinated into the empire, as is often the fate of many like herself. An incredibly intelligent tactician with a skill for language, combat, and negotiation, Pandora rose through the ranks quickly from her growing youth. With a controlled, nearly emotionless deposition, it made her a favorable cadet among the high ranking officers for a woman who would not argue, yet one who shined in times of urgency and combat.

Currently serving as a vice admirable on board a ship primarily staffed by many of  her halfblood brethren,  her ultimate goal is to take a shot at the rebllion and mandalorian brigade that proves to be a thorn in the empire’s side.  Show the empire just what atrolians can be beyond simple body guards or sex slaves.

Appearance wise, Pandora is an albino that stands at about 6’3, bearing subtle canine features in her large pointed ears, eyes, claws, teeth, and a thin layer of white fur that covers her body. She had a tail as a child that was hacked off in training , deemed as liability in combat. An event which she resents, and continues to be reminded of from  the tail nub that was left behind.

PLOT POINTS TO EXPLORE: 

Pre order-66 where Rosie is a padawan training with other younglings or taking part in the clone wars

Rosie is traveling the galaxy in a desperate attempt to avoid the inquisitor's tracking and the empire's tyranny with her adolescent/toddler  force-sensitive daughter.  For her species, Rosie is the equivalent of a late teen/early 20 year old mom learning to survive entirely on her own. She takes up mercenary/Bounty hunting work on the neutral planets she makes her temporary home on, which could lead to crossing paths with your muse either as the target, the client, or perhaps a rival hunter

Rosie herself is still a powerful force user, even if she was not promoted to the rank of  a Jedi. That being said: she is adept in lightsaber fighting forms, she knows how to find and make a lightsaber, the use of the force for both practical and impractical reasons, and she still possess  her former jedi master in the shape of a force ghost who continues to train her in using both aspects of the light and dark side of the force. With the Jedi order destroyed, despite her negative feelings for the order, padawan and surviving jedi were still family to her. She is capable of teaching another muse survival skills , fighting skills, or how to hone their connection to the force

Mia, her daughter, is fearless and will attempt to make friends with anyone because her mother keeps her hoarded up and suffocates her with worry and overprotectiveness. Downside is Mia tries to make friends usually by harassing someone with questions, or by taking something shiny and making them chase her for it. She is still a kitten at the end of the day and possess kitten mannerisms that do get her in trouble. Your muse could be a victim of her antics or have a secret friendship with her while her mother is often out trying to hunt. Maybe your muse is a neighbor or an ally that occasionally comes by to help Rosie get a break, or maybe you just really think this kitten is cute

Please teach Rosie it is okay to learn to be her own person. She is more than just a mother, there is more to life than just fighting and worrying about tomorrow.

Rosie strains in the heavy pull of the dark and light sides of the force as her emotions rule her abilities just as much as they fuel her. Her love for her daughter serves as her light, but when she is in danger or her limits are tested, Rosie is capable of great destruction and misuse of her abilities for selfish personal gains.

The current state of Rosie’s homeworld Atrolize has been degraded under the rule of the empire, their species subdued to slave labor and breeding cattle because of the species genetic compatibility with any humanoid species in the universe. Anyone who becomes handicap or fails to pay their debts becomes sold off as a slave – which can mean hard labor, the life of a concubine/prostitute , or an exotic pet to trade among the wealthy. When Rosie is seen in the streets on more criminally inclined planets, its not uncommon for someone to ask a price to buy her off or buy her time. Lets see how your muse feels about that

Rocky “died” after taking heavy hits from clones while trying to help civilians and jedi escape. He was on death’s door but was saved by the jedi, ultimately.  I wouldn’t mind a scenario of a muse being one of those that nursed him back to health. Be it a jedi, padawan, or a native civilian

After assuming his family was murdered by the empire, Rocky took fully embrace the Traditional mandalorian code he had long ago abandoned in his time of mourning. He never takes off his helmet, and has taken fully to aiding rebels in unraveling the empire one step at a time. Rocky often trains the newest rebels in close and ranged combat, leads recon missions or targets possible allies, and takes bounty jobs on the side to pay for the maintenance of his own weapons and armor.

Guts was a brother in arms to Rocky who bears the burden of feeling responsible for his brother’s death. In honor of his brother’s memory, he still returns to check on Rosie and Mia to bring supplies and credits to help them. Bearing an unrequited love for Rosie, he struggles with these emotions and the burden of his own bloodline as a lothwolf shifter. Given that his father Balrog is determined to bring him home, he desperately avoids his destiny by throwing himself in danger. A fellow mando companion or a friend in general to provide him someone to talk to about his struggles would be nice. Though, obviously, being seen with him is a dangerous game as your muse may become a target to force him back home to his clan.

Balrog is the clan leader of a mandalorian cult composed of his surviving lothwolf shifters, along with an amassed army of new mandalorians willing to follow him in their path of retribution for the deeds done against them by the Empire. Their loyalty to Balrog knows no bounds and the mandalorians prove to be a power that even torments the empire as they control trade routes, pilfer what they deem is a necessary tax to go through their territory, and  take over arms, armor, and drug smuggling in their region. Balrog considers himself the leader of a new world order of mandalorians now that the old ways are simply inefficient given their enemies. This in itself can be a major point for any kind of character targeted for trying to stand against them or for simply being in the way.

John is a self serving lone wolf that travels the galaxy taking the worst kind of moral work that gives him the best pay. For all intent and purpose, john is a selfish sociopath but at the very least he’s funny and may hassle your muse either as a target or coworker. Or maybe your muse targets him because of the high bounty on his head. Any which way, he’s an adventurer if you want a little corruption on your muse.

Following the fall of the empire and the gradual recovery of the universe, the rebellion is still needed against the first order… Mia, now a fully grown Atrolian, has taken the Jedi skills taught to her by her brother to run reconnaissance detail and the training of new recruits against this well known threat. Though she is only slightly younger than Luke and Leia, her species has put her in what is the equivalent age of a young adult.

▪︎ The Sequels:  The Rey Saga

( Taking place during the era of the first order, Onwards) 

♡ A Rebel at Heart: Mia Blagrove 

Following the fall of the empire and the gradual recovery of the universe, the rebellion is still needed against the first order… Mia, now a fully grown Atrolian, has taken the Jedi skills taught to her by her brother to run reconnaissance detail and the training of new recruits against this well known threat. Though she is only slightly younger than Luke and Leia, her species has put her in what is the equivalent age of a young adult.

♡ The Old Warcat: Rosie Valentine 

Unable to part with her daughter knowing Mia has taken to fighting a war way over her head, Rosie begrudgingly puts her exhaustion aside to make sure these brats don’t get themselves kid. Luke Skywalker sure as hell isn't the last Jedi and someone needs to teach these new generation brats some humility. Who better to do this that a war cat?

Plot Points:

Mia is a young woman at the time of the first order rising, similar to the age of her own mother when the clone wars took place. She has become a formidable opponent given her tall agile stature, her force abilities, her flying capabilities with her wings, and her unyielding nature when it comes to justice and doing what is right. As soon as she was old enough, Mia ran off and joined the resistance to face off against the rising threat of the first order. Here, she takes on stealth and recon missions in a similar fashion, She is fearless and inspires hope in others with her strong presence. Being who her mother is, Luke Skywalker is no longer the last jedi. Being part of the rebels leaves open a large window in which she can meet muses varying from first order agents, rebels, or even planet natives as she travels around the galaxy

Rosie suffers empty nest syndrome and goes against her better nature to follow her daughter into a war that has nothing to do with them. She has grown harsher, more tired since her master’s ghost deemed his teachings maximized and left Rosie to become the teacher of a new generation in a new world. While still only a young woman in terms of her species, the stress of being a mother and a warrior has given Rosie an older appearance. She aids in humanitarian work, as a healer for rebels, or as a heavy hitter sent in emergency situations. Where Mia can be found, her mother is usually not too far behind.

Depending on what happens in the prequel verse, there can be a point of involvement with Rocky which can lead to paths crossing between the family by chance. Any previous connection with any of the character can be a major emotional moment for how the muses deal with Rosie, Mia, or Rocky being whiplashed by the discovery that they’re all alive

Self explanatory but Mia would have issues in trying to unravel planetary corruption. Rosie has decided assassination is always a good option 

[congregamus]

TW: grief, death mention, cult mention

Just gotta say that this weekend has sucked ITO mental health. Every now and then (like now) I allow myself the tiniest grief in the direction of my sister, and it almost knocks me over.

On Wednesday, I allowed myself to recite Allerseelen, Hermann von Glim's poem that Richard Strauss set so elegantly to music:

Stell auf den Tisch die duftenden Reseden, Die letzten roten Astern trag herbei, Und laß uns wieder von der Liebe reden, Wie einst im Mai (etc.)

I made it all the way to the end without breaking, but the grief in me was very strong. The poem's refrain, "As once in May", grounds the text's autumnal longing in a past spring, perhaps grief's favorite poetic home. Toni's autumn was in spring. In May, to be exact, so there's a double irony here for me. She was not awake when I came to say goodbye to her, but she did wait for me, to be sure. She let go fewer than 12 hours after I arrived at her bedside.

My late sister Toni's online avatar was AutumnZephyr. This is the first fall season she's missed, so it seemed to me that one of the ways I could honor her was by reveling in her favorite season. This was her birth season—she would have turned 50 the day after tomorrow—and she (like her sun sign, Scorpio) was complicated and full of dark beauty.

It is Persephone season, and my late sister is a good stand-in for the larger metaphor, which, in the language of the Tarot is the High Priestess, navigating the Mysteries, mediating between the underworld and the waking world. She proffers a pomegranate silently, as reality seems to glitch.

I knew Toni in all her hypostases: Maiden, Mother, and Crone. 50 is no Crone-age for many, but for my sister, who was so sick, it was. In the end, she completely embodied the witch she named herself to be: a fright to children, though no threat to them, surrounded by a menagerie of animals who chose her because they'd been otherwise abandoned.

As a mother, the card of the Moon best represented her. She did what she thought was best. To many, her choices seemed as backwards as the crayfish's walk. And she kept secrets. She suffered much, and did not speak of it for years until the inner wounds had festered and resisted healing through traditional care. Her children have a complicated relationship with her, which she grieved while among us. She did not want to continue the cycle of pain, but such was the amount of generational wound that she carried, that it was beyond her power to contain it entirely.

My relationship with her as a Maiden, in the flower of her youth, was less complicated, and so Wie einst im Mai, if I will allow it, resonates as far back as being very young children playing together. (The Library—my memory—has undergone extensive metaphorical shelling, so there's not much left except perhaps ruins of a collegiate gothic frame, standing in warning to future generations about the dangers of the cult of Christo-fascism; but I do have memories of playing with her without conflict.)

All loss is hard. Autumn is the season whereby we may accept the beauty of inevitable loss because the visual metaphor pleases. November, specifically, is the month set aside for requiems and remembrances.

This afternoon, I go to the parish where I do administrative work. There, they will give an Evensong service in memory of the organist's sister, who also passed this year. My Salve Regina was to have been premiered, but it turns out to have been a bit much to incorporate and will be played on another day. I would have loved to hear it, but its lack is no stain on this day. Instead of wondering how my piece will be received, I get to focus on seeing as much of this day's beauty as I can through the eyes of one who has been all Three Women, by lending the Great Woman—who never was any different from my sister—my own eyes, while I yet have them.

[thebirkenstocksocialist]

Hello dear! 🌼

What are your thoughts about Queen Kristina? Tell me all.

I believe sincerely she doesn't care about Wilhelm liking boys but just how it all affects the Crown. I understand her upbringing has affected her behavior but I still feel it's not reason enough. Maybe I'm being too harsh.

She's being an awful mother and I inherently believe Wilhelm should never forgive her for not telling him about August and the actions she took regarding him and the video. I'm hoping she changes her ways in S2.

Looking forward to your thoughts!

Oh goodness I have so many thoughts (and feelings) I have a feeling that it will take me a while to organize. Also, reader be warned, I am probably going to analyze and speculate a fair amount, so if you aren’t into that, move along.

Thank you to my darling @books-books-smolderinglooks for the awesome ask. This is particularly meaningful coming from my friend who is also a mother. My feelings about Kristina will always be seen, at least partially, through the lens of my experience as a parent.

So I think I will first share my thoughts about her as an individual. I believe that Kristina doesn’t have an identity outside of being royal. She shares that she knew from birth that she would inherit the throne from her father. This is all she has ever known and she was taught to parent by a succession of royals - all of them preparing their first born to take over the throne. Kristina is THE QUEEN. That is all she is. She has no individual life. Her life is a life of service to the people (or at least she believes that. I believe in burning all monarchies to the ground but I digress). She believes that this is a privilege, which she makes abundantly clear to Wilhelm. Everything she does is about image and service. It is very likely that she raised her children to be this way, but Erik received a very different education than Wilhelm as he was expected to succeed her. The little bit of dialogue we get with Erik lends to this idea. He encourages Wilhelm to just pretend. He also jokes (gross) with August about nailing down a wealthy, beautiful girl of the appropriate class (Felice). We also hear from Erik’s peers that he “took his role seriously”. He is the RIGHT kind of prince. The prince that Kristina raised to be a reflection of her own image.

So, in essence, I don’t really think that Kristina thinks of herself as a mother. Well, she does, but the role is always second to the role of queen. And for her, the two are inextricably linked. Her role as a mother is to prepare her heir. Her parenting is guided by the role that rules her life - that is her only identity, QUEEN. I don’t actually think we ever see her step out of this. Not once. Every action she takes is the action of a queen. Not the action of a mother. Her role as a mother absolutely does not lead her decision making. I don’t even know if it is even present. If it is, it’s pretty deeply buried under duty and crown. As a mother, I can only barely see it.

For example, when she holds Wilhlem’s hand during the funeral, I see a grieving woman who has lost her heir. Who is afraid for the crown. She grasps her son’s hand for support. What we do not see is her supporting Wilhelm in any way. He walks behind Erik’s casket alone, holding in his tears. He has to, that’s what she has taught him to do. She chokes on her own grief when he points out that he has always been compared to his brother. Her absolute lack of awareness of Wilhelm’s experiences illustrates how hands off, or even neglectful, she has been as a parent.

Now, her mother role exists. She loves her children, don’t get me wrong. But that love is intertwined with her role as a royal. And therefore, she doesn't put motherhood first. Ever. She channels her grief immediately into preparing Wilhelm for his role as crown prince. Sitting down to dinner, presumably the day they buried her son, asking Wilhelm to come to meetings with her. For her, there is no room to breathe. Instead of attending to her living son’s heart, his grief, she is asking him to bury it along with her own. She is seeing only the crown prince, not the boy who just lost the most important person in his life. She doesn’t see that boy. Only the crown prince.

The first scenes we see her in - she is only angry about Wilhelm’s behavior. She is not concerned for his safety, we do not see her increase his security. She is angry that he fucked up his royal image. She is concerned with COVERING his injury with makeup, not attending to his wounds. Physical or emotional. She slaps his hand away from his mouth as he bites his nails. She is at best, obtusely unaware of his anxiety or, at worst, she gives no fucks about it. I lean toward the latter. She is a smart, calculating woman. She was raised to be that way. I would assert that she views Wilhelm as weak. As the fuck up. She almost says so at the dinner table later - “no more mistakes”.

So, going into Wilhelm’s experience of being outed publicly and his confession of feelings for Simon (not just sex), we have Kristina well established as a QUEEN and not a mother who mothers. A queen who gave birth to an heir and a spare and has reared them as such.

Let me talk a little bit about homophobia for a second. I actually don’t think it’s ok to separate types of homophobia. I understand that with different experiences there may be more, or less, harm caused by homophobic actions - ranging from sting of pain to death. But, I believe in calling a spade a spade, if you will. I think by saying that she doesn’t care that Simon is a boy, we are actually diminishing the harmful nature of her homophobia as a parent, specifically. (This is also how I feel about August and I will die on the hill that he is homophobic but that is another post entirely. Sorry, I digress again).

With that said, I don’t necessarily believe that Kristina thinks that being gay is WRONG. I think she probably thinks it is fine - but only for everyone else. She absolutely does compare her own “unfortunate romance” to Wilhelm’s love for Simon. Here - I think she is expressing very clear classism. But - it is inherently homophobic to work to erase her son’s fucking identity. If I were to utterly look over my child’s confession of feelings for someone of the same sex, that is homophobic. If I were to raise my children under the expectation of assumed heterosexuality - that is homophobic. Period. It is my job as a mother to love, support, and see my child for who they are. It is also my job to model and expose them to all the options that are truly out there for them in terms of love and relationships. To not just tolerate or accept, but to celebrate their expressions of love. As it is said multiple times in YR - they didn’t do anything wrong.

On the contrary - Wilhelm and Simon are doing exactly what teenagers do. They are falling wildly in love, super fast. They have bonded. They have sex. All of this is absolutely developmentally normative and expected behavior. And it’s lovely! Part of Kristina knows this. She is attempting to relate with her own experience of young love. But that is all we get from her- “unfortunate romance”.

As a young person - I grew up in a household that was liberal, per se. My parents were always ok with my friends who were gay (there was tons of biphobia growing up and MSPEC identities were essentially invisible for me, hence my very late coming out). My two best friends growing up were both raised by lesbian moms. My parents always supported gay rights and gay marriage. And yet, My father never told me that HIS father, my paternal grandfather, was gay. I figured it out as a teenager and he admitted it. My father, who I had always known to be supportive of gay rights, blamed his fathers sexual orientation on his drug use and addictive behavior. I was floored. Turns out my grandad’s partner was bi which didn’t come up until I was almost 30.

I share this because - being raised in a situation where being queer is ok for everyone else - but never presented as an option within your nuclear family - is homophobic. Being heterocentric is homophobic. Perhaps I am projecting a bit here, and that’s ok, but I see this experience for Wilhelm, but on a much much larger scale.

Kristina views so much being a stake for THE CROWN if Wilhelm loves a boy. She specifically mentions the importance of heirs. She consistently, harmfully erases his identity. This utterly breaks my heart as a mother. And, I have grief for my own experiences that only mildly reflect Wilhelm’s.

Now, I haven’t even talked about the sexual trauma that both Simon and Wilhelm experience from being both outed and having their sexual intimacy shared without their consent. Outing a person intentionally is abusive and so taping them without consent. Abuse. Full stop. Do we ever see Kristina show any concern for her son after suffering this double trauma? NO. We do not. This boy is starving for some kind of love and support before he is even outed. He hugs the headmistress for fuck’s sake.

This is the place where Kristina’s failing as another really shines through. Her son has suffered abuse and trauma. He did absolutely nothing wrong. It was essential to Wilhelm’s healing that she see his hurt and honor his feelings then act protectively to keep him from further harm. He needs that to deal with the trauma. Instead, she lies, covers it up, and sets up his life so that he is required to constantly interact with his abuser while also pressuring him to give up the only supportive relationship he has left. Not to mention that he has to pretend like nothing has happened.

The failure of these actions is, quite possibly, unfixable. Instead of attending to her son’s healing, she has complicated the trauma that Wilhelm experienced. I believe that because of this neglect, she has likely jeopardized the only thing that is important to her - the crown.

As a woman, and a mother, Kristina’s failure to protect her son truly disgusts me to my core. I, too, would like to see some level of humanity out of her in season two. I’d like to see her SEE her own failings. To care about what she is losing - the one son she has left. To stop using Erik’s memory to hurt Wilhelm. For me, as a mother, the most painful scene in the show is when she defends her decision to protect the legacy of the crown, yelling at Wilhelm that it is the only way to make sense of Erik’s death before he hangs up. Betrayal trauma is some of the most complicated to heal. Kristina has utterly betrayed her son. The work that she has to do to regain his trust will be a long road.

Maybe I am a cynic, but I am not holding out hope for any of her walking that road. I am not sure how the writers could play this out in a believable way. I do, however, have hope in Lisa’s vision.

So, in conclusion, fuck Kristina. I hope Wilhelm gets to find love and support with a found family because he sure as hell isn’t getting it at home since his brother died.

Who knows, maybe Ludvig, who I just view to be a “yes man” will show up. One can dream.

[mellarkably]

🚨 NHIE SPOILERS BELOW 🚨

first of all. that was a crazy ass season. so much happened and i can barely keep up or remember. so while this probably won't be a coherent or well worded recap, yhat defintely won't go over everything that i just watched for the past six hours, it'll just be my thoughts for now.

personally, i really liked the kamala plot and her struggle in the workplace. it was probably one of my favorite parts of the season. i'm not sure if kamala will be ditching prashant for mr. kulkarni but if she does i wouldn't be shocked. considering how prashant played into the whole workplace problem. also rip steve lol who remembers him. homie got done dirty.

now speaking of devi. there were many things she did this season that were not at all good or rational. however, i do like the fact that they delved more into her grief, and overall she actually seemed to develop over the season which made me happy. there are aspects of her grieving process that kinda felt unanswered, but hey, it is what it is. for what it's worth, im happy with the amount of growth she had over ten episodes. i actually felt like giving devi a hug so many times towards the end. and maitreyi killed it as always.

regarding the new kids! malcolm, well, i honestly kinda have intense apathy towards him as a character. he was cool at the start, a dick at the end—so yeah, i feel like he served his purpose overall. i felt extremely bad for oliver the entire time. and aneesa! she was the coolest addition they could honestly have had to the team. she's fun, charming, and fits in very well. i felt extreme sympathy for her ed and im glad they put a hotline at the end of those episodes. she's a great girl.

i'm very glad they gave paxton more of a well fleshed out personality this season. he seemed much more personable overall. although i felt like his episode at times fell a bit flat or felt too preachy regarding the whole hot people can be smart too concept, it was overall a fantastic episode and gigi hadid was a great choice as narrator. also loved the little switch to ben's pov when andy steps in. that was funny. i also liked the fact that they went into his ethnicity!

regarding his romantic feelings for devi though. i feel like i can't understand? like does he like her? does he not? is he embarassed of her? is he not? i failed to understand where he was most of the time. the mixed signals, like. paxton. i like you, but huh? well, to be fair, the romance in devi's life this season was pretty much a rollercoaster ride anyways so. i do love paxton's obijan though. great guy. we didn't get enough of rebecca though!

out of the two besties, i honestly liked fab's story a lot more. it felt relatable, that whole feeling of not being able to fit in as a new sapphic. and i adore fab and eve. i'm glad they didnt make their relationship too cookie cutter.

eleanor's subplot was alright. again, it was really hard to kinda, if i put this blatantly, give a fuck about malcolm and whatever their relationship was. (loved tyler alveraz's performance though) but i liked her talking with her stepmom sharon. i wish they spent more time on that rather than malcolm but again, they don't have much time to waste.

i loved nalini's subplots. all of them. she was honestly one of my fav characters this season, as well as devi's grandma. we got to delve into the indian culture more too, so that was very cool. her relationship with dr. jackson was also nice for the short time they had with each other. i didn't expect them to breakup, i kinda just expected devi to learn to be okay with her mother moving on, but then again, i also agree that it felt a little fast. i loved the flashbacks with mohan too.

i feel like i wanna save ben and benvi for last because i have too much to say. it was an absolute rollercoaster ride to be a team ben while watching this season. i'm a bit dissapointed that we didn't get any individual plot regarding him, stuff that didn't have to do with girls, but i get why. he got that in s1, and it was paxton's turn to shine.

regarding the whole ben and aneesa thing; honestly, i think they're cute. i love aneesa and i love ben. i just want him to be happy. but it's clear he still has feelings for devi and he doesn't really know what he wants, which sucks for everyone involved. i think that he just assumed that devi liked paxton more than him, that he was her second choice (which honestly, considering the things that transpired, it's not very hard to see why he though that, and he was clearly hurt with her clear choice of paxton over him on multiple occassions) but oh well.

i feel like ben was a catalyst for a lot of the things devi needed to do. like apologize to aneesa, for example. and in that way, they still work well. i loved their banter, whenever we got it. i have hope for them in season 3 (if it happens), considering the way they ended it, but eh. aneesa is also a great girl, so it sucks that this is the direction we're going. but yeah. i am a bit bitter with the dreadf lack of benvi i kinda got this season, but their conversations and the way he helped push her development did make me feel a little better.

as for what team i'm on or whatever, i don't feel like i'm avidly on any team tbh. i'm still lowkey rooting for ben and devi. the reason why i'm not completely getting behind daxton is because i didn't really like what paxton did in episode 10, with the whole not wanting them to be public thing. the entire season felt like he was sending mixed signals. not that i'm saying hes a shitty guy or anything, but yeah. and the reason i'm not completely team ben is because he seems to be teetering between aneesa and devi, so yes, again with the mixed signals. kind of. but the reason i'm still rooting for ben is because i really liked the way they pushed each other, or majorly, he pushed her development, with asking her to apologize, etc. and although him getting together with anessa was not a win for me, a benvi, to relish, i think it helped devi learn to act a little more mature and less territorial.

if i'm being completely honest, i think that devi needed to be single at the end of this season, at least for now. i read the synopsis of episode 10 and was kinda hoping that she'd make that choice, that she'd choose herself, because what she needs isn't a boyfriend. what she needs is just to recover. and i honestly still don't feel like she completely got over her dad's death.

OVERALL THOUGH. this was a much better season than the first one. i feel like they finally got into their groove in terms of acting and comedy. (also trent is the funniest >>>) although i felt like this season was kinda like the first one but on steroids, which at most times was very anxiety inducing to watch, i did like the episodes and i was heavily entertained. go watch it!

i also really need a season 3 so—

[bestworstcase]

I'll admit to mainly finding that 'nobody picks apart the other Damaged Elder Figures so harshly' anon irritatingly disingenuous, though your askbox isn't the place to go PvP about it. I also guess the 'we don't talk about Raven' bit clocked as a flavor of 'barn door closed after the horse' protectiveness that...well, fits Typical Fantasy Homebody Parents more than it actually does Mr Wizard's Special Spy Squad survivors. Though now I'm wondering how much caginess they absorbed from Oz.

hahah fair enough! tbh i didn’t blink twice at the other anon because in the rwby circles i’m adjacent to i do see a clear discrepancy between how tai is discussed and how the other members of the old guard are—in both negative and positive contexts. people talk mostly about tai’s parenting; whereas like people will have all sorts of discussions about qrow/raven/summer that don’t really involve the kids at all? dhdhsks that’s not universal obviously and i see a fairly equal mix of bad dad/good dad takes but, yeah.

if qrow is anything to judge by ozpin did his level best to drill the ethos of secrecy into the heads of everyone he entrusted with the conspiracy and qrow, at least, clearly took it to heart even if he does try to weasel around it by dropping hints until his niece and her friends stumble into enough of it on their own that he can justify spilling the beans. and while ozpin’s secrecy always nominally centered around this specific goal of keeping the shadow war…in shadows…like, keeping secrets is a habit that tends to spread, isn’t it? conspiracies snowball, lying about one thing can so easily become lying about other things too, and there’s a thin line between hoarding information and getting into a mindset that even inconsequential information should be played close to the chest because, well, is it really necessary for the other person to know?

which of course is also just going to be enabling gasoline on the fire of any pre-existing inclination towards repressing things or sweeping unpleasantness under the rug. and in general it’s corrosive to teamwork and social cohesion by way of erecting barriers against open communication, hence the catastrophic disintegration of team strq itself.

wrt tai not talking about raven specifically, what tilts me toward “he stonewalled her because it hurt to think about and he couldn’t get over that” is that yang kinda presents it that way? she didn’t even know raven existed until after summer died, and then tai “shut down” and eventually told yang that 1. summer wasn’t the first love he’d lost, 2. raven was on a team with him and summer and qrow, and 3. she left after yang was born. so like, this very limited amount of information trickled out at a time when tai was distraught and grieving, which kicked up some of the old grief he must have felt after raven left, and then there’s this line of equivalence drawn between raven leaving and summer dying and how that made tai feel. definitely reads to me as it slipped out in a moment of distress, then he wasn’t prepared for yang to get curious about her own mother so he just shut down on the subject.

[firelxdykatara]

You’re doing a LoK rewrite, correct? Would be really interested in hearing how you plan on fixing Suyin’s character and the Lin-Suyin conflict because……. oh boy. Man there’s a lot to unpack there. This is what happens when we don’t let Toph just raise her fucking kids for the sake of pushing a stupid as hell narrative about working women and single motherhood.

I am indeed!

In... you know, the way I'm doing most of my big potential projects, in that I have a folder with some documents that have plot notes and... some day I may actually get full, finished fics out of them (h2o AU is in there, as is my voltron!atla fusion AU, and uhhhh my book 3 atla rewrite, and a few other things), so... but I will say that the docs I have for my LoK rewrite so far amount to roughly 4.2k words of just Plot and Character Notes, which may some day turn into words of Story, hopefully.

ANYWAY, POINT IS: yes, this exists, and I have Many Many Thoughts.

Including how the Gaang kids would shake out! Cause I know I'm doing Zutara, and maybe Tokka???? Although I don't wanna just leave Suki out either... maybe a throuple??? Or Sukka having an amicable breakup before Sokka and Toph get together--maybe she already has Lin by then, and Sokka helps support her through the grief of losing Kanto???? Idk honestly, I haven't actually figured any of that out definitively yet except that Aang was perfectly happy to settle down with an Air Acolyte from one of the rebuilt temples because he grew up and out of his crush on Katara pretty easily once he hit puberty and matured a bit.

UHHH none of which is actually an answer to your question, because it's a valid one! Which is why I've been sitting on this a while (10 days I'm so sorry) bc I haven't made any solid decisions but I've been letting it percolate around my head a bit. And the more I think about it, the more I really like the Sukka -> Tokka idea (and I don't want to kill off Suki since the kids all deserve their awesome Kyoshi warrior auntie in their lives, and also I want a Sukka kid to be besties with Iara [zuko and katara's youngest] so maybe she gets with someone else after she and Sokka split? I could be talked into Ty Lee/Suki actually, the more I think about it....), but obviously having a stable father figure and a Toph who is... not what LoK made her out to be will dramatically change the Beifong family dynamic.

That said, I think I actually have a solution. (I'm so sorry for what I'm about to do.) Toph has Lin with Kanto--and he passes away when Lin is two or three, which is why she has very few memories of her father. (Although none of this 'she doesn't even know his name until she's 50+ cause Toph didn't tell her daughters about their fathers' bullshit.) Sokka is there for her through it all (all of the gaang is, of course, but you know that it sometimes just hits different when it's someone you're also starting to fall in love with, especially when there are older and much more deeply buried feelings there that are now resurfacing, because at least in my version Toph was deeply in love with Sokka when they were teenagers, but he was in love with Suki and she also loved Suki so she didn't want to mess up anything about their family or the group dynamics by making her feelings anyone else's problem), they fall in love, get married and have Suyin.

(Sokka may jokingly refer to it as a shotgun wedding, but the truth is he wanted to propose well before he found out she was pregnant, his attempts just kept getting messed up in increasingly comedic fashion.)

Throughout all of this, Republic City has been established, Sokka is Chancellor, Toph is something of a defacto police chief--mostly because, at the time, no one else was willing to volunteer, and she jokingly offered to whip the law enforcement, but unfortunately everyone else at the meeting took her seriously. However, she is also the founder of the probending league, and basically her feelings about law enforcement are complicated and she actively discouraged her kids from joining the force which is part of why Lin did. How else do you have a teen rebel phase with a parent like Toph? (Which, in this instance, means tough and firm but fair, with a 'you break it, it's up to you to fix it' attitude and very little desire to actually control her daughters and their behavior.)

Ah, but here's the rub.

Suyin is ten years old when Sokka dies, and Lin is sixteen. I'm not sure how he's killed--maybe by Yakone, to tie it into my plans for Amon and book 1. (Note that I'm not sure when the Yakone bloodbending trial happened in canon, but it doesn't matter. The timeline I'm gonna build will be completely different post-comet, and I'll eventually write it all down so that I can keep things straight.) Which would incidentally provide excellent means of having Katara have a very personal stake in the Amon conflict, and perhaps color the fight between him and Iara, but I'm getting off track. And I think Sokka being killed by Yakone, and Toph being unable to protect or save him, or deliver her own brand of justice to avenge him (because Aang is there to stop her and.... shit probably got ugly, I suspect she didn't talk to Aang for at least twenty years after Sokka's death--and this isn't to say I think Toph is particularly violent or murderous, but in that moment, she absolutely wanted to kill the man with her bare hands, and however much she may have regretted it afterwards, she took a very long time to forgive Aang for stopping her in the first place), is what results in Toph stepping down as police chief.

She didn't withdraw from her daughters or fuck off into the swamp or anything (words cannot express how much I hate that part of her canon history), but she did grieve for a very long time. Lin, meanwhile, felt like it was up to her to keep her family together, while also feeling a desperate need to... prove herself, I think. And because her mother was so adamant that she not join the police force, that's exactly what she does. I think Lin completely misread Toph's intentions, too, and believed that the discouragement was because her mother didn't think she had what it takes, when in reality I think Toph was scared of Lin losing herself in the job like she herself had begun to, and eventually coming up on something she couldn't change or fix and making the same mistakes she had.

(I think Toph and Lin have communication issues largely because they are both headstrong and willful, but where Toph thought she was giving her daughters the room they would need to make their own way, what Lin desperately craved was direction and she felt like that was something her mother simply couldn't understand.)

Suyin, on the other hand, fell in with a bad crowd like in canon. I think that what she desperately needed was attention, similar to Lin craving direction, and Toph was trying so hard not to be her own parents that she went a little too far in the other direction and Suyin began to feel like it didn't matter what she did, her mom wouldn't care, or get angry, or discipline her, or anything. Lin and Suyin butted heads a lot growing up, too, especially after Sokka's death, because Lin tried to rein in her sister's behavior and this was met with resistance and derision because Suyin felt like Lin was trying to be both mom and dad and she was neither but her big sister would never admit to being just as lost as she was and it made her furious.

So when Suyin is sixteen, and Lin is twenty-two and new to the force, The Big Rift happens. Lin catches Suyin and her gang, tries to apprehend her, gets a scar on her face in the ensuing conflict. But instead of abusing her power and sending her problem child off to her mother before fucking off to the swamp to avoid the consequences of her actions, Toph tries to actually fix things. Suyin cools her heels in prison for a while, because she was paralyzed by guilt at the time when she hurt her sister (a few inches lower and she could have slit her throat), and was still there when Lin's backup arrived.

Uhhhhhhhhhhh..... I'm so sorry I rambled for so long, BUT THE UPSHOT IS: I think Suyin learned a bit about culpability and taking responsibility for her own actions, Toph realized that her daughters had different needs than she did at their age (and I think a lot of the problem was that grief clouded her own ability to connect with her daughters, and in trying to not be her own parents she lost sight of how to be the parent her own daughters needed), and Lin, I think, had to realize that she had never fully processed the loss of not one but two fathers and had turned to her job in order to avoid actually confronting the grief that had overshadowed her childhood.

However, she did not forgive Suyin, at least not right away--and she wasn't forced or expected to. Suyin understood that she crossed a serious line, she took her lumps and did her time, and no one shamed Lin for her anger. I think, as a result, she had less reason to hold onto that bitterness, and perhaps by the time the story actually begins, she and Suyin are on much better terms, though I haven't worked it out exactly yet.

UHHH yeah I went on for days lmao. All of this is subject to change, too, depending on the needs of the story whenever I get around to actually writing it all down, BUT these are my initial thoughts, at least.

[xxwritemeastoryxx]

Sacrifices

Author: xxwritemeastoryxx

Pairings: Klaus Mikaelson x Reader

Word Count: 2.5K

Warnings: Character death, mentions of blood. Mild trigger warning for thoughts/talks of death (It’s canon typical with the Series Finale, but I wanna add this in there just in case.)��

Author’s Note: Welcome to day 3 of Angst week. This my darlings is the prequel to Temporary Spells. This piece was originally supposed to be posted last year, but as we all know things became chaotic and it was almost impossible to do so. But, it is here now and I am quickly working through my drafts! I’m actually below 20 Items and that doesn’t include the new 2021 requests that I’ve asked for. So I’m making a lot of progress!

Feedback gives me life and motivation for future things. 

Klaus was ready to take the Hollow within him if it meant that Hope got to live a long life, even if it was without him there with her. Klaus knew that his siblings would be there to protect her and be by her side whenever she needed them. Hope would even have Y/N if she ever needed anything at all.

While Klaus had been dead set on this plan of his, Y/N hated it. She hated every part of this plan and she had made it known several times. But as the clock was ticking down for Hope, Klaus wasn’t going to listen to any of Y/N’s plans. The Hybrid’s thick skull was impenetrable once his mind had been set.

Y/N only had a few more hours before Hope would begin her first transition and the Hollow would be pulled from her. While Klaus believed that this was the only way, Y/N knew there had to be another. And the woman wasn’t going to stop until she had found an answer.

She poured through every book she had. Looking for anything and everything she could get her hands on that had been left behind by her family. Some spells couldn’t hold that kind of magic while others were darker than the Magic the Hollow provided, making it the very last resort. For if Y/N dabbled into the darker forms of magic, she knew she’d be lost to it as well.

However, when her phone rang hours later with Elijah’s phone call, she knew she had been too late. Klaus had taken the Hollow into himself and with the help of Hope he and Elijah had been able to bring Klaus back to New Orleans before he could finish the task of killing himself. While one timer reached its end, there was another one that was beginning it’s countdown.

“There has to be something.” Hope said as she watched Y/N flip through the pages of her grimoire.

“I’m trying as best as I can to find something.” Y/N promised.

Even after Freya had tried convincing Hope that there was no amount of magic in the world that could slow the Hollow from taking over Klaus completely, Y/N refused to give up. She refused to believe that there was nothing else they hadn’t tried. When Hope came in and saw that she hadn’t quit like her Aunt had, Hope could only hang on to the sliver of hope that Y/N would find something.

As Y/N continued to flip through one book, Hope’s eyes looked over at the other opened book on the table. The design of it had been foreign to Hope. Even as she read the words along the page, she was curious about it.

“What is this one?” She asked as she looked up at Y/N.

Y/N looked over at Hope and sighed as she took in the page. “It’s a grieving spell. One that my grandmother had created for my grandfather right before she passed.” Her eyes moved back to the pages in front of her as she continued to explain. “One that would grant the person grieving a chance to see their loved one after they’ve passed. It’s temporary in the terms of once the person has stopped grieving, they stop seeing them.”

Hope’s eyes moved back to the page as she ran her fingers over it. “Why do you have it open to this page?”

“A back up plan.” Y/N said with a nod. “Because if your Aunt is right, I think that spell would be best for you.”

Hope’s eyes watered at that. Her lips had tried their hardest not to tremble. “Let’s hope that it doesn’t get to that point.”

_____

Y/N heard Klaus’s footsteps as he entered the room. He could easily hear as her heart sped up for a single moment before it returned to normal. And as he entered the room, she never once looked up at him. Her eyes were still trained on the pages before her. From what he heard, she hadn’t moved from that spot for over a twenty-four hour period.

“Y/N/N,” He began as he came to a stop just a few feet away from the very bed they had shared.

“Don’t.” She said as she quickly shook her head. “Don’t you dare ask me to stop looking because I am not ready to give up.”

“No one is asking you to.” He said softly as he moved to sit on the edge of the bed, careful to not disturb the organized mess that has taken over the top of it. “But we should talk before the night ends.”

“You didn’t want to listen before you left.” She said as she finally tore her eyes away from the book to look over at him. “I asked you-no, begged-for you to let me find a way that didn’t involve us saying goodbye.” Her bottom lip began to tremble. “But you wanted it done your way. And I’m not ready to let you go.”

Klaus quickly took her hands in his as he brought the other one up to rest on her cheek. “We both know there was no other way around this, love. I couldn’t stand by and watch my daughter die from this.”

“I understand, I really do.” And Y/N had. But the thought of Klaus not being around to be with his daughter after all this time of them being a part, Y/N hated the idea. While Hope was her step daughter and Y/N would do anything to keep her safe, Hope needed Klaus more. “But she needs you. She just lost her mother and you are willing to take your own life. How is that fair to her?”

“It isn’t.” Klaus agreed. “But what other choice do we have now?” His eyes moved towards the books before looking back over at her. “We’ve come to the end of this and I have come to terms with what is needed to be done. And I know you will be there for Hope. To care for her and protect her. I couldn’t ask for a better partner to be there for her.”

Y/N bit down on her lip as she tried to blink back the tears that were wanting to spill. She was determined not to break when there was still that thought of hope to keep him from wanting to end his life.

“Would you stop me if I found a way?” She asked cautiously as she looked him in the eye.

A smile pulled at his lips as he took in her words. “If you find something and come swooping in at the last second, I wouldn’t stop you.”

She chuckled at that. “We both know I’m great with timing.”

His hand that rested along her cheek moved down to the side of her neck. “That you are. It is one of the reasons I love you.”

Her eyes watered at his words. “Don’t start saying goodbye.”

“I would never.” He promised. “We both know I’m not particularly fond of emotional goodbyes. I’d rather our last conversation not be filled with words that we say out of sadness.”

“And what would you want our conversation to be?” She asked as her eyes scanned his face. She could see the emotions that were hidden behind his eyes. The ones that he refused to speak of.

As Klaus has stated, he hated emotional goodbyes. He hated the emotions that he’d feel with them or even the hurt that was forced upon the other person. That was something Klaus didn’t want to see on Y/N. He knew his decision hurt her in ways that he’d never be able to fully understand. But for right now, with his time ticking down, he wanted her to be happy.

“How much I love you.” A tug of a smile pulled at his lips. “How much the last several years has meant to me. You kept me sane in my time of need. Especially after visiting Elijah. You managed to make sure I wouldn’t lose myself completely.”

“I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat.” She said with a nod. “And that is coming from a witch that promised she wouldn’t get herself involved in vampire business.”

“You just couldn’t resist my charms.” He said with a chuckle that made her laugh in return. “There’s my favorite laugh.”

“It’s usually only you that hears it anyway.” She said with a smile.

“Then I am very lucky, aren’t I?” A bit of a smirk pulled at his lips. “I’ll let you get back to your books.”

Her face fell at that as he began to move away from her. Her chest filled with an emotion that was close to breaking out of her. She couldn’t stop herself from putting the book to the side and following Klaus off the bed until she is standing in front of him.

They looked at each other, words no longer needing to be said between them. They could easily decipher the emotions that were surrounding them. Their eyes held on to each other for only a moment before Klaus closed the distance between them and brought his lips down to hers.

The kiss between them shared everything they had refused to say in that moment. The goodbye that neither of them actually wanted to say. The feelings of fear, love and even the grief that had surrounded them had been conveyed through the kiss. And it wasn’t long before Klaus broke away from her, leaving Y/N completely alone in the room.

_____

Klaus, Y/N, Elijah and Rebekah stood in the streets of the French Quarter. The walk to let Klaus do as he intended had felt the longest. While the others had finally gotten Klaus to agree to a ‘funeral’ as his last few hours, the laughter and fun they had was nothing in comparison to what they felt now.

With a rather quick goodbye for Rebekah and promise of the cure for immortality in the future, Rebekah had left knowing that she couldn’t say goodbye to her brother. Y/N had known, just as the siblings had, that Elijah wanted to take his life with Klaus. It was why he had stayed put instead of leaving as Rebekah had.

Y/N on the other hand knew that this wasn’t going to end as any of them had planned. The time between Klaus leaving her room and the last meal with family, she had found a way around this. She found a way for Klaus to be able to stay with his siblings, with Hope and not have to be the one to sacrifice his life. She had just yet to say anything to anyone.

As Klaus began to walk away from Y/N and Elijah, Elijah moved to take a step after his brother. Y/N reached out and placed her hand on Elijah’s arm, as if to stop him for only a moment. Elijah looked over at Y/N confused by her actions.

“I know your intention is to die with him,” she began. “but it won’t be necessary.”

“This is my decision.” Elijah noted as he took in her words.

“Your death would be pointless seeing as Klaus will not die tonight.” Her words caused Elijah to still for a moment, taking in what she said. “He will not be the one to die tonight. And if your intentions are to go out with him, it will only be you that does.”

Elijah’s eyes quickly moved from her to his brother who had still been walking away from them, unbothered by the conversation they were having. “He can’t hear us.”

She shook her head. “No.” She took a deep breath trying to get her thoughts in order quickly. There wasn’t much time left now. “This evening, I performed a spell unbeknownst to Klaus. One that would tie his death and only the action of his death, with another. He will survive tonight, and Hollow will be gone.”

“If that is true, why not tell him of your plan?” Elijah asked. “Having someone take my brother’s place is a better plan than any.”

“Because in order for someone to take Klaus’s place it needed to be someone that was willing to take his place. No one wants to die, not with that kind of darkness within them. While Klaus is hellbent on taking his own life to ensure Hope’s safety, we both know that girl needs her father in her life.”

As Elijah continued to take in her words, realization formed within him. His eyes searched her face for any proof that he had been wrong. But there was nothing that showed his thoughts had been wrong. And it was as he looked down to where Y/N’s hand had been on his arm, that his thoughts had been proven correct.

Where the dark veins had been climbing up his wrist some time before, they no longer did. For as they moved down, they climbed up Y/N’s wrist. She had been taking the smallest piece of the Hollow that he had within himself.

“A willing participant.” He repeated a moment later. “And what am I to tell my brother when he finds out?”

“I’d be able to tell him.” She said with a nod of her head. “There is a temporary spell put in place that I’d be able to speak with him. To explain my side of things.”

“You should be with him.” Elijah said as his eyes looked over her face, but she had already been shaking her head.

“By the time I got there, it’d be too late.” She explained. Just as she had, she felt blood fall from her nose. Her hand instinctively moved to wipe it. “A human can’t hold that dark magic for long. You should be the one that’s by his side when he finds out. I can already feel the spell working. The hollow is slowly being transferred to me.”

“Y/N,” Elijah began but stopped himself as he watched as her eyes changed from the color he had been so used to seeing turn to a bright blue for only a moment. Once her eyes returned to normal, blood began to spill from the corner of her eyes. “It’s killing you.”

“As planned.” She said with a nod. “Now go, he’s going to need you. Especially after he learns that I did this.”

Elijah only nodded his head before he was gone from her sight. It seemed like only a second had passed before a pain filled her chest. One that told her that Klaus had shoved the white oak stake into his chest.

A cry of pain passed her lips as she fell to the ground. Despite the pain that was filling her body, she felt at peace. Her actions saved not only the man she loved, but saved a child from becoming an orphan. From the moment her eyes landed on the spell, Y/N knew she would go through with it. And as darkness began to take over her senses, she wondered what true peace was like in the afterlife.

The last thing she heard had been the sound of Klaus calling out her name as he tried making his way back to her before the darkness consumed her completely.

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[celticcrossanon]

BRF Reading - 12th of April, 2021

This is speculation only

Cards drawn 11th of April, 2021

Question: What do we need to know about Prince Philip's funeral?

Interpretation: Harry and Meghan and their shenanigans, when the funeral is supposed to be about Prince Philip and only about Prince Philip.

Card One: The Knight of Swords. This is the card of an air sign person, particularly a Gemini. In this spread it stands for Prince Philip and all that his life represents. The funeral is reminding the world about the values that Prince Philip embodied - honour, dignity, service, the ability to keep information to yourself, the ability to keep your private life private, to be able to put others ahead of yourself with dignity and grace, to protect what is important to you, creating a legacy that lives after you, etc. This is Prince Philip's funeral and it should be all about him.

Card Two: The Nine of Pentacles. This is a card about money, wealth, material goods. Here we see Daedalus, the craftsman, standing over a pile of gold that is the result of his hard work. The money represents both financial security for the future and the result of honing and practising his craft in the past. The pile of gold is standing out to me, so this card is all about money. Coming after the Prince Philip card, it is about Prince Philip's money/estate - the money and goods that he leaves to his wife, children, friends etc.

With Harry as the underlying card (see below), this says that Harry is concerned about his inheritance from Prince Philip. He is expecting a lot of money, as represented by the large pile of gold on the card. The Moon card coming after this card, on top of the Harry (and his guilt) card in the spread, tells me that there could be and probably will be some illusion or deception about the amount of money Harry will inherit from Prince Philip. It may not be the huge amount that he expects. It may be that there will be PR articles about how much Harry inherited, and they turn later to have grossly over estimated the amount. It may be that Harry will try to use emotional manipulation/deceit to get more money from the inheritance than that amount to which he is entitled. It may be all of these and other forms of deception/illusion/deceit.

Nothing is going to be as it appears when it comes to Harry and his inheritance from Prince Philip. Do not believe the articles that will come out. Do not be upset by them. Remember this and wait for the truth to emerge over time.

Card Three: The Moon. This is the central card of the spread and the only major arcana card in the spread, so its energy is very important. The energy of the Moon card here is one of deceit, distortions of truth, illusions, and perhaps outright lies. Nothing is as it appears on the surface, especially when it involves Prince Harry (the underlying energy of the spread), and you have to dig deeper to find the truth. The truth of these illusions will almost certainly be cloaked with secrets and/or hidden in the shadows (for example, the article that said Prince Harry wanted to wear military uniform at the funeral - I can find articles discussing this, I can find articles giving the opinions of people on whether it will happen or not, but I can not find the article that said Prince Harry asked to wear military uniform - it has vanished like moonbeams in the light of day). These deceptions will be particularly strong around Prince Philip's inheritance (the Nine of Pentacles) and Harry's past (the Six of Cups).

Card Four: The Six of Cups. This is a card of the past, of looking over the past, and sometimes of childhood. On the card Psyche sits on the rocks, remembering her past life with her husband and drawing strength from it for the future. In this spread, this card is a card about the past. The funeral of Prince Philip will (obviously) be about his past and his life. Here, with the underlying energy cards being about Prince Harry, it says that this is a card about Prince Harry's past, especially his past with Prince Philip. With the Meghan card ahead of it, this refers specifically to Harry's past when he was coupled with Meghan, and how they treated Prince Philip. With the Moon card behind it, expect deceptions, illusions, secrets etc around this past. The past may be re-written to show a different version of Harry and Meghan's relationship with Prince Philip, with any actions that reflect badly on the couple being re-written to show them in a better light. Harry may also use his past with the BRF as part of his deception/illusion/manipulations to get more money from Prince Philip's inheritance, or to soften the impact of his past actions towards his grandfather (for example - 'they treated Harry so badly and he still went back to the funeral as a respectful grandson' - that sort of distortion of the truth).

As with the question of Prince Philip's estate, nothing is going to be as it appears when it comes to Harry and how his past is portrayed with Prince Philip and the BRF. Do not believe the articles that will come out. Do not be upset by them. You know the truth, and all the distortions of the truth in the articles can not change what actually happened.

Card Five: The King of Wands. This is a fire sign person, particularly a Leo, and in this spread it stands for Meghan. It is at the opposite end of the spread from the Prince Philip card, and this indicates that Meghan's values are directly opposed to those of Prince Philip. Instead of the funeral being about him, she wants to make it all about her. The card of the past/childhood (the Six of Cups) appearing before this card indicates that Meghan may do something about her unborn child or her first child to pull the attention back to her, and/or release PR about them in some way to try and get attention. She may also release PR combining the past with the present, the most obvious example being articles comparing Harry walking behind his mother's coffin (the past, child) to Harry walking behind his grandfather's coffin (the present), especially if she can twist this to suit her victim narrative (for example, he was forced to walk behind his mother's coffin and now the mean BRF wouldn't let him wear a military uniform for his grandfathers, despite him being on active service during his years in the army, the only one of the BRF to do so - the lies and distortions of truth in this example are what the Moon card represents in the spread).

Underlying Energy Card One: The Knight of Pentacles. This is an earth sign person, particularly a Virgo, and in this spread the card stands for Prince Harry. He is the energy underneath everything else in this spread, and he is the major concern as people prepare for the funeral.

We know that the other members of the BRF will behave at the funeral, follow HM the Queen's wishes, and ask only to grieve in private for a short time before returning to their duties. We have no such reassurance about Prince Harry, who has already shown that he will go against the express wishes of the widow, HM the Queen, in his quest for attention and PR that he can use to make money (he showed this when he and Meghan put up a cold and heartless tribute to Prince Philip on their website when HM the Queen had said that nothing would be said by the Royal Family, and everyone else just had copies of the tribute from Buckingham Palace).

Underlying Energy Card Two: The Nine of Swords. This card shows Orestes tormented by the Furies after he killed his mother. They pursued him wherever he want, and he could not escape them. Similarly, Harry's thoughts are tormenting him. He is plagued by thoughts of how he treated his family (who he is returning to face at the funeral), how he treated his grandmother, who his grandfather spent his life protecting and supporting (putting up that heartless 'service' statement after the Queen has said no member of the family was to speak out is the latest in a long line of disrespectful actions that have caused her stress and worry), and how he treated his grandfather (the Oprah interview while Prince Philip was in his last days on this earth and blowing off an important event for the Royal Marines, a position he inherited from his grandfather, to attend a movie premiere are two incidents that come to mind). He feels guilty.

The Moon card above this card and the Knight of Pentacles (Harry) card says that Harry is not only involved with deception around the funeral, but he is also deceiving himself. He feels guilty, but he is not yet ready to admit to himself that his actions caused hurt to others, and so he lives in a constant state of uneasy and defensive self justification.

Harry can not escape these thoughts and they are causing him stress and sleepless nights. The thoughts keep coming up in his mind (like the swords pointed at Orestes in the picture) and every time he has to justify his actions to himself. It is in this state of mind, stressed, defensive, and self-justifying, that Harry is attending the funeral.

I am not saying that Harry is not grieving his grandfather, just that the energy coming from the card is stress, guilt and the self-justification of someone who knows they have behaved badly but are not ready to admit it. These feelings are most likely powered by grief at losing his grandfather, and that is why they are so constant and so strong.

Arrangement of the Cards: Look at how the spread is arranged. Prince Philip is at one end and Meghan at the other, with Harry (and the Nine of Swords, his guilty feelings) as the balancing point underneath the five cards. This says to me that there is a range of energy between that embodied by Prince Philip (service, duty, putting yourself last) and that embodied by Meghan (putting yourself first and only you, no conception of duty or service), and at this point of time Harry is standing precisely at the middle of these energies, in fact he may even be torn between them. He may turn back towards the Prince Philip side, or he may turn towards the Meghan side, but at this time he is balanced in the middle. The Moon card is directly above Harry, indicating that there will be some sort of deception(s) or illusion(s) about his presence/behaviour at the funeral, and/or that he will use the funeral as a cover for other behaviour, and/or as a way of getting what he wants. The cards on either side of the Moon card show what will be involved in and/or the reason for this deception/illusion: Money (the Nine of Pentacles) and Childhood/Children/the Past (The Six of Cups).

Conclusion: This funeral is meant to be all about Prince Philip, but Meghan wants to make it all about her. Harry is in the middle, and he is tormented by his past actions with respect to his grandfather, actions that he has to keep justifying to himself. The Moon card says that there is so much illusion and deceit going on on, both in Harry not being honest with himself (deceiving himself about his intentions/motives/how others react to him/being self justifying etc) and in Harry's actions at the funeral, especially in regard to his inheritance from Prince Philip, and in regard to his past, especially his past actions towards his grandfather. Harry may be using deceit/illusions/emotional blackmail based on his childhood to try and get the money he thinks he deserves.

[haztory]

𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬

--nanami kento x gn!reader; hurt, comfort, minor character death, established relationship, death from a disease

--summary: Death is part of the process, Nanami Kento learns early on. He's no stranger to it nor the quiet that follows it. But when it plagues you like this, he finds himself at a loss.

a/n: I don’t know where this came from. it just happened. have I mentioned I'm a huge nanami simp as well? something about capable men just gets to me hehe. anyways, enjoy!

i listened to ‘clouds’ by luke faulkner while writing this

(w.c. 2302)

Death is part of the process, Nanami Kento learns early on.

It’s not one he has to particularly enjoy, but it would be advantageous in the resting of his conscious to make peace with it. Rather than let death ruin the few hours of sleep he can manage a night, it’s significantly easier to never let it weigh too heavily on his mind, never let its stay linger for more than necessary in the space of his thoughts. His occupation demands a certain air of nonchalance from him, requires the detached, almost stoic acknowledgment of the situation. Eventually, familiarity will settle in the depth of his recollection and death becomes something one needn’t blink twice towards. 

It’s not an aspect of the job he likes, per se, but it’s significantly better than the alternative. This seemingly apathetic conception of human life is unfortunately an evil requirement. Instead of festering over the lives he didn’t save, he can focus on the ones he has yet to protect. His slate may be tainted with copious amounts of red— inky, dark, bleeding red; the kind that looks black as it accumulates— but in true Kento fashion, he’ll wipe it clean. Gently, with a clean rag and with slow, circular motions, he’ll wash away the evidence of his failures with as much respect as he can, regardless of how exhausted he may be and how much easier it would be to just run his body, suit, and knife through the stream of water.

The victims may no longer be of this earth, but their last physical embodiment lay wickedly upon his person, his weapon, and his soul. Where he couldn’t save them, the least he can do is lay their last parts to rest with as much kindness as one can muster: with a slow wipe and a silent prayer. 

Death is part of the process, but, if one allows it, it can also be the fuel towards excellence. A drive that settles in after the brief misfortune, kickstarting the desire for improvement; A need to do and be better. To work harder and save more people. But that’s all it must be. No residual guilt, no lasting regret, only fuel. That’s what Nanami Kento learns early on.

What he learns rather recently, though, is that death is much different when it’s inevitable. 

When there is no amount of slashing, no amount of fighting, no amount of improved skills that can prevent it. Even worse, when you know it’s coming and preparation can do very little in settling the grief. 

Death is part of the process, but how can one rationalize it when it doesn’t come from the immediate life or death situation he so often faces? When it doesn’t come from the hands of maniacal cursed spirits or the wickedness of greedy men, but instead, from the unforgiving nature of nature itself? How does one reconcile the inevitability of death when it happens to someone so young?

Cancer. 

She was only eleven.

Death is part of the process, Kento used to think, but as he stands amongst the sea of black on this fitting day of grey, he can’t help but notice how incredibly unfair this all is. Her mother stands a few feet away, silent as they scatter her ashes by the river she used to play in as a child. She stands flanked on either side by loved ones, and yet, the abysmal look on her face betrays any ideal that she may be comforted by the closeness of others; Hardly even cognizant of the fact that they’re there. He’s seen that look before, once on himself.  

It’s the face of vicissitude, the kind that casts someone past the rocks of sadness and out onto the sea of loneliness and despair. A place that no one can follow.

Spouses are called some variation of widow, children are called orphans. What does one call a parent who’s lost their child? No doubt the lack of a label only helps to contribute to the loneliness of it all. Suspended in pain without even the decency of a customary societal title attached to one’s name. Left with nothing but the echoing emptiness of a broken heart.

Grief personified. A hollow shell of a being. Just another person who lost someone they loved. Nothing more, nothing less.

Kento is used to death, but this? This has heartache weighing heavier on his shoulders than he’s used to, forcing his impeccably straight posture forward with a sag of tragedy. The silence of the fellow attendees forces him to maintain some morsel of composure, in fear of disturbing the serene devastation of it all that’s composed so fragilely. So delicate that even a sigh will break the glass of still anguish. As her ashes are scattered to the river and the priest begins the common prayer, the image of her weak smile in her last moments plays vividly behind Kento’s tinted glasses. He can hardly swallow the lump that tightens his throat.

He can hardly imagine how her mother feels. Can hardly imagine how you feel. She was your niece after all.

His eyes trail towards your figure. Standing to the right of your sister, dressed in the customary black, and hand held tightly in hers in solidarity of the magnitude of the loss. Kento didn’t mind standing towards the back, away from the bubble of intimacy that surrounded the two of you. It would’ve felt like an invasion of the sanctity of family to stand anywhere near. A foreigner, he’s always attributed himself to be whenever accompanied with your family— not out of their refusal to accommodate him, but rather his own voluntary maintenance of separation from their sphere of loving connection that was more or less absent from his own life— and any meager effort to share sentiments of sorrow would feel, more or less, inauthentic. At least at this moment.

So he waits, towards the back of the gathering. A far enough distance to ascertain his separation from the immediate family, but close enough to where, should you require him at any point, you need only turn around to seek him out. And he will come to you, as fast as his legs may go, regardless of the people that may be in the way. For his hand has been twitching this entire time with the need to physically comfort you and his eyes continuously dart back to your figure in watchful consideration.

The priest ends his prayer and the last of the ashes are sent off and silence once more encompasses the gathering. The aching kind, the one that wants to be disturbed so badly, but remains untouchable. The kind of agonizing mute that has surrounded his life since you received the fateful phone call a few days before.

Kento is no stranger to quiet. It’s his preferred method of life, not the kind of person to find delight in unnecessary, boastful noise, nor the kind to entertain it often. But this is the kind of quiet he finds greats distaste in. Especially since it’s deprived him of his favorite kind of din— yours.

The life that is so intricately intertwined with yours has held virtually no recognizable clamor in four days. No low chatter from the television, no raucous laughter induced from one of your social media apps, no prolonged discussion of each other’s days or interesting points of conversation. Only silence has filled every gap and crevice as you two packed bags and made arrangements to head to your hometown in preparation for the funeral. Lamenting silence filled the space as you sat side by side on the train towards your destination. Mournful silence encompassing the home of your sister upon your mutual entry into the area. Silence so thick yet so delicate, so long and so void that any attempt to dismantle it feels boilingly uncomfortable.

He doesn’t like the wall it has unintentionally placed between you two, wanting nothing more than to tear it down with his bare hands and have you back within the safety of his arms. But he knows better. 

Death is part of the process, and he must let grief run its course. He’ll just remain in the shadows as a beam of support, intent to provide the space and time you need, but always keeping a trained eye on you.

That’s what love is, he supposes. It’s an odd thing to think, especially as solemness surrounds him as it does now. The drag of sadness competing with the surge of love that overwhelms his veins. It’s burning, and intense, and while his is mostly in consideration of you (as most things in his life nowadays are), it’s peculiarly indicative of the moment. Poetic, almost. 

Bleeding affection borders this ceremony of gathered friends and family in a proper send-off, love encapsulated in the silent tears trailing down faces and memorialized in the air of stagnance. Pouring in every direction as they all gaze sadly at the traveling ashes of the young girl down the steady waters of the river.

It’s grief, yes, but also love, for what is grief but love with nowhere to go?

The ride home is like all the other days, incredibly hushed. Inaudible. He can barely hear your breaths. He wonders, and not for the first time, if when he dies, this is how you will grieve. In this tragic quiet, moving with such stillness that was he not watching, he wouldn’t know you moved at all. A vacant soul wandering just to survive. Jujutsu sorcerers unfairly make their peace with dying early on in their tenure, and maybe he’s committed you to a life of tragedy by involving himself so intimately with you. 

When he dies, and he will— this life that he has chosen spares him no luxuries, not even false beliefs— he will condemn you to a brutal reality that he could have spared you from were he not so selfish. He hates seeing you like this. Hates it with every fiber of his being.

Death is a part of the process. He understands that. He just wishes it wasn’t so collateral. A prolonged state of your affliction that resulted from his hand would surely be a more painful fate than any gruesome death.

Your parent’s home is warm, in sharp contrast to the events of the day. And while they stayed with your sister, Kento insisted you return to your place of stay to wash and change if only to give you a moment alone; So he can check on you in the sanctity of privacy, grant you a brief respite from the unrelenting tide of sorrow, cherish you in these sparing instances that he can never take for granted. 

You bathe alone, he gives you that. He makes tea the way your mother taught him how, even though you quite like the way he makes it and has it set on the table upon your return. Dressed in comfier attire and seated blankly at the table, he settles in beside you. His shoulder touching yours hoping to convey in this minute action that he’s here. 

He doesn’t need the words to say it. Just his presence. 

His hand too, as you settle your own silently in the space of his large one, gripping tightly onto the rough skin. He rubs his thumb along the back of your hand, bringing it to his lips as he placed two long kisses on its surface. You’ve made eye contact all day but this is the first time you’ve really looked at each other. 

Where he can see the pain swimming in the pools of your irises behind the film of unshed tears and you can see the unrestrained sympathy and worry in his. 

“She was eleven,” you whisper, unable to speak any louder.

He doesn’t say anything. There’s not much he can say, only press his lips harder to the back of your hand.

It’s the only moment you’ve had alone together since arriving, and while he was so desperate before to hear something, anything come from your mouth, he finds that the inactivity the fills space once more is rather appropriate. One that he doesn’t want to disturb. Not when there isn’t anything he can say that can heal this wound, nothing he can do except love and care for you when you’re too weak to do it yourself. 

He places a hand behind your head, tilting you forward as he places his lips upon your forehead and smoothing the stray hairs that have displaced themselves from your formal hairdo. Fingers travel down the back of your neck and rub gentle circles on your shoulder, healing any aches with his touch. 

“Drink,” he murmurs against your temple, and you do. A sign of progress that he relishes in. He’s more than eager to see the slow trek back to a state of normalcy, but he knows it’ll be different from here on out. There’s a hole in your heart and it will take a while to heal. 

But he’ll be there. For as long as he can, whenever he can. Because that’s what love is.

Death is part of the process, but he finds it’s infinitely more manageable with you. He knows you feel the same way when at the end of the day as you lay side by side in the guest room of your parents’ home, you take comfort in the safety of his arms and finally, fill the air with something other than the prolonged silence and let him comfort you. 

Death is part of the process, and he knows the inevitability of his own part in it. But in this moment with you, he’ll let himself indulge selfishly in your noise. It’s his favorite sound, after all. 

end notes: come shoot me a message! i love hearing from yall.