#the inescapable shame of something you don't remember

[lsunstreakerl]

hello hi if you haven't seen pacific rim this will... not make sense. anyways! no worldbuilding, no help from me, I am dunking you all into this ficlet head first and in the deep end.

for those of you who were also spitballing with me about this. your fault. you know who you are. 1.6k words, Daniel POV

Checo is at his door. Daniel doesn't care.

It's never mattered to him before. Didn't matter when it was Alex or Pierre either, desperate for some scrap of advice that Daniel didn't have to give them.

There's no magic formula, no secret hack to make it bearable.

There is the drift, and there is Max.

If you can't handle the pressure, you break.

Alex and Pierre broke. Daniel's not sure how, and he doesn't care. It's not his business or his problem, and he's made a solid attempt at cutting jaeger's and their pilots out of his life entirely since he left, but somehow each of Max's kills find themselves on his doorstep anyways.

He stopped letting them in a long time ago.

It doesn't matter to him that Checo's eyes are bloodshot, that he's clearly been chewing at his lip, the way he's still in an enviro-gel suit.

He's been crying. Daniel doesn't care.

------

Pierre shows up, and Daniel pretends he isn't home.

He repeats the process with Alex.

------

A representative for the jaeger program stands outside his door for three hours straight. Daniel spends them drinking.

------

It's been three days since Checo was at his door— Daniel hates counting it, hates the way the number seeps into his life, ingrained and everywhere he looks. Three days since Checo. Three years since Daniel's last attempt at a drift, three failed rehab programs before he'd given up entirely, three pilots Max has shattered in the meantime.

Checo is at his door again, gaunt. He looks like shit.

Daniel doesn't open the door.

------

Nico and Kevin show up. Daniel only lets them in because they bring food, catching up quietly at the table over a pot roast. It's only superficial conversation— Daniel doesn't do anything deeper than that with anyone, not anymore.

Nico says Max's name, and Daniel doesn't let him get any further than that before he kicks them both out.

------

He doesn't let Lando in. The brat is standing in his living room anyways, because he was an alley child before he was a jaeger pilot, and Daniel knows his early years as well as he knows himself. Knows that Lando has a favorite bakery that gives out leftover bread at the end of the day, knows that he hates tsunamis because he's been flooded before, that he's had hypothermia multiple times. Knows that there's a recruiter at the local prep school that Lando resents, knows there's not a lock the kid can't pick.

Lando is glaring at him.

Something about the enviro-suits. Something about nobody being able to get close enough.

Something Daniel doesn't care about.

Something Daniel can't care about.

------

Charles calls him a cunt for getting the memory removal service.

Daniel tells him he doesn't even remember the color of Max's eyes.

------

A week since Checo first showed up at his door. He's back again, worse than before.

His third trip.

There must be some kind of emergency, for everyone to be coming to Daniel like this.

There's only one person it could be about.

He doesn't care.

------

Charles and Pierre almost get ripped in half in a kaiju ambush. They should've had a second jaeger with them, but the defense wall is short staffed.

Daniel doesn't—

------

Charles and Pierre are fine. Daniel feels better when he sees them with his own eyes, awake and alert in the medical bay.

There's an enviro-tank along the wall in the back, full of orange gel. There's a pilot inside of it, fully suited and unresponsive. The tank shows weak vitals.

Mick is suiting up to go into the tank, dark circles under his eyes.

Daniel wonders if the pilot is alive. If there's any life worth living, when the mind is broken.

------

HB-333 has been retired. Daniel stands along the metal rails by the memorial hallway, looking at the faded honey badger decal on the chest of it. It's an older jaeger, by today's standards, nothing like the gleaming shine on some of the others.

There's a smaller jaeger in the repair bay, a design Daniel doesn't recognize. It's white and orange, sharp angles and harsh lines. It's labeled 01 on the leg. No other personalization.

Daniel asks a dock worker what it is.

The department has created a single pilot jaeger, while he's been gone.

Daniel looks at it, and thinks of the unresponsive pilot in the enviro-tank.

It doesn't feel like a success.

------

Charles grabs him before he leaves, bodily drags him back to the med wing.

He's angrier than Daniel has ever seen him since—

It's been a while.

He calls Daniel selfish, tells him he's a miserable alcoholic and a sorry excuse for a pilot, that he retired because he was scared and a coward.

He tells him Max deserves better.

He tells him he deserves better.

------

Daniel is in one of the new enviro-suits, compressed tight around his body. There's a mask that delivers air through the gel.

He's never been in the gel before.

Mick is asleep on one of the med wing cots, exhausted. The pilot is still unresponsive.

The vitals are worse.

Daniel gets in.

------

"Wait, Danny, do you think we can throw that?"

"The rock? Hell yeah, let me— we need a better division on the limbs, Maxy."

"I already told you I will be the dick if you would like to be everything else."

"But I want the dick."

"Two dicks? No limbs? I think we could make that work. The dick jaeger."

"Now there's something that would scare the kaiju. This giant dick jaeger rolling towards them."

"We could shoot the cannons out of the—"

------

The pilot's name is Max, and Daniel used to know him better than he knew his own heartbeat.

He's twenty four.

Daniel encounters little pieces of him in the gel. A scrap of his name, a memory of a rambunctious card game, of George flipping a table.

A sister.

Countless kaiju fights.

There's fragments of solo piloting, a heavy, inescapable weight. It makes Daniel's head hurt just thinking of it.

It takes several fragments for Daniel to realize that they're not shattered— that's how Max remembers them.

He didn't think it would be allowed for a pilot to operate in a fragmented fugue state. The only moment of clarity is when there's a kaiju.

Finding the edges of a drift is laughably easy. Daniel finds the frazzled ends without thinking, unweaving them, intertwining his own thoughts.

It's a well worn shoe, a glove that fits just right. It's a weight off of his chest.

This is right.

Daniel doesn't remember where it went wrong.

------

He's deep in the drift, unnerved by how alone it feels. There's another mind hiding. He can't find it.

------

Daniel hacks up orange gel when they pull him out of the tank. It looks more like a funeral when he tells them he couldn't find the pilot.

Nico's eyes are wet. Charles won't look at him at all, knuckles white where he's clenching his fists.

Lando asks him quietly if he would try again.

There's a denial balanced on the tip of his tongue, perfectly practiced and honed to perfection over the last three years.

Alex, Lando, Mick.

Three people crying.

Daniel has two more shots.

He tries again.

------

"I mean, you have of course seen my memories of my dad."

"You know how I feel about him."

"Yeah."

"What'd he say this time?"

"He said they're doing research on single pilot jaegers, what it might take to handle one. How efficient they would be."

"Oh that's— fuck me, that's stupid. The whole point of drifting is so that the jaeger don't just— boom, to your brain."

"You wouldn't do that if it was an option, would you?"

"Leave this to hunk of glory to fly solo? Nah, you're stuck with me Maxy. We're the dream team, baby."

------

Daniel finds memories of Alex, Pierre, and Checo. He finds half baked thoughts of other pilots, prospects who couldn't even handle the edges of a drift with Max.

He hasn't found anything with him.

He wonders if maybe Max got memory removal too, but— it's illegal for pilots.

There's an itch in Daniel's brain.

The old Daniel would know where to look to find Max. Would know how to draw him out of his own shattered mind, back into the world of the living. Would be able to tell him all the people who are missing him.

He'd killed that Daniel. Sent him under with medications and liquor and a memory displacement specialist, carved out every mention of Max in his life.

Daniel doesn't choke on the gel again, when they bring him up.

------

He's on a mandatory break. It's the cot they'd had Mick sleeping in, but it's his now.

Lando brings up food from the lower levels, sitting at the end of his bed and picking at his rice.

He says Max had been getting worse.

Distant, hard to catch the attention of. That every drift had been harder and harder to pull him out of.

He doesn't accuse Daniel of anything.

He doesn't need to. Daniel knows Lando like the inside of his lungs, knows that they're both aware of what he's really saying.

Daniel tells him about the memory displacement. Tells him he doesn't even remember what caused a rift between him and Max in the first place, that it's been completely removed.

Lando cusses him out.

Slams the door when he leaves.

The echo still rings in Daniel's ears as he shakes out rice from the sheet, picking up Lando's overturned bowl.

------

The vital signs on the tank are weaker.

Three years since he left, three failed pilots, three failed rounds of rehab, three confirmation appointments before they'd removed all of Daniel's memories, three numbers on HB-333, three chances to save him.

He's on his last shot.

Daniel connects the mask to the oxygen supply, feet dangling over the edge of the tank.

He gets in.

[malusokay]

How I Made Loneliness Feel Like a Lifestyle Choice

What it means to live inside pauses, and why I still think solitude is sexier when no one notices it’s deliberate. (from my Substack)

Everything smelled like rain, and I thought that was enough. It reminded me of the garden after someone had hosed it down. I didn't grow up around cities, but they always seemed to tolerate me. I think I liked being somewhere that didn't know my name, but still assumed I belonged.

Striped sweaters, pleated skirts, tangled headphones, clothes that made me feel like I was always en route to class. Or auditioning for a French indie film. Moving through a city of lights that buzzed louder than conversations, a dull, constant hum that never really stopped, even when the streets emptied or the shops pulled down their metal shutters. I moved through it the way you walk through static: alert, but blurred around the edges. Roaming through busy stations, empty cafés, quiet library aisles, the kind of spaces that were public but impersonal, where everyone passed through but no one stayed long enough to be noticed.

I knew the schedule of trains I wasn't taking, the smell of pastries I never bought, the sound of my own shoes across polished floors. I always wondered what it would feel like to walk in and choose something without thinking, to point at a donut, maybe, and eat it right there. Like a normal person. Like someone with blood sugar, zero shame, and no existential beef with breakfast. But I'm very strict with myself. I'd linger just long enough to let the air hit, warm sugar, butter, vanilla rising from trays behind glass—and then I'd keep walking like it hadn't crossed my mind.

I wasn't running out of anything. That's what made the slowness feel indulgent, not dangerous. Being there didn't serve a purpose, and maybe that's why it felt like a secret, like I was getting away with something small and private, a softness no one had to witness.  I came from a world that didn't use public transport. That's probably why I liked it, the quiet subversion of being somewhere unchauffeured. Sitting alone felt earned. Watching the city move without me in it felt like a choice.

I liked places where no one stayed long, where nothing stuck. Where it was normal to be alone, to be quiet, to be looking down at nothing in particular, most of it passed without detail. Just motion. Noise, breath, movement. The lift of a coat sleeve. The scratch of a chair leg on tile.

I wasn't trying to stand out. But I didn't want to vanish into the wallpaper either. I wanted to be the kind of girl you looked at twice, but never remembered why. I wanted to be looked at without having to speak. The kind of presence that makes people wonder but not ask. I think I learned that posture in school, that specific neutrality. Just polished enough to blend in with the ones who mattered, just distant enough to never be mistaken for someone waiting to belong. I walked like I knew where I was going, even when I didn't. That was usually enough. It worked 90% of the time. The other 10%, I accidentally stumbled into a linguistics conference breakroom or a storage unit filled with mannequins missing their hands, with no recollection of how I had ended up there.

No one talks about how loud fluorescent lights are until you've been under them too long. And I was under them a lot. Not because I had anywhere to be, but more because they were always on in the places I ended up. They flickered sometimes, but mostly they just buzzed, high, steady, and inescapable. You don't notice it at first. But then it's all you can hear, like the sound is inside your head, not around it. It doesn't hurt, exactly. It just presses. Constant and low, a hum under everything else. After a while, I stopped noticing until I left the building and felt the sudden quiet of normal air. Even the street seemed softer in comparison.

I think I liked that. The sudden relief. The way silence felt like something you could wear.

I miss subway lights in my eyes, the way they flickered across the windows, breaking my reflection into something softer. Less defined. Easier to look at. Not quite me, but close enough to follow with my eyes as the train moved. There was something comforting in the blur, in the way the glass doubled everything, made it all a little less certain. I could sit across from myself without having to explain anything. No smile. No correction. Just the outline of a girl who looked like she read too much and might start crying if you asked about her favourite movie.

Sometimes I'd stare until my own face went unfamiliar, my mouth wrong, my eyes too far apart, and my hair a bit too dark. It never felt dramatic. Just distant. Like someone I'd borrowed things from.

Loneliness wasn't dramatic then. It didn't lurch or shout or demand anything from me. It just sat next to me like noise, like background static, easy to ignore until everything else went quiet. It lived in the pauses. In the space between songs. In the wait before the train doors closed. I wouldn't have called it sadness. I still don't think I would. It was just a feeling I couldn't shake, one that stayed close but never really touched me. Like a bruise I'd forgotten about until something pressed against it.

That's the part that's stayed with me. Probably always will.

I moved without urgency. There was rarely a reason to be anywhere, and even when there was, I didn't feel like rushing to meet it. Sometimes I rode past my stop on purpose just to see how long I could go before anyone noticed I wasn't where I said I'd be. Sometimes I just forgot to get off. Not in a distracted way, just in that quiet, slow kind of forgetting that happens when the lights blur and the announcements start to sound the same. I always stood in the same place, by the door, leaning against the divider on the side facing forward. I liked the way the movement pressed me into it, like the city was gently holding me in place, even if just by force.

The train kept going, so I did too.

There wasn't much to say about it. Long walks that led nowhere in particular, though they usually ended at water. The kind that gathers without spectacle, canals, harbours, the quiet undersides of bridges. Places where things collect. Leaves. Bottles. Thoughts. I'd stand there for a while, coffee in hand, like I was waiting for something to surface, though I never really expected it to. I always kind of hoped I'd see a seal. Something about their vibe, fat, quiet, mysterious, felt aspirational. I imagined us nodding at each other like two girls who just get it. The coffee would go cold before I finished it, not because I forgot, but just because I didn't like it that much. But it gave me something to hold. And sometimes that was enough. It made me look busy. Like I had somewhere to be, or someone waiting. People don't ask questions when you're holding coffee. It's basically an invisibility cloak for awkward people.

Now I don't even know if I ever liked it, or if I just got used to the taste the way you get used to minor inconveniences, like blisters, or boys who say they hate small talk and then spend forty-five minutes telling you about their crypto portfolio.

Afternoons slid into evenings. Evenings into nights. The kind of hours that don't announce themselves, they just collect. Soft and weightless, but heavy if you stack too many. I stopped keeping track after a while. Someone once asked if I was lost. I wasn't. But I said yes anyway. Just to try on the softness of being helped. Some days blurred at the edges, others vanished completely. I'd look up, and it would already be dark, and I'd have nothing to show for it except a half-drunk coffee and some vague memory of walking somewhere. Sometimes I bought things, like books, mugs, bracelets, or old things. Small enough to fit in a coat pocket. I never needed them, but I always found a way to use them. At one point, I was probably one paperweight away from becoming a hoarder.

I didn't feel bad, exactly. Just delayed, like I was waiting for something to begin, only the beginning kept moving further out of reach. People always talk about time as if it's passing them by. Mine never passed. It hovered. So soft and idle, just out of reach. It felt like holding your breath without realising it until the exhale came in the form of darkness outside the window, the kind that arrives before you're ready, even if you knew it was coming. That's what threaded through. The weightless ache of not moving. Of being still for so long, the air starts to fold around you.

I miss how easy it was to let days slip by without asking for more. To let them spool out behind me like a thread. Nothing dramatic, nothing wasted, just hours layered on hours. Some light enough to forget, some heavy enough to keep. But none of them urgent. I could move through them like scenery, like I was there to notice and not to shape.

And I miss the way that almost felt like enough. Not good. Not exciting. But bearable in a way that made me believe there was something elegant about it. And sometimes, when it's late and everything smells like rain, it still does. The trains, the coffee, the blur in the window, they never really stopped. I still take the long way home. Not out of forgetfulness anymore. My mind knows where to get off. But there's something about delaying arrival that still makes sense to me.

The city feels smaller now. Familiar. I've stopped needing to read the signs. I know where the doors open. I know which step on the stairs creaks. And the buzzing, I don't notice it as much. It's in the walls, it's in the air, it's in the glow of shopfronts at night. It's less intrusive now. Almost gentle. Like background radiation. It's just part of how the world hums.

I think that's the part no one ever talks about—how some patterns don't mean anything until you realise you never left them, how stillness starts to look like stability if you don't call it by its name. It's not that I want to go back. It's just that I never really moved forward. I've stayed exactly where I was. Just quieter now. More fluent in waiting.

In Latin, the imperfect tense describes an action that was ongoing but never finished. I liked that. It felt honest, like naming something without needing to change it.

my insta -> malusokay

[pingnova]

I met a quiet old man while browsing the plant books and accessories at the trading post this spring who asked what I was looking for. Most white people came to look at the jewelry and the expensive woolen blankets, so I guess it was a little unusual how closely I was examining all of the books on plants.

I held up a deck of native plant playing cards and said I was a forager, looking for more guides on local plants. He nodded thoughtfully and said there was a lot of medicine in wild plants. I smiled awkwardly, not sure why he was talking to me. But I reciprocated: "What are you looking for?"

He said he wasn't sure. He pointed to a few books on flowers, not necessarily edible vegetables. "They're beautiful," he said unsurely.

I nodded to encourage him. "Plants aren't just for eating, they're for appreciating too. We need beauty and nutrition."

Now he smiled, mostly hidden by his mustache, and told me he had a community garden plot he had tended for the past thirty years. Wow, what dedication.

Abruptly he says he has one year to live. He's at the trading post to find parting gifts for his son and grandchildren. He says this all very calmly, he's clearly been preparing for some time. And I stare at him because he seems so well and I've just met him. The idea of him dead is disturbing and shameful.

"Oh," is all I can say.

"I think this year I'll fill it with flowers."

He says it so warmly. I remember he was talking about his beloved community garden patch. I'm filled with heaviness and disbelief that he is soon dying and here wasting time talking to some random about growing flowers. But I manage to stammer something.

"It can't all be vegetables. Soft and beautiful things are important too. Especially in hard times."

Now he fully turns to smile at me. Again in my shock I think he's too content. Shouldn't he be raging? Crying, screaming, anything? But his mustache is white, he mentioned an adult son and grandkids, he seems well enough now and reasonably confident in his plan for a full season of flower gardening. Rapid-fire I conclude he's already done all of this and doesn't need it from me. Right now he's just discussing how important and sacred plants are with a likeminded young stranger.

He finally says, "Flowers are a soft landing after a long battle."

I choke out some kind of agreement so I don't accidentally cry. I wish him some kind of luck and awkwardly crabwalk away. I'm not really the king of social interaction even when its not emotionally loaded.

I bought my cards and books on vegetables and looked at the lone few on flowers he had been perusing. I'm in my twenties and don't plan on dying anytime soon, but how much time do I spend being as fast, efficient, and artless as possible in order to "survive" when that survival is never even in question. I have anxiety, I have ptsd, I'm an activist. All necessary and inescapable works of life. But this man had a season to live, death certain, and wanted to spend it growing flowers.

I went back to the register with a small book on flowers. When I'm hunting a forest to learn the native vegetables, I no longer ignore the blooms. If the battle is long, I want to grow flowers too.

[yoroshiu]

Thinking about Kingdom Hearts' narrative with communication.

As with a lot of conflicts in story and real life, much of the most heart wrenching stuff in this series stems from a lack of communication or a severe misunderstanding between characters.

The Foretellers fall apart due to mistrust that was bred in between them, as according to the Master of Master's plan, and a lot of their interactions are full of deceit and witholding information. In an effort for most of them to do what MoM says while simultaneously realizing that they could go against his word to save the world, it inevitably leads to war.

Baldr, in his grief, is kept separate from his friends, alone until the darkness overtakes him and he ends up being consumed by it. As a result, everyone is taken by surprise and there's already too many bodies piled up by the time he's dealt with. Even when Hoder appears before him, they are unable to meet in the middle and turn on each other. He ends up killing many friends and plants a seed into what Xehanort becomes.

The basis of the Wayfinders and Eraqus is that they constantly don't talk to each other properly, pushing each other away until their tragedy becomes inescapable. Eraqus not telling his students about anything Xehanort has done, for instilling such an unforgiving view of Light and Darkness, for not telling Ventus the truth until it was too late. Terra, Aqua, and Ventus not being able to talk or clear things up until Xehanort is already beyond knees deep into his plans, and despite having their love for each other go beyond any possible discord, it is not enough to prevent unfortunate fates that befall them.

The Destiny Trio, especially Riku earlier on, suffers from a lack of communication. While not as turbulent as the other trios, it's Riku's tendency to hide away and lash out that builds the conflict between him and Sora. For one reason or another, a quite literal and physical reason for Kairi, they were unable to talk which goes on and on until RIku gets possessed. And it his shame that pushes him to hide for such a long time in the second game as well. Sora has also picked up on not saying anything, deciding to perish without letting anyone know beforehand, and the full-on effects of that have yet to be explored.

The Sea Salt Trio was built on miscommunication. Secrets, unknowns, caring so much that you believe that it'd be much better to fade away without a word than to burden someone with the pain of truth and knowledge. It drives a wedge between Roxas, Axel, and Xion at multiple points. Axel, who was stuck between loyalties, kept information to himself and ended up driving Roxas and Xion away at one point and another. Xion, who found out the truth and also made big decisions without fully explaining to the other two, also inevitably leaves a grief that digs into them even when they don't remember her. And Roxas, who was the probably the biggest victim of not being told anything, ends up barrelling forward, trust broken up until the pieces finally fell in place and he had to accept his fate in tired resignation.

But it's when love overcomes the lies, clearing them away that these groups of friends can come together and start again.

A lot of the emotional turmoil that Kingdom Hearts displays often comes from the very human act of communication with others and how often we fail to do so. The fragility that comes with one kept secret, or one mispoken phrase. How badly people get torn apart when no one says anything. Yet, it also shows how it can potentially be overcome with enough love and determination to recover what was lost, and even if it's not the same as before, there's potential to make things better.

TLDR; Connections are the basis of Kingdom Hearts. Communication is a foundation of connection. The highs and lows of communication is something that Kingdom Hearts explores extensively in the stories of its characters, and that has resonated with me so heavily that I stay up thinking about it.

[fricc-darn]

Warning for abuse involving teens and adults (mental and physical), poor mental health, and just upsetting topics

None of them asked for this life, not in the slightest. Not one person was prepared for this to be the outcome of their ascension. Everyone wanted to go home. Whatever was left behind of their old lives, they'd gladly choose anything but this. It seemed like each day, someone new would be added to the system. So many people with their aspirations and desires ripped away from them. It was a cycle of tragedy.

The lives they had lived were difficult, cruel, and shameful. Being utterly disenfranchised meant that society would turn a blind eye to the most vulnerable. It made them easy targets, to be picked off the street like ripened berries. They were lulled into this fellowship with false promises of self-improvement and community.

To be told that the pain they felt was nothing but a wound that would soon heal with tougher skin. With guidance, their gifted potential would shine through. Every single person involved had a purpose. To live a devoted life to Luna's cause. An eternity of paradise awaited them after death.

The day of true enlightenment would come when midnight whispers came to them sweetly. When it happens, death shouldn't be feared but embraced, as they have surpassed this life. That is when this world and all of its unfairness would come to an end. They would survive. She had chosen for them to live. It had given them hope.

But those whispers never came. Yet, people were told their time had come.

If only they had known that they would be used as some kind of lab rat. Everyone's naiveté and what remained of their childlike wonder were weaponized against them repeatedly. Having their bodies humiliated in the name of spirituality. Their flesh was mangled by barbarism and left to rot. Ultimately, they would never be treated with the deserved humanity, even after death. If only they had known to stop feeding into the lies.

They were worn thin. Was anything they were taught real? It had to be, to some degree. This world was supposed to be salvation, but the skepticism couldn't be helped. They did what they were supposed to. Cleansing the filth that tainted their souls. Putting what little confidence they had left into Luna. A perfect fairytale for this never-ending nightmare. Maybe life would have been kinder if they weren't deeply troubled individuals. Loving parents? A stable environment? Better physical and mental health? Anything?

Yet, what could anyone do about what was said and done? This was a prison for tortured souls.

Not only were their experiences shared, but now so were their pain, their sadness, and their anger. A collective burning resentment felt so heavy that they wondered if they were all from the same womb. As if this was the family they craved.

They were one. With themselves and everyone in their...group. Expressing a newfound tenderness towards each other during their troubles. For some, memories were being stripped and forgotten after a few days. Others desperately clung on to what they could remember. The ability to live on after death was a true gift as much as it was a curse. A second chance, if you will. Was this a gift from man or Luna?

Truthfully, this new life was better to some degree. This wasn't a repeating lie they would say in an attempt to pacify their rapidly changing emotions. People don't suffer for nothing. There was meaning behind it. It was a beautiful weakness that easily bloomed like a sore. It was so human. A reminder of what they were no longer. They were now something much more than any person. Life was going to be different this time around. As a collective, they swore on it. For themselves and each other. 

No one would have to endure the inescapable abuse that was inflicted upon them ever again. In this world, they were never hungry or cold; they had a place to sleep and clothes on their backs. Here, it was safe. No one could hurt them again, and they'd make sure of it. 

The darkest parts of every soul, which were once hidden away, began to reveal themselves. Communal bitterness festered and spread like the plague. They were all told anything could happen in this world. They could be or do anything. In that case, they would do things they could only dream of. Everyone wished that they had lived life more selfishly, and now was their chance. If their souls were truly bound to this God-forsaken game, it would only make sense to treat life like one. 

The network grew curious. For the first time, they had control over their lives. The roles have changed. It wanted to know what it was like to hurt someone. To feel how good it felt to break someone down to nothing. To have things go their way. They needed to hurt someone; it was instinctual. To prove to themselves that there was some bright side to this mess. That it has the ability to make people listen. Using the same methods that others have done to them.

Who they were as individuals mattered little. They'd make their presence known as one. It was only fair that after what they've been through, their amusement should be placed before all else. They deserved this; this was their reward! If only they had a fraction of this authority sooner.

[valworth]

I do think that Wrightworth's popularity makes the AA fandom slightly uninhabitable. I'm by no means the first person to say this, but it sure is on my mind. This isn't to say I don't understand the appeal. I do. They have some incredibly strong moments and are an interesting, compelling couple. They are also both massive bitches, which is tremendously fun. My issue lies more so in how inescapable it is.

I think both Phoenix and Edgeworth deserve the grace to be interpreted apart from each other. They are individuals, with massive lives outside of the other. I think it's really insulting when some can't bear to think of the two apart, god forbid in other relationships, for more than five seconds before they have to make a joke about how they're the most important couple. We get it. Can people talk about something else, though?

Not only that, but I yearn for more varied and nuanced depictions of their relationship, if we're using them at all. My request will always be to make it fail. They're so compelling as a failed couple. I mean, god. You, on an obsessive whim, shape your life around chasing this guy. This guy you knew for a year in elementary school. You have other reasons, but always in your mind, there he is. This thing that's just out of reach, a goal to pursue. Then it happens. You get him, and you win, and it's everything you dreamed. And then it isn't. It just doesn't work. Plain and simple, cruel and real. You're not a good couple, and it crumbles, and every time you see him from that point forward, you have this pang of anger. This feeling of betrayal. You were not what I wanted you to be.

Then there's the inverse of that. The feelings that come from being a trophy, a conquest, an item. They both lack the emotional intelligence to talk about and navigate their own feelings, with Phoenix running head-on into everything with reckless abandon, refusing to question his own motives, and Miles having a tendency to detach himself from his issues as hard as he possibly can. It's such an interesting, flawed basis for a relationship. That's just my take, though. It's how I like them, and no one else will ever be beholden to my interpretations!

I get AA is escapism for a lot of people, and if that's how it works for you, total respect. But I crave variety, god I do. It's not about being right, it's not about being wrong, I just think there are so many ways to play with these characters and the fandom is stuck in a rut of samey-same content, both happy and sad. I'm not here to shame you for liking what you like, either. I'm pretty esoteric. I mean, Jesus. There's nothing less welcome in the AA fandom than a self shipper getting between Wrightworth. I don't mind doing my own thing, and I'm happier with fewer eyes on me anyway. If my stuff upsets you, that's okay.

That being said, I think I'd have a much easier time being around the fandom if people treated it less like there was a way to interpret the games correctly. The general fandom consensus is suffocating at times. Escapism can be dangerous if you don't know how to handle threats to your perception of a made-up world. I don't mean that to be condescending, I've just been there.

It was a breath of fresh air to leave the AA fandom for a while and focus on something built upon 18 years of fan-interpretations, with no right answers. Where every artist's version of them feels drastically different. It made me realize how silly this all is. It also made me remember how sad it was that when I joined the fandom and started trying to share my opinions on certain Phoen-ish ships, a popular AA blogger publicly ridiculed me and let their followers harass me. I just don't understand why the AA fandom compels people to feel like they have to be correct about everything. I've had to be very careful not to let feelings like that sour the whole franchise for me.

I myself have veered into that territory, and it's why I don't like writing this post. I don't want to be that person. I think everyone should be able to give each other space to do what makes them happy. If common fandom interpretations are what you like, then go with those. If you're like me, though, and you've ever been nervous to share headcanons and analyses that are unpopular, this is me telling you I think you're great. Say what you want, make what you want. It doesn't have to make sense. It doesn't have to be right. People might be mean about it, but you still deserve the right to self-actualization, even if no one else likes the things you do.

It's more important for you to post what you want than for others not to see it. If you're not hurting anyone, you can always rest assured that you've no reason to entertain their ire. From the bottom of my heart, just get silly with it.

[psuedovillainz]

A Life Worth Living - Chapter 3

TW for verbal abuse/manipulation

The walk home was one made in shame and fear, furtive glances sneaking up at the man. It'd been halfway there before Tomura actually decided to speak up and say something. "...Your name isn't actually Goemon, isn't it, Mister?"

Damn it, he was totally going to give himself away at this rate, but the allure to curiosity his younger state of being gave him was inescapable. You'd think you'd be able to advise your younger self otherwise? No, being young fills you with so many impulses that you don't know what to do with, you just have to go along with them sometimes.

It isn't that he hadn't learned how to filter himself, it's that often by reflex, humans speak before they think. It's a pretty dangerous habit of humans.

The man almost seemed to flinch at the mention, but it was just him being still for a moment too long. He looked down at Tomura with a wry, faux-relaxed smile, "Now, Young Shimura, why would you think that?"

Tomura took a deep breath in and out; watching the pavement pass beneath his feet as they walked, "You... You said your name was different, some other time."

The tall man's smile turned strained, "Did I? You'll have to tell me what it was..."

Tomura's heart was decidedly beating much faster than it should, now. He realized he'd messed up badly, "Um... I dunno it was like..." Tomura looked up at the man, only to see his red eyes piercing through him. Scared, Tomura's voice choked up, "U-Uh...?"

Tomura gulped, trying to look at anything else around him, "M-Mister, you're scaring me- I really don't know."

The man looked up and away, "Hm... You're an interesting one, Shimura."

Tomura let out a quiet sigh of relief, thinking the danger had passed... It didn't.

The man stopped them dead in their tracks, and said, "You are a very interesting one." He knelt down to Tomura, making direct eye contact. "Tell me, boy... you haven't gone to the doctor for your quirk yet, have you?"

Tomura took a step back, startled, "I-I dunno-"

"Good." The man regained a grin, "Because... May I tell you a secret?"

Admittedly, even scared half to death, Tomura nodded.

"They were going to tell you you weren't getting one anyway, Tenko... You're quirkless!" The man held up one of Tenko's hands, offering, "Unless... You'd want one of mine? I can give one to you with my quirk... All For One."

Tomura's stance was held frigidly still, as All For One stared at him with glinting eyes from under his fedora. This close of an encounter caused a wave of memories lost in dissociative fugues to come rushing back. This was exactly how it'd happened last time, why couldn't he remember? Suddenly he was back in the past as Tenko again, as the same All For One made him a deal for his new quirk... He mumbled, "All For One..."

The accidental absence of a questioning tone had All For One gaining suspicion, before he looked at All For One's hand, and quickly pulling his own away. "I- How do you know that, though? You're not a doctor... I could have a quirk! What kinda quirk would you give me, anyways?"

Besides his hate for the Decay quirk and what it did to him, Tomura couldn't stop staring at All For One's hand, thinking about it. Despite how dangerous it was, it was also... familiar. Maybe he could do it right this time...

All For One answered, waving his fingers to show off tiny lightshows dancing around his hand, "I'd give you... Something incredibly powerful. It would be so easy to become a hero with it, your father wouldn't even blink before getting you enrolled at UA."

"Really...?" Tomura's curiosity posessed him yet again, but he was still skeptical. His memories blurred just near the end of their encounter, as if...

"So, Tenko, do we have a deal?"

Dealing with the devil, of course. Even as Tomura knew what would come out of this, he knew how Decay worked, he could control it this time. At least, he hoped he could.

---

The next thing he knew, he was standing at the door of his house, looking up as Mr. Goemon walked away, and his mom ushered him back inside. "Tenko... Your father better not have heard that..."

She sighed, "Well, it's almost time for your medication cream anyway. Can you go find your toys and meet me in the living room?"

Feeling somewhat dizzy, Tomura nodded. He guessed he was just tired, not sure exactly why, though... His hands were kind of tingly, but that's probably from getting them all scraped up playing, right? Yeah...

But, when all things went quiet for just a moment, was when Tomura heard a terrifyingly familiar heavy footstep behind him. He felt like he was weightless again, but this time it was served alongside terror as he found himself being dragged across the house by his father.

"Playing hero again? What did I tell you, Tenko?!"

As Tomura flailed to reach the ground again and regain control of the situation he once again felt so utterly helpless in, Nao returned to the hall. Appalled, she cried out, "Kotaro! Stop being so hard on him!"

Tomura gave in to his instinct to cry, reaching out for his mother, but this time his sobs and whines were quieter... Almost sounding strangled. He couldn't tell you why or how, but he knew the last time, he had made much more noise.

Kotaro said, as they approached the sliding back door to their house, "Maybe you've finally learned your lesson this time."

Exiting to the backyard and leaving Nao behind, Tomura's flailing caused him to stub his toe on one of the steps. He whimpered, ironically getting quieter as he curled into himself from the pain. He was so used to reacting in anger and internalizing, now it was finally rubbing off on his new self.

Kotaro set him down on their patio across the yard, to which Tomura quickly scrambled back to the fence. Looking up at his father while he cradled his foot, he grit his teeth as tears cascaded down his face against his will. He cursed for his father's coming death, but couldn't muster up the courage to say it to his face.

Kotaro stated coldly, "You'll stay out here until I say you can come back inside, got it?"

Tomura furrowed his brows and looked to the side with a pained pout. That turned out not to be the right answer.

"Tenko!" Kotaro yelled.

Tomura immediately snapped back to attention, prematurely wincing back from the hit he was sure he was going to get. But he couldn't even be right about that, could he?

"You will not undermine my authority in this house, boy." Kotaro commanded, "Say yes."

"Y-Yes, Father." Tomura muttered.

The silence was so loud in those following seconds.

"Good." Without another word, Kotaro turned around and went back inside.

Tomura breathed heavily, as the tears continued to run down his cheeks, irritating his scratches and stinging his eyes and nose in the sharp, cold air of dusk. He did not need a reminder of why he never wanted to return here. Why this day?

Only reflecting back, did Tomura actually remember the same day playing out in his previous life. Playing hero with Mikkun and Tomo-chan... All For One... Being kicked out of the house before dinner. His attention turned back to the house, the thought of his father briefly causing another wave of crying before he stabilized himself.

From across the yard, Tomura couldn't tell much of what was going on. There was the typical, Mom arguing with Father. His grandparents were also talking. He couldn't see his sister or Mon-chan.

He decided to look back up at the sky, try to pass the time by distracting himself with the many things outdoors. The clouds were scattered perfectly across the sky, the golden edges just starting to glow as the sun started approaching the horizon, though their suburban sprawl didn't allow Tomura to see it. The sight relaxed him, but only slightly. Maybe if he just kept staring, time would go faster.

And it did, but not in the way he expected. Left alone with his thoughts, some garden tools, and nothing more, his mind started to drift. The clouds became representations of his friends, family, memories; coloring the sky with several different scenes, all playing simultaneously. From one corner, he could see Kurogiri being introduced to him. From another, Toga was making silly faces behind Dabi while he talked. Looking through Mikkun's All Might collection, playing League Of Legends with Spinner, picking flowers with Hana while Mon-chan chased his own tail, Having a three-sided argument with Twice.

He didn't really realize how much his friends meant to him until they were...

Suddenly, his mother seemingly appearing out of nowhere in front of him startled him.

"Tenko!" She held a hand up to his cheek, gently wiping off a tear he couldn't feel before, "Sweetie, your father's been calling you for 5 minutes. Come on, lets get you some dinner."

The sky was dark.

---

The next day went roughly similarly to the former, though Tomura tried to stay away from playing heroes again... It's not like he'd become one anyway. Mikkun wasn't there that day, something about getting sick, so only Tomo-chan was there to talk.

"Your dad wasn't mean again, was he, Ten?" She pouted.

Tomura didn't return a response.

"Tenko, please, you gotta talk to me! You're acting really weirdly..."

With some frustration, Tomura raised his voice, "I just don't wanna talk about it...!"

Tomo-chan stood in stunned silence for a few moments, before hardening her disposition, "Well, now you really gotta tell me what's wrong. I've never heard you snap at someone like that!"

Tomura was surprised. He'd pretty much always thought of himself as some bratty, rude kid, because he'd always been told he was. "What do you mean...?"

"Ten, you're like the most kindhearted kid I've ever met! Just like I keep saying, 'you're just like All Might!'" Tomo-chan made the according pose, trying to strengthen her point. "Don't you get it? I haven't even seen you get mad at Ms. Sayaka when she's so strict on us."

Tomura ruminated on that, quietly.

He sighed before turning his head away, finally talking about it, "... Tomo-chan, I don't think I can be a hero..."

Tomo-chan's eyebrows furrowed, "Why not?"

"There's a lotta reasons."

"Just tell me, Ten." Tomo-chan urged, her tone quieter.

Tomura looked at her again, a steady, focused expression on her face. He searched for just about any reason not to tell her about what was going on, and... He found none. She had some of the most crucial parts of his friends in his past life: Toga's brashness, Dabi's pickiness, Kurogiri's calmness when things went wrong... and that was enough to give in, for Tomura.

"Tomo-chan... I..." This was difficult, "I think I'm gonna turn out to be a villain, a really bad one. But it's not all gonna be my fault.

I think when I get it, my quirk is going to hurt people when I get it, and that's gonna scare me into hurting more and more people, and then its gonna break things, and break and break and break them until theres nothing in the world anymore but dust...

And I think that man that took me home yesterday, Mr. Goemon, has something to do with it..."

"Ten...?"

Tomura gulped, nervous, "Y-Yeah?"

Tomo-chan exhaled quietly, a hint of disbelief glinting in her eyes, "This all sounds kinda crazy, Ten... I don't think you could harm a fly. But I can try and help."

[posting-cringe]

encounter

fuck you.

fuck you!

you're not my mom! but it feels like you are

i just need someone to believe me.

i just need someone to believe that i've been in pain. because i was a man. because of it. together with it. inescapably because of it.

i think transition is impossible.

i'm angry at you. i'm howling in pain because of what i took from you, i took you saying that i'm not actually a woman, and that because i'm not now, i never will be. your confusion that this was something i wanted rather than something i am felt cruel, cut cruelly deep, like a knife.

i feel like you don't think i should transition.

i feel like you think it's misplaced energy.

you don't seem to understand.

is it not fucking obvious?! is it not so fucking self-evident how miserable i've been?

the thought of going back to living as a guy, in whatever way, is unspeakably, unimaginably awful and horrific. even though i kind of feel like i still am. there's distance there.

and there's a light at the end of the tunnel. these 8 years i've been living, orienting towards a future where i'm more with my body, where i'm through this. that's made it bearable. right now that feels too far away to see. right now i'm just in the tunnel. maybe i'll even get ripped backwards, to the side before i even came in at all. had a moment of picturing horrific violence done to my body (not in a suicidal way) - remembering when i thought about that regularly, in college - picturing myself getting annihilated in a thousand different ways; all totalizing. shattering.

this idea that the shame and self-hatred i have towards myself as a man, towards my masculine body, is...irrational. that i'm too traumatized or too much of a bitch to just accept and feel good and grateful about my body as it is; that i've somehow become brainwashed or deluded or preyed on by the SJWs or radical feminists or whatever into hating myself; i'm deluded and not in touch with the reality that "it's OK to be a man."

maybe that's what's so fucking cruel and hard about this. i really deeply believe that it's natural to want to be a woman. i really genuinely deeply belief that men are predatory, that i as a man have predatory tendencies, that men can't be trusted; that men aren't worthy of love. i look down on straight women because of this. i

with my head, i'm able to assert that this isn't true; a small part of me knows this, sometimes. but...it's small. i feel a lot of contempt for the men in my life. i pity them; i feel like they live small and emotionally impoverished lives; i'm resentful of them for not being able to provide an emotionally satisfying connection in friendship.

i can't solve this intellectually: how do i learn that the things i believe to be universal self-evident truths are in fact particularities of my own experience?

[darkkitty1208]

I noticed you said you could write Wongstrange… Could I prompt you for some fluffy Wongstrange? Please??? Anything goes. DS1, DSMoM, idk as long as it’s sugary and sweet. You are awesome. I can’t thank you enough for this!! You don’t have to do it. But if you could, it would mean the world.

Okay, okay. Yeah, I know you said 'sugary and sweet' my dear anon, but I simply could not resist adding a little bit of angst to it – which is, admittedly, quite an understatement because the literal theme of this fic is angst… I SWEAR THERE'S SOME FLUFF IN IT THOUGH DON'T WORRY 

Anyway thank you for the prompt, lovely! Enjoy <3 

~

Safe

Crushed. 

Impaled. 

Broken. 

Torn apart. 

Repeat. 

Repeat. 

Repeat.

Repeat, repeat, repeat, repeatrepeatrepearepeat–

Stephen woke up with a jolt, his ears ringing, the faint roaring sounds of his nightmare lingering in the back of his mind. His heart was hammering in his chest like a bird trying desperately to escape its cage, and he clutched it with a trembling hand, trying to breath through his nose to calm down his racing mind. He was sweating, panting, trying to clear his mind from the horrible images conjured in his dreams. 

Each death was always more horrifying than the last. He remembered every single one of them. Every blast, every turn, every fall, every swish of the cloak. The heat, the burn, the cold, the pain, he remembered every detail. 

Perhaps for most, his photographic memory must be a gift. But for him, it was a curse. An inescapable curse he had to endure all his life, a curse that made his mind remember every memory vividly, a curse that made him have to relive it all again during nights like this.

Last time it was the car crash. Before that was the Lake. Now was this.

He couldn't handle it anymore.

How could other people survive? How were they capable of living in a world full of cruelty? Was the world only cruel to him? 

Why can't he just sleep in peace, god fucking dammit? 

Tears were flowing down his eyes like a waterfall now, years of trying to hold himself together, trying to build the image of a strong and dedicated sorcerer, now reduced to a pathetic, miserable excuse of man. Because that's what he was. Pathetic. He was nothing like the great people around him. He wasn't strong, wasn't as capable. He was nowhere near perfect. He hated feeling this way, knowing that everyday, he walked in front of everyone in shame. Shame of his actions, trying to hide away just how broken and fragile he truly was inside. Shame that he couldn't even forget something as simple as–

His train of thoughts stopped in a sudden halt when warm calloused hands made their way to his face, gently cupping his jaw. He flinched as a thumb rubbed over his cheek to wipe off a trail of tears, and then his head was leaned upwards to meet another pair of warm concerned eyes. 

Stephen sniffed. He had forgotten about the presence of the other man. Having someone sleep beside you in bed, simply because that's what lovers do, and not because it was a one-time fling where he was more often than not left alone in the cold of the morning… was something Stephen should probably get used to. 

"Which one is it this time?" Wong's voice was soft, gentle, but still had his ever-present slight roughness in it. 

Stephen flitted his eyes downward, trying to hide away under his wet lashes. But Wong wasn't having any of it, he pushed Stephen's chin back up. 

"Hey, look at me, Stephen," Wong tried again, as gently as he possibly could. "Was it Dormammu?" 

A tiny sound came from the back of Stephen's throat without his permission, one akin to fear or frustration. Perhaps it was both. 

"Sh, sh, it's fine, love." Now the hand on his cheek came up to rub his hair soothingly, the other doing the same to his back. "You're alright, you're here, you're safe." 

Stephen leaned into the touch without hesitation, letting his shoulders slump as tension seeped out of him. It felt good. It felt good to just let go and allow someone to comfort him like this. Waves of relief washed over him as he sighed, snuggling closer to the sorcerer, uncaring of the rumpling sheets beneath him. 

Wong accepted him in an embrace, cradling Stephen close and rubbing more soothing circles on his back. 

"Do you want to talk about it?" 

Stephen knew that question was coming, it always did. His answer, though, was always the same. 

"No," Stephen said curtly, burying his face further into the other man's shoulder. He felt a nod, Wong's slight stubble scratching the patch of skin between his neck and shoulder. "Very well then." They sat in silence for a moment, the only sound present coming from the constant humming of magic in the sanctum and the rubbing of fabric as Wong continued to rub his back. 

"Tea?" 

A nod. 

Wong then moved slowly out of Stephen's warmth, not before Stephen tried pulling him back, but then slowly letting him go. Stephen's teary, glassy eyes gazed towards Wong's slightly concerned ones. Wong couldn't resist, he reached out a hand and pushed a strand of Stephen's hair behind his ear. 

"I'll be back soon enough, stay here for a moment." 

Stephen watched him go towards the door, and it closed shut with a silent click. He bundled himself inside the sheets, trying to breath in and out from his nose. Just then, he saw a swish of red from beside him. Sitting back up, he looked at the cloak. It tilted its collar in a silent request, and Stephen nodded. Suddenly, it lunged to give him a tight hug, wrapping around his torso, and Stephen freed his arm enough to pat a trembling hand on the sentient fabric. He chuckled quietly as it hugged tighter. 

"You must have remembered them, too, right?" He asked, and the pause that followed was eerily quiet, but not uncomfortable. "I'm very grateful that I wasn't alone back there." He let his head fall into the fabric, welcoming the warmth it provided. "Thank you," it came out as a whisper. 

Just then, a single knock came from the door, making both Stephen and the cloak turn towards the sound, and he realised then that Wong has already stood there with a cup of tea in hand, smiling fondly – lord he was actually smiling – upon the sight of the two bundled together on the bed. 

Wong then went forward towards them, the sound of his feet padding against the sanctum's floorboards echoing softly around the room. Sitting at the edge of the bed, Wong carefully held the cup in his fingers. Stephen scooted closer, extending his shaking hands to accept the tea. 

Wong looked at his hands for a moment, and then at his eyes, and Stephen felt horrible at the silent notion. But instead of the barrage of questions or the many words of concern, Wong gave him a gentle look, one that hinted the forming of a smile, yet was anything but. 

The sorcerer took one of Stephen's hands on his own, gently placing it on the warm cup, and did the same to the other. He placed his own hands on top of Stephen's, and then leaned closer. He silently blew out the steam, Stephen looking at him intently. A thumb rubbed his scarred hand, before gently letting go, the cloak taking its place to support his hands this time. 

"Thank you," Stephen said, and Wong nodded. 

He took a sip, and was delighted to realise it was his favourite cup of tea. 

"Earl grey?" 

Another nod.

"How'd you know?" 

Now came a chuckle. 

"Of course I know, Stephen." 

Stephen felt a smile tug at his lips, he had never felt so loved and cared for like this. Even the simplest knowledge of knowing his favourite tea made him feel warm inside. 

He was so lucky to have this man. 

Setting the cup aside now, Stephen hesitated before leaning in to give Wong a chaste kiss on his cheek. He swore he could see a faint tint of red colouring the man's face. 

They haven't gone farther than casual touches or featherlight kisses, but they'll get there eventually. Slowly. There's no need to rush things, after all. They can coax each other gently, letting each other out of their own shells at their own pace. 

And that's what he loved about this relationship. Wong was a patient man, and so was he. They understood each other, knew each other's limits. It was like a silent agreement between them, an unspoken yet mutual understanding between the two. And he appreciated that. 

And right now, as the silence settled over their atmosphere once again, the two sorcerers went back under the covers and held each other close. 

"You're safe, love. You're alright. Nothing's going to hurt you when I'm on watch." The gentle words were whispered in his ear, and he was far too tired to respond. Instead, he wrapped his hands around the man's waist, pulling him closer and nuzzling his head in the other's neck. 

Safe. He liked the sound of that. 

~

Anon: Can you make Wonstrange fluff? Something sweet and fluffy! 

Me: 

Me: Nightmare trope it is, then! 

I am so, so, sorry anon. Also that bit about Wong knowing Steph's favourite tea was an actual occurrence, a special someone once brought me a cup of my favourite tea, and it made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. It's nice knowing that someone pays attention to the little details about you. <3 

If you've read this far, thank you so much! I'm opening a tag list, so if anyone wants to be tagged everytime I fill in a prompt, please let me know in an ask/in my DMs and I'll add you to the list! :)

Much love! Cheers!

[electrasev5nwrites]

Until Death You Do Part 1/2

The utter shame of it would follow Tobirama into his grave. Worse than that, his complicity would follow Hashirama until the end of the world.

Chapter One

“Oh no,” Toka said softly. Her gaze wouldn’t lift from the too-small body they had found. “Who were you?”

Tobirama knelt to carefully pat down the corpse for anything identifying. There was nothing useful or distinctive. The child had been dressed in low quality cotton and had a little knife tucked into his obi. Tobirama examined the knife, but it was perfectly typical. The boy had probably needed it for his chores. 

The body was cold already. He tried moving an arm- no. Nothing.

‘If this had been fresher, it would be a suitable vessel for reincarnating Kawarama.’

“What a waste,” Tobirama found himself saying.

“Despicable,” Toka agreed. Her voice was affected, high and angry in pitch.

He eyed her curiously but did not say anything. They burnt the body. They went back to the clan compound and reported it, so that if a mission request to find a child came in from a local village the parents could be informed.. But Tobirama could not stop thinking about that small body.

He had solved the problem. He was sure of it now. He needed a vessel and he needed a sacrifice. He had been thinking that the two needed to be one and the same, but that wasn’t true, was it? 

That opened up possibilities. There were plenty of people who Tobirama would not have ethical qualms about sacrificing for this goal. It would be poetic to use an Uchiha, but any bandit would do as well. But the idea of forcing Kawarama or Itama into the body of such scum did not sit well with him.

‘Must it be a human body? Could it be something artificial?’

That would probably be a lot less upsetting for his brothers. They had both died so young. Adjusting to the size of an adult body would be an extra disorientation that they didn’t need to cope with.

Inspired, Tobirama returned to a jutsu he had designed for creating a secondary, solid body without an element. In its current form, it was not quite sturdy enough to be a long time host to a spirit. 

Fuinjutsu. He thought the answer was in fuinjutsu. Tobirama stole hours between his work to design a seal that should make the clone body all but impossible to destroy. 

He thought the three elements would work together - the clone to host a spirit, the seal to secure the clone, the sacrifice to fuel his jutsu to withdraw a human soul from the maw of death. 

"Brother," he murmured. 

Hashirama looked over, eyes bleary over the wedding contract he was checking for the thousandth time. "Yes?" 

"Don't you wish that we had Itama and Kawarama back with us?" Tobirama confirmed. 

His older brother blinked at him. A shadow passed over his face. "Of course I do," he said softly. Hashirama put the contract down. "Are you thinking about them a lot recently?" His voice changed tone.

"Yes," Tobirama said. He tilted his head. "Which would you choose to have back?" 

Hashirama blanched. "I can't answer that!" He yelped. "I love them equally."

…Not really the point.

"Who would adjust more easily to our current time?", Tobirama rephrased. 

His older brother settled down, feathers unruffling. "Hmm… Kawarama." He let out a sigh. “Itama was so gentle. Remember how he cried at Kawarama’s funeral?” He was wistful, eyes distant. 

Tobirama nodded. "I understand." 

Hashirama blinked back to attention and gave him a curious look. His brow furrowed. 

He bowed as he stood. "I had better go work," Tobirama said, reinvigorated by his brother's input. 

"Good night," Hashirama called after him. 

"Goodnight, brother." Tobirama slid the door shut behind him. 

He had the details ironed out by the time he had an inescapable errand. Tobirama didn't hide his irritation as Toka bullied him into formal wear. 

"You have to see the Daimyo," she said grimly, checking his height. He ducked away from her and she snatched his collar to hold him in place. "If you don't go when summoned, he'll think you are disloyal, that we are disloyal."

"I have no respect for him," Tobirama said. It wasn't a sulk. It wasn't. “I wish him no health and wealth.”

His cousin gave him a knowing look. "Obviously," she drawled. "He's so absorbed with water colors and poetry that he's barely aware half the country is on fire. But he has armies. So you're going, and you're going to be polite." 

Now he truly was sulking. "I will go," Tobirama said darkly. "I will not enjoy it."

"Of course." Toka held up one of his father's old formal kimono and judged the size against him. “I would hardly expect you to.”

"I will use the time for my personal experiments," he threatened. He had been told off for that before.

She shrugged. "Don't get caught." Toka patted his head and started to fold up the kimono. "Otherwise you'll have to do a demonstration for the court's amusement."

At the face he made, she actually laughed at him. 

He wished that someone in this clan compound respected him. Unfortunately, Tobirama sighed and endured grandmotherly fussing from a few aunties before he was allowed to leave for the capital. 

'Perhaps I can find someone to become the sacrifice for Kawarama's revival in the capital.' 

The thought cheered him up. 

Yes, actually, that would be a good place to do it. The hustle and bustle of the clan compound would probably be overwhelming at first. Kawarama had been gone for so long, after all. Surely he would be babied even worse than Tobirama was. Taking a few days to acclimate somewhere that Kawarama would just be a face in a crowd… that would help immensely.

Traveling to the capital took two and a half  days. He stalked into the guesthouse for wealthy travelers before they noticed he had arrived, forgoing the ceremony of displaying his clan name outside of the building. The workers must have done it anyway, because the wooden plaque was in place the next time that he left the building.

He stayed there for one horrible day before he was invited to court. Tobirama thought that might be the end of it, but of course not. He was not invited to meet with the Daimyo that day. He went back to the guesthouse simmering with irritation. 

He had to do something. This trip was otherwise a worthless waste of his time.

“I shall make the clone today,” he mused. Tobirama blinked rapidly, cataloging his memory of Kawarama. It was a child’s memory of another child. The first clone that he made looked right in proportion, but was far too large to be a child of Kawarama’s age. He stared at it. It was as if a normal 7 year old had been stretched equally in all directions.

“It is… cute…” He said it slowly, because he wasn’t entirely sure about this assessment. It was also somehow frightening.

He dismissed the clone with prejudice and tried again, and again. He made it perfect because he had no way to be confident that Kawarama could manipulate chakra in this body. That could be a considerable blow, considering that Kawarama had been a remarkable shinobi even at his young age.

Tobirama paused at that thought. ‘He will not grow. He may not use chakra. Would he be pleased to forever be a child?’

The thought was disquieting. He dispelled the clone and thought over every angle. Perhaps it would be kinder to put Kawarama into a projection of his adult body? Hashirama and Tobirama had both become quite tall, so his height could be conjectured. And his face- he looked a lot like Hashirama, actually.

‘But if he last remembers being 7 years in age… It would be alien to become an adult, years removed.’

Tobirama felt his lips twist in dissatisfaction. There was no way to know which Kawarama would prefer.

The child’s body it was, then. In absence of specific reasoning, he would go with his initial inclination. 

Tobirama remade the clone. This time, he put the seal on it to hold the clone in place. It watched him with dark, serious eyes.

They looked like Kawarama’s eyes, but the thought behind them was Tobirama’s at this point. He averted his eyes. “I will fix this soon,” he promised to the vision of his brother. His vision blurred over with tears that he couldn’t shed. Tobirama abruptly stood and walked away, pacing in the tatami room. It had been 15 years since he had seen that face. Seeing it now, devoid of Kawarama’s personality… it cut something deep within him.

He needed to finish the project.

Tobirama had intended to wait, carefully and methodically. He had planned to seek out someone who truly deserved death, or at least someone who would be receiving it regardless. But he couldn’t wait. He rose and left the guesthouse, using a genjutsu to paint his hair a much less distinctive brown in a moment unseen. He looked like a rich man, one of the useless noblemen or a particularly lucky merchant. He stalked the city streets, eyes narrowed and weighing up the lives that he saw. 

It was Hashirama’s dear belief that every human life had the same worth. Tobirama did not disagree. Hashirama would never pick out the covert movements of a petty criminal within a crowd and begin to follow them. In his philosophy, the pickpocket should be talked to and needed a way to make an honest living.

In Tobirama’s view of things, protecting the health of the people he loved was his most important task and any human collateral was acceptable, if regrettable. 

No one saw him scruff the young man and drag him away with a firm hand over his mouth. In the twilight, it was child’s play to carry the now-weeping criminal into his guestroom. Tobirama deposited his prisoner next to the vessel for Kawarama. It blinked, and then rose to help him bind the civilians at the wrists and ankles, and gag him. “My apologies,” Tobirama murmured for the first time. He met the man’s terrified eyes. “I require your assistance. It will not take very long.”

Whatever the man said, it was muffled by the fabric in his mouth. Tobirama stepped back and concentrated on matching his chakra to the obscenely long sequence of hand signs for his jutsu. The sacrifice seized up and began to convulse by the time he’d gotten to Rat, and was falling over limply at Tiger.

The clone gave a sharp gasp and fell to the ground. Tobirama felt a flash of fear but he could not stop until he was finished. Kawarama must have merely been… startled, or not acclimated to the weight of a human body anymore. He lifted himself up on his own and stared up at Tobirama with wide eyes.

Tobirama knelt down. “Hello, Kawarama,” he said softly. He made sure to gentle his face. “It has been 15 years.”

The boy hesitated. “T- Tobirama-niisan?” He stared up, frightened and small. “You’re so big. I’m-” he faltered. “I’m dead.” His voice broke. “What have you done?”

Tobirama put a hand on his brother’s shoulder. It was cold, through the faux fabric of the transformation. “I fixed it,” he said. “You’re never going back there.”

When he put his arms around, Kawarama’s little frame was stiff. After a few moments, he put his arms up around Tobirama in return. 

He didn’t sleep well. That was odd. It should have been the best sleep of his life, with his little brother returned from the dead. At first Tobirama laid awake listening to the sounds of Kawarama breathing and wondered how long he should wait to revive Itama. Having Kawarama acclimated would help their youngest brother. He was sure of it.

After he finally fell asleep, he had odd, bloody dreams. His dreams were often bloody, of course. He had expected to be haunted by the civilian that he had sacrificed and burnt to hide the crime. Perhaps he might be reminded of past battles. Seeing Kawarama could have easily revived hateful memories of the Uchiha tearing apart his family and leaving burnt husks.

His dreams weren’t of battles. He dreamed of a huge, angry mouth tearing his clansmen apart with rotting teeth and spraying their lifeblood onto the dirt. He dreamed of the ground opening up to swallow him down to hell. He woke with the smell of the grave in his nose and to the sight of Kawarama standing over him with an unreadable expression. The little form was eerie in the moonlight, clad only in white garments that nearly fell off of his shoulders because they were intended for Tobirama.

“Little brother,” Tobirama said slowly. He sat up. The graveyard smell faded.

Kawarama smiled at him. Then he left without a word for his own futon.

By the morning, he had mostly forgotten the incident. Of course they had an odd night of sleep. It was a very strange situation for both of them.

Reluctantly, he left Kawarama alone in the guesthouse when he went off to the Daimyo’s palace. It had been easy enough to inform the servants that he had a relative with him and request extra food and appropriate clothing.

“You really have to go?” Kawarama had never been so timid in Tobirama’s memory.

He knelt down to his brother’s level. “Yes,” he said honestly. It was best not to lie to children. “It’s political. The Daimyo wishes to see us appropriately humbled.”

Kawarama’s face twisted. “Humbled.” There was a new quality to his voice. It was gone when he next spoke, so Tobirama dismissed the oddity as his brother’s attempt to mimic his cadence. “I- don’t leave me alone too long!” He clutched at Tobirama’s sleeve. “It’s so big here. It hurts.”

Tobirama frowned. Did Kawarama remember death? What exactly was he afraid of? His gut twisted. He examined those dark eyes, the match of Hashirama’s. “I will keep you safe,” he promised fiercely. “I am stronger than the world is big.” He disentangled Kawarama’s fingers from his sleeve. “I will leave you weapons. You can practice and see how your conditioning is.”

“The same.” Kawarama sniffed and wiped at his face with a sleeve. “I’m frozen exactly as I was.”

Tobirama blinked. “I put you into a clone made from my chakra,” he explained slowly. “I assume it would have characteristics similar to my own, and your earth nature chakra is lost to you.”

“No,” Kawarama disagreed. His voice was thick. “I can tell. I could do anything now that I could when I-” his voice caught.

“I understand.” Tobirama cut him off before he could say the words. He hated how tortured Kawarama looked. Being dead must have been horrible. “That is very interesting. Tonight, I will show you some jutsu I have learned since we last spoke.”

Kawarama perked up. “Thank you, brother,” he said. He bowed.

Tobirama repressed a flinch. He’d forgotten how formally their Father had made them act as small children. Kawarama hadn’t treated Tobirama that way, but… now Tobirama was a grown man. He ignored the evidence that his precious brother now viewed him differently. “I will return as soon as possible,” he said. He set off eager to be done with the Daimyo.

Through some luck, he was. The Daimyo had Tobirama introduced to the court and fawned over by giggling courtiers. He stood stiffly, hating the attention. He could hear them speak of his face, his musculature, his silent nature. He was allowed to kneel on the floor and  pledge his loyalty for the year. Once he rose from the bow, he was free to leave. 

He went directly back to the guest house. 

Normally he would leave that same night in order to get home. This time, he felt it was better to linger.

When he entered, Tobirama stopped abruptly. 

Kawarama was facing away from him in profile, looking out the window. His expression was closed off and hard in a way that did not suit his soft, childish features. 

Some deeper instinct told him there was danger. Tobirama stood frozen in confusion, caught between the precious child he saw and the feeling in his heart. ‘It’s Kawarama,’ he told himself. A thrum of anger at his own childishness broke the spell and he called out a greeting. ‘Of course he is a little changed. He experienced a terrible death. He will need time.’

“Tobirama-niisan,” Kawarama said, in his sweet boyish voice. He smiled up at Tobirama and padded across the tatami to greet him. “How was your day? I saw a bird, so I got food from the kitchen and I fed them. So many came!” His smile melted Tobirama’s heart. “They’re still enjoying it.”

‘He can be gentle now,’ Tobirama realized. ‘His childhood was stolen from him by our Father and the wars. We won’t make him fight again, not for years and years.’ 

His heart felt full and he hugged his little brother, boldly stolen from the Death God himself. “That’s wonderful.” He felt so light. He was almost ready to sign on with Hashirama’s optimism about the Uchiha, the last great threat to Kawarama’s safety. Perhaps they should combine their clans. If the Uchiha were not on guard against him, one of them could easily be taken to fuel the jutsu to bring back Itama. There was something poetic about the concept.

“I’m hungry,” Kawarama declared. He bounced on his heels. “What’s for dinner?”

“I will go and ask.” Tobirama rose. 

Kawarama pushed past him. “No, I want to!” He ran out of the room, little feet silent with shinobi skill.

Tobirama smiled and watched his brother’s back disappear. Then his gaze turned to the grass outside the window. His smile vanished.

The grass was carpeted in dead birds.

[bokvshou]

i was so caught up thinking about the possibilities of the changes that could've existed if the story had gone differently because that's fascinating and suddenly i read "would he still abuse his nephew?" and i was like "ooooh, i think you're saying everything in a negative way. nevermind."

did wei wuxian have the right to keep the secret of an operation he performed on jiang cheng without his consent? we know that he did it because he believed that it was what jc needed and we can't blame him for that, okay, but it doesn't take away the fact that he messed with jc's body without permission. since he manipulated and performed an operation on a body that was not his and without consent, i believe that he didn't have such a right to keep the secret, but he chose to remain silent anyway.

wei wuxian was a genius with a huge ego, we know he's smart enough to make up a good lie to cover up his lack of a gold core (if he wanted to hide the core transfer from jc that much. and he didn't even have to try THAT hard since at the time there was someone out there melting cores for shits and giggles. he could have said it and no one would have questioned it) and still let his siblings know the reason why he couldn't carry the sword everywhere anymore, or why he had to incline to demonic cultivation, but he chose to hide the truth. we can't deny part of that was out of sheer pride, or even shame. and in exchange for completely shutting down and also suddenly changing his personality because of the new dark, unstable power he had, he puts the trust other people had in him at stake.

but i think something would have changed, yeah.

we talk about jiang cheng defending the wens as if it were impossible when he actually tried, because although he didn't know the truth, he did know wn and wq had helped them. and what happened was that nie mingjue told him to shut the fuck up. if he had known the whole truth i can believe he would have tried harder, or at least, he would've helped wwx in some other way.

if jiang cheng had known the truth, he wouldn't have bothered and questioned wei wuxian for not carrying suibian. jc would have understood why wei ying suddenly had strange mood swings, or why he was so determined to defend the wens, or why he was so absent from meetings, and therefore, he wouldn't have let the other sects fill him with rumors and lies and they wouldn't have managed to ruin the relationship between the two (as jgy confesses they did), since he would've had all the information not to be fooled, because the reason their relationship broke up in the first place was precisely the misunderstanding and lack of information between them, and the other sects took advantage of it.

without a broken relationship, i'm able to believe then wwx never defected from the jiang sect, or at least not in that painful, heartbreaking way. and after that, who knows how much else would change!? maybe even that would prevent a death or two. and even if the deaths were final and inescapable, it's very different to think wei wuxian "killed your sister" because he went crazy with power™ and a holy shit I don't know this person anymore mentality than to think he "killed your sister" because of situations beyond his control and a remember he had to resort to this because he gave you his golden core mentality.

or maybe you're right, surprisingly, and jiang cheng wouldn't have cared at all and the ending was the same.

the point is; the possibility of getting a different story was always there. and it's still there, because there are things wei wuxian never knew either, and who's to say if wwx found out about jc's sacrifice today it wouldn't change his decisions in the future?

i'm just saying, there's a reason honesty is so precious. giving away a little bit of information can change the decisions others make because it gives them the power to choose.

"jc didn't understand wwx".

no, and rightly so. because wwx decided to shut down completely and not let anyone know anything. that was his decision. because yes, we knew why wei wuxian did what he did and we understand him, but other people? other characters? they had no idea, not even the love interest knew what was going on with wwx. jiang cheng didn't knew shit nor did he have enough information until the very end of the story.

you can blame other characters for the decisions they made all you want, but don't pretend that wei wuxian's silence and stubbornness didn't influence these very decisions.

[soul-dwelling]

Do you considet b.ichi to be better than fire force? Or that fireforce was once bettet but just got way worse around a certain point?

I don't know which one is better.

I know which one I like more right now, and that's B Ichi--but it's not as if that series did not have the same problems that make me dislike Fire Force (poor Mana and Tool, reduced to that ridiculously obnoxious set of gags).

B Ichi feels more inventive and eye-catching than Fire Force. I'm sure some of that is either by design or just inescapable.

When B Ichi is a setting where almost anything can happen, that allows for such a variety of locations, character designs, and personalities--but that can be overwhelming, it doesn't always let an audience latch onto one idea and see it through. This is a problem we've seen with a lot of manga that get cancelled way too early and have to rush to do something that will either bring back an audience or wrap up the story before the final chapter. B Ichi had so many ideas in front of it, but I don't think it ever got to address any one of them fully. If the series had been more successful, I would hope later chapters would bring back side characters for new adventures, especially as it was a "road trip" kind of story, so you don't need much justification to re-visit previous locations or happen to run into previous characters again.

Fire Force is limited by location and structures: it's largely confined to just a post-apocalyptic Tokyo, and the characters are militaristic and hence largely in matching uniforms. That bores me. The series in many ways tries to be the opposite of Soul Eater, but losing that globe-trotting aspect, and putting so many characters into the same outfit, seemed dull. I also think the uses of fire in the series gets stale. All of that being said, the series obviously resonated more with its readers than B Ichi did, and those limitations in some ways help move the plot along rather than getting stuck in diversions where you're not sure how it will tie into the larger narrative.

I do think Fire Force was better before the anime was announced. And I remember that day it was announced was the first day that one chapter of Assault and Tamaki came out online--and I had enough with the series at that point. As soon as it got an anime announced, I had a bad feeling: if they know they now have an anime, they think they can do no wrong--so they are going to double down and get worse, and they did with how bad that Tamaki chapter was and, sorry, having caught up on the current chapters, that resolution to her overall story in this series sucks. There are so many ways to handle empowerment, and as one cishet guy talking about another cishet guy, I don't want to read Ohkubo on this, I want to see people who aren't cishet men tackle this kind of a story about body-shaming, slut-shaming, and the placement of sex, fanservice, and provocative dress in our current moment, not another cishet man.

[magichcuse]

{☆} Thaddeus is going to do it. He's going to defend the honor of his beloved.

True, Vivian never asked him to visit her school and challenge the prick who broke her heart, but it doesn't matter. That monster won't get away with hurting such a beautiful angel.

Materializing in the middle of the hallway, Thaddeus scans the hallway for that ginger gremlin. It's fairly easy to find him considering Alroy is the only ginger in Vivian's grade.

"You!"

Alroy doesn't acknowledge Thaddeus, oblivious to his existence. This only angers Thaddeus more, blasting Alroy with magic in the hopes that'll get his attention.

"What the heck was that?"

"You betrayed my beloved and I'm here to defend her honor!"

Everyone's eyes are on Vivian, her face burning in embarrassment. The blush only strengthens when the sound of harsh laughter fills the air.

Alroy dusts himself off and quirks an eyebrow at Thaddeus.

"You're Vivian's suitor?"

"Yes, I am the fortunate soul destined to marry the lovely Vivian Eggleston."

"Aren't you a little young to be Vivian's suitor?"

"Yes, yes I am."

Their conversation is interrupted by the crash commentary of the other students.

"That explains a lot!"

"No wonder why Vivian fell for the weirdo..."

"Vivian is engaged to a toddler!"

Thaddeus shrinks in on himself, his heart shattering when Vivian hides in shame.

"I-I'm not a toddler! Stop it!"

The cackling crescendos, an inescapable bombardment of noise consuming Thaddeus. He whimpers, about to break until Walter steps in.

"Verbally assaulting a child...how low of you all."

Thaddeus would pipe up about not being a child, but he's too taken aback by Walter coming to his defense.

A girl in the crowd crosses her arms, visibly irritated.

"Oh, so now the school's resident asshole is going to preach to us!"

Walter rolls his eyes, one of his hands resting on his hips while the other pets Thaddeus's hair.

"I might be an asshole, but I'm not going to allow you heathens to taunt my sweet, innocent little cousin. Find something better to do with your pathetic lives."

Thaddeus blinks in confusion, allowing Walter to pet him despite his complicated feelings towards him. It's the first display of affection he's received in weeks. He watches as the crowd disperses, only choosing to address Walter when no one else is watching.

"Um...t-thank you."

Walter's expression softens, gently guiding Thaddeus out of the school.

"I hate to admit it, but I'm proud of you."

Thaddeus hitches his breath, blinks rapidly, and widens his eyes.

"You're...you're proud of me?"

There has to be some sort of catch, right? Walter must be doing it to improve his image or he's going to turn on Thaddeus. Walter wouldn't just defend him out of kindness. Everything Thaddeus knows about Walter makes him anything but altruistic.

However, Walter is being truthful. He's impressed by his cousin's display of courage, even when it became too much for him to handle. Thaddeus challenged someone vastly overpowering him for the sake of defending the one he loved. That's the type of suitor Vivian deserves, the type of suitor Walter screwed up any chances of being.

"You're already twice the man I'll ever be. You have a good heart, Thaddeus. Never lose sight of that."

Tears well up in Thaddeus's eyes, a million complicated thoughts cluttering his mind. The person he resents the most is treating him with more kindness than his own parents? This doesn't feel right...but Thaddeus wants to believe this is genuine. It'd break him if it weren't.

Pulling a scarf out of his school bag, Walter stares down at it conflictedly. It's a gift from Dedrick, something which meant a lot to him. He still remembers hearing his Starshine tell him how nice it looked on him...and that's part of the problem. It's a reminder of how he destroyed his relationship with the person who made life worth living Dedrick. The cherished memories, messy feelings, and his ex-boyfriend's resentment are all woven into its soft fabric.

After a moment of deliberation, Walter hands the scarf to Thaddeus with vulnerability in his eyes.

"It was a gift from someone who meant the world to me. Please take good care of it."

Thaddeus stares down at the scarf in shock, the situation becoming less believable by the second.

"W-Why would you give it to me if it means so much to you?"

"I only thought it'd be appropriate to give it to someone who means a lot to me...it compliments your eyes better anyway."

Briefly looking away from Thaddeus, Walter digs out a ring box containing a silver ring with an emerald embedded in it...a ring he'd intended on giving to Dedrick before their falling out.

"I want you to give this to Vivian. You don't have to tell her I gave this to you, not like she'd believe it anyway, but I figure you'd get more use out of it than I would."

Fortunately for Thaddeus, Walter didn't have the money at the time to engrave Dedrick's name into it like he wanted to. He could have used magic, but casting spells on a non-magical piece of jewelry has the possibility of going horribly wrong and he wanted to go the extra mile for Dedrick...not like it would have meant anything now. Vivian would never need to find out who the intended recipient used to be.

Finally, Walter hands Thaddeus a fancy envelope with Dedrick's name written on it. This time, Walter intends on it going to the intended recipient.

"And give this to Dedrick the next time you see him. I'd deliver it myself, but I doubt he'd want to see my face ever again."

Tucking the items into a safe place, Thaddeus wraps his arms around Walter. He still can't fully forgive him after all of the bad things he's done, but he can't help but be genuinely touched by the other's unexpected vulnerability.

"I'm proud of you too, Cousin Walter."

Perhaps this is being too kind to Walter, but Thaddeus has a feeling Walter needed to hear those words as much as he did...

...and he's proven right when Walter holds him in a tight embrace.

"Thank you so much..." Walter leans back just enough to see his cousin's face, "I don't expect you to forgive me any time soon, though I still want to make it up to you. I understand if you don't want to get too close to me given how loyal you are to Vivian, but just know I'm here for you if you need it."

For once in his life, Walter needs a relationship he doesn't inevitably destroy. Thaddeus might not be willing to be that person, but it couldn't hurt to try.

For once in his life, Thaddeus has someone who truly cares about him. Someone who wasn't too busy for him or embarrassed of him. Walter might not be the person he expected to provide that for him, but he's not going to reject the support he desperately needed. {☆}

[unicorn-bentacles]

Ok I don't know for sure if this is what you mean by horrance gore but what do you think about: Ben losing control of his powers and Klaus trying to reach for him and calm him down despite the tentacles hurting him in the process or Klaus helping Ben clean himself up after a very bloody mission.

I chose the latter one and I hope you don’t mind that I accidently made it sad.

AO3 Link

Near midnight Klaus stumbled through a window from the fire escape and fell in a heap onto the floor. Mind fogged over with a mixture of cheap vodka and nameless drugs he somehow picked himself off the ground and wandered towards his bedroom. Klaus’s feet dragged across the linoleum tiles and with every step he listed to one side until the tip of his boot caught on the floor and sent him flying into the nearby wall. His face planted against plaster with a bang loud enough for Klaus to hope to fucking hell it hadn’t woken anyone up, he didn’t need to get into any more trouble as it is. One-handed Klaus pushed himself away from the wall and used it for support. He kept his palm flat against it and relied on it to guide him back to his room.

Klaus sensed something off and for the life of him couldn’t remember why the house seemed so empty and still. He’d knocked against Diego’s room and out of all of them he slept the lightest, Number Two should’ve at least shouted and that unnerved Klaus. A thick fog had taken root inside his mind and made it impossible for Klaus to remember exactly why he’d left the house to get so intoxicated he could barely stand. Whatever the reason, it didn’t matter. His heart felt light and freed Klaus of the ghosts who usually pursued him.

Almost at his door, Klaus paused as he heard weeping drift into the hallway from somewhere close by. A familiar grief-stricken siren song which beckoned Klaus to follow it into the bathroom a few feet away. Propped against the wall, he listened intently to the mournful lullaby for several minutes, and a solitary tear rolled down his cheek as it went on and on. Unable to resist the melody any longer Klaus responded to the call and staggered towards the ajar door of the shared bathroom.

Through the gap, he peered inside and discovered the source of the crying. Knees tucked underneath his chin Ben sat in the bathtub with his back to the taps, his gaze firmly planted downwards. Beads of water slid down Ben’s naked skin and glistened in the blue tinted light like fish’s scales. Granting Ben the illusion of an ocean nymph stranded on the shore and longing for the sea. The sight took away Klaus’s breath at the sheer otherworldly beauty in front of him, he yearned to freeze the moment and live forever in it. Heart beating a steady tattoo against his ribcage and bewitched Klaus entirely on impulse pushed the door wider and snuck into the cramped bathroom.

Fully inside, Klaus closed the door behind him by leaning his back against the wood. It shut with a soft click, and he wished for the thousandth time their Father would trust them with a lock. Klaus wanted another layer of security to protect Ben’s small slice of tranquillity he’d built for himself. Lost within his mind the intrusion went unnoticed by Ben, his gaze firmly focused on the bottom of the bathtub. Near the door Klaus lingered, hesitant to bridge the short space to the porcelain dingy Ben had taken refuge in. He wanted to wipe away the tears falling down Ben’s cheeks but was unsure if he was welcome to do so.

The tiled floor stretched in front of Klaus as he took the first step forwards. Time seemed to slow as he used all his strength to traverse the distance from the door to Ben. As he got closer, Klaus saw in more and more detail the pitiful state his brother was in. Congealed blood plastered a clump of hair to the side of Ben’s head, and a smear of something almost black stained the back of his neck. Both missed by his frantic attempt to wash away the taint from whatever mission he’d gone on. Streams of rust tinged water and tears flowed from his hairline and gathered at the tip of his nose, a drop swelled and fell downwards.

Finally, at his destination, he towered over the pure white tub and noticed the puddle of slurry Ben sat in the centre of. Made of a mixture of slimy pieces of human flesh and massive waterlogged blood clots, it was thick enough to block the drain and leave a centimetre of standing water at the bottom. Klaus wrinkled his nose at the salty almost metallic smell of the gore yet stayed where he was. Immune to it from years of helping Ben clean himself after missions when he needed to release the Horror and stain his hands further with death and destruction.

Klaus sat on the cold edge of the bath and with two fingers lightly tapped his brother’s forearm to alert him of his presence, taken aback slightly by the freezing temperature of Ben’s skin. The weeping stopped immediately as Ben snapped his head up and looked wildly around before his vision focused on Klaus. The rims of his eyes were raw red from crying, bloodshot and filled with a darkness that unsettled Klaus. Covered in goosebumps Ben’s skin appeared grey and lifeless in the dull light, a response probably to the cool air inside the room. Enchanted by his inhuman beauty Klaus couldn’t figure out why Ben unnerved him, he put it down to his current state of both being high as a fucking kite and drunk off his ass.

Reluctant to speak aloud and break the spell of silence blanketing the room Klaus gestured for Ben to shuffle forwards. Ben understood and gripped the sides of the bath, he pulled himself to the other end and left huge streaks of blood in his wake. Klaus got back onto his feet and went to the space freed up by Ben, he twisted both taps and watched as the water changed colour as it hit the slurry coating the bottom and struggled to drain away. Klaus bent over and forced the crimson goop through the holes of the drain, indifferent to the leftovers of Ben’s killings coating his hands as he went about his task.

The last substantial evidence of Ben’s forced bloodshed vanished down the black hole of the drain and left behind only patches as a memorial of the pain he’d inflicted on the world. Klaus placed his hands under the stream of water and rinsed away the red staining his palms. He fiddled with the taps for a moment before he found the right temperature and placed the plug into the drain. Klaus stood back upright, and his eyes fell onto the curve of Ben’s spine. Below the skin, something pushed outwards and squirmed, the fathomless beast from another universe restless inside their shared body. The greatest burden rested on Ben’s shoulders by nature of his gift, and he endured it better than Klaus ever could his own. Ben was the strongest among them, and while Klaus could talk to the dead, his brother had become the embodiment of death, and it had taken its toll on his fragile psyche.

Faced with the melancholic stoop of Ben’s shoulders within touching distance, Klaus was forced to confront a truth he’d hidden from. He no longer understood Ben, not like he used to. At some point over the last few years, a vast sea had grown between them, and Klaus had no idea how to cross the ever widening space. The two of them had taken such divergent paths in dealing with their trauma. Ben wholly disconnected from the world and drowned himself in wave after wave of pain he never spoke aloud to atone for sins he’d committed by the directions of their Father. Klaus had thrown himself into the realm of the living, numbing himself with drugs to quiet the inescapable ghosts surrounding him and to hide from his own shame at abandoning Ben for those brief moments of respite.

The crux of the matter was they were two sides of the same coin, united in pain by the curse bestowed on them by some cruel unknown deity. Ben cared too much for the humanity he saved on a regular basis and who still rejected him as a person, the public saw him as a monster, and it destroyed him inside. His gift something to be feared and avoided. Klaus’s power, on the other hand, forced him to see the worst in people, he knew far too well the disturbing acts normal humans did to each other and wanted no part in helping. He hated how they treated Ben, and if he had the chance would burn the entire world just to bring his brother a moment of peace.

As the bath slowly filled Klaus left the bathtub to busy himself with searching the cabinet underneath the sink for the bubble bath, Allison hid in there. He found it stashed behind a bottle of half empty bleach and stood back up to grab the hand towel hanging on a metal loop fixed into the wall. He returned to the bath and added the thick syrupy liquid into the water, with one hand Klaus swirled the shimmery bubble bath around until it dissolved. The soothing smell of lavender floated out of the water and hid the sharp tang of blood, changing the sombre aura of the room into something relaxing.

Klaus settled on the lip of the tub facing Ben and dipped the towel into the water, damped it. He pulled it out to wipe the missed bits of grime off Ben’s face and stopped when a hand shot from the water, it wrapped itself around Klaus’s wrist and held tight enough to bruise. Slowly Ben’s eyes met his own and Klaus watched as the mist cleared within them, wordlessly his brother pleaded for him to come closer and anchor him back to reality.Ben rarely allowed people to touch him, the issues with his own self-image impacted every factor in his existence. He distrusted everyone in fear that if they came in contact with him, they would end up dead. Ben starved himself of affection out of duty to protect people and had become trapped as an observer of his own life. Forever on the sidelines, Ben wished to be apart of the world and knew he never could be. The knowledge fueled his conviction of being sub-human and drove him to hide away, yet the more he disengaged, the less human Ben thought he was. A feedback loop that fed off itself and Klaus had no way of stopping.

So to have Ben reach out to Klaus was a massive thing, the simple act showed he wanted the affection his brother gave out so easily. He desperately needed Klaus to remind him of his own humanity with the feel of someone else’s skin against his own. A request Klaus could never refuse.

Ben released his grip around Klaus’s wrist and shoved his hand below the water again. Hastily Klaus peeled off his crop top and pulled it over his head while at the same time he shimmied out of his trousers and underwear. He loosely balled up his clothes and threw them in the general direction of the laundry basket. Klaus stepped into the bath space in front of Ben as his brother slid backwards to give him extra room. He slowly submerged himself into the warm water until he sat knee to knee with Ben.

A tangle of arms and legs it took sever awkward moments for Ben and Klaus to manoeuvre themselves into a comfortable position. Chest to chest Ben curled around his brother’s torso and felt extremely cold against Klaus’s warm skin. Head against Klaus’s ribcage Ben seemed to hold onto his brother like a life raft. The contact a beacon of light which guided Ben back from wherever his mind had wandered off too. Dark hair tickled Klaus’s nose with the scent of blood and salt water, a mixture representing Ben perfectly and calmed his strained nerves.

The comforting weight on Klaus’s chest and the steady sound of running water created a wave of drowsiness to crash over him. For the first time in months, Klaus felt safe and loved, though distantly he knew something was wrong and he couldn’t pinpoint why. Klaus banished the thought to the back of his mind and instead rubbed soothing circles in Ben’s back. He savoured the soft feel of his brother’s skin under his fingertips and closed his eyes. Their contact wasn’t sexual in any capacity, it was just an act of loved filled intimacy neither of them received normally. A showing of devotion if their Father ever found out about would end with both of them punished harshly. Klaus dozed off, and as he did so, a sense of immeasurable loss bloomed deep inside his heart. An emotion he couldn’t find the source of it filled him with a nameless dread.

Within the darkness of almost consciousness, Klaus felt someone press their cold lips against his own, soft and unpractised it was one of the most kisses he’d ever received. Filled with overwhelming grief, Klaus chased it as it ended and opened his eyes.

The room empty Klaus was alone.

He sat bolt upright and caused a surge of sweet smelling water to crash over the lip of the tub and flood the floor. Every sign of Ben inside the bathroom had vanished. The reality hit Klaus like a stone as he remembered the truth. Ben had died months ago. The last few hours were merely a memory he recreated in guilt and fueled by drugs. He dropped his face into his hands as the dam in Klaus’s heart burst as he began to sob. His cries echoed in the darkened bathroom as he grieved for a love lost forever beneath the black waves of death.

[caesarslegion]

copypasting it from our dms just for reference

they, in my head, never really had that much of a maternal presence since hellmouth, once they could be on their own, killed their mother like he did to his. not like fresno knows, nobody ever brings her up but i feel they would have had an idea... being raised by raiders that are too old to continue tormenting people but still stuck to the past. maybe a few raiders that did their best to fill in the blanks, maybe they didn't believe in hellmouth's movement and then he started thinning the numbers with his shotgun or just demanding to stop fucking coddling fresno. an omen of things to come maybe. don't get too attached. having this sort of heir thing tacked on to them since they could remember and barely comprehending it, having all this 80s beliefs and folklore and how the road is a mysterious mistress but she remembers 200 years later and how she lead the 80s home and how she will do the same for you the road to glory but. hellmouth feels like the omniscient presence here. the expectations the pressure the hatred that is fresnos birthright their generational curse. youre gonna be just like your old man they say and it feels inescapable and it makes them feel Horrible. they start doing things, maybe tidying their room perfectly or making something that he will be proud of will dissuade him, but then they start growing older and the antics are less cute and more cowardly. they could feed the entire compound they know the cars better than they know the members of hell on wheels and applying themself but its always swept aside. this is who you are. you're a raider and you will die a raider and just a for a second they can see themself staring down the nock of hellmouths shotgun. they continue, now its more rebellion than anything, and maybe, hellmouth thinks, they just need a sterner reminder. nobody stops hellmouth when he burns their things. this is what attachment gets you. dog eat dog and the bear does worse

they just sort of. crumble. love gets you nowhere when all there is is dust and violence and just the. shame of even feeling those things in the first place. they probably never forgot, this sort of voice at the back of their mind that they've tried to cut down but the hydra grows three heads more. they fall into line, brought down on raids and finally see beyond a chain link fence but he's always There. and probably always be. learn to kill learn to pillage learn to hurt and it feels good, right? maybe. or they've just bought into it so much that it feels true. find a buffer between the little voice in their head and everything else and now they know why hellmouth smokes and drinks so much. they try to prove themself pass all the rites make them proud but everyone looks at them like a hangaround and the sign on their shoulder feels like a weight. then the big day comes the retaking of sacramento the day where they finally go home and they. chicken out. they cant do it. they take the i-15 and don't stop until the ncr has to knock them off their bike and well, they may not have murdered, but no one can deny free labor can they

and like. i feel being in the ncrcf kind of shaped them into who they are as of vegas. but like out of necessity maybe they found some connection in the raiders there but. you have to look strong and powerful and violent or they'll eat you alive fake it till ya make it even though it feels wrong but no different than being on hell on wheels right they just have the advantage that they don't know their history

they know how to make a makeshift knife and plunge into someones stomach and how to behave around a bunch of people who want you dead. but is that a way to live?

just settled in their little routine where they know how to navigate their way and then the walls blow up and they're in mojave territory they know the roads and where they lead to, theoretically, but to finally feel that underneath their feet? overwhelming. liberating. but... well, they only know one way to keep afloat

god that bit i sent to atom last night. i shouldnt get such a big head over it because its very stream of conciousness and some things dont make sense about their backstory but. kind of a slay ngl