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holicanth · 3 years

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Hanging On Threads (2)

@shinoweek 2021 Prompt 3 - Sunset/Canon Divergence

Words: 3.7k

Genre: Angst. Drama. Shinohina. Tragedy

Warnings: -

Additional Tags: Shinohina, Kibahina, Naruhina, family issues, Konoha’s noble clans, nepotisme and collusion.

Author’s Note: I’m so sorry y’all. I’ve been extra busy :( Here’s chapter 2 (?) of my Shino week series. I hope you have a great day :)

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2

It has been 3 days since Shino disappeared from the Aburame compound.

It has also been 3 days since the Konoha elders re-welcomed the Aburames and reintegrated them into society.

Ever since, Shino has been staying at ROOT, hiding undercover while waiting for Danzo's orders.

And with that, Shino is handed the dreadful task of explaining every little detail to Torune.

"I just can't understand your logic, Shino." He says, clenching his fists on the table. "You should know better than to just run away from home like that!"

"What do you think you'll achieve with this?" Torune grits his teeth, "You cant escape this--there's no way Danzo will let you out anymore!"

Guilt that has previously bubbled inside him was now gone. Shino felt close to nothing as he stays cooped in ROOT. No fear. No anxiety. He was obviously feeling full of himself, believing to have won his side of the bargain. As such, none of Torune's words were ringing bells inside his head.

Shino tries to keep his facade well-put.

"How is Uncle Shibi taking the news?"

"I've sent some beetles to Father. I can tell he's doing well even without me. Nothing else will change in the household."

"Not until," Shino's words come to a startled halt. "Until I finish my promise to Danzo."

His brother bangs the table in a display of panic that Shino has never seen. " You don't know what he'll do to you. Shino, you don't know anything..."

His words cut off abruptly. In a split second, Shino senses a tremble in Torune. A slight quiver of his lips.

Torune used to live with them, and had expressed massive gratefulness towards his uncle. Shino didn't realize at that time (he was but merely eight), that more than anything, Torune's sacrifice was addressed more towards Shibi. The boy would do anything to protect his uncle—you can see it in the way he devotes himself to his work.

A kindred sort of regret rose in Shino. To think that he had so easily thrown away the ideal life that Torune had bestowed upon him—and voluntarily at that.

But both of them know that there is no safer alternative.

(It's an inevitable fate, they console themselves. It is a necessary sacrifice.)

"I had to do it for our clan." Shino repeats the fact to his brother. "We were to be killed soon enough. And it would have been Father first."

Shino's eyes flit nervously as he spoke.

"And who do you think would pull the trigger, Shino?"

Torune didn't ask why. Like he knew all of the details already.

Shino glanced around the room, thinking. He already knows the answer. Rather, he's trying to figure out how to word it in a manner that doesn't...offend Torune.

(Shino could list all the names of the ANBU members that have been in contact with particular individuals. Journalists, Governors, Clan heads, people of high posistions. Their agenda was blatant. Shino knows because their names have been whispered in contemplation throughout the Aburame compound.)

"The jonins," Shino says, in a hushed voice. "The jonins will work together with the ANBU. The Sarutobi clan will be extremely involved too."

There is a pattern Shino notices in Konoha's history. It's that the types of people who reign over the village are identical and identifiable amongst each other. A teacher to their student, A blood relative to their predecessor. Lesser clans would do anything to grab ahold of that social circle.

Replacing an unliked noble clan would be one of such tasks.

Torune listens keenly, in a hum that neither denies or confirms it.

"Not only that," He resumes, "There seems to be equal participation from other clans. Such as the Nara. You know they've been looking to steal our research on bugs."

"They're especially interested in yours, Torune."

He doesn't oblige. Torune was aware of this well before he came to ROOT, too. Fear and suspense were not things Torune had to be worried about. But today, he finds that he had to face it--the abject horror of seeing his little brother in a hostage situation. The pure fear of knowing how hopeless he is engulfs him. Was there nothing that Torune can do?

(A shinobi must constantly opress their emotions, follow a strict set of rules that they decide among themselves, and avoid extraneous conflict.

This was the first lesson Danzo had stamped inside Torune's memories.

To disconnect oneself from the act of murder—it was the essence of a shinobi.

Or so Torune thought.)

"I was to be sent as well, Shino." Torune looks down as he breaks the ice. "They want us gone because of our power. Of our potential. They'll take our knowledge and use it to their own benefit. All the research, medicine, poisons and bugs."

(The Aburames are notorious for being mysterious. All done in order to conceal oneself, to prevent oneself from having their secret techniques outed in public. Ensuring, that they stay formidable, underestimated,

and strong.)

"You heard Danzo say it. They think we're weird. Unsanitary. Off-putting. That our secrecy is a form of betrayal, even when we've been constantly obedient to Konoha."

"And will you die as well?" Shino asks cautiously, "After you've killed all of us, will they dispose of you too, Torune?"

A sorrow smile lit up Torune's face. There was, again, no answer. Shino knows—No, he had plenty of ideas already. Torune’s predisposition was already a valid enough reason for Konoha to justify his death. Killed or not, there are many ways to make a man break. Danzo would have his merry time trying out which one of those methods satisfy him best.

What Konoha was capable of bringing unto the Uchiha was just as likely to happen to the Aburames.

(This exchange ended on a heavy note. Nothing Shino says will add or subtract from the issue at hand. Just a hanging air of dread, looming over their clan's future. Both of them did what they had to preserve their clans. To protect those important to them.

But this sense of kinship—to protect those that they love. Is it not what Konoha preaches to their young, too?

Or was it the reason that Konoha wants to tear apart the Aburame family ties?)

A knock on the wooden door brings an end to the brothers' conversation. The Yamanaka boy comes in, head held high.

"Lord Danzo has requested for you, Shino Aburame. Come along, now."

Shino leaves Torune in the room. Torune knows best that he should not interfere lest he wants to live a day beneath the soil.

It can be said that ROOT was an illegal form of bodyguards, acting as Danzo's personal squadron. A blatant display of political corruption, despite Danzo’s "fancy" position as Konoha's elder. The facility was well maintained, and there was never a shortage of child soldiers sent there. The clan leaders know Danzo as a demanding figure.

The Yamanaka boy—Fuu Yamanaka stops to knock at a set of tall doors. Shino stops to ponder whether he was related directly to Ino Yamanaka.

An oddly lit room opens up by Shino, displaying machines, scrolls, and different books that are perfectly arranged inside the giant walls of bookshelves. Danzo stood in the center, on a throne chair that he does not deserve.

"You may leave now, Fuu." He spoke in a low tone.

Something in Shino buzzes as he watch the Yamanaka eye him begrudgingly while he closes the door. The buzzing didn't stop after he went out.

(His bugs were reacting to something. A feeling that Shino doesn't want to name)

"You. You're the son of Shibi Aburame, aren't you?" Danzo sneers, "So the Aburames have a dojutsu now, huh? What a nuisance. What, is your dojutsu like the Uchiha's? Prompted by deep emotional pain?"

(Shino feels the buzzing again. His bugs were on guard, but for what?)

"Does Shibi have this ability, too?"

"No." Shino spouts a half-lie.

"And how did you get your hands on this? Are you saying that it just appeared out of nowhere?"

Danzo was gauging for answers. Shino was never good at communication himself, but he was naturally gifted in speaking conspicuously

"It was always in the Aburame blood. Just forgotten through time. Nothing new."

"And you vermins have been hiding this to yourselves, haven't you? Yet you wonder why Konoha has no trust in you."

"The other clans have aces up their sleeves, too. It's why they call it a Hidden Jutsu."

Shino didn't mean to sound snark. But Danzo himself might not have the mental intelligence to understand sarcasm, so Shino thinks it's okay.

"So this dojutsu of yours—The Senrigan—tell me how this is more useful than the Byakugan."

Shino bit his tongue before answering. Once more, he'll have to cherry-pick his words exceptionally well.

"I transfer my sight to my bugs. Depending on how many bugs there are and how they're aligned, my sight can reach other countries."

"The Senrigan requires one to be perfectly still, but the bugs can collect all sounds, sights, and other details without having their chakra traced. Hiding my chakra under the bug's natural chakra will make them unnoticed by sensors"

Danzo squints his eye, thinking. "Quite the useful spying tool, huh."

"Still, we need to make sure you're telling the truth. Take off your glasses."

Shino was taken aback from the sudden request,

"Now."

He does as he's told. The sunglasses are safely kept in his pockets. Shino's eyes were dark under the sunlight, and an even deeper shade of obsidian indoors.

"Let's have you demonstrate your Senrigan, shall we? I've sent Fuu to loiter around Konoha's busy streets. Locate him using the senrigan, and tell me every word he's speaking."

And without further ado, Shino created some hand seals, took a deep breath, and a swarm of kikaichu flew out of his body, travelling through the doors and crevices of the ROOT headquarters before dispersing overground. The emerald hue of Shino's eyes looked stunning in the dark.

Even from a distance, Danzo can sense an intricate, huge web of chakra dispersing from the boy's body, Undulating, stretching outwards, and going back and forth between Shino's body and his bugs. Then, as if on command, the chakra fell silent and Shino lets out a long exhale. He's successfully established the connection.

As Shino stills his senses to callibrate himself to the beetles, he orders them to trace any signs of the familiar Yamanaka chakra signature. He steadily reduces his chakra input. When a preferable balance is reached, Shino waits in silence. Until a bug notifies him of any significant clues

(Go to the streets. He instructs them. Hover around in small swarms and don't terrify the people.

A short pause. Don't bump into anyone that I know, He commands again.)

Danzo watches as the Aburame in front of hin froze into a lotus pose. The stare in his eyes blank, but definitely buzzing with intel and chakra. There is much to be studied with this new forbidden jutsu.

Shino is notified of a sighting near Konoha's marketplace. He checks in with the bug, and once their visions link he can tell that the person had the same chakra signature.

"I've located him." Shino said. "He's using a mask and brown cloak, performing jutsus to the local children."

"And what is he saying?"

Shino tries to concentrate as hard as he can. The hand seals that Fuu was using was something he didn't recognize. Apparently memorizing while the Senrigan is activated proved to be more dizzying than he thought.

"Tori, Uma, Ne, Inu, Ne, Tori, Hitsuji, Tatsu, I, Ushi..." Shino recites slowly, making sure that he isn't wrong. "This is a variant of the Water-style technique. He's forming water spouts from his fingers."

That's absolutely correct, Fuu signals to Danzo, who had been telepathically communicating with him all this time.

"Well done, Shino. You've proven to us that you and your clan can be of use."

And with that Shino scrunches his eyes shut. A little bit disoriented from having to memorize while using the Senrigan. His beetles swiftly fly back to him, bringing him a small amount of chakra they absorbed from the villagers.

"I've done my part in reintegrating the Aburames. Give me a month and things will be back to normal. Are you ready to fulfill your side of the promise?" Danzo asked, as he stood up from his chair.

Shino gulps nervously. He didn't really plan out what to do next. But Shino was a master at lying, and with a countenance that no one can read, he was indecipherable.

"Why did you want us gone in the first place?" Shino asks, not realizing that he had voiced the thoughts out loud.

Danzo Shimura was a man who took the Second Hokage's manifesto to heart. Perhaps a bit too much. Shino had suspected, backed with the evidence and observation of his clansmen, that Danzo was pulling strings that led to the Uchiha massacre. It was easy to connect the dots, especially with Shibi and Shino's ability (they were tasked to clean it up. Shibi was fast in doing so, while Shino tended to the unconscious Sasuke.)

From the very formation of Konoha, the Aburame clan was in charge of the most tedious work. Often times having to deal with the brunt of it while Konoha lives scott-free. Border patrols, cleaning up after crimes, interrogation. The Aburames are efficient, but this efficiency ultimately lead to their public consternation.

"You Aburames are skilled, I must admit." Danzo's croaked voice echoed through the chamber. "So much so that any village would want to use you as weapons."

"And that's all there is to it, really. You bunch are too strong. Too skilled. There's too many unknown factors. The higher-ups have agreed to eliminate these threats. After all, Konoha prides itself in being a friendly nation. Your blood brings filth to our soil."

Shino knows that there is a lie slipped between those words. Danzo was not a friendly type of leader.

"The Four Noble Clans of Konoha are in need of a change. The Uchihas have proven to be evil. It is in Konoha's best interest to discard the bad, and salvage whatever is left. Haven't you noticed? The only reason we keep the Akimichi is because they're dumb enough to be controlled by the Nara and Yamanaka. And the Hyuuga's reputation are held at our mercy. You're smart enough to figure the rest." Danzo says, walking to approach Shino.

What?

Did he hear his words right? The Akimichi clan? All along, Shino had thought that the lucky title of a 'Noble Clan' are given to clans who had body modifications that cannot be replicated by other ninjas. To think that his fellow team had such a scheme hanging around their backs...Shino wants to believe that Team 10's friendship is genuine.

"Tomorrow," Danzo says, patting the chuunin's back, "You will be promoted as Jonin and will be registered as a member of the ANBU. Of course, that's a lie. Because tomorrow I will personally have you run... special errands for me."

Shino gulped. He didn't like the close proximity.

"Make sure you say your goodbyes today. You'll be listed as dead for security reasons."

And with that, Shino is let out of the facility. He finds himself pondering aimlessly on a nearby park bench. Autumn has turned the Konohagakure into a beautiful display of warm colors. The trees looked like they've been covered in a rich, velvet cloak and the air was sublime. Shino wonders how long it'll be till he can bask in this scenery again.

First, he'd visit his father. Then, he'd visit his other family members. After that he'll visit...no one. How could Shino bear to look at his friend's faces after resolving so adamantly to despise them? After convincing himself that they've forgotten him.

(And Shino still hopes. He hopes that somehow someone will notice eventually.)

But he supposes he'll finish his priorities first. Evade a civil war, restore his clan's honor, and the rest will be his secondary concerns. It is dire that he doesn't get emotional, especially in the current state Konoha is in.

He looks at the children, playing games under a nearby tree. They were too young for the academy, of course, but if they were old enough to attend, would they all turn out like him? Cold and efficient?

Shino thinks that he used to be a perfectly good student. A good ninja, but perhaps not so good as a friend. One can see plenty of differences between Shino and the rambunctious Naruto, but do they realize how much he envies his cheerful personality?

(And Shino envies him so much. He's taken the attention of the girl he favors. And now, he has taken everyone's attention away from Shino's disappearance.

Naruto had outshined Shino. As if Shino was a shadow that should not exist.)

He's had enough of the pointless thoughts. It was almost noon and Shino has to hurry home if he wants to say proper goodbyes.

But a shrill bark had frozen him to his seat.

"Akamaru, calm down!" A familiar voice shouted.

Shino jolted at the sound. It was coming from behind him. He senses two people walking by, and a dog beside them. Shino was already certain of who they were.

"Akamaru, what's wrong boy? You shouldn't be barking at strangers." The man—Kiba himself said, as he crouched to rub Akamaru's head.

"Maybe he sees someone, Kiba-kun? I don't think anyone's back home from missions..." Hinata replied, looking around the park.

Oh heavens. If there was anyone who Shino would avoid the most, it'd be these two—Hinata and Kiba. He doesn't want to face them. He doesn't even want to be near them. Alas, everytime Shino denies this thought his heart urges him more and more. To simply turn to them. To tell them everything.

(But who was it really who had decided to forget about him in the first place? No one had bothered to ask where he went after the Chuunin exams.)

Akamaru's barking turned into a soft whine. The canine was visibly confused.

Shino has yet to move from his spot at the bench.

"Come on now. No one is here. You've mistaken him for someone else, buddy." Kiba says, sounding a little harsh for someone who claims to be Akamaru's partner.

(Shino wanted to burst out laughing. Doubting a ninja dog's nose? Especially one who has worked with Shino for years? Kiba was a bad liar.

See, even Akamaru notices! Shino thinks to himself, proud to have concluded that the fault was theirs all along.)

Akamaru still whines when Kiba motions him away from Shino's bench.

"Why are you being so difficult today?!" Kiba grunts, frustrated. "Come on Akamaru, you don't want to upset Hinata on our date!"

Oh.

So it’s like that, huh.

"K-Kiba-kun! Please don't shout in public..." Hinata whimpers, fiddling her thumbs together.

And with a little nudge, Akamaru finally moves on with them. The couple enjoying the beauty of Konoha's Autumn, oblivious to everything behind it.

It took minutes. Hours, even for Shino to compose himself enough to process the ordeal.

And those hours were filled with empty pondering. With words that were on the tip of falling out of his mouth. With feelings that he had not been brave enough to admit before. With the eternal, everlasting regret of not speaking up.

But there was nothing he could do.

A shinobi must constantly suppress their emotions, follow a strict set of rules that they decide among themselves, and avoid extraneous conflict

This is for the best. he repeats to himself. Hinata would be better off without him, he thinks.

(But he could have made her happy too. He would've given everything for her.)

A stroll to wash off these thoughts. Yes, Shino thinks that all he needed was to cool his head, shrug it off, and return to his obligations tomorrow. The warm glow of sunset was eager to mask his unease.

The sunset was particularly shy that day, and had swiftly sank to allow the moon to greet him instead. It's already past six o,clock. He knows that he needs to greet his family, but Shino's distraught conscience told him to look at the sky. The moon was still as luminous as usual.

Shino had always known how beautiful the moon is. How beautiful its pearly shimmer is.

(How gentle her eyes were, radiating such a serene, pure love)

And like an opened dam, suddenly Shino feels his chest aching. Like a hole had opened inside him--one that he can't touch nor see. A hole that, no matter how hard Shino tries, would always engulf him in rain. In a downpour that feels like a thousand needles showering on him.

It feels like such a distant memory. Months ago they were still fine. Hinata was still his comrade. And now, she's floating further away from his grasp. Was there no more space for Shino in her heart?

(But Shino was a fool to believe—

A firefly can't love the moon.

Its language can't be heard,

Its wings can't reach the sky,

Its light can't compare to the sea of stars.

It can only do what a firefly does best.

Illuminate the night in its own glow.

A token of a love that falls on deaf ears.)

By the time Shino reaches the Aburame compound, his tears were already dry. Shibi waits for him near the estate gates, and without speaking a word, held his son in a deep embrace. A fitting greeting for a child who's always been forced to grow up before his time.

Shino was going to stay the night in the estate. Saying goodbyes and packing things up. Of course, no further information would be given—everyone was in a state of wary due to the constant supervision.

He had to console them the best he can. Explain the situation. Share his insights. Assure them that this is his job as the Aburame heir. And for that, he would do everything in his capacity to make sure his loved ones don't perish.

A night is never enough to tell stories. By tomorrow morning, Shibi would have said goodbye to two sons.

#shinowek2021 #Shino Aburame #aburame shino #naruto headcanons #naruto fanfiction #hinata hyuuga #kiba inuzuka #akamaru #Akamaru is the real mvp here #we love some good team angst #also...i rlly like the last sentence i wrote in this one 👁️👁️#also..i like the last sentence i wrote in this one 👁️👁️

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dareactions · 4 years

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How would the love interests react to learning that the inquisitor has frequent nightmares that just got worse with the events of Haven? You’re doing a great job, by the way!

Cassandra: She isn’t surprised, everyone had to deal with the nightmares and echoed screams in their heads. Cassandra herself had woken up multiple times herself, the horrifying sound of the attack refusing to leave her be- so she knows how it feels. The Seeker finds her own ways of showing support, before a proper relationship they are hidden. The soft comforting touch on the Inquisitor’s shoulder, the suggestions dropped to others just within the Inquisitor’s earshot. Then it developed into hugs during those long and horrifying nights, grounding each other when needed and reminding both themselves and their lover that the battle is momentarily over and for the night they are safe. It breaks her heart, watching the person she loves struggle with sleep and guilt because of something they had no control over- all she can do is offer her support and love, hoping that it’ll help ease the Inquisitor long enough for a few hours.

Solas: The elf isn’t surprised, no- Solas knows better than most just how fickle the mind can actually be. There is guilt hidden behind that perfectly upheld lie though, guilt that he technically caused despair to someone so important to him. The man doesn’t hide his intentions to help like Cassandra, he is open with his suggestions of sleeping potions and potentially using the fade to help. He knows that the mind can do incredibly powerful things to people, especially when they’ve seen horrifying battlefields. He has no qualms about staying up later than usual, speaking to the Inquisitor in hopes of well- boring them to sleep with information. It’s worked on others in the past.Dorian: To say that Dorian isn’t haunted by nightmares as well would be a lie, so he knows how the sleepless hours can affect you. Though, he is almost certain the Inquisitor doesn’t dream about the scornful eyes of a father- but rather Corypheus mocking voice, the sounds of screams and the pain that came with the attack. Sometimes he finds himself absolutely horrified with it all, so he goes to him. He goes to the Inquisitor during late hours of the night and they talk, he can’t stop the dreams but he sure as hell can help the man fall asleep one way or another-most often through odd tales and late-night laughter paired with wine. Sera: A loud ‘yikes’ escapes her when she finds out, because holy shit. Sera would be lying if she said she wasn’t curious about what the past dreams were about, the ones replaced with the horrors of haven- but she doesn’t poke or prod. She knows her limits just as well as anyone else, besides that’s the last thing the Inquisitor needs. Instead, she does what she does best, pokes fun at other people- does jokes and pranks; makes the Inquisitor laugh in their exhaustion. She is just happy she can make her smile despite the bad, reminding the Inquisitor during long nights that it’s okay- cause they’re not alone anymore.

Blackwall: Oh he knows that feeling too well, it’s like staring into a mirror. Blackwall is just as used to the horrifying screams in his head at night as the Inquisitor is so he has his own tricks to share. Of course, there is a certain heartbreak to it- knowing that someone he cares for so much is plagued by the horrors of war- a war they probably shouldn’t have had to get involved with if it weren’t for bad luck and being in the wrong place at the wrong time. He shows support, shows coping mechanisms and the two spend hours up when the whispers of the dead catch up with them. Sometimes it is good, to have someone that understands the terror or going to bed at night with the people you failed to save standing at the foot of your bed- sometimes it’s bittersweet because Tom realizes that they are just two very broken people who most likely are cursed to forever has only shards of a fully normal life. Blackwall won’t let that stop him from showing love and support though.Iron Bull: If there is one thing Iron Bull knows, it’s people. He knows what makes them tick, their little habits and how to show support when they clearly need it- and that is what he does. Bull shows his little tricks for a good night’s rest, offers whispers of comfort and love in the dark and other ways to cope. He has had his fair share of dreams in the past and with time learned to deal with them, something he will gladly assist the Inquisitor in doing as well. He has to admit he worries though, when the hours turn into days of no sleep at times- that’s when he intervenes and takes control. He reminds the Inquisitor that you cannot lead without a proper head on your shoulder, normally that makes them take at least a one hour nap next to him- guarded from any dangers and for once sleeping properly.Josephine: Haven was a tragedy, Josephine was the one who had to help write the letters for families of the deceased- she was the one who organized funerals and spoke with nobles about what to do. She saw the Inquisitor start to break apart from the dreams before anyone else, because she stumbled in on them asleep by their desk- tears in their eyes and sweat rolling down their forehead. She starts buying scented oils she knows helps, always leaving a lingering hand on their arm when they fall asleep nearby. Josephine knows she cannot change the terrors they have seen, but she hopes to ease the pain with her love and support. Some nights all that is needed is to hold the Inquisitor as they fall back to sleep, sometimes Josephine knows that sleep won’t come for the night and the two amuse themselves with conversations. The Inquisitor probably will always sleep with a knife under their pillow and the dead whispering in their ear, but Josephine hopes that her touch and voice can help them focus on something else- even if just for a moment.

Cullen: He knows this well, the dreams that is. The feeling of being stared at, waking up drenched in your own sweat with the need to vomit and scream all at once. Sometimes he wakes up wishing he could erase his own memories, and now he realizes that the Inquisitor does as well. He offers his methods of coping- and his company. Lonely nights aren’t lonely anymore and suddenly the Inquisitor can sleep for more time, even if it’s just 30 minutes. Cullen wishes he could remove the guilt and the bad memories but for now all he can do is offer bad jokes and soft equally as exhausted smiles as they meet in the kitchen to grab something to drink during the cold nights in Skyhold.

#Anonymous #cullen rutherford #josephine montilyet #lady Montilyet #iron bull #romance #romance reactions #romance reacts #dragon age #dragon age inquisition #inquisitor #dragon age reactions #companions reaction #blackwall #thom rainier #sera #dorian pavus #Cassandra Pentaghast #solas

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theholycovenantrpg · 3 years

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In the beginning was ZADKIEL, an ANGEL loyal to the cause of the ANGELS. He is said to be IMMORTAL and uses HE/HIM pronouns. In this New Testament he serves as the LEADER of the VIRTUES. Blessed be his name.

THE INDELIBLE MARK.

Zadkiel is the leader of the Virtues and has been anointed as the virtue of Justice. Such an anointing is no small thing, granting him an uncanny ability - even among the angels - to find those who have not yet been given the proper condemnation for their sins and transgressions. The blade that he was given was forged by Michael himself, as all the Virtues’ blades are, and is said to flicker blue in the light. Those who have had the misfortune of being cut by it say that it fills them with a frigid sort of cold, the feeling coming over them comparable to being filled by the fear of God. Since he was given the blade of Justice, Zadkiel has also been entrusted with aiding Michael and being his counsel in all matters of war. During battles and all public appearances, Zadkiel rides beside the great king of Caelum with the infamous blade of Justice strapped to his waist and the retinue of the Virtues behind him.

THE HISTORY.

What does it mean to ache -- to ache for what you have and what you don’t? He has lived his whole life aching and is no closer to finding the answer. Every breath he has taken since the first flicker of his existence has reminded him that he has no other purpose than to exist in a perpetual state of tragedy, and yet he can’t find it within himself to loathe the one that made him like this. He was one of the first to be created and the first to whom God extended his mercy -- it was nothing more than a simple pat on the cheek, as though his existence was a blight that God was forgiving. So enraptured was he by his Father that he was blind to the golden tear that painted his Creator’s cheek. God might have made him, but how was he to know that He had rendered tragedy embodied? When He raised his fist against his people, it was Zadkiel who drew it back. When he bid Abraham to kill his son Isaac, it was Zadkiel who threw himself upon God’s favored mortal and counseled mercy. He became one of the greatest Cherubims of God, so much so that there were those among his brethren who whispered it was Lucifer who was jealous of him, and not the besotted mortals. Lucifer was the Light-Bearer, but it was Zadkiel who bore the light within him, shining it upon those who were lucky enough to bask within his ever-forgiving presence.

They did not know his perpetual anguish. They did not see how it resounded with every breath, with every movement of his celestial bones, with every painful beat of his immortal heart. From his lofty height he watched as Mortals began to turn their back against the God that had granted them so much -- God called and beseeched them to love Him once more, but their ears had turned to stone the moment that they had realized the potential of the gift of free will that He had given them. And Zadkiel, merciful and forgiving as he was... could not blame them. Their creations were fascinating, their minds free; who were God and His angels to constrain them from such unending potential? It would soon become clear that not all within Heaven held feeble Man in the same regard. What was once reverent and holy became something rotten and rancorous. As devoted as he was, Zadkiel did not realize what his brethren were doing until it was too late; before he knew it, he was wielding his blade against his brethren. It became slippery with their ichor. He will never forget how the blade blazed and glistened when covered with the blood of divinity.

All he could remember was the searing pain of Michael’s hand enclosed around his arm. The way the beat of his heart seemed to quiet itself when he was told that now was the time to decide. How tears fell from his cheeks as he realized that he had no choice but to forgive his brothers for committing this atrocity, for forcing him to commit it with them, and for casting out from heaven the only entity who might have understood the ineffable pain of his existence. And each day it seemed that they were all intent on reminding him of the horrors he had done -- Michael especially. Each day, with a smile upon their face, they brought him close, teeth white and shining, looking invigorated. Proud, even, of what had unfolded at their hands. Zadkiel did then what he’d always known to do: he forgave them, willingly and readily, donning his armor and steadfastly staying at Michael’s side, hand upon the pommel of his blade when others drifted too close. Many laughed at him for being so guarded. Who could fell the greatest among them?

A heretic, drenched in Holy Oil, careened towards Michael. The angels stood in shock as he moved closer and closer, howling: death made all equals, celestial or not. It was Zadkiel who cut him down in one clean movement, and though his hands were singed, he wiped his blade clean, still. It was then that he was anointed the leader of the Virtues. Justice, they all cried, and it was Justice that they declared him to be. How far he had fallen from the angel that he used to be; the hand of God, who counseled the staying of cruel hands though he wielded his own so liberally. There was a hypocrisy to his existence, the Harbinger of Justice, when all that had he done proved he was anything but. He could forgive others readily -- easily, even for horrific, blasphemous things, and yet he had long since forgotten how to forgive himself.

THE CONNECTIONS.

MICHAEL: Liege. They were close once, despite the disparity in their positions - one an Archangel and the other a Cherubim. They were both treasured by God, beloved by Him especially when Lucifer was cast out from Heaven. They had both thought of the fallen angel as a brother and had found comradery in the face of misery and disappointment. But then Michael became more prominent among the Mortals, revered and uplifted while Zadkiel receded into the background, all too glad to remain beneath the shadow of God’s hand. To this day, though, he does not speak to Michael of what had been done to their Father, nor does he question the reigning king of the Divine as to the motivations behind his actions. Such insight would not change what had happened but he cannot help but wonder, when cleaning the blade of his sword, if there was something he could have done that would have prevented the fall of his Father, the fall of them all.

ISOLDE WICKEN: Twin-flame. He had known of her when light first dawned - it had meant to be different; the world less wild and vicious, the two of them more content and peaceable. God had meant for him to be her guardian angel, to guide her so that she might relish the power of her visions, tend to them like a gardener might tend to a bush of roses. She would appreciate the beauty of their power, but would be careful of the thorns that might pierce her skin and make her bleed. The ache that would wash over her would abate, but she would know, she would understand how it fills her lungs and how unrelenting it can be. When he first tried to approach her, to spark something of what might have been and though there is the vehemence of a woman who has suffered, there is something that quakes in the air whenever they draw near to one another. Perhaps that is the power of shared pain and misery.

CASSIEL: Shadow. He had adored her -- as they all had. He had been her guard and her protector, had sought to quell any rebukes that might have been spurred by jealousy for her lofty place among the hierarchies. Though the world was full of tragedy, it was reassuring to know that there was a singular light that was untouched by such melancholy darkness. He knew that his heart was forever heavy, but there was dastardly hope that was ever pervasive and present whenever he would look into Cassiel’s eyes and witness nothing other than unabated light. Imagine his disappointment, then, when he had to hear from Michael’s own mouth how she had not only turned against her brethren but more or less torn the wings from their backs herself -- had ultimately been the executioner of so many of their kind. He can not abide to look at her now, because when he does there is only ever an impenetrable shadow that is cast over his heart.

JUDAS: Disgust. It is hard for him to be disgusted by someone - he is merciful and just, forgiving to a very fatal fault, but Judas is someone that seems to be the exception that proves the rule. Perhaps it’s because Zadkiel finds him so piteous, like looking upon a festering, disease-ridden thing and finding that they beg you to not put them out of their misery. One would think that Zadkiel would have the same point of view upon all demons but no, this sentiment seems to be singularly reserved for Judas. Whenever the two are forced to convene in the Holy Land and Zadkiel is forced to level his gaze with that stain upon the earth, he can conjure within himself no sense of respect or amicability - only terse civility that seems to belie a near-palpable sense of repugnance. Perhaps it is because the two are so at odds - one divine being is capable of forgiving everyone but himself, while the other forgives himself and condemns the whole world.

Zadkiel is portrayed by Lewis Tan and was written by ROSEY. He is currently OPEN.

#literate rp #rpg #new rp #biblical rp #fantasy rp #m #a #zadkiel #o #om

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irinapaleolog · 4 years

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The Rise of Skywalker Does a Terrible Disservice to the Women of Star Wars

Besides Reylo, one of the great marketing tools of the Star Wars sequel trilogy was its emphasis on girl power, as well its subversion of class dynamics. The films showed that women -- even poor, destitute women with no connections to powerful men -- could play the same role in the franchise as every cocky flyboy or adopted son of a moisture farmer. Unfortunately, and despite the press tour assurances from the cast and crew that Rey and her gal pals are here to lead a new generation of fans into the new world of gender equality, The Rise of Skywalker makes sure that none of the women of the franchise gets to live happily ever after nor establish any lasting romantic connection.

Instead, Episode IX leans heavily into the tired trope of the "strong female character" that has to resign from silly notions like love and family to live up to her full potential. Adding insult to injury, the film removes all agency from the women, and instead thrusts them onto a straight-and-narrow path of contrived choices foisted upon them by male characters or by the Force -- which, in J.J. Abrams' movie, acts not as the power that propels life in the universe, but like the mean Catherine de Bourgh of Pride and Prejudice.

Let's start with Leia Organa, whose call for help in The Last Jedi was ignored by the entire galaxy. However, Lando Calrissian, who has been hanging around on Pasaana doing who knows what, just has to say the word for an entire legacy fleet to appear out of nowhere. Then there's the handling of her Jedi training, which she gave up because she felt the Force might corrupt her unborn son -- a narrative choice that comes out of left field but that mirrors the real-world dilemma of women giving up promotions for fear that their careers might get in the way of parenting.

But we could argue that Leia's arc in Episode IX is clunky because Abrams had limited footage of the late Carrie Fisher. But what about the characters portrayed by living actresses?

There's Rose Tico, played by Kelly Marie Tran, who had a major role in The Last Jedi with an interesting arc of her own. Unfortunately, a vocal segment of Star Warsfans loathed the character and harassed the actress until she left social media. Things looked brighter when Abrams announced Tran would rejoin the cast in The Rise of Skywalker and that her role would be even better. She was billed as a general, an essential part of the Resistance; Tran went on a press tour and talked about the great feminine energy of the set. The comes The Rise of Skywalker, where Rose appears three times, speaks four lines, and is sidelined to the "really important job" of tech support, with her connection with Finn never addressed. In The Rise of Skywalker, Rose doesn't get romance, connections, friendship, a job, or a story of her own -- something that should please the most toxic fans.

Then there's Jannah, played by Naomi Ackie, another "strong female character." The twist this time is that, like Finn, she's a former Stormtrooper who mutinied and defied an order to kill a bunch of villagers. For a few seconds, her story is hopeful and fascinating, and teases the line from the trailer that "good people will fight if we lead them," that free will and the power of the individual are concepts that exist in Abrams' Star Wars.

How foolish of the audience to hold such hope. Jannah and Finn explain theyweren't the ones who decided to spare the innocent villagers; it was a feeling. The Force takes care of silly dramatic concepts like agency, choice and heroism. Jannah is not a good person because of her actions, but because the Force willedher to be one. The only funny thing about this depressing predeterministic twist is that it also works as an apt metaphor for the actions of the characters in The Rise of Skywalker, who do things not because they make sense, but because the script -- the Force -- says so. To add another nail to the coffin, The Rise of Skywalker Visual Dictionary hints at Lando being Jannah's father, yet another woman of Star Wars whose story doesn't matter unless she's related to a legacy male character.

Moving on, Keri Russell plays Zorii Bliss, a spice runner from Kijimi who essentially wears Leia's slave outfit, only with thermal underwear. Zorii's only purpose in the story is to provide a tragic background for Poe Dameron, as well as a potential love interest. She's also a glorified MacGuffin holder (twice!), and one of the many characters that Abrams fake-kills to ignite an emotional response from the viewer in a desperate effort to make Poe sympathetic. Zorii's role could have easily been filled by Rose, who was an actual tech whiz with a questionable past and a potential massive beef against Poe. After all, he's directly responsible for her sister's death.

Let's move on to Rey (Daisy Ridley), who is retconned from being a resilient orphan scavenger strong in the Force... to receiving her powers from a male bloodline. Now, to be perfectly clear, there's nothing wrong with overly dramatic space operas where everyone is related to a royal family, but this "reveal" goes against the premise of The Force Awakens and the heart of The Last Jedi, which proposes that anyone can be a hero.

There were no hints at all about this "twist" -- not in the movies, in the animated series or in the ancillary material, which makes it feel like a last-minute decision designed to appease those fans who accused Rey of being an overpowered Mary Sue, overlooking one of the most common Mary Sue tropes: their tendency to be secretly related to important canon characters.

Another Mary Sue trope exploited in The Rise of Skywalker, but that wasn't even touched in the previous two movies, is the female character sacrificing herself for the greater good, only to be saved at the last minute by a man, which is exactly what happens here. This double-whammy of "being powerful because of grandad" and "getting to live because of a man" is particularly egregious, and caters to no one, because of what happens right after Ben Solo sacrifices himself. We'll get to that in a moment.

Then there's the Force vision scene. Rey already had a trippy Force vision in The Last Jedi, a deep dive into an array of feminine symbology that she wasn't afraid to confront, from which she emerged heartbroken but stronger. In The Rise of Skywalker, this moment is undercut and shows Rey terrified of the darker, sexier, powerful version of herself, which is a hard pill to swallow. Rey explicitly says that she has nightmare visions where she and Kylo Ren are the evil Empress and Emperor of the Galaxy, linking the fulfillment of her desires to the galaxy's apocalypse. In Episode IX, romantic love is a flaw that the "strong female character" should overcome, but sex is pure evil.

Her visceral rejection of her dark side is also a 180 turn on her chill acceptance of her darkness in The Last Jedi. In the real world, women are taught from a young age to hide their negative feelings, to smile and live to be pleasant to everyone, to not be loud or angry or intense. That mentality only makes things easier for everyone in the world who is not a woman, and runs contrary to the quickly angered but enthusiastic scavenger of the previous two movies. However, by the end of The Rise of Skywalker, Rey has transformed into this Cool Girl version of Ideal Femininity/Strong Woman Character.

Ben Solo's death right after his redemption and first kiss should have been treated like a tragedy at least by Rey, and at least for one minute... but she does not react at all. The camera cuts from Ben's clothes folding as he disappears to Rey's neutral expression as she flies back to the Resistance. His death, and any emotional reaction that it might have caused in the protagonist, is not mentioned at all, which is baffling, to say the least. After a brief reunion with Finn and Poe, Rey immediately regresses on-screen to a lonely child on a desert planet, sliding down a Tatooine sand dune and negating her evolution for the last two movies, just so Abrams could throw in a homage to himself.

For the sake of argument, let's take Rey's reveal of her villainous ancestry at face value, and let's imagine that Disney had prepared this reveal from The Force Awakens: Her ending is still insulting, because it forces her to pay for the actions of her grandfather, despite having suffered as much as anyone from his evil ways. Palpatine's murderous pursuit of his son's family was what caused Rey to grow up heartbroken and abandoned on Jakku.

Rey longed for family and love her entire life; she jumped at the opportunity to establish a real connection with Han Solo, Maz Kanata, Finn, Leia, Luke and Kylo Ren, and in The Rise of Skywalker she looks longingly at the Pasaana children, clearly wanting a family of her own. Rey marveled at the green of Takodana in The Force Awakens and at the water of Ahch-To in The Last Jedi. Just like Anakin, she hated the desert. So why does the plot force her to go back to Tatooine to take on the Skywalker name, a planet where none of the Skywalkers, Organas or Solos were born; that Anakin and Luke longed to escape; where Shmi Skywalker was enslaved twice and then killed; and where Leia became Jabba's sex doll? Wouldn't it make more sense for her to head to verdant, watery Naboo, where both Palpatine and Padmé came from, the place where the latter wanted to raise her Skywalker twins?

But, no, Rey doesn't get to live where she would be logically happier, or where it makes sense; she goes where the fan service is stronger, and the twin suns of Tatooine were unparalleled -- until now. When an old woman asks Rey her family name, she answers "Skywalker," which doesn't hold up to close examination. Luke Skywalker refused to train her, Leia's name was Organa, Ben and Han were Solos, and she's standing on the Lars' buried homestead. And although it makes sense that she would lie about her true ancestry, denying the Palpatine name still reeks of burying her darker side, which worked really well for the Jedi Order.

Compare this ending of a lonely girl on a barren planet lying to strangers about her family name to the ending of The Return of the Jedi, where Luke, Han, and Leia are surrounded by life and celebration, and everyone is radiant with love and living family. Or compare it to the ending of The Last Jedi, where a Force-sensitive boy is looking up at shooting star. Or even the final scene of Revenge of the Sith, which takes place in the same spot after the fall of the Republic, the death of Padmé and the rise of Darth Vader -- but at least in that little spot there's love, family, life and hope.

Directed and co-written by J.J. Abrams, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker stars Daisy Ridley, Adam Driver, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Lupita Nyong’o, Domhnall Gleeson, Kelly Marie Tran, Joonas Suotamo, Billie Lourd, Keri Russell, Anthony Daniels, Mark Hamill, Billy Dee Williams, and Carrie Fisher, with Naomi Ackie and Richard E. Grant.

#the rise of skywalker #reylo

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englass · 5 years

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Threadbare

Pairing(s): John Seed x F! Reader/Deputy

Warning(s): A little bit of Possessive Behaviour near the end (when isn’t there in my fics haha)

Word Count: 9,101

A/N: Gonna use this opportunity to apologise to @starsandskies @softseeds and @seedlingsinner for not getting back to you on your ‘Last Line Meme’ tags, I’ve been working on this and didn’t want to risk spoiling anymore of it than I have 😅 Apologies again, lovelies! ❤️ Now, I hope you all enjoy this inconsistent mess; I’m just glad that it’s finally over!

Also, side note: this is the final/original version of ‘A Moment In Time’ that I never thought that I’d finish, so... yeah, I actually finished it; oops? 😅

- - -

The room is quiet, save for the gentle rustle of fabric and your calm breathing, only ever holding when your concentration tightens or a loud sound catches your ear. It’s a risky move you’re making, being here of all places. All it would take is one slip up and any patrolling Peggies would come running. In your current position, rifle resting just out of comfortable reach against a nearby night stand and hand gun securely holstered to your thigh, the potential outcome could be precarious.

Still, such thoughts are far out of mind. If anything, for once, your mind is not plagued by the worries, fears and demands of the people. It is quiet, tranquil, filled with an occupied motion that lulls and eases. It is the most peace you have had since this whole debacle began; and secretly, unknowingly even to yourself, you take your sweet time and milk it for all it’s worth. An unconscious action deeply needed.

Every so often you take stock, pausing to look, only to end up staring at nothing in particular, around the room you hold court in. It’s a surprisingly large room and it is as gorgeous and telling as the man it belongs to: all high-class with expensive taste, yet subtly simple – modest in design and openly exquisite in every minute detail. Almost everything, save for the immaculate wooden furniture and feather-soft carpet, falls within the spectrum of blue. It creates an oceanic space filled with a deep and enriching sense of stillness and liberation, emulating the ebb and rise of a tempered wave.

It’s an absent wonder why sloth is visualised as the coercing colour.

You shift slightly, readjusting your position as you turn back to the article of clothing in your lap, eyes layered with an embedded fatigue not aimed at anything in particular. The glaze is misleading, your movements speaking not of a tired body. Instead, they are easily measured with a humble confidence, working at a steady pace with a precise and focused concentration, all benign.

There is an edge of paranoia, sharp and teetering like the point of a knife. It fuels the anvil-heavy weight on your shoulders, makes it hard to breathe even the shallowest of breaths. Worry gnaws at your edges alongside its cutting twin. ‘What ifs’ are a dangerous line of thought, yet even with an empty mind it turns in the background, twisting and coiling like a viper as worry and paranoia feed and pamper it.

The stress of the situation – the position you’ve been made to hold, a final bastion in a red-dyed field – has left a very real and scarring impression upon you. A bitter taste you can’t wash out.

It’s why you draw out your time with a self-imposed task that could be over within a matter of seconds. You drown yourself in an old action and memory, away from the war you have been made charge of.

It actually makes for quite an interesting scene.

Away from the tragedy of a civil war and the reluctant role you play in it, in the confines of a grand modern home, one would see the image of domesticity. A young woman sat on a satin quilted bed, expression relaxed and eyes tinged with oblivion as they lose themselves in a rhythmic motion, effortlessly mending a piece of male attire with a needle and thread in hand. A simple kit that the young lady wields with a conviction that rivals that of a knight and his sword.

Yes, quite a scene it makes.

Admittedly breaking into the infamous Seed Ranch wasn’t the best place to host such an image, despite how well you fit into the frame (obscenely so), but it wasn’t your idea to come here in the first place. No, the Resistance has a way of... puppeteering you. Not that you would ever openly admit to such a thing.

Thankfully you have it on good authority – ‘it better be on good authority’, you had snarled, before stalking out of the door of the outpost you had been visiting – that the youngest Seed would be away for the day. Overseeing another load of confessions and such, you had no doubt. It would be the perfect opportunity to take the ranch for the Resistance; loot the cave while the dragon is away, so to speak. Perhaps that’s why, along with the decrease in guard numbers, you had somewhat made yourself at home, taking your time to slowly wander the grand ranch and really take it all in; all in its full and undisturbed splendour.

Arguably you could do so once it was under the Resistance’s control, it would be a lot easier and less stressful to do so then, but you are not naive enough to believe that they won’t change anything once it’s theirs. No, it’s better to see it as it’s intended to be, before that travesty occurs.

Yet, despite your initial wanderings into the many, many rooms around the ranch, it was John Seed’s bedroom – of all places – that had caught your eye. It is why you are currently perched contently on the man’s king sized bed as you tend absently to one of his shirts.

It’s truly silly when you think about it, it’s just a shirt after all, but it turns out that sewing your younger sibling’s toys and clothing growing up has ultimately left a very lasting impression upon you. You had found solace in the action growing up and you still felt it now, more so than ever with the violent turn your life has taken, and you wanted nothing more than a brief moment to try and capture that same tranquility once again.

Although, in all honesty, even you know that you’re not potentially endangering yourself like this for a reason so small and seemingly petty.

With your modest sewing kit on the night-table next to you, and the faintest whisper of the birds songs outside, you pause to look over your work. It’s not turned out too bad, it won’t be the worst you’ve ever done, but not the best either. Not that you believe for a second that John would actually appreciate the gesture, no matter how perfect it turned out.

John Seed, though mainly known for his slippery lawyer ways and role within the infamous Eden’s Gate, was a very rich man. His life before Eden’s Gate, before being reunited with his lost siblings, had him as a rather successful property attorney from what you’ve heard, and it’s from that life and accumulated wealth that’s allowed the project to get as large and domineering as it has done.

It’s also allowed him to lavish himself in some of the most luxurious, and most audaciously expensive, brands that you’ve never heard off. Not only was he good looking, tall and slim with a lean frame painted with tattoos and gifted with a pretty face home to a devilish smile, but he dressed impeccably well.

It was near impossible to not initially swoon at such a charming character, but sadly he was a bit of an open book. The exterior may be exquisite, utterly unique and persuasive in how it draws you in, but it’s too easy to read and you find it’s pages to be littered with an underlying venom and rage; a bitterness that may be understandable, but hardly justifiable.

It was actually quite sad when you chose to sit down and actually think about the man and his siblings, to sit down and try to read them as best as you could. Each of them were broken in their own ways, left in disrepair, from the lives they had lived. You had even gone so far as to read Joseph’s physical book, the bible by which Eden’s Gate knelt before, to see if it could tell you more. The question of how they became – how you know them to be – a guiding hand as you flicked through the yellowing pages and over painful words.

Theirs was truly a sad story.

Still, you know it is no excuse for what they have done, or what they continue to do; and yet there is a part of you that, secretly, knows that you do this simple gesture for more of a reason than out of habit or past influence. It’s a simple but nice gesture and, although you don’t feel like it’ll be appreciated, you’re sure it’s something that they – John in-particular and especially so – have never been given before. At least not willingly.

If anything, with how rich John is, you wouldn’t be surprised if he just brought a new shirt from an equally fancy, if not tear-inducingly expensive, brand without even batting an eye. That’s if he didn’t get it custom made. You’re pretty sure your average store doesn’t sell plane printed jackets and Eden’s Gate belt buckles after all.

Even so there’s no need to waste money, even if he can burn it and still be well off, when you can just as easily fix it. Besides, it’s actually a really nice shirt. Even with its predictable colouring.

Despite all the terrible things the man has done, and will no doubt continue to do, you can’t help the small smile that blooms across your lips. The knowledge that the Baptist, the dreaded Reaper, of Eden’s Gate has a favourite colour and is so shameless in embracing it is strangely humanising to you; and also surprisingly sobering.

At a leisurely pace, mind now hollow with an echoing sorrow, you pierce the fabric and loop the needle through the gap between the strand of thread and pull, creating a knot. You do this a second time, creating another knot to make sure it stays, before you reach for the small scissors in the kit beside you, cutting the remaining thread loose.

With a soft touch you run your finger over the fabric, silently marvelling at its heavenly texture as you thoughtfully look over your finished work. The thread you’ve used isn’t as high quality as the shirt itself is made out of, a fact that actually irritates you, but it’s the best that you own and you find yourself sighing in resignation; leaving it be.

Yes, it’ll have to do.

With a lingering gaze you start to slowly turn the shirt back to being inside-in, taking your time to enjoy the quiet that’s fallen over you. It’s only as you go to straighten the shirt, holding it out in front of you and giving it a final, critical look-over, that the silence breaks and you’re startled out of your revere.

Looking toward the bedroom’s door with wide doe-eyes you are shocked to see none other than the Baptist, John Seed, himself standing at the threshold. Eyes equally as wide, but much more bemused than your own, staring at you as you internally curse your luck with a tensing jaw.

He isn’t supposed to be here...

“You know, I must admit, Deputy,” he drawls with an intriguing lilt, ocean eyes dragging over you as he leans his lithe form against the door frame with crossed arms, completely at ease despite the situation, “I never pegged you for a housewife. It makes for quite an... interesting image. Did you also happen to cook me a meal and do the laundry by chance, darling?”

His smile is mocking, sharp and cruelly delighted, and it has you flushing in a mixture of shame and restrained anger. The fact that you’ve been caught in such a position puts a nasty dent in your pride. You know how this looks: the fearsome Deputy, poster child and head of the rising Resistance, sewing; and not just sewing, but sewing the damned enemy’s – a man on your given blacklist – shirt of all things.

It’s a colossal embarrassment.

You’re also aware of what this could do to your reputation if this got out and you don’t need John Seed, the smuggest bastard around, to gloat over that. Nor do you want him making smart quips that you know he’s more than likely going to constantly torment you with now over the radio for everyone else to hear.

Life’s a living hell at the moment as it, and you don’t need something like that being added to the proverbial pile. The humiliation would kill you quicker than a piece of shrapnel from a plane crash.

“Oh shut up,” you snip, “like I’d do you the honour; and if anyone makes for an interesting image around here it’s you, unexpected as you are,” you sass lowly. “Honestly, when are you going to do us all a favour and just fuck off. Maybe you should go and play with that little toy collection of yours like a good little brother instead of harassing all of us, now that would be an interesting image.”

It’s hardly even a half-baked comeback you give him, your bite a mere brush of teeth, yet it’s still enough for his expression to turn into something testing. A tick in his jaw as his icy eyes pierce you like a needle, pinching and uncomfortable; attention grabbing in the worst way possible.

The look is near enough water off a duck’s back. If you’ve come to learn anything from your few, but nonetheless taxing interactions with the man, it's that he won’t take the risk of action unless he’s a hundred percent certain that he has you right where he wants you; where you can’t or won’t fight back.

He wants things, people and confessions alike, handed to him on a gem encrusted platter. Given to him so he can play his twisted little games and break all his new and precious little toys. Always pushing past limits and breaking you down until you can do anything else, but give him exactly what he wants. Spoiled brat.

Perhaps John isn’t as absolved of his sin, carved into his chest like a fatal warning, as he thinks he is.

Closing his eyes John kisses his teeth with a restrained annoyance that is difficult to miss. For all his talk of wrath, and how well you embody it, he puts you to shame in how well it suits him, wearing it like a second skin and parading it like a model wrapped in Prada.

“As much as I’d love to spend my free time doing things that don’t concern you or your petty Resistance, it’s a bit too late for that now, isn’t it dearest,” he hits back with a chilled, but airy quality. “After all, you’ve made yourself quite a fixture in my life as it is, and I don’t believe for a second that you’d actually want out of that.” There’s a hint of something knowing in his words that doesn’t sit right with you. “And in case you haven’t noticed, but this is my home that you’re trespassing in. I’m pretty sure you’re breaking the law actually; you hardly have a warrant after all, Deputy,” he bites, cruel and vile and so self-satisfied.

For a brief moment the twins of worry and paranoia raise their heads with salivating jaws, itching like an infection to tear into you as you suddenly start to fret over John’s motives for this back and forth; along with the simmering anger that lurks beneath the water.

The anticipation of what his next rage fuelled actions could be is rattling. You can’t tell if he’s going to laugh this all off like some sort of bad joke or straight up lunge at you with the likes of a wild animal by the end of this. He can be rather unpredictable, and it’s that unpredictability that makes him so feared throughout the Valley. It’s what makes him so dangerous.

Yet it seems you can do nothing but poke the bear lately, your own frustrations and stresses giving you a false and reckless bravado. Albeit with a soft and unthreatening tone.

“And do I look like I care? We’re at war John, I’m pretty sure anything goes; your methods have already proven that. Now, are there any other normal past-times that you want to mock me for while I’m here, or am I free to go?”

Internally you wince. That came out a lot more defeated than you intended it to be. Still, you hope he at least concedes on this petty back and forth of yours and actually lets you leave–

“I’d hardly call your level of wanton wrath ‘normal’, Deputy. Tell me, what is your total body count at the moment? How many innocent lives have you gorged yourself on in order to fuel that gluttonous soul of yours, until it’s satisfied with the carnage you leave in your wake? Don’t worry though, you’re in safe hands. I’ll be sure to give your soul a good scrubbing once I get you in my chair. Starve it out of you until you bleed across my floor...”

You don’t say anything, merely roll your eyes and gently shake your head at the flip in attitude, continuing to look and touch up the shirt in your tender hold. He’s likely lost in his own warped thoughts if the way he stares through you for moment is any consolation. However, even lost in thought, you’ve found that John is not one to keep quiet for long, and he quickly proves that notion right.

“You know,” he says suddenly, conversationally; tip of his tongue wetting his lips as he looks for all the world like he just discovered the weight of gold, “if you wanted to confess to me you could of just called. Really, you needn’t go through all this trouble just to make my life easier, darling. I could have set up a welcome party and everything for you. Pulled out the red carpet, set it all up and made it all nice and perfect, for you... just for you, Deputy.”

It doesn’t make sense to you how he can warp what strangely sounds like the most sweetest and innocent of words into something so filthy, sinful and ultimately twisted; as if whispered around a forked tongue made of false promises and sugared venom. He’s an expert at his craft, you’d give him that. Sadly though you can’t help but skim over your absent companions playful jabs and blasé observations with a newfound air of caution.

The beast of worry looks at you with a telling, razored grin.

“... Flattered,” you drawl warily.

For such a simple and plain response you don’t feel that his boyish grin – filled with an emotion that is so foreign on the sadistic and calculating man that you feel the lazy shift of fear beside the intent prickle of paranoia and worry; something self satisfying and grateful and speckled with awe – is justified.

Like the flippancy of the wind John’s expression shifts, fluidly, into an emotion akin to a played up indignation. He sharply huffs through his nose.

“You should be. I make so many exceptions for you my dear and you do nothing but repay my kindness with more bloodshed. It’s rather rude of you in fact.”

“To be fair,” you cut in with a tired glower, careful with were you step in this game of twister, “your kindness leaves much to be desired. It’s not like anything I’ve ever seen, so forgive me for misconstruing your intentions.” It’s said with the most blatant sarcasm, dripping thickly like molten tar, and yet John lights up like a town on the eve of Christmas. The remains of his coiled agitation shifting into an unwarranted giddiness.

Good Lord, you’ve not even spent five minutes with this man and already you’ve got a killer headache.

“Oh? Should I learn by your example then, my dear Deputy? From this... quaint little gesture of yours, hmm?” He’s eyes hungrily roam over your lap, no doubt acutely aware of the way your thumb has comfortingly been brushing over the silken fabric of his shirt. “Not to say I don’t appreciate it mind you.”

You can’t stop the roll of your eyes nor the huff that accompanies it. “Trust me, John, there’s no gesture here.”

He makes a sound in his throat, chimed with a badly contained mirth. Slightly, barely visible from your perch on his bed, he leans forward with something almost predatory in those sea-deep eyes of his. “Then what’s that in your lap?”

You turn to hold his gaze, icy and sharp with a smugness that screams of a known victory. He’s got you there. Your teeth grind into each other as you will for a retort to come to mind, but nothing does. With a heavy exhale through your nose you turn to the ceiling and pray for the strength to survive this ordeal.

Not that you’re completely confident that you will. With a swift flare of frustration one of your hands shoots up, palm facing skyward, in a half-arsed admission. “I don’t know. I don’t know, okay, I was just trying to be nice I guess.”

“Nice? You?” John barks mockingly, “Oh don’t make me laugh, Deputy. You’re a killer; there’s not an ounce of mercy in that tainted soul of yours. After all,” There’s a humourless chuckle, a glint of something vicious in his sea-deep eyes, “what ever happened to serve and protect?”

The look you throw him is completely disbelieving, practically aghast from insult, but there’s also a familiar rage resting within the glaring pools of your eyes that John knows rather well. Truthfully, it’s not something he’s ever seen in you before, more a muted irritation than straight up fury, and it thrills him something fierce to see it threatening to come into full bloom.

Conflict has never been in your veins. You came from a quiet and career driven family, to the point where your parents were hardly ever around. Arguments were rare, and if they did happen they never lasted long. You didn’t have the courage, nor stomach, for such things; and despite how much this County has twisted your placid instincts into something sharper, more aggressive and impatient, some things will just never change.

Lips in a tight line, brow furrowed and eyes ablaze in a dirty glare, you look away from him; down to your lap then across to your resting rifle. He’s not wrong, and ultimately that hurts worse than anything physical that he could very well do to you. The battle of your morals – your conscious – against your duty, against the pedestal that everyone has hoisted you up onto like some sort of savour – another Joseph almost – , is a constant one.

“Then what does that make you?” You ask quietly, something cruel lurking beneath the surface of your own waters. “What makes what you do so good, so much better and different than everyone else? Because you believe your brother, because he believes he talks to God?” There’s a huff of a laugh, a mocking condescension hissing with fangs bared, “don’t make me laugh, Inquisitor.”

John’s away from the door frame before you can even blink, a warning shift that tells you that this is no longer a strained, but casual banter between enemies. There’s a familiar glare in his eyes, dark and treacherous like the deepest waters and daring you to get a little closer, to swim a little deeper; to say another word against his brother.

Despite your writhing worry at the sudden tension in the air, twisting and flailing and coiling, you take a deep breath, let it suffocate you a moment too long, and then let it go. Tracing the lines and scratches on your rifle as your shaking anger lessens into a quiet ache. You’ve never been able to maintain it for long; you’re just glad that it no longer makes you break down crying anymore.

John on the other hand...

“Joseph,” he starts, voice so tight that it trembles, “wants to save people.”

“And you don’t?”

There’s a pause; a subtle shift.

You watch as John’s jaw gets tight, his head tilting the slightest amount to look down his nose at you; arms crossing over his chest in a defensive gesture as he leans back against the door frame again; a faux display of casualness.

It’s all the answer you need.

Slowly you nod your head, an acknowledgment even though you needn’t give one. A murmured ‘right’ scoffed under your breath. In all honesty you didn’t expect him to be so (indirectly) honest with you. In a way you can very much respect that, appreciate it even, but in another it only has the beast of worry grinning hauntingly at you; a new dread crawling up from the deep. It’s twin sewn from paranoia slinking up beside it with an equally telling flash of teeth.

Surely he can’t be doing this just for Joseph, just for the Project; there has to be something more that he’s gaining out of this. There has to be.

“Atonement,” the word is drawn out, a slow and delicate dissection, “is the absolution of sin… without it we are left to fester in the disease of our past transgressions. If we are not absolved of sin then we can never even begin to hope to be allowed entrance into Eden. However,” the baptist gives you a pointed look, head ducked and eyes alight but shaded, a stray strand of hair falling loose, “that decision must be genuine. They must want to atone, otherwise what would be the point?”

There’s a bitten laugh that scraps between his teeth; bared in a feral frustration that speaks of long talks and discussions that lead to nowhere but dead-ended roads. A hand claws through his hair, putting that stray strand back in place as he looks to bite at the inside of his mouth; eyes briefly cast to the side.

The afternoon sun, gradually turning richer as time goes on, catches against the satin blue of his vest, making it shimmer like the clearest of Caribbean seas. With his gaze turned away from you for the moment you can see the way the light glazes them, can see the hellfire for all it’s worth beneath those choppy waters; the rage given a flare of new life with the setting sun as the shadows stretch and consume, turning the once clear and shallow waters of his eyes deep and foreboding.

You think you may actually be starting to see some of the truths that lie within the Book of Joseph.

There’s a hesitant inhale; a steadying breath.

“But, it is the will of The Father to save everyone, regardless of if they are worthy of it or not.”

Looking away from the shirt still in your lap you turn to John, many questions on the brain, but only one that gets voiced.

“So you don’t think I’m worthy?”

John blinks. A moment of consideration before he meets your curious gaze; stars glinting against a multitude of emotions, all buried and unspoken, but telling all the same.

“I don’t think you believe yourself to be worthy.”

The bluntness of his response catches you off guard, eyebrows jumping high in surprise. It’s straight to the point in a way that you never imagined him to be, and you can’t help the interested ‘oh’ that melts on your tongue in response, lilts in newfound curiosity as your head tips to the side ever so slightly. “What makes you say that?”

You half expect a smile and some sort of jab, another dig to attempt to provoke you and prove a point that only he is fighting to prove. Yet, he does nothing of the sort. He’s quiet, simply watching you, and it’s with a strange type of realisation that you realise that, not only is he back to looking relaxed and at ease, but so are you; the tension lost and in its place lies a peculiar air, a feeling of contented melancholy almost; an accepting moment of reprieve within the wheel of fate.

“You’re still here,” he answers simply, an airy awe cushioning his tone, “if you didn’t want to be convinced then you would have left a while ago. You wouldn’t be asking me in the first place.”

There’s a tightening anxiety in your chest, a truth struck too close. Are you really that easy to read? Is your dissatisfaction and growing suspicion of the Resistance – coupled with your thirst to learn more about the local cult and its founders – really that obvious? You should hope not, such things will get you into trouble if you’re not careful. Satisfaction over discovering such things would certainly not bring you back if that were the case.

“Tell me, Deputy,” there’s a new glint in John’s eye, a new interest piqued, “what is it that you’re looking for exactly? Because whatever it is apparently can’t be found within your little Resistance, otherwise you wouldn’t be entertaining me like you are, nor would you be concerning yourself over such a touching gesture.” Surprisingly there’s a lack of sarcasm to his tone this time around as he loosely gestures toward your lap, where his shirt still lies under your gentle touch.

You suck on your tooth for second, petulantly glancing away with a quick, but weak rebuttal of, “It’s not a gesture.”

A familiar, if not slightly fonder and more teasing, lopsided smile lights up across John’s face. This strange companionship of yours back on steady waters. “If you say so, my dear.”

The warmth of the gradually setting sun is a welcome blanket at your back, the stillness between you both comfortable despite the different lines you draw and stand on in this war. Faintly you can hear the chatter and motions of the guards outside, the rumble of distant engines, but they quickly fade into the background as you genuinely consider John’s words.

Just what are you looking for?

You’re not too sure, and you don’t suppose John would appreciate such a response no matter how honest it may be. Really, if you were to be insanely honest with yourself, you would guess you are looking for a reason to stop; a reason to turn your back on those you are fighting for and not those who you are fighting against.

No matter how many times you humanise the Seeds, excuse their actions on past situations, you can’t justify what they’ve done. You may one day forgive them, when all is said and done and this whole sorry war is nothing more than a story for the grandchildren; but you could never forget the horrors they have put people through, the uncountable and unimaginable things they have done to get to where they are now; to both you and the residents of the County.

Yet, does that justify what the residents of the County have done? Does that excuse the crimes and damages conceived by the Resistance? No, no if things were even a sliver close to normal, if you were actually a proper deputy and not so damn green, then maybe everyone would of been locked behind bars by now; and you would be no exception, right beside them with blood covered hands.

The world has never looked so grey to you as it does now; and that honestly scares you worse than any cult.

“But please,” John continues after a beat, breaking the silence, “indulge me; what is it you’re after, my dear? What is it that you are really searching for?”

Absently your thumb brushes over the fabric in your lap, a heavy hesitancy causing you to take your lip between your teeth, biting at the skin there until the taste of copper hits your tongue. Eyes downcast as you debate with yourself over how honest you can be with John, how raw you’re willing to let yourself became in front of someone like him; as an enemy, as an ex-lawyer and – maybe, just maybe – as a friend.

You look up at him, see the interest and something else that you can’t quite name dancing like fireflies over a lake’s still surface. Watch as he patiently waits for you, for what you think and have to say… It’s a nice change, if not a little strange.

Without a thought you smile at him, a beam too tight that it doesn’t quite reach your eyes, a huffed laugh under your breath. “Nothing much,” you squeak, “although a decent meal would be a start.” The laugh lingers on your breath, eyebrow cocked and lips tilting into lopsided smile; an intended joke.

John looks wholly unimpressed at your bid at humour, his own eyebrow raising casually in a silent question. Surprisingly though he doesn’t say anything in response, doesn’t call you out or outright accuse you of lying, even though you both know that you just did.

Ultimately, it leaves you with a new type of uncertainty, anxiety rising once again as the smile slowly falls from your face. Still, you push past it as best you can, clearing your throat awkwardly as you decide to stand from your seat on the bed, looking and then making your way toward the set of draws on the left where you had found his discarded shirt.

You feel, but still try to ignore John’s eyes on you as you place the shirt back in (what you hope is) its original resting place, neatly folding and fitting it between others not unlike itself. Briefly you brush your fingers over the collar, savouring the uniquely expensive feel of the shirt before closing the open draw. No doubt you’ll never get an opportunity like this again. It’s a little sad in a way.

With a quiet hum you turn – back facing John – toward the bed, and with a casualness as if you own the place you start brushing down and straightening where you’d been perched on the edge of the bed, smoothing out the creases.

Admittedly, with the sudden lack of conversation, John’s silence is really starting to get to you, a familiar edge of paranoia creeping into the forefront of your mind like scavenging rodents. You listen with a keen interest as you finish your work, the rustling of fabric and your own soft breaths the only sounds that really catch your ear.

With your back facing the infamous Baptist you would have thought this would be a great opportunity for him, your more laidback and docile nature on full display for him to take advantage of if he so wished to. It really would be a perfect opportunity.

Yet, as you turn around, once more with a hum at your work, you find that John hasn’t moved from his spot in the doorway. If anything he still looks very much at ease there, completely comfortable and unconcerned as he rests his lean frame against the door, arms and legs casually crossed as he simply watches you with soft eyes; reflective pools that refuse to hide even the tiniest of emotions. Yet, strangely enough, you suddenly feel as if time is impervious to the both of you. As if there is no one else in the world, but you and John.

The sparkling sapphire of his eyes, deep and as unfathomable as the ocean, whisper in dulcet tones the promise of a loving caress within the safe haven of his gaze. An unexpected gentleness in the sorrow of a buried plea, a want for something never owned, but always craved. Such a display of tenderness, from a man that you know to be cruel and volatile at times, is so far removed from the usual turbulent seas in his eyes that it makes you feel breathless.

His face – strong defined jaw, coupled with an immaculately trimmed beard, and skin a naturally tanned hue that looks as smooth as the silk of his shirts – is not masked by barely contained snarls of rage like it often can be, nor the sharp displays of malicious mockery and petulant pleasantries that hiss between his fangs when bared. Instead he bears a freedom and fondness that has your heart racing, a strange vulnerability on his suddenly boyish features; an unfamiliar, yet not unpleasant, warmth stroking over something deep within your chest that you had feared you were starting to lose.

A thought skims across your mind, and is banished just as swiftly as it had appeared; but even so it leaves an impression that you can’t help but entertain. No matter how futile and unachievable it may be; a hopeless romantic forever at heart.

Lost in fanciful scenarios that will never come to be you don’t notice the way that John also takes you in, cataloguing every minuscule detail and committing it to memory with a keenness that rivals the amount of silver on his tongue.

With where you stand, still and serene in the heart of enemy territory, the large window of his bedroom holds proudly behind you. The fading afternoon sun casting a light pastel orange across the earth and room, beaming through the glass and haloing you in a warm and intimate glow, your form mesmerising and ethereal with how at peace you look when held within such a divinely born light.

Your eyes, typically brimming with a wrathful defiance and a gluttonous need for misguided justice, are a demure beacon that glitters like the limitless galaxies within the cosmos. A flare of hope and unconditional love, soft and reassuring, for all of those that catch a glimpse of your guiding starlight. And although he feels unworthy, tainted and irrefutably damaged as he is, John also feels unbelievably blessed to bare witness to such an otherworldly sight; to be gifted with the absolute vision that is you.

And, for a moment that never quite ends, John can’t help but question how you could be hell-incarnate when heaven touches you oh so sweetly.

There are many words John Seed would have used to describe you, none of them necessarily complimentary or flattering, yet in this shared time between the two of you – just the two of you – only one word comes to mind as he unknowingly, longingly gazes at you.

Angelic. Yes, angelic you truly are. Stunningly and perfectly angelic.

John can’t remember the last time he felt this way about anyone, if he has ever felt like this at all even, but suddenly he finds that nothing else matters to him. Not the Project, not his brothers, and not even the work that he should be doing but that he had slipped away early from, because – frankly put – he was tired. He was as fed-up with this war and the responsibilities placed upon him as he suspected his dear Deputy to be. Both falling foul to your shared sin of sloth in regards to the duties you uphold.

Yet, John at least holds direction and dedication to the work divinely placed upon him. Knows what the end game is and strives to achieve it to its fullest potential, but you? You’re wavering; you’re doubting. Straying away from the path you are on, looking into the distance for something else, all the while refusing to even acknowledge the right one. The one alongside him.

You may not say it, nor ever even admit it, but John knows exactly what it is you are looking for. Knows the evidence that you’re desperately trying to compile in order to build a strong case in favour of yourself and the choices that you’ve been making, wanting to justify yourself and the many actions that you’ve made until this point between you both in the name of your feeble Resistance. And John also knows that he and his siblings are partially to blame for that.

If it wasn’t for them, you wouldn’t have to try and stand alone for yourself in your own self made courtroom. Wouldn’t have to stand before your self-conscious as you pleaded your guiltlessness before your own guilt. But, really, that’s why you needed a lawyer; that’s why you needed him. John could help you with that, could show you a better path where you could be free of such shackles. He would stand and defend you where no one else would; he would protect you when no else could.

He just wished that you’d let him. Wished that you would just sign the contract laid out before you so he could aid you, so he could fight for you. Yet, you still refuse to bless him with the payment of his favoured word. You still refuse to acknowledge just how in debt this battle will leave you without his help. It’s a small ask, a tiny payment, for a lifetime of rightful assurance.

Yet, John wonders if maybe it’s not just the courtroom that he wants to defend you in.

In his previous life, before the Project and his reunion with Joseph, John likely wouldn’t have even paid you a second glance. You’re a bit of a Plain Jane, have a very girl-next-door sort of look about you. Yet, in the wake of this interaction, bathed in the golden hue of the setting sun, John can’t think of anyone more beautiful. So human and down to earth; lost and conflicted, yet certain and firm. You really are an oddity, and one that John finds himself genuinely wanting to learn more about.

True, he had always had an interest in you, especially when this war between you first began, but it had always been a professional interest (despite what many thought or claimed). You needed to join the Project, Joseph decreed it so, and although his interest had risen to a slightly more personal level it was still business; without you he wouldn’t be able to reach Eden. His fate was in your hands.

Yet, fate seems to want to play you both into each other’s arms, for if it didn’t then surely this sacred moment between you both wouldn’t be happening. Surely, if this wasn’t meant to happen, John wouldn’t be longing for the love that Joseph promised him – the love that only you could give him – like he suddenly and hopelessly is.

John knows where he stands in this war, it’s a fixed point that he can’t move away from even if he eventually decided that he wanted to, but really his dear Deputy is still undecided. You still have a choice to make in this divine plan; you still have time to choose. And, funnily enough, it looks as if you’ve already started to make that choice. That curiosity of yours, you being in his home – on his bed – looking so domestic, like a wife waiting for her husband… to John this is a sign, a hint, a mere taste of the future that he’s always secretly hoped and longed for. A prophecy in its own right.

Yet, as much as he wants to fight for you, to defend and cherish you, he regrettably knows that the time for such things isn’t quite here yet. It’s close, certainly within his reach, but you need to meet him the rest of the way. You need those final damning pieces of evidence before you’ll come to him. You’ll want every piece of evidence available before you’ll walk your chosen path; and although he shouldn’t interfere, John could very easily acquire such evidence for you. He could very easily make such evidence for you. A little more time, a few strings pulled and a couple of sins stripped, and he could give you everything you need and so, so much more.

The temptations of the promised future are a fruit too sweet not to savour.

Eden’s Baptist watches with a fresh interest as you sigh heavily, chest rising and falling with the action, as you start to walk towards him. John’s chest tightens, flutters under the way your sparkling eyes meet and hold his own, only a hint of uncertainty, a fleeting touch of something questioning – do you feel it too? Do you feel this like he does? – on your face before you look away, glance down like a bashful bride, and come to stand next to him.

He doesn’t move from where he’s been leaning against the door, doesn’t even dare to breathe in case this moment is blown away like ash on the wind. Yet, when nothing happens and all he can focus on is his and your own gentle breathing, he takes a gamble and swallows thickly, slowly turning his head so he can look down at you next to him, naturally pretty despite the odd scratch and speck of dried blood on your well worn clothes.

The tension is palpable between you both, not so tight that’s it choking you, but tight enough that you can certainly feel it; hear it moan like a bow dragging steadily over a cello’s strings. Although, not as ominous as one would first suspect, but more melancholy; a rich sadness. As though despite how much you might want and wish for something, it will never come to pass; a sad inevitability that you can do nothing but walk past, never to stop and consider. Or at least you shouldn’t, for only heartbreak lies down those withered and desolate roads.

Which is why you shouldn’t stop, why you shouldn’t be wanting to reach out with a tender touch, a reassurance to this greedy want of yours for something more out of this moment, for more out of this strange connection and unlikely companionship you have discovered between the two of you. You shouldn’t feel this safe when standing next to the man that wants to starve this Valley into submission. You shouldn’t feel so at ease around a man that derives a sick thrill out of torture and the power it gives him. You shouldn’t feel like you’ve finally found a home when you’re sitting on his bed with his shirt in your arms.

You can’t deny that you’re attracted to him, that there clearly is some sort of unexplainable connection between the both of you, but whatever this connection may be… it can never be explored. It can never happen. You will never side with Eden’s Gate, and even if you decide that you can no longer be with the Resistance, it’ll be for the same reason why you can’t join Joseph’s cult. Ultimately, your decision, whatever it may be, will change nothing. Just like nothing will change John’s decision.

Ruled by the cry of your heart and the attachments it’s quick to make you hesitantly lay your greedy hand upon him, turning slightly as your right hand crosses you in order to gently grip his toned arm; the familiar feel of uniquely expensive silk sliding pleasantly

against your skin.

You feel him tense under your hand, arms tightening from where they are still crossed across his chest, but you don’t blame him. Really you’re not even too sure what it is you’re doing, this will only hurt you more when you walk away from whatever this could’ve been if things were different, but you always have had a bit of a penchant for torturing yourself with things like this.

So no matter how much the ‘what if’s’ will wound you in the future you still immerse yourself in the feel of him, of the way he relaxes as your thumb brushes back and forth in a comforting gesture against his arm, the smell of his cologne naturally intermingling with his natural scent… it’s a bitter torture that already has the tears coming to your eyes, but still you stay a little longer; heart hopefully romantic even though you know better.

This – the two of you – could never work.

“Deputy…”

“You know,” you cut him off, the slightest fracture in your softened tone, “I didn’t mean what I said earlier, about your planes. They’re not toys; they’re really cool actually,” there’s a buried laugh under your breath, a small smile that speaks of a brief reminiscion, “the way you have them all set up, cataloged with their little name plates… it’s really cute. It would be super cool if you had them hanging down from the ceiling though; like, having them act out dog fights and things almost. Can you imagine it?”

You giggle there, head ducking as you get lost in thoughts and bitter imagines – helping to set them up, walking in and seeing them like that, being lifted and twirled under them like stars in the sky – that will never be.

This war has taken everything from you, has made you doubt and lose sight of who you were before. Even your dreams for the future, regardless of who they may be with, have been tarnished by the stains on your hands and the things you have been pushed into doing. How could you ever have a normal life after this? Who would want a life with you after all of this? It all seems so impossible and far too far out of reach for you now.

Although it may be cruel, your wandering thoughts and the reminder they bring is a good grounder, and in turn your smile sours; even as one blooms sweetly across John’s face, a light dusting of pink across his cheeks.

For the better, you don’t see it.

“Anyway, I better go; got a County to save and all that after all. I’ll see you around though, John,” you pause, hesitate, desperately cling to this fleeting moment that’s finally reached its end, “take care of yourself now, sweetheart. Lord knows we need to...”

With nothing else to say, that quiet piece of compassion laid out before him like a final offering, you leave; letting go of his arm with a parting squeeze and a faint caress as you pull away, walk past him and out the door until you’re eventually lost to him yet again. A weary ghost bound to forever wander the lonely battlefield.

John doesn’t follow you, doesn’t even reach out to stop you like a part of him begs him to do, and instead merely turns to watch you leave. Head down and arms wrapped comfortingly around your waist. He really should stop you, force this moment to last for as long as he can get it to, but he doesn’t; and that surprisingly hurts him, letting you go. Yet, the pain it brings only hardens him, makes his thoughts straighten and become resolute in the face of the same realisation that had dawned on him only moments before hand.

And as the sun sets over the horizon, the sky streaked in sunburnt northern lights, colours shifting like water with the flowing of time, John finally moves to sit in the same place you had been on his bed; alone and lost in thought. Reaching out to pick something up off his nightstand as he draws his elbows to rest on his spread knees. His hands cupped against his mouth and securely around your forgotten sewing kit, as he stares blankly at your abandoned rifle.

Another sign in and of itself.

Although you hadn’t been looking at him when you had left John had certainly been watching you. He had seen the way that your eyes had glistened like unsteady waters as the courtroom erupted into a debate that you felt that you couldn’t win; the choice taken from you as your morals and exploited loyalty raged and dictated the sentence you should face.

He knows you felt it, knows that there is something special between the two of you, and that it’s taken this moment between you – this one act of rebellion stemmed from your curiosity – for him to see it; for him to finally grasp the meaning behind his brother’s plea.

You were right when you had questioned him on his lack of care regarding the Atonement; how he doesn’t care to save those that don’t believe, how he doesn’t want to put in the effort for those that will only put it to waste. If their motives are not genuine then the process is entirely pointless. Although, John won’t deny that there is a certain gratification in having such control over someone. Forcing them to say yes, purely for their own survival, is not the intention, but it certainly works all the same. After all, Joseph hasn’t exactly scolded him for his methods; especially if he gets a little therapy and self management out of it.

But what of you? What do you have as an outlet, as a way to cope and make the prize all the more sweeter? Better yet, what is the prize that you’re working towards, because John certainly has his in mind, and it won’t just be the end of a cruel and uncaring society.

You’re a puppet, both in terms of your occupation and the leading role you’re now being made to fill, dancing on fraying strings. Strings that John could fully free you from, help to cut you loose, if only you would just say ‘yes’. He’d be able to properly protect and defend you then, reassure you in your choices and how the things you’ve done were never truly your own; your caring nature merely exploited by those that you were forced to associate with while under the influence of shock. The trauma brought on by that helicopter crash disorientating you and leaving you vulnerable toward their manipulative and pressurising ways.

At least if you were to say ‘yes’, John would be able to safely guard you and your surprisingly tentative character. He would be able to love and cherish you, hold you close like no other, and make it so that you would want for nothing while in his arms. He could actually keep you in his bed, smother you in the pleasure that he would gladly give you as his beloved; chain you there as he ravished you and the softness that you would offer him, that you allowed him a tantalising glimpse of.

If you said ‘yes’, then John would finally be able to secure you and your loose strings, worn and threadbare under the continued pressure of your wailing guilt, to his own tangled ones; knotting them together until they have been sewn into something new, becoming one and the same. And when that finally happens, you will be entwined around a silk too rich and blissful to be so easily frayed.

#thank god it’s over #i’m done!#I’m not sure how I feel about this still #but then again i never think highly of my work so...#john seed x reader #john seed x female deputy #john seed x deputy #john seed #fanfic #fanfiction #my writing #fc5 #far cry 5 #far cry

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danielxrk · 5 years

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✞ SELF COMPOSED SONG * NEVER LOSE YOUR FLAMES ( so eat my dust, that's all i am, a speck out in the crowd )

daniel doesn't check his phone until after class is over, and when he sees that blinking email notification, he doesn't think much of it at first. it's not that he's forgotten about the mga auditions, moreso that he's so relaxed about it, he doesn't even think about when they'll get back to them. it's only when he sees who his recent email is from that his eyes widen. his next course of action is easy: high tail it off of campus and to the sharehouse where the rest of his bandmates live. they went into this together; it's only fitting that he opens this with them, too.

when he arrives, kenta and minhyun are sitting in the living room, staring at what daniel can only assume are their respective emails. he just stands in the middle of the room silently at first, looking between them, and figuring out where all of them are (woojin probably in his room-- safe bet) before he breaks out into a slow smile. "okay, let's do this!" he declares. "who wants to go first?" crickets. daniel still isn't too bothered, and it's unusual. typically, daniel is a bundle of nerves, even over mundane matters and things that ultimately have no lasting impact. an email that could change his entire life? no big deal.

the more he thinks about it, the more his supernatural confidence wavers, as thinking usually goes for him. "i'll do it," he offers regardless, before he slips even further and ends up cowering in fear within a few minutes. he drops his bookbag onto the floor in preparation. he doesn't know what to expect, truthfully. if the daniel of last year made it to callbacks, surely the daniel of today will too, but he knows he isn't talented enough to feel entitled to anything, and he doesn't. he heard all of the singers in that room, and was still struck by the same inferiority he felt the season before, suddenly unimpressed with what he thought was his tangible growth over the past year. he thinks he'll find peace with any result regardless, so he taps on the email on his phone, and reads it, scanning, expression concentrated before is eyes shift back to the expectant faces of his friends. "i got in," he says, completely straight faced before he ends up grinning. "sungwoon, i got in!" he yells, just in case the other didn't hear him from his place in the kitchen-- whatever he's doing in there.

he encourages the others to open their emails next with a level of exuberance only his closest friends ever see from him, even going as far as chanting “open it open it open it,” until they finally cave and listen to him. one more callback notice, and then another, and another and even if daniel had faith in all of them– believed they could make it this far –there was still a pessimistic part of him that translates to disbelief now. how lucky are they, that they make up five of 100 people? no, it’s skill more than luck. and probably the fact that they’ll make for good tv. that helps.

he's unbelievably, undeniably proud of them, and it takes a minute or two for it to really settle in. this isn't just going to be him and sungwoon, but all of them together, no one left behind, at least for one set of performances, and he'll savor it as long as he can. with this email, however, comes the realization that there's much work to do, in a relatively short time. ah yes, that part of the mgas. daniel can't say he missed it. he wonders if there's much about this process he missed at all, and briefly, why he came back. of course, there's the band, and the album, but underneath it all lurks the ever-present question: does he really belong here? he can believe he belongs on stages in dingy clubs, in between heavy bassline's and sungwoon's voice sinking into everything. he belongs there, but maybe not on a show of people wanting to be idols. then again, he's here because of where he belongs-- because they all belong on stage, playing their songs in front of bigger and bigger crowds, more and more love for all of the members, surpassing what he and sungwoon ever received on their own. that's why he's doing this, ready to go through the whole process over again, this time with a clear goal and the clear thought that this time, he knows what he's doing.

he stays over at the empty enigma sharehouse after he arrives, going through the notes app on his phone, full of potential songs he saved when he was trying to think of a song for his first audition. so many of them required a guitar accompaniment for him to keep true to himself, therefore couldn't make the first cut. i'm so tired ended up being one of the last songs he added to the list, and he settled on it almost immediately which leaves...several other choices. the standout pick is wasteland baby by hozier, but he fells some overwhelming, incapacitating fear when he thinks of actually performing it on stage, in front of the people that he knows will be there.

sungwoon. joohyun. in one room. all he can picture is both of them thinking any love song he performs is about them, and he knows what person every love song he hears is about today, and he can't bear to do that to the other one of them-- that false hope, that surge of emotion for reasons that aren't genuine. maybe it's mainly because he's scared to sing i'm in love, i'm in love with you. he could convince himself it's because he isn't ready for the plunge into the depths that those words are, but it might really be because he's afraid he means it. he's so scared to mean it.

so he leaves wasteland baby on the backburner for a time when he's braver-- a time where he's stronger, and not so weighed down by worry, and searches for his next best option, still sat in the empty enigma living room, staring intently at his phone. last year, he performed a song on his guitar in english, and he doesn't know how he can't do that this time, but it needs an upgrade. he thought of performing one of his own songs at the audition too, but again, wanted to wait for a time when he could marry it to some kind of instrumental, too determined to let their composition shine through too.

that thought still circles in his head: what did he miss about the mgas? and he finally finds his answer. he misses working toward the same dream together-- misses everyone banding together and helping one another despite it being a competition, and the bonds forged under unbearable stress and pressure, lasting relationships, and the experience. the growth. there's a song he wrote for that, not long after the mgas, not long after his mind and heart were dominated by sungwoon's sudden disappearance afterward.

the song: never lose your flames, about his feelings on the show, and his feelings about himself in general, and words he wanted to tell the contestants he shared his time with, among all of the doubt and the criticism. it only seems appropriate to bring out now, if he wants to stand out and show what he thinks he's good at. it's a step up from last year, and it reflects who he is better than anything else he could think of. he needs an acoustic arrangement, and thankfully, he started one back when empty enigma were still preparing for their album, while they were toying with the idea of a secret track-- something soft to contrast the rest of the album. in the end, it didn't make the cut, and daniel wasn't torn up about it; a better song did, and nlyf didn't quite seem to match as well with the rest. maybe it made more sense for daniel to sing it than sungwoon all along. cameo to sing it instead of squall, he means-- yes, of course.

so when woojin asks if he knows what he's performing on the very first day, daniel can honestly say he has something in his mind, and he doubts it'll change. he spends his time divided from the apartment with the guys and his own, finding comfort in working in the presence of his friends, even as they go about their practice individually, and finding solitude in the kind of work that can only really be accomplished alone. he retraces his lyrics, wondering if he should edit anything-- tweaks the arrangement to make sure it shows off his best sides, and will translate well to an audience instead of remaining a song on an album that would never be played live. the more work he puts into the performance, the more convinced he becomes that it's the right choice. not an easily misconstrued love song-- check. a teaser of what to expect on empty enigma's album? check. that's all he really needs.

he helps the others where they need it, playing the parts of his song he's worked through on his guitar in exchange for any help they may need, though naturally they don't need it, aside from kenta with a little korean pronunciation. maybe the others could use the help, and just don't want it from him. it's a disappointing thought, but one he keeps out of mind and doesn't allow it to trouble him too much. how much help could he really offer to kenta and woojin with their dancing, anyway? minhyun is fully capable of preparing himself, proving his slightly unexpected talent on their album and in all of their recent shows. sungwoon on the other hand-- well, daniel is a little afraid to find out what he'll be performing, so maybe it's best that he doesn't. regardless, the more time he spends with them, the more convinced he becomes that they'll all do well, and where he felt fear last year, he now feels excitement.

he trails minhyun and sungwoon into the venue, hovering behind them, like he can prevent some kind of tragedy should the keyboard fall and crush sungwoon beneath it's weight or something. he wrestles back and forth with whether he should offer his own hand to help, and even though minhyun at the least seems entirely capable, he still finds his hand supporting them from the back, and he releases as soon as they find their seat. it's somewhere in the middle of everything, equal parts close and far from the stage, and as he sits, he's satisfied.

it's minhyun, then him, then kenta, the sungwoon, and woojin follows, and this is probably for the best, as much as he desired to sit next to sungwoon. there's some inkling that he might need his space-- time to process, and as much as daniel feels the pull of his company, he wants to give him that, so long as he isn't wrong.

soon, the peace and comfort of the band's familiarity is disrupted, first by the group that sits behind them. he doesn't think much of the male that sits behind him, but the more of his friend group that trails in, the more unsettled he becomes. maybe it's just eunji. last time he saw her, she wasn't happy with him-- closer to livid, more accurately, because she realized he and cameo were in fact the same person. cameo, who flirted at empty enigma's comeback halloween show, too enthusiastically and overbearingly, and daniel, subdued regular of her mother's friendship, always soft-spoken and kind-- two distinctly different sides of the same coin. he doesn't blame her for her feelings, so he doesn't try to talk to her-- doesn't even try to look at her, and instead, faces forward, eyes fixed on the stage, determined not to drift to anywhere he may see her.

thankfully, minhyun's reliable presence beside him brings some comfort, as does kenta's talkative nature, and woojin's predictable safe distance from everything, whose company he still appreciates, and...sungwoon, whatever incomprehensible and powerful something that he is to him. soon they're joined by a stranger who seems immensely friendly-- hyunggu, he introduces himself, and daniel offers him a handshake and a smile, though slightly hesitant, despite his typical reservations of dealing with strangers and the discomfort of who exactly sits behind him.

equal parts thankfully and unfortunately, someone significantly more familiar slides into the seat directly behind him, and as he looks out of instinct, it's joohyun. he smiles upon seeing her on instinct, and she smiles back, and as bad as he should feel having both her and sungwoon in close proximity, in the moment he's just glad he doesn't have to worry about how she's doing by herself. here, he can see her, and proof that she's okay. her injury has been frightening, the termination of her trc contract distressing, and daniel tried to spend as much time with her as he could during her recovery, both so she wouldn't be alone and for his own peace of mind. he knew her tendency to push herself, and yet he...didn't stop her for signing up for the mgas despite likely not being fully recuperated. as much as he fretted over it, for the sake of her safety, he had to admit there was part of him relieved to have her, as horrible as he felt about it. here joohyun was, endangering herself, and here daniel-- someone supposed to take care of her --was, thankful that she was here, and that he didn't have to go through this show without her. somehow it gives him strength.

there's more though, two...vaguely familiar figures joining hyunggu in front of them, and it doesn't take long for daniel to realize who they are, despite not knowing their names, and their appearance is incredibly puzzling to him. he has mixed feelings: one, the guy that punched him in the face last year for no reason, and the other, a guy who got stood up for a date in the cafe daniel works at, then proceeded to dump his entire life story on poor daniel. both were incredibly surreal experiences, and he feels similar seeing them now. the life-story-sharer, who introduces himself as suwoong, swiftly apologizes to daniel for what he did to him upon recognition, and daniel simply smiles reassuringly. "it's alright. at least you got me out of making coffee," and honestly, daniel always appreciates that.

in between daniel talking to taeyang-- his gym buddy and guitar collaboration buddy, strangely both in one person --suwoong starts yelling over the row his bandmates are in to talk to eunji, and daniel grows rigid. life senses the opportune opportunity to shit on him, and yugyeom turns around then, with an attempt to...flirt with him? daniel wonders if he remembers what even happened last summer, and decides he must not, given how drunk he seemed that night. he tries to i'm-too-innocent-for-this and i'm-too-oblivious-for-this himself out of this dialogue, because he would like to be excluded from this narrative, especially right in front of the two people he's in love with, and-- wait, what?

it's all incredibly overwhelming, something like sensory overload, the front row too rambunctious and the back row too intimidating, emanating with some sinister energy that makes daniel certain he's being talked about unkindly. his eyes keep wandering to sungwoon, and he never catches him looking his way, and daniel frowns without intending, because he feels like just a look from him would give him some reassurance, though he writes it off as sungwoon feeling similarly to him. understandable. daniel understands all of it, even if he wishes they could be...he doesn't know what he wishes they could be. a little warmer, maybe-- a little closer, a little less like sungwoon feels so far away even when they're separated by mere feet.

joohyun leans forward then, and he feels it before he hears her somehow, her voice a whisper. "it's going to be mga8 by the time this is over," she says, and daniel laughs. "mga10," he corrects her. "you gonna be on that one too?" he almost feels bad, but he plays it off with a cheeky smile as he looks back at her, and she pushes him, so he laughs again, and he feels a little better. he can always count on her to show up at exactly the right time. their entire history is evidence.

suddenly, however, he's distinctly aware of sungwoon's presence, and the air feels heavier, and the ease slowly drains out of him, replaced with that ever well-known feeling of guilt, like a new friend he immediately hit it off with. no, the guilt isn't new. it's a new situation, but this feeling settled in him from somewhere close to the day he was born. he can't do anything without fear of hurting someone. he doesn't want to. he wants so desperately for everyone close to him to be happy; he never wants to be the reason for their pain, but he knows he is. maybe not to joohyun. he still doesn't know what she feels about him, even if she kissed him during the sn project finale. he wrote that off as a brief moment of impulsivity due to excitement, only for the sake of his own sanity. but there's sungwoon, and he knows better than to think he hasn't put him through the wringer-- knows he might still be doing it, even now. he knows that despite all of this, it was sungwoon he confessed to, not joohyun, and after some ruminating, he knows what that means, even if he's afraid to admit it.

finally, the real show begins, and shakes him out of his thoughts, and he's glad to focus on the entrance of the ceos. he's seen this all before, and it doesn't surprise him, but his eyes widen regardless, because he forgot how poised and respectable they look-- like they're shining, and even daniel, with his complete disinterest in idols, can't help but admire them. this ignites a burning desire to impress them, and he hopes at the very least, bringing them an original song will set him apart in their eyes. even more than that, he hopes they don't think his song is absolute garbage. that worry is unfortunately very real. everyone claps, and then the performances begin.

he watches with rapt attention at first, and if he wasn't distinctly aware of the strategically positioned cameras and microphones to catch every reaction of the audience (he was), he is now. he wonders how many of his conversations from earlier will air, and whether they'll paint him as a hero, villain, or some background character this time. the performances are good overall; mnet knew what they were doing when they narrowed down to this number, and then there are some that...are not. maybe they were kept for their personality (daniel can relate) or for humiliation on national television for the country's amusement. then again, maybe some of this audience will rank him among the performances that aren't good. all he can hope is that it's less of them than last year. he thinks it will be.

the longer time goes on, the more he's overwhelmed by the sheer volume of the row in front of them, so he turns his attention to kenta, bundle of energy he is, and he chats with him during breaks as distraction, and then in a low voice during performances, still giving those on stage the proper respect, of course. his eyes keep falling to sungwoon regardless, and he wonders if he's okay. he seems uncharacteristically quiet, but maybe that's just on account of daniel hogging kenta, though unfortunately, he's smart enough to not be fooled by is own excuses. half of him wants to ask him, and he leans forward in his seat to get a better look at his face, and maybe he's about to-- but something holds him back. he just wants to fix this, but knows better than to try now. are you okay? i love you, you know. i want you to be okay more than anything.

somehow, it's not in regards to his performance that he's at all shaken, and when so jisub calls his name for his performance, he stands with a smile. if he didn't have this subtle, indwelling confidence that surrounded him ever since he settled on this song, it would be kenta's squeeze of his hand, the pat on his back by minhyun, sungwoon's uttered good luck that puts any of his doubts in stage, and he slings his guitar over is shoulder.

everything is a little more intimidating on stage, and he makes the mistake of letting his eye rake across the audience, taking them in. this is the amount of people that will hear his own, personal, pain-stakingly written song. his gaze snaps back to the judges, and another smile blooms on his face when he meets so jisub's eyes. he wonders if so jisub is glad to see him again, after calling him a great contestant last year, even if it was paired with comments about the weakness of is voice. maybe the ceo held some small sliver of faith in him. he doesn't want to disappoint him.

"hi, i'm kang daniel," he greets, smile appearing once again. "you may remember me. if not, hopefully you will from now on," and he leans away from the mic, making final tuning adjustments on his guitar, and he realizes something-- adds: "for good reasons, i hope," and he laughs lightly. "i'll be singing an original song for you today. i hope you like it."

riddle me this, i gotta figure it out are they laughing at me because i'm prone to fear and doubt? am i messed up, am i loud? well, eat my dust, that's all i am a speck out in the crowd

usually daniel is crushed by insecurity. that was him, on this show last season-- in these shoes a year ago, shaking and uncertain. maybe it was his personal life in the past year that he could credit with his growth and new confidence, or perhaps it was this show itself, showing him he could stand on stage in front of a large audience-- as himself, not cameo --that did it. perhaps it was the aftermath, and the threat of his band falling apart that revealed how important music really was to him, and how important the people he made it with were. they're all here too, and he thinks that's why he can stand on stage like he belongs here. his eyes drift to all of them where they're sitting, and his lips curl up in a smile as he sings, before he faces forward again.

i'm trying to clean up the mess i made but the towel i used to soak up my worry it just went up in flames you see i got a conscience like gasoline i could siphon shit it out, get up and leave but, i fuel the fire with everything they said it's stuck in my mind you're better off dead

he originally wrote this part with criticism from the mgas in mind, but it grew into a different animal-- all of the criticism in his life that built and built until it stitched itself into the fabric of his existence, self-replicating without anyone else's help. he edited the words here in his mga version, necessarily, replacing the previously explicit version with something more family friendly, and it's amazing how comfortable he feels here, behind his guitar, singing his own words. originally, this verse built into the chorus, but for this two minute arrangement, it goes on, building up even more.

feeling like i’m nothing’s something that i’m getting used to trying to devise a plan that’s positively fool proof nobody can see me past these walls that i’ve been building now it’s starting to cave in, but i won’t give up

daniel's fool-proof plan was always cameo, and the escape that he was (is?), and everything he spun to cover him up. he was a mask, and before the mgas, kang daniel never knew music or the stage by himself. the illusion began to shatter, the worlds started to collide, he started to panic, and yet he pressed on on account of some newfound love and purpose he never possessed before. now, he carries cameo with him, but stands on stage as kang daniel, and it's like this that he's the best version of himself. next, the chorus hits, the guitar something close to exploding, and this is the message he wants all of his friends-- everyone in this room-- to know, so he smiles.

if you got the keys, then start the car and drive as far as you can if you got the blood, then you got the heart to give yourself a chance seems like we've been so scarred some people call it art i hope you make peace with your pain and never lose your flames

there are probably countless people in this room that think they don't deserve to be there, just like daniel did last year. even more than that will be beat down and shredded by the pressure and absolute necessity to push forward and remain strong. he wants them to keep going, to give themselves a chance no matter what anyone says-- to take this opportunity in front of them with all of its pain and all of its joy, and make the most of it. don't let it crush you, don't let it take anything from you. we can do this.

the chorus gives way to what is actually his favorite part of the song: a brief break for nothing but his acoustic guitar, something he composed himself without anyone else's help. he steps away from the microphone briefly, to look down at the frets as he strums, and he smiles, genuinely content. he likes singing, but his heart will always be with some kind of guitar more than anything else. nine seconds, and he returns to the microphone.

feeling like i’m nothing’s something that i’m getting used to wanting to fit in, i always wanted to be perfect to you i gotta get up out this bed, if you can see inside my head you understand i got to give up

the words are personal, but also applicable to many, he thinks, so it's both a message to others and himself, with his mother, her oppression, and how much it impacted his entire life in mind. after two months on his own, he's breaking free of it, but sometimes it feels like that isn't the case. at least he doesn't want to give up as badly as he used to-- as much as he wanted to under her rule, even at the time he wrote this song. he used to float by without direction other than what she told him, and now he's so much different. he's grateful. he heads into the pre-chorus, through it, skipping past what was originally a keyboard part written for sungwoon, and then starts the final chorus, taking these final moments to bask in the glow of the stage, unable to fight back the smile on his face.

and then it ends, but his grin doesn't, eyes disappearing into crescents, all genuine satisfaction and enjoyment. he keeps a tight grip on his guitar and bows, and is about to head off the stage before he makes a split second decision to lean toward the mic again to chirp a quick, "thank you!" and then he scurries down the steps and back to his seat.

he grins at his friends as they greet him upon his return, and pointedly ignores the fact that sungwoon doesn't. minhyun and kenta perform soon after him, and suddenly the show is a lot more interesting-- not that it wasn't before, of course, it was just, you know..blurry. long. excruciating in an enjoyable way, somehow. he pats minhyun's knee encouragingly when it's his turn, squeezes kenta's shoulder before he leaves to get on stage, and quietly cheers "go kenta, go!" with the most faith in him in the world. he has faith in minhyun too, of course, but anyone that doesn't is just..wrong.

they prove is believing in them isn't misplaced, with minhyun's voice even more striking without the company of heavy drumbeats and crazed guitar riffs backing it. he can dance too, which daniel didn't know, but that isn't a surprise because he didn't know anyone in this band could dance despite half of them listing it as their best skill on their forms. he gives kenta his full attention at first, amazed to see him dance for the first time-- thankful that he gets to be here to see him stand on stage like this, but he soon becomes distinctly aware that nothing separates him and sungwoon now. the desire to reach out to him is like an itch-- to grab his hand, maybe, or to push him into woojin just to mess with them both, or to slide over just so he can be closer to him, like that'll help him get inside his head, but maybe inside his head isn't where he wants to be. maybe he just wants to be with him.

the others return, and so daniel returns to watching the performances, and surprisingly, they pass more quickly now, but he still turns around in his chair to look at joohyun with concern. he knows it can't feel good on an injury to be stuck in these chairs for so long, so he mouths "are you okay?" to her, not wanting it to be caught on one of these dangling microphones should it put her at a disadvantage. she nods to him, and he nods back hesitantly, but it doesn't stop him from checking on her periodically for the rest of the night.

soon, it's sungwoon's turn. hyunbin calls his name and daniel just looks up at him as he rises, dazed, eyes following him as he leaves and makes his way to the stage. he always knew sungwoon belonged on stage, and the spotlight on him reminds daniel of it now, and he can't help but smile. he feels the same as he did last year when sungwoon took to the stage-- so glad he has the chance to show everyone his talent, and that so many others can hear him like he has.

daniel knows the song as soon as it begins, and he's glad sungwoon found it, because the piano intro is meant for him. he doesn't make the connection between the lyrics and their relevancy until sungwoon starts to sing, and his heart immediately turns to some kind of mush that oozes down to his feet. he feels positively sick, but not in a bad way, in a way he could feel for the rest of his life, and he's so overcome by emotion, absolutely overwhelmed and overtaken by it and everything sungwoon is. daniel knows english almost as well as he knows korean, and he knows this song, and he knows what all of this means, and when sungwoon looks him in the eyes-- he wonders if it's the first time he has today --daniel knows what that means, too. he doesn't break eye contact with him, and he feels his gaze in his bones. i need you too, and he thinks he needs sungwoon more than anyone. he needs him more than anyone does; he needs sungwoon more than he needs anyone.

he's swept away in all of it, like it's a tide rolling in, slow in its rising and powerful in its impact. even among it all, he almost wants to sing along. it's just the sungwoon effect. the bridge is softer, but he still feels his heart quiver in his chest, and it all reminds him of what he said the other day: i know i really like you, and that it feels…limitless, like it could be anything, and he feels that infinity, burning straight through him. he could listen to sungwoon sing forever, but in that moment all he wants is for sungwoon to come back. soon it ends, and he does, and he barely gives him a chance to sit down before he's reaching for his hand.

and when sungwoon's fingers curl around his, he's so glad. sungwoon looks at him, and he can't help but smile, even if he meant this as a gesture more serious and sincere. he wants it to mean everything he can say, not only because of the cameras, but because he knows it could never creep its way up from his heart and out of his mouth, at least not yet. it's i understand and thank you, and there's no room for doubting whether this song was about him. he knows it. he still feels it somewhere underneath his skin. it's i love you, i love you, i love you, and when sungwoon squeezes his hand, daniel squeezes back.

[ :00 - :42, 1:45 - 2:43, 3:08-3:30, but sped up a little for time *]

#rkmga5 #rkmga5callback #rkxsungwoon #joohyunrk #rkkenta #rkpwj #rkminhyun #;ee #( * in korean btw but just ref #this is legit 6k i wouldn't wish reading this on anyone #will proofread and tag others #after i write my interview solo sfgsdf #;solo #rkhyunggu #rkkyungri #rksuwoong #rkeunji #rktaeyang #;stam

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bloodkingdomrp · 5 years

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♚SILAS.JAMES.MONROE-DUMONT

“ Where does seeking justice end and seeking vengeance begin? “

✚ AGE & DOB: Thirty-Four & September 19th, 1986 ✚ OCCUPATION: Emergency Room Doctor ✚ AFFILIATION: Unaffiliated

♛THE HISTORY♛

Before he was Dr. Monroe-Dumont (Dr. MD, as his colleagues like to tease him), he was just a Monroe. One of three, actually; always linked with his siblings by teachers and neighbors who neither took the time to get to know the family nor raise a finger to help them. Yet they never failed to shoot the pitiful trio sorrowful glances and whisper to each other about how terrible things must be for those poor, pinched Monroe children.

Roe was the eldest, and, therefore, the only one who remembered what their mother had been like before. He still had memories of a mother who patiently showed him over and over again how to tie his shoes, who would hum while she cleaned the house, and cut his sandwich into four perfect triangles if he asked nicely. A mother who’d remember she had three young children waiting for her and hurry home in order to tuck them into bed with a kiss, no matter how late she got off work. But that was all before she had become a walking list of tragic statistics: battered girlfriend, single mother; deadbeat, drug addict. No family, no education, and three kids under the age of ten, Miranda Monroe self-medicated herself out of a sea of anxiety until she was too fucked up to remember how to be stressed about anything at all. Dose after toxic dose, drugs became her only comfort, her entire identity. Eventually taking hold of her completely, leaving no room for trivial things like tenderness or parental instinct. So those became responsibilities Roe took on.

Barely more than a child himself, Roe was a poor substitute for a parent, but he tried his best. Long nights spent tucked against Annie and Parker, whispering endless, made-up stories in their ears until they fell asleep. Anything to distract their minds and keep them from asking about where their mother was or when she’d be coming home. The days were longer still, helping his siblings with their homework while his own sat in the bottom of his backpack, encouraging them to “eat up,” even as the powder-cheap mac n cheese stuck to the roof of his mouth as he tried to swallow it down for the fifth time that week. Good days were few and far between, but he had Annie and he had Parker, and in the end, he would have traded anything to get that back, because far too soon the Monroe three became two.

Case number: 371209. Patient: Monroe, Parker. Age: 7. Cause of death: Arrhythmia resulting in ventricular fibrillation. Drug screening: positive screening for cocaine [benzoyl-methyl-ecgonine] and heroin [diacetylmorphine].

Miranda lands herself with charges for felony homicide, abuse, and neglect of a child. The cruelest factor at all being that the withdrawal she faces in prison somehow ended up being a bigger demon to her than the loss of her youngest child. The neighborhood is a flurry of rumors and rehearsed sympathy—what a tragedy, if only we had known, if only we could have done something. A blessing in disguise, others dare to assume, for at least the two other children can be helped now. Roe and Annie did not take as kindly to their supposed rescue.

Roe doesn’t want to like the Dumonts. Their smiles are too kind, their house too big, and their lifestyle too perfect to be real. But they’re equal measures persistent and patient, whisking Roe to and from court-mandated therapy sessions, giving him space on his bad days, and tactfully pressing in during those brief moments when his walls begin to drop and he forgets that he doesn’t want to be a part of this family. It becomes hard to not want to be there. It’s the little things that start to break him; Peggy asking him what he wants to eat every time she goes to make a shopping list, Jonathan bringing home a new pair of shoes when he notices Roe’s are looking a little worn. Roe had forgotten what it felt like to be the one being taken care of, and no matter how much it felt like weaknesses to admit it, he didn’t want to lose that. He did not know if he could handle losing the first people, aside from his siblings, who looked at him like he was something more than a walking tragedy. And for a reason, that Roe still has trouble fathoming, the Dumonts did not want to lose him either. Three hundred and seventy-two days after being placed in their home, they finally broached the topic of adoption. Though, Peggy would later confess that it only took a week for her to be sure that Roe was meant to stay with them. And yet, that was still too soon. At that time, Roe was still a child grieving for a brother lost, mourning a family that would never be reunited, and it would be another year before any legal decisions were made to change his custody.

Compared to the life Roe had lived within his first fourteen years, the Dumont’s home was near perfect. In all ways but one: Annie wasn’t there. Judges and family social workers all kept promising the same thing, “It’s only a temporary.” But temporary was a heavy weight on his shoulders as days turned to weeks, weeks to months, and nearly two years had passed with the siblings only getting to see each other every few weeks. Roe had fought against the decision, questioning the courts on why his sister couldn’t be placed where he was, attempting to force them to see reason and put them back together, pleading with them when nothing else had worked. But they remained unmoved. It had been deemed that Annalise Monroe required a certain level of care that her older brother did not. Where Roe had taken his upbringing as a cautionary tale—every decision a conscious effort to distance himself from his parents and the path they had walked—Annie was tragically and undeniably a product of her early home environment. Rebellious and chaotic, she was moved through several therapeutic foster homes before landing herself in a residential facility. Her case managers hoped that the structure would provide a safe environment for her to start to work through her trauma, but with Annie things were often one step forward and a fierce and destructive leap backwards. The Dumonts had offered to serve as a potential step down for Annie after she completed her treatment, but with a series of self-sabotaging behaviors, discharge was seeming farther and farther away.

In the end, it was the move that forced the decision. Jonathan’s work transferred him from Chicago to St. Louis, and though Roe had already, inadvertently, come to think of the couple as his family, legally he was still in the state’s custody. As such his placement with the Dumonts would have been disrupted by their move to a new state. At this point it was no longer a question. The Dumonts calmly explained to Roe that they were going to adopt him so he could stay with them. Though some might have mistaken their actions as controlling, or inconsiderate not to ask Roe his opinion, it was a merciful decision. It offered Roe exactly what he wanted without having to say it out loud, lest he have to taste words coated with a sickening layer of betrayal towards the sister he was leaving behind. Guilt was a familiar companion and it travelled with him still, and yet, though Roe would not admit it aloud, his first night in Missouri—over three hundred miles away from every terrible and cruel thing that had ever happened to him—he slept a little easier.

Roe thrived in this new environment. Never bold or boisterous, his mark was one of quiet excellence. Given the time to actually focus on schoolwork, with the Dumont’s constant encouragement and praise, Roe developed a love of learning that promised nothing less than success when paired with his uninhibited determination. Supported and cherished, Roe learned what contentment truly felt like. If it was not for his steadfast communication with his sister, he could have written off his early life experiences as nothing more than an extended nightmare. He had finally seen what the world could be like, away from the pernicious streets of Chicago, and it was something he longed to share with his sister. To finally, finally, give her a new start as well.

In the summer of 2008, Roe had just graduated with his degree is pre-med and was eagerly awaiting the start of his graduate classes at Washington University in St. Louis. Despite his excitement for his continuing education, frankly, the only countdown that was on his radar was Annie’s eighteenth birthday. Released from the state’s custody at that point, she would be free to go where she wanted, and the Dumonts had already agreed to allow her to move into their spare bedroom while she figured out her next steps. He had expected his sister to share his elation, to turn away from the city that had practically held her captive all these years and never look back. But when he shared his plan with Annie she had simply shrugged and resolutely declared that she thought she would stay in Chicago for a while longer, and when Annie made up her mind about something there was no changing it.

That was not to say Roe did not try. He spent the next four years of medical school and first three years of his residency periodically sending his sister different job opportunities or school possibilities; all of which were far outside the radius of the windy city. Occasionally Annie would feign interest, going as far as to apply for one of the jobs. At least that is what she would tell Roe whenever he pestered her on the subject, though somehow none of them ever seemed to work out.

It was a Tuesday in May when Roe had called Annie, telling her about a secretary position that had opened up at a private practice where one of his friends from school was now working. The following Thursday he received an incoming call from an unknown number. The woman on the other end of the line explained that she was calling because he was listed as the emergency contact for Annalise Monroe, who was being rushed into surgery after receiving a gunshot wound to the head. He’s later told it’s a miracle his sister survived the surgery and that they were able to get the bullet out. Unfortunately, said miracle did little to counter the bleeding that had already led to severe swelling inside of her brain. In a cruel form of irony, ultimately, Roe gets his wish and gets Annie out of Chicago. She’s transferred to an ICU in a Missouri hospital, only an hour away from the Dumont’s home. The hospital there is smaller, vastly different from the bustling hospitals in Chicago’s city limits, giving them more time to dedicate to monitoring and caring for coma patients.

Unable now to call Annie, Roe instead spends the last year of his residency on the phone with her doctors and the investigators in charge of her case, her attacker never having been identified. No matter which he ends up calling the responses are always the same: there are no new updates. Annie remains alive—if you could call her pitiful state of existence that—and any leads towards finding who shot her remain dead and cold. Upon finishing his residency, St. Luke’s Hospital offers to hire Roe on as full-time staff. Much to the surprise, and clear dismay, of his adopted parents, Roe declines the position. Instead taking a job at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, putting himself back in the heart of the very city he had spent over a decade avoiding.

Roes never been the best with using his words, and he has none to verbalize why he had to go back. He doesn’t think he has the answers even within himself. Perhaps he was desperate to gaze upon the city in a new light, attempt to see whatever Annie must have saw in it, that kept her resisting all of his efforts pull her away. Or perhaps it was just the inescapable noose of fate, that there must always be a Monroe suffering in Chicago’s streets. And some days he did suffer; especially in the beginning, moving around the city with a haunted look in his eye. Every nerve in his body on edge, the entire city serving as one large trauma reminder for the child he once was and the trials that he faced. Peggy calls him often; tells him he sounds tired and that she wishes he would take some time off work. It’s the only line she uses with him now, after the one time she had been bold enough to tell Roe he should move back, which resulted in the only true fight they’ve ever had.

He doesn’t take time off, instead he rides it out and faces the sense of foreboding headfirst, drives through his old neighborhood every day after work until his hand doesn’t tremble against the wheel anymore. It’s not great, and it doesn’t feel like home. After all, Parker and Annie were the only reasons Chicago ever felt like home. But Roe survives. He makes a handful of friends and invests deeply in his job at the hospital. He’s just started to find some new semblance of normal when he receives the phone call that he’s been anticipating—dreading—for nearly three years.

They bury Annie on the Dumont’s family plot. “Your family is our family,” Jonathan tells him. And Roe knows that they believe that. The way Peggy cries, sorrow down to her very soul, is nothing less than a woman grieving the daughter that she never had a chance to take in. She cups his face after the service, and whispers, so sincere that it breaks his heart a little, that she prays he can find peace now. But peace is not what Roe feels. Annie may be at rest, but his soul rages on— a flicker of something dark deep inside of himself that he had tried so hard to ignore. “Death can be a time for healing”, the pastor had said, black suit pressed to perfection, worn leather bible clutched in his hand, a picture of poetic reverie. Roe agrees with him, more than any of them will ever know. He knows it’s true. It’s death that will bring him comfort. It’s just not Annie’s death that he needs. He has no name, no face, barely any clues to go on, but it doesn’t matter. He knows he’ll find them. And when he does, they’ll pay for they did.

♜ THE DETAILS♜

(+): conscientious, +resourceful, +compassionate

(-): critical, -reticent, -penitent

Face claim: Hugh Dancy

written by Bev | CST&EST

#the doctor #closed

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leightaylorwrites · 6 years

Text

Leigh Dissects YA fiction: Fallen Kingdoms (Chapter Seven- Chapter Ten)

Chapter Seven - Auranos

Sigh… I thought we’d at least get a break from Cleo by heading back to Magnus but I guess that was foolish of me to hope.

No one knew why, but Cleo guessed her sister had fallen in love with someone else.

The gender-neutral “someone” makes me hope for a single lesbian in this story. It’s another foolish hope.

Emilia had never so much as cast a flirtatious glance at any of the men in the palace [...]

LET EMILIA BE GAY 2K18

His parents didn’t approve of smoking inside the house. Aron might be arrogant and confident, but he was still seventeen and had to abide by his parents' rules until his next birthday-unless he wanted to move out ahead of schedule. And Cleo knew without a doubt that he didn’t want that sort of responsibility, financial or otherwise.

I’m sorry when did I leave this YA high fantasy and enter a teen drama on the CW? This entire part is a mess of modern-ness and should have been cut.

Aron: [I’m not sorry for killing him lol I kind of liked it too]

Cleo: How can you sound so calm about this?

Aron: Would you rather I lie and say I have nightmares too? Would that ease your own guilt?

Cleo: I want the truth.

Aron: And that’s what I’ve given you.

I get that Aron is a horrible creepy killer, but he has a point. He IS honest. When the villain makes more sense than your heroine, there’s an issue.

When he smiled, the look was equally menacing and enticing. “I will find you.”

YA authors stop writing scary love interests challenge.

Chapter Eight - Limeros

“Naughty girl.”

She ignored the flush that immediately heated her cheeks.She wasn’t being naughty; she was being inquisitive.

And I’m being disgusted. So not only does Magnus have the hots for his adoptive sister, Lucia blushes when he calls her “naughty.” Clace are BOTH unemployed.

“Cleiona’s also the name of the youngest Auranian princess,” Magnus mused. “Never really thought about it before. Same age as you are, right? Nearly to the day?”

I have… questions. First, how does he know Cleo’s exact birthday? Two, it’s likely going to come into play later that they are at most a few days apart but how does that work with Lucia? How does Magnus know her day of birth? We find out later Sabina (the lady from the prologue) brought Lucia to the palace as an infant but it wasn’t the day she was born so how would Sabina know her birthday? Even if she had a vision on the baby’s day of birth or something like that, how did Lucia survive without being breastfed? I need answers.

Magnus: One of grace and beauty, my sister, with a multitude of suitors at her beck and call. Forced to be siblings with a scarred monster like me.

Lucia: As if that scar makes you a monster. You can’t be blind to how girls look at you-I even see maids here in the castle wistfully watch you pass, even if you never notice them. They all think you’re devastatingly handsome. And your scar only makes you more… intriguing.

If you think plain hetero splooging is bad, just wait until you see plain hetero incest splooging!

“[Tomas] was cut down as a spoiled lord tried to show off in front of a princess - Princess Cleiona [...] The two watched Tomas Agallon’s young life bleed from him in front of his own family.They didn’t feel sorry for the pain they caused that family and all Paelsia.”

I mean… it’s true. Too bad the evil king is saying this and therefore the reader is supposed to disagree with him and know that Cleo the Super Special White Girl can’t do anything wrong ever but still. He’s right.

The words were acid on his tongue as jealousy flashed through him like a bolt of lightning. “But [Lucia] isn’t interested in walks around the palace grounds. Not with, well… not with you.”

The boy’s eyes widened. “What do you mean?”

Magnus forced a tense look on his face as if he’d said too much and now felt guilty. “It’s really none of my business.”

[...]

“It’s just that she’s mentioned you to me [...] And she made it clear that if you ever stopped by, you should not be encouraged any further. She means no offense, of course. But… her interests in a potential suitor lie elsewhere.”

In case incest splooging wasn’t enough to make me hate this character, he’s entered Rowboat’s, well, boat. Territorial pricks are not cute @ YA authors.

Magnus had no patience for anyone who would be manipulated so easily. If the boy was truly interested in Lucia, he should be able to stand up to any adversity, including an overprotective older brother.

But you literally just told this kid Lucia SAID she doesn’t want him. If he’s taking your word as truth, that’s not him being manipulated, it’s him believing you because why would a prince lie to him about this? He’s not doing anything wrong by respecting what he believes are Lucia’s wishes??? He has more respect for her than you do?? Why do people like Magnus??

“I wouldn’t hesitate to say you were lying.” He took her arm in his and squeezed it until she flinched. A flicker of fear went through her pale eyes. “Who do you think the king would believe? His son and heir? Or a kitchen maid?”

Amia swallowed hard. “I apologize, my prince. I would never say such a thing.”

“Smart girl.”

So… Magnus is literally physically abusing and threatening his casual hookup and people stan??

There was no Limerian law that stated that pure royal blood was necessary for the position. Even the son of a whore could become king.

Magnus is being all emo over the fact that Tobias could be king someday, a problem which is easily solved by Magnus killing Tobias. This doesn’t happen, but I think I’ve found the problem with all these series that try so hard to be the YA version of Game of Thrones/ASOIAF: nobody has the balls to write how these conflicts would actually play out in a real political setting. YA does have to be toned down in comparison to adult fiction but when you tone things down so much that they make no sense, it doesn’t work at all.

Blood sacrifice? How deeply savage.

Can’t tell if I’m tired of the word savage being used in this book (it’s used at least 20 times in reference to Paelsia) or if I’m tired of it in general (thanks stan twitter).

The king swiftly moved behind the boy, pulled his head back, and slashed the blade across his throat. Tobias’s eyes went wide and his hands came up automatically to his neck. Blood squirted out from between his fingers. He collapsed to the ground.

I’m DONE. We got half a page about Tobias being a threat to the throne for Magnus and instead of seeing them battle it out, or Tobias team up with an enemy later on, or anything that might give some payoff to the fact that Magnus has a secret half-brother, he’s sacrificed a few pages after his main introduction. Do you see what I mean now about YA fantasy writers holding back?

Chapter Nine - Auranos

I DON’T CARE, WHERE IS JONAS

“It’s unfortunate about Princess Emilia, though. So, so sad she isn’t well enough to attend.”

We get it. She’s dying. You’ve reminded us like four times already.

[...] Emilia’s most recently finished painting, a study of the night sky.

Subtle foreshadowing isn’t subtle enough for me.

That [her marriage] was solely a political choice sounded so cold, so analytical.

Does Cleo… not know what politics are? Does she not understand that royal arranged marriages happen all the time? Does she not realize she’s a princess? Why is she so dumb??

“You do know [Nic] is madly in love with you, right?”

Dammit. We came so close to having that platonic relationship but we can’t have a young man in this series not want to splooge over Cleo. It’s the first book and Cleo already has three love interests for this series. Alien Trashryver is worried.

Emilia: “I fell in love with someone else [...] I’ve never felt such love as I felt for him.”

DOUBLE DAMMIT.

Despite being named for the goddess, Cleo wasn’t invested in religion [.]

Isn’t being named after a religious deity frowned upon? I know in some religions you can be named after a minor figure - such as Christians with the archangels. But you can’t name your child God. Cleo being named after the primary person in the religion seems wrong.

But how else would we know she’s a Super Special Magical White Girl if she didn’t have a name far beyond what she deserves?

Her sister had been in love with a guard who’d died two months ago. “It was Theon’s father, wasn’t it?”

Isn’t he like… old??

Her sister had been in love with the king’s bodyguard who’d been thrown from his horse to his death. A tragedy.

That is verbatim from the book and I can’t stop laughing. This bitch said “a tragedy,” I’m CRYING.

Emilia was always the rock - comforting Cleo when she was upset over [some petty stuff] or the loss of her innocence to Aron.

“You’re the same as you were yesterday and the day before,” she’d soothed. “Nothing has changed. Not really. Forget what troubles you. Regret nothing, but learn from any mistakes you make. Tomorrow will be a brighter day, I promise.”

If you think things are cool because HEY we’ve got a YA heroine who isn’t a virgin, we later find out Cleo was drunk when this happened and therefore is an assault victim. The book never acknowledges the later, but instead has Emilia tell Cleo to learn from her mistakes and that nothing has changed. Feminist YA at its peak, y’all.

“You can’t. You’re to be the queen one day. If you die, that means it’ll be me. Trust me, Emilia, that would be a very bad thing. I would make a terrible queen.”

I mean, yeah I agree that Cleo would be a shitty queen but I’m more annoyed at how these five sentences are written.

Emilia: “There’s no one out there spying on us through the eyes of birds, hoping for clues of where to find the Kindred.”

Cleo: “I’ve never believed in such nonsense.”

Btw, Cleo said earlier she thought the birds were watching her. Consistency is hard, I guess.

[Theon] shook his head. “I knew my father cared about someone, but he wouldn’t say who it was. I figured he was involved with a married woman. Now I know.”

So Cleo’s boyfriend is her sister’s dead husband’s son… Cleo’s love interest is her nephew. He’s her step-nephew, but her nephew nonetheless.

Chapter Ten - Limeros (this time with the bird dude)

[...] to see his bird friend, Phaedra, perched on the branch next to him.

Now, I could give this book points if the whole point was that the western world was meant to be Greece, while Mystica is a mix of Italy and Spain. But the existence of Paelsia with its North African/Asian/Roman setting messes it all up.

All [Lucia] would see when she looked at him was a golden hawk. For some reason, this realization pained him.

So we can’t have lgbt+ romances or poc romances but Cleo the Super Special Magical White Girl can get three+ love interests and Lucia can get two love interests - her adoptive brother and a dude who can turn into a bird. White authors, man. White authors…

One thing I do like about this Ioannes dude is that his chapters are short, leaving little room for bullshit. However, they make me go back to Magnus and Cleo sooner than I want.

#leigh reads it #leigh dissects ya #falling kingdoms review

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weltratsel · 6 years

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The Last Messiah

One night in long bygone times, man awoke and saw himself.

He saw that he was naked under cosmos, homeless in his own body. All things dissolved before his testing thought, wonder above wonder, horror above horror unfolded in his mind.

Then woman too awoke and said it was time to go and slay. And he fetched his bow and arrow, a fruit of the marriage of spirit and hand, and went outside beneath the stars. But as the beasts arrived at their waterholes where he expected them of habit, he felt no more the tiger’s bound in his blood, but a great psalm about the brotherhood of suffering between everything alive.

That day he did not return with prey, and when they found him by the next new moon, he was sitting dead by the waterhole.

Whatever happened? A breach in the very unity of life, a biological paradox, an abomination, an absurdity, an exaggeration of disastrous nature. Life had overshot its target, blowing itself apart. A species had been armed too heavily – by spirit made almighty without, but equally a menace to its own well-being. Its weapon was like a sword without hilt or plate, a two-edged blade cleaving everything; but he who is to wield it must grasp the blade and turn the one edge toward himself.

Despite his new eyes, man was still rooted in matter, his soul spun into it and subordinated to its blind laws. And yet he could see matter as a stranger, compare himself to all phenomena, see through and locate his vital processes. He comes to nature as an unbidden guest, in vain extending his arms to beg conciliation with his maker: Nature answers no more, it performed a miracle with man, but later did not know him. He has lost his right of residence in the universe, has eaten from the Tree of Knowledge and been expelled from Paradise. He is mighty in the near world, but curses his might as purchased with his harmony of soul, his innocence, his inner peace in life’s embrace.

So there he stands with his visions, betrayed by the universe, in wonder and fear. The beast knew fear as well, in thunderstorms and on the lion’s claw. But man became fearful of life itself – indeed, of his very being. Life – that was for the beast to feel the play of power, it was heat and games and strife and hunger, and then at last to bow before the law of course. In the beast, suffering is self-confined, in man, it knocks holes into a fear of the world and a despair of life. Even as the child sets out on the river of life, the roars from the waterfall of death rise highly above the vale, ever closer, and tearing, tearing at its joy. Man beholds the earth, and it is breathing like a great lung; whenever it exhales, delightful life swarms from all its pores and reaches out toward the sun, but when it inhales, a moan of rupture passes through the multitude, and corpses whip the ground like bouts of hail. Not merely his own day could he see, the graveyards wrung themselves before his gaze, the laments of sunken millennia wailed against him from the ghastly decaying shapes, the earth-turned dreams of mothers. Future’s curtain unravelled itself to reveal a nightmare of endless repetition, a senseless squander of organic material. The suffering of human billions makes its entrance into him through the gateway of compassion, from all that happen arises a laughter to mock the demand for justice, his profoundest ordering principle. He sees himself emerge in his mother’s womb, he holds up his hand in the air and it has five branches; whence this devilish number five, and what has it to do with my soul? He is no longer obvious to himself – he touches his body in utter horror; this is you and so far do you extend and no farther. He carries a meal within him, yesterday it was a beast that could itself dash around, now I suck it up and make it part of me, and where do I begin and end? All things chain together in causes and effects, and everything he wants to grasp dissolves before the testing thought. Soon he sees mechanics even in the so-far whole and dear, in the smile of his beloved – there are other smiles as well, a torn boot with toes. Eventually, the features of things are features only of himself. Nothing exists without himself, every line points back at him, the world is but a ghostly echo of his voice – he leaps up loudly screaming and wants to disgorge himself onto the earth along with his impure meal, he feels the looming of madness and wants to find death before losing even such ability.

But as he stands before imminent death, he grasps its nature also, and the cosmic import of the step to come. His creative imagination constructs new, fearful prospects behind the curtain of death, and he sees that even there is no sanctuary found. And now he can discern the outline of his biologicocosmic terms: He is the universe’s helpless captive, kept to fall into nameless possibilities.

From this moment on, he is in a state of relentless panic.

Such a ‘feeling of cosmic panic’ is pivotal to every human mind. Indeed, the race appears destined to perish in so far as any effective preservation and continuation of life is ruled out when all of the individual’s attention and energy goes to endure, or relay, the catastrophic high tension within.

The tragedy of a species becoming unfit for life by overevolving one ability is not confined to humankind. Thus it is thought, for instance, that certain deer in paleontological times succumbed as they acquired overly-heavy horns. The mutations must be considered blind, they work, are thrown forth, without any contact of interest with their environment.

In depressive states, the mind may be seen in the image of such an antler, in all its fantastic splendour pinning its bearer to the ground.

III

Why, then, has mankind not long ago gone extinct during great epidemics of madness? Why do only a fairly minor number of individuals perish because they fail to endure the strain of living – because cognition gives them more than they can carry?

Cultural history, as well as observation of ourselves and others, allow the following answer: Most people learn to save themselves by artificially limiting the content of consciousness.

If the giant deer, at suitable intervals, had broken off the outer spears of its antlers, it might have kept going for some while longer. Yet in fever and constant pain, indeed, in betrayal of its central idea, the core of its peculiarity, for it was vocated by creation’s hand to be the horn bearer of wild animals. What it gained in continuance, it would lose in significance, in grandness of life, in other words a continuance without hope, a march not up to affirmation, but forth across its ever recreated ruins, a self-destructive race against the sacred will of blood.

The identity of purpose and perishment is, for giant deer and man alike, the tragic paradox of life. In devoted Bejahung, the last Cervis Giganticus bore the badge of its lineage to its end. The human being saves itself and carries on. It performs, to extend a settled phrase, a more or less self-conscious repression of its damaging surplus of consciousness. This process is virtually constant during our waking and active hours, and is a requirement of social adaptability and of everything commonly referred to as healthy and normal living.

Psychiatry even works on the assumption that the ‘healthy’ and viable is at one with the highest in personal terms. Depression, ‘fear of life,’ refusal of nourishment and so on are invariably taken as signs of a pathological state and treated thereafter. Often, however, such phenomena are messages from a deeper, more immediate sense of life, bitter fruits of a geniality of thought or feeling at the root of antibiological tendencies. It is not the soul being sick, but its protection failing, or else being rejected because it is experienced – correctly – as a betrayal of ego’s highest potential.

The whole of living that we see before our eyes today is from inmost to outmost enmeshed in repressional mechanisms, social and individual; they can be traced right into the tritest formulas of everyday life. Though they take a vast and multifarious variety of forms, it seems legitimate to at least identify four major kinds, naturally occuring in every possible combination: isolation, anchoring, distraction and sublimation.

By isolation I here mean a fully arbitrary dismissal from consciousness of all disturbing and destructive thought and feeling. (Engström: “One should not think, it is just confusing.”) A perfect and almost brutalising variant is found among certain physicians, who for self-protection will only see the technical aspect of their profession. It can also decay to pure hooliganism, as among petty thugs and medical students, where any sensitivity to the tragic side of life is eradicated by violent means (football played with cadaver heads, and so on.)

In everyday interaction, isolation is manifested in a general code of mutual silence: primarily toward children, so these are not at once scared senseless by the life they have just begun, but retain their illusions until they can afford to lose them. In return, children are not to bother the adults with untimely reminders of sex, toilet, or death. Among adults there are the rules of ‘tact,’ the mechanism being openly displayed when a man who weeps on the street is removed with police assistance.

The mechanism of anchoring also serves from early childhood; parents, home, the street become matters of course to the child and give it a sense of assurance. This sphere of experience is the first, and perhaps the happiest, protection against the cosmos that we ever get to know in life, a fact that doubtless also explains the much debated ‘infantile bonding;’ the question of whether that is sexually tainted too is unimportant here. When the child later discovers that those fixed points are as ‘arbitrary’ and ‘ephemeral’ as any others, it has a crisis of confusion and anxiety and promptly looks around for another anchoring. “In Autumn, I will attend middle school.” If the substitution somehow fails, then the crisis may take a fatal course, or else what I will call an anchoring spasm occurs: One clings to the dead values, concealing as well as possible from oneself and others the fact that they are unworkable, that one is spiritually insolvent. The result is lasting insecurity, ‘feelings of inferiority,’ over-compensation, restlessness. Insofar as this state falls into certain categories, it is made subject to psychoanalytic treatment, which aims to complete the transition to new anchorings.

Anchoring might be characterised as a fixation of points within, or construction of walls around, the liquid fray of consciousness. Though typically unconscious, it may also be fully conscious (one ‘adopts a goal’.) Publicly useful anchorings are met with sympathy, he who ‘sacrifices himself totally’ for his anchoring (the firm, the cause) is idolised. He has established a mighty bulwark against the dissolution of life, and others are by suggestion gaining from his strength. In a brutalised form, as deliberate action, it is found among ‘decadent’ playboys (“one should get married in time, and then the constraints will come of themselves.”) Thus one establishes a necessity in one’s life, exposing oneself to an obvious evil from one’s point of view, but a soothing of the nerves, a high-walled container for a sensibility to life that has been growing increasingly crude. Ibsen presents, in Hjalmar Ekdal and Molvik, two flowering cases (‘living lies’); there is no difference between their anchoring and that of the pillars of society except for the practico-economic unproductiveness of the former.

Any culture is a great, rounded system of anchorings, built on foundational firmaments, the basic cultural ideas. The average person makes do with the collective firmaments, the personality is building for himself, the person of character has finished his construction, more or less grounded on the inherited, collective main firmaments (God, the Church, the State, morality, fate, the law of life, the people, the future). The closer to main firmaments a certain carrying element is, the more perilous it is to touch. Here a direct protection is normally established by means of penal codes and threats of prosecution (inquisition, censorship, the Conservative approach to life).

The carrying capacity of each segment either depends on its fictitious nature having not been seen through yet, or else on its being recognised as necessary anyway. Hence the religious education in schools, which even atheists support because they know no other way to bring children into social ways of response.

Whenever people realise the fictitiousness or redundancy of the segments, they will strive to replace them with new ones (‘the limited duration of Truths’) – and whence flows all the spiritual and cultural strife which, along with economic competition, forms the dynamic content of world history.

The craving for material goods (power) is not so much due to the direct pleasures of wealth, as none can be seated on more than one chair or eat himself more than sated. Rather, the value of a fortune to life consists in the rich opportunities for anchoring and distraction offered to the owner.

Both for collective and individual anchorings it holds that when a segment breaks, there is a crisis that is graver the closer that segment to main firmaments. Within the inner circles, sheltered by the outer ramparts, such crises are daily and fairly painfree occurrences (‘disappointments’); even a playing with anchoring values is here seen (wittiness, jargon, alcohol). But during such play one may accidentally rip a hole right to the bottom, and the scene is instantly transformed from euphoric to macabre. The dread of being stares us in the eye, and in a deadly gush we perceive how the minds are dangling in threads of their own spinning, and that a hell is lurking underneath.

The very foundational firmaments are rarely replaced without great social spasms and a risk of complete dissolution (reformation, revolution). During such times, individuals are increasingly left to their own devices for anchoring, and the number of failures tends to rise. Depressions, excesses, and suicides result (German officers after the war, Chinese students after the revolution).

Another flaw of the system is the fact that various danger fronts often require very different firmaments. As a logical superstructure is built upon each, there follow clashes of incommensurable modes of feeling and thought. Then despair can enter through the rifts. In such cases, a person may be obsessed with destructive joy, dislodging the whole artificial apparatus of his life and starting with rapturous horror to make a clean sweep of it. The horror stems from the loss of all sheltering values, the rapture from his by now ruthless identification and harmony with our nature’s deepest secret, the biological unsoundness, the enduring disposition for doom.

We love the anchorings for saving us, but also hate them for limiting our sense of freedom. Whenever we feel strong enough, we thus take pleasure in going together to bury an expired value in style. Material objects take on a symbolic import here (the Radical approach to life).

When a human being has eliminated those of his anchorings that are visible to himself, only the unconscious ones staying put, then he will call himself a liberated personality.

A very popular mode of protection is distraction. One limits attention to the critical bounds by constantly enthralling it with impressions. This is typical even in childhood; without distraction, the child is also insufferable to itself. “Mom, what am I to do.” A little English girl visiting her Norwegian aunts came inside from her room, saying: “What happens now?” The nurses attain virtuosity: Look, a doggie! Watch, they are painting the palace! The phenomenon is too familiar to require any further demonstration. Distraction is, for example, the ‘high society’s’ tactic for living. It can be likened to a flying machine – made of heavy material, but embodying a principle that keeps it airborne whenever applying. It must always be in motion, as air only carries it fleetingly. The pilot may grow drowsy and comfortable out of habit, but the crisis is acute as soon as the engine flunks.

The tactic is often fully conscious. Despair may dwell right underneath and break through in gushes, in a sudden sobbing. When all distractive options are expended, spleen sets in, ranging from mild indifference to fatal depression. Women, in general less cognition-prone and hence more secure in their living than men, preferably use distraction.

A considerable evil of imprisonment is the denial of most distractive options. And as terms for deliverance by other means are poor as well, the prisoner will tend to stay in the close vicinity of despair. The acts he then commits to deflect the final stage have a warrant in the principle of vitality itself. In such a moment he is experiencing his soul within the universe, and has no other motive than the utter inendurability of that condition.

Pure examples of life-panic are presumably rare, as the protective mechanisms are refined and automatic and to some extent unremitting. But even the adjacent terrain bears the mark of death, life is here barely sustainable and by great efforts. Death always appears as an escape, one ignores the possibilities of the hereafter, and as the way death is experienced is partly dependent on feeling and perspective, it might be quite an acceptable solution. If one in statu mortis could manage a pose (a poem, a gesture, to ‘die standing up’), i.e. a final anchoring, or a final distraction (Aases’ death), then such a fate is not the worst one at all. The press, for once serving the concealment mechanism, never fails to find reasons that cause no alarm – “it is believed that the latest fall in the price of wheat...”

When a human being takes his life in depression, this is a natural death of spiritual causes. The modern barbarity of ‘saving’ the suicidal is based on a hairraising misapprehension of the nature of existence.

Only a limited part of humanity can make do with mere ‘changes’, whether in work, social life, or entertainment. The cultured person demands connections, lines, a progression in the changes. Nothing finite satisfies at length, one is ever proceeding, gathering knowledge, making a career. The phenomenon is known as ‘yearning’ or ‘transcendental tendency.’ Whenever a goal is reached, the yearning moves on; hence its object is not the goal, but the very attainment of it – the gradient, not the absolute height, of the curve representing one’s life. The promotion from private to corporal may give a more valuable experience than the one from colonel to general. Any grounds of ‘progressive optimism’ are removed by this major psychological law.

The human yearning is not merely marked by a ‘striving toward’, but equally by an ‘escape from.’ And if we use the word in a religious sense, only the latter description fits. For here, none has yet been clear about what he is longing for, but one has always a heartfelt awareness of what one is longing away from, namely the earthly vale of tears, one’s own inendurable condition. If awareness of this predicament is the deepest stratum of the soul, as argued above, then it is also understandable why the religious yearning is felt and experienced as fundamental. By contrast, the hope that it forms a divine criterion, which harbours a promise of its own fulfilment, is placed in a truly melancholy light by these considerations.

The fourth remedy against panic, sublimation, is a matter of transformation rather than repression. Through stylistic or artistic gifts can the very pain of living at times be converted into valuable experiences. Positive impulses engage the evil and put it to their own ends, fastening onto its pictorial, dramatic, heroic, lyric or even comic aspects.

Unless the worst sting of suffering is blunted by other means, or denied control of the mind, such utilisation is unlikely, however. (Image: The mountaineer does not enjoy his view of the abyss while choking with vertigo; only when this feeling is more or less overcome does he enjoy it – anchored.) To write a tragedy, one must to some extent free oneself from – betray – the very feeling of tragedy and regard it from an outer, e.g. aesthetic, point of view. Here is, by the way, an opportunity for the wildest round-dancing through ever higher ironic levels, into a most embarrassing circulus vitiosus. Here one can chase one’s ego across numerous habitats, enjoying the capacity of the various layers of consciousness to dispel one another.

The present essay is a typical attempt at sublimation. The author does not suffer, he is filling pages and is going to be published in a journal.

The ‘martyrdom’ of lonely ladies also shows a kind of sublimation – they gain in significance thereby.

Nevertheless, sublimation appears to be the rarest of the protective means mentioned here.

Is it possible for ‘primitive natures’ to renounce these cramps and cavorts and live in harmony with themselves in the serene bliss of labour and love? Insofar as they may be considered human at all, I think the answer must be no. The strongest claim to be made about the so-called peoples of nature is that they are somewhat closer to the wonderful biological ideal than we unnatural people. And when even we have so far been able to save a majority through every storm, we have been assisted by the sides of our nature that are just modestly or moderately developed. This positive basis (as protection alone cannot create life, only hinder its faltering) must be sought in the naturally adapted deployment of the energy in the body and the biologically helpful parts of the soul1, subject to such hardships as are precisely due to sensory limitations, bodily frailty, and the need to do work for life and love.

And just in this finite land of bliss within the fronts do the progressing civilisation, technology and standardisation have such a debasing influence. For as an ever growing fraction of the cognitive faculties retire from the game against the environment, there is a rising spiritual unemployment. The value of a technical advance to the whole undertaking of life must be judged by its contribution to the human opportunity for spiritual occupation. Though boundaries are blurry, perhaps the first tools for cutting might be mentioned as a case of a positive invention.

Other technical inventions enrich only the life of the inventor himself; they represent a gross and ruthless theft from humankind’s common reserve of experiences and should invoke the harshest punishment if made public against the veto of censorship. One such crime among numerous others is the use of flying machines to explore uncharted land. In a single vandalistic glob, one thus destroys lush opportunities for experience that could benefit many if each, by effort, obtained his fair share.2

The current phase of life’s chronic fever is particularly tainted by this circumstance. The absence of naturally (biologically) based spiritual activity shows up, for example, in the pervasive recourse to distraction (entertainment, sport, radio – ‘the rhythm of the times’). Terms for anchoring are not as favourable – all the inherited, collective systems of anchorings are punctured by criticism, and anxiety, disgust, confusion, despair leak in through the rifts (‘corpses in the cargo.’) Communism and psychoanalysis, however incommensurable otherwise, both attempt (as Communism has also a spiritual reflection) by novel means to vary the old escape anew; applying, respectively, violence and guile to make humans biologically fit by ensnaring their critical surplus of cognition. The idea, in either case, is uncannily logical. But again, it cannot yield a final solution. Though a deliberate degeneration to a more viable nadir may certainly save the species in the short run, it will by its nature be unable to find peace in such resignation, or indeed find any peace at all.

If we continue these considerations to the bitter end, then the conclusion is not in doubt. As long as humankind recklessly proceeds in the fateful delusion of being biologically fated for triumph, nothing essential will change. As its numbers mount and the spiritual atmosphere thickens, the techniques of protection must assume an increasingly brutal character.

And humans will persist in dreaming of salvation and affirmation and a new Messiah. Yet when many saviours have been nailed to trees and stoned on the city squares, then the last Messiah shall come.

Then will appear the man who, as the first of all, has dared strip his soul naked and submit it alive to the outmost thought of the lineage, the very idea of doom. A man who has fathomed life and its cosmic ground, and whose pain is the Earth’s collective pain. With what furious screams shall not mobs of all nations cry out for his thousandfold death, when like a cloth his voice encloses the globe, and the strange message has resounded for the first and last time:

“– The life of the worlds is a roaring river, but Earth’s is a pond and a backwater.

– The sign of doom is written on your brows – how long will ye kick against the pin-pricks?

– But there is one conquest and one crown, one redemption and one solution.

– Know yourselves – be infertile and let the earth be silent after ye.”

And when he has spoken, they will pour themselves over him, led by the pacifier makers and the midwives, and bury him in their fingernails.

He is the last Messiah. As son from father, he stems from the archer by the waterhole.

Peter Wessel Zapffe, 1933

Notes:

1 A distinction for clarity. 2 I emphasize that this is not about fantastic reform proposals, but rather a psychological view of principle

#nihilism #peter wessel zapffe #cervis giganticus #the last messiah #consciousness #humanity #pessimism #death #antinatalism

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northamptoncouplestherapy · 4 years

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In every waking millisecond, we sit on the cusp of delight and apprehension

In our daily lives, we often do not know when a moment morphs from creation to cessation. Beginnings command our attention, proclaiming themselves with confetti and sparks: babies are born, we fall in love and build houses. While dancing in our kitchen, we throw caution to the wind, getting drunk on dreams and hope. Equally apparent are finalities, though they declare themselves more somberly: loved ones die, relationships end, and our children inevitably grow up.

In between memorable instances is the stuff of life — moments that make memories, which in turn compost into time and pave the way for the new. It’s in the realm of folding laundry, checking texts, and sitting in traffic that we dwell — not knowing in time, what each interaction and minuscule detail will stand out as, or if it will stand out at all.

I remember one autumn, walking in a meadow with my aging father. He was struggling with worsening heart failure, and his grey eyes and softened coloring seemed to coalesce into the landscape that surrounded us. This man, whose back I rode in tidal pools — who took me bushwhacking, owling and fishing for trout — could no longer cross a stream without taking my hand. In that moment, unbeknownst to me, slept the seeds of an ending, and I now realize that this was to be the last time we’d walk on wild ground together.

Often, only in hindsight do we comprehend that we have crossed such thresholds: moments when endings occur, and we are nescient. Though if we are lucky, we can still recall the last kiss or time we perched our child (now too heavy) on our hip. But, more likely, we will not remember these junctures. How could we? Nescience, defined as the absence of knowing, is more accurately associated with innocence, and less so with ignorance.

That we don’t recognize most endings when they happen is simultaneously tragic, merciful, and perhaps most poignant, profoundly human.

Is there a realm in between? Where the unconscious and the conscious intermingle — affording us daily opportunities to wake to our child’s musings, our mundane chores, and the silenced stirrings of our heart?

Social scientist and bestselling author Brené Brown speaks to foreboding joy (FBJ): windows of beauty and awe so painfully tender and lovely that in the space of a millisecond, we unconsciously flash to terror and shut them down. It seems our minds are prone to transposing the ghosts of catastrophe onto our sleeping children, most intimate loves, and occasions of good fortune.

FBJ, an instinctual recoiling from delight, is one of the most insidious defenses against vulnerability and is inherently embedded in being mortal. When (or if) we have a history of trauma, we may live for years unknowingly haunted by it, and, if left unchecked, it has the potential to shut down love and connection, two of the bedrocks of a wholehearted life.

Recently, while writing the article: John Gottman and Brene Brown on Running Headlong Into Heartbreak, a thought occurred to me that was so heartrending and breathtaking, it warranted an essay of its own:

Foreboding joy is Negative Sentiment Override to life.

Negative Sentiment Override (NSO), a term coined by John Gottman, speaks to the tendency toward viewing our partner and the history of our relationship through a darkened lens. It is a symptom as much as a state. Characterized by a loss of hope, our memories, once imbued with fondness, get recast in our mind’s eye and become concealed by gloom.

NSO is, in essence, a cumulative byproduct of missed opportunities for connection: sliding door moments, where we turn away (and against) junctures that necessitated our care and presence — we neglect to ask about the biopsy, forget to say we’ll be late, or dismiss the melancholy expression on our partner’s face — again and again.

What if every moment in life is a sliding door moment, and in turn, gifts us with opportunities to love or wither?

A child in utero will move towards its mother’s voice as surely as any day lily seeks out the sun. An infant’s heartbeat will synchronize to the rhythm of its primary caregiver by ticking in solidarity to the universal cadence of life: the crickets chirping, raindrops pattering and the rocking of the tide. We come into this world, turning toward — to love and to be loved. It is our birthright.

But what happens if, from the very beginning, life slaps us down and turns us away, meeting us with desynchronization or silence? If instead of a soft caress or a friendly smile, we encounter neglect, abuse, rejection, or ridicule by those we are wired to trust? What happens if we experience such assaults globally, as a result of factors beyond our control, such as our race, ethnicity, class, gender, or sexual orientation? The implications are staggering.

With each loss, we experience a growing intolerance to risk, and in turn, a subconscious aversion to joy. According to Brown, trauma’s greatest casualty is vulnerability. When we’re no longer able to discern what is safe, good, and life-giving, our compass is uncalibrated. So (understandably), we lose trust in life, dress-rehearse tragedy, and recoil or come out swinging.

Turning away from love is the hallmark of anguish. Our psyches and souls start to hurt when a growing sense of urgency complicates the ageless crucibles of mortality and transience. Have we reached a pinnacle where the cumulative legacy of humanity: intergenerational trauma, patriarchy, racism, genocide and negligent stewarding of our planet is compelling even the sanest among us to dive-bomb into the abyss by swallowing fistfuls of blue pills and disowning our vulnerability in turn?

In every waking millisecond, we sit on the cusp of delight and apprehension, informed by an infinite number of variables. What FBJ and NSO share in common, is a turning away from the potential of love, life and vulnerability — sometimes knowingly and sometimes not. In the belly of the whale lies loss and our relationship to it.

Over the summer, a momma fox and her two gangly adolescents took out every backyard chicken within five miles of our rural home. My daughter and I were standing at the door of a white transport van, in a Cumberland Farms parking lot, when the universe delivered a jumping bean of a rescue puppy into our arms and promptly scooped up seven chickens in exchange. We came home to silence and feathers.

A week later we brought home four new pullets, including a sweet black Australorp that honked instead of clucked. My daughter named her Midnight. We locked them safely away in the run. Several days later, while feeding the hens, I turned to the buzzing of flies and saw the starless shape of Midnight slumped lifeless on the stoop. Despite our diligence, we had lost another bird unexplainably, and I struggled with how to tell my child.

We cannot escape certain realities in life. The fox lives in the hen. What are we to do?

The Imperative to Delight

If joy is a portal to terror, it is simultaneously a gateway to delight — each shimmering moment invites us to embrace the paradox of our mortality. We awaken to myriad experiences: what is bitter may become sweet, what is sorrowful may become luminous. Delight, at its best, is the embodiment of gratitude, and I would argue that we are obliged to revel while together we weep — that in acknowledging we are ephemeral, there lies the potential for a sorely needed tenderness amongst humanity.

As poet Ross Gay so beautifully ponders in his essay: Joy Is Such a Human Madness, “What if we joined our sorrows — what if that is joy?” Such communing requires a willingness, courage, and most importantly, vulnerability. But, we can (and must) turn towards sorrow as surely as we turn towards delight — they are sisters and to embody both is grace at its finest.

Gay also takes it a step further, discerning between pleasure and delight. With pleasure being readily accessible and playing to our senses. Sitting with my ten-year-old over breakfast, sharing steamy black vanilla tea and a platter of smokey bacon and maple-cream frosted toast is a pleasure. It’s the first day of fifth grade. Looking at her face, her eyes the same river blue-green they were as a baby; the angle of her nose, familiar — yet not. Time bends, and I swell with tears and laughter — delight.

Sitting at the threshold of joy is both terrifying and magnificent. Angst is an understandable outgrowth. But when we reside here chronically and unknowingly, it is likely due to a multitude of injuries incurred over time. Trauma has crawled into our beds and slipped a worm inside our ear; it burrows deeply into our hearts and whispers that we are not lovable — the reclaiming of delight, and our worthiness of it, is therefore not a luxury but an imperative.

The Capacity for Awe

We must find a portkey — that magical touch-down object Harry Potter reaches for when circumstances necessitate that he transport himself from here to there — a portal to awe that is readily accessible and simultaneously grand: the first two verses of Cohen’s Hallelujah, a glint of light, a lush peony. Each of these can be gateways to joy because awe is non-discriminate.

By nurturing our capacity for wonderment, we nurture fondness and admiration for life. It’s a powerful antidote to negativism and hopelessness, flies smack in the face of nihilism, and is a courageous stance in response to hurt and fear. Furthermore, since awe does not require a shared theology, it is transcendent and is a balm that treats all wounds in a world where there are many.

As a couples therapist, I’ve witnessed my share of marriages ending. Having sat with partners whose love is metamorphosing or dying, I’ve observed the terror on people’s faces, heard the shouting and seen the tears that come from the inevitability of change. I’ve been struck by the palpable beauty and tenderness that can arise in the seemingly darkest of moments — a wife reaching for her husband’s hand while simultaneously weeping and saying goodbye.

Finding beauty and risking vulnerability through joy, is a monumental feat when in NSO to life. What awe is fantastically good at is taking that which rattles us, and instead calms, dazzles or assures us, thus morphing the full catastrophe of living into shimmering stardust. Even amidst suffering, life affords us ample opportunities to pause and take in the beauty, and when we can let our perspectives soften, things like our time-worn hands or the death of a relationship offer up potential in cultivating a gentleness.

I spent years eluding heartache, and in turn, the totality of joy. Despite my proclivity for sad memoirs and murder ballads, I did my best to keep loss at bay and maximize pleasure. On numerous occasions, I grasped when I should have let go, and with the steadfastness of Icarus, I burst into flames, then ash, then water. Loss has given me the gift of perspective and age (ironically) time. Grief is merciful that way.

When I was a child, my father kept honeybees. He’d lull them to sleep with smoke while we plundered their hives. In the space of an hour, I’d taste sweet nectar, get stung by a bee, and doze in the afternoon shade. It was all there: delight, pain, oblivion.

I don’t know much, only that the same force that created that honeycomb ravaged my father’s heart — that there is salvation to be found in mystery, tiny things, and being wrong, that foreboding joy and negative sentiment override are universal wounds of humanity which we must minister to tenderly and with care — and that in time, if we do not turn towards love, we turn towards nothing.

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#The Gottman Institute #Couples Therapist #Couples Retreats #Couples Counseling #Northampton Center for Couples Therapy

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ofsort · 7 years

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Peter Wessel Zapffe - The Last Messiah

The first English version of a classic essay by Peter Wessel Zapffe, originally published in Janus #9, 1933. Translated from the Norwegian by Gisle R. Tangenes. I One night in long bygone times, man awoke and saw himself.

He saw that he was naked under cosmos, homeless in his own body. All things dissolved before his testing thought, wonder above wonder, horror above horror unfolded in his mind.

That day he did not return with prey, and when they found him by the next new moon, he was sitting dead by the waterhole.

From this moment on, he is in a state of relentless panic.

In depressive states, the mind may be seen in the image of such an antler, in all its fantastic splendour pinning its bearer to the ground. III