#the way down lettered

[lovesickeros]

☆ de fontaine

{☆} characters furina {☆} notes cult au, imposter au, drabble, gender neutral reader {☆} warnings angst, suicidal thoughts, hurt / no comfort {☆} word count 1.4k

This wasn't fair. This wasn't fair. This wasn't fair!

She thought, for one moment, she could put the mask down and breathe – for one moment of daydreaming, she thought she could just be Furina. She thought she would finally get to live the live she should've had in the first place, the life she threw away to play God to an audience who saw her as nothing but a circus animal, dancing to their whims. Furina just wanted to be selfish for one brief and fleeting moment..and it was gone before she could even grasp it in her hand. A comet soaring past far out of her reach.

She can barely keep her hands from violently shaking as she looks down at them – broken and bloody and more a corpse then a person – and she feels so numb she can't even feel the rain pelting against her back. None of this is fair, she wants to scream, why is it always me? But her voice is silent beneath the torrent of rain. She wonders if the ocean would take her if she sank into it's depths – just for a moment, she wonders how it would feel to finally be able to sleep at ease.

Furina is tired.

But Furina is nothing if not useful, isn't she?

So she forces her feet to move, dragging against the stone beneath her heels, and drags their bloodied body into the nearest empty building, letting the rain do the work of washing away the smeared blood following her path. The smell makes her feel sick, the feeling of it sticking to her hands and gloves makes her lightheaded, but she persists. Because Furina is useful, because Furina won't let them die out in the rain, because Furina won't stand by and just let them rot on the streets like some..pest.

Furina wants to go home. She wants to sleep and she isn't she if she wants to wake up, this time. But she keeps going anyway.

Because it's all she's ever done, and the habit sticks.

An Archon she may not be, not anymore, but the expectations of five hundred years still linger like eyes on the inside of her skull. They watch her, pry and prod at her thoughts, mocking laughter and judging eyes following her as she forces herself to dance to the song they weave with glee. Furina never stepped off that stage – she's still there, she thinks, watching the crowd stare at her in disdain as the curtain call looms above her like a guillotine. She still hears Neuvillette deliver her damnation and salvation with a trembling voice, still feels her hair stand on end when electro crackled like the crack of the whip, Clorinde's blade aimed at her like a loaded gun.

She's trapped on that stage and she never left, not really.

She hates it. She thinks she hates them, but it's not their fault. They didn't ask for this, didn't ask for everyone to turn against them, didn't ask for her to save them. Neither did she..yet here they are, she thinks.

She tries to tell herself she's in control this time, though. She can stop performing her part in this horrible, bloody play any time she wants. It makes her feel better, just for a little while, if she convinces herself she's still Furina, painfully human.

And Furina has always been good at lying.

It's the believing that's the hard part.

There isn't time for her to wallow in her own self pity, though. They're still bleeding out onto the dusty, creaky floorboards of some random, broken down house and she's just standing there as the blood stains the wood. She can fix it – she's good at fixing things. She's done nothing but fix things – try to, anyway – for five hundred years. She can fix a little wound, how hard could it be? Her hands are clenched so tight they ache as she kneels down, wincing at the creak of the floorboards beneath her heels– she hesitates just long enough to wonder if she's making a mistake before she peels away just enough of the outer layer of their clothes to see the deep, bloody gash across their chest. She tries not to think about it – it's deep, too deep, and she feels dizzy just looking at it, but she's handled worse, right?

Furina can fix it. That's what she's good at.

She doesn't feel so confident when she tries to wrack her brain for..something. Five hundred years, and a little wound stumps her? No, she had to have learned something, right? She's decidedly not trying to buy time because she's panicking, parsing through hundreds of years of memories like flipping through a book. Furina isn't made for this, not really – she's running on nothing but adrenaline and she's really not sure what she's doing, but she's trying. And just like before, it won't be enough, will it?

She'll fall short again – she'll be too late to fix it before she's alone again.

Furina was an Archon..used to be. What use would she have for that sort of knowledge? Which makes her predicament all the more harrowing and bleak. What was she supposed to do?

Furina had heard it first hand, that vitriol in Neuvillette's voice. She isn't sure she's ever heard him that..angry before. She's not sure he would listen to her if she tried, either. And that scares her more then anything. All of Fontaine was up in arms about this..imposter, yet here she was, staring down at them bleeding out in front of her, and she was trying to save them.

Why? Why is she throwing away her only chance at normalcy for a fraud? Why didn't she just turn them in?

They were dying – that should've been a good thing, shouldn't it? So why didn't it feel like it?

"Why you?" Her voice breaks as she speaks in harsh tones, grabbing the front of their shirt in trembling, bloodied hands. "Why now?" She wants to scream, to demand answers they can't give, to claw back the reprieve she was promised after five hundred years of agony..and all she can do is sob into their chest, pleading for an answer that will not come. "Why me?"

Silence is their answer, and it hangs heavy on her trembling shoulders as she cries.

Of course they don't, she thinks bitterly, no one has ever answered her pleas spoken in hushed sobs. Not her other self and certainly not them.

Furina has always been alone. Furina will always be alone.

Because Furina never left that stage, never left that moment when she looked at herself in the mirror and took up a mantle too heavy for her to bear. She always finds her way back eventually. There's no one on the other side anymore – she stands alone on a stage, waiting for an inevitable end she isn't sure will come.

"Please," She pleads through tears and choked sobs, clinging to them like they are all that keeps her from sinking. "Please don't leave me, too." The words burn on her tongue – how pathetic is she that she craves companionship from the bloodied body of the imposter? Perhaps she's truly lost her mind after all these years..perhaps she's finally gone mad. She must have.

But their presence is like the first feeling of gentle warmth upon her skin as the sun crests the horizon, like the gentle lap of tides along her heels, the sway of branches and leaves as the wind blows through them like an instrument all it's own. They are the soothing sound of rain against the window as she watches the dreary skies in fond longing, the first bloom of spring as color blooms upon the landscape like paint had been spilled across the hills and valleys.

They are like the faint spark she carefully nurtures and stokes, so fragile even the smallest wind could blow it out like a candle. She cradles it within her palms, pleads with whoever will listen – prays that someone finally listens, because if not for her, then for them.

She's failed to protect too much already, let too many people with so much trust in her fall between the cracks of her fingers like grains of sand. She won't let them go – she can't.

If nothing else, if she couldn't be saved when she begged for salvation from that five hundred year long agony, even if she never got that chance..

Furina will make sure they do.

[ethaniscool69]

Just saw another Cas: "I love you." Dean gives info about the world meme and god damn. I know the "I love you" was romantic, and I understood what that meant. it's great that he was finally able to say it, even if it wasn't under the best circumstances, but it just hit me right now, and it hurts. He really did love him, and nothing really happened after that. Just thinking about what could have been is so saddening. Castiel sacrificed everything for Dean. He sacrificed his love and what could have been. Then Dean died a meaningless death.

The life they could have had if a TV network wasn't so scared of men kissing. The possibilities, right there, but still so out of reach.

Neither of them got the ending they deserved, needed. They were wronged.

Dean, living his whole life thinking he's driven by hate, madness, and anger and in the midst of all that, finding Cas. Finding Love. That then to be taken away from him as soon as he realizes that is nothing but sad. Dean had an opportunity to feel loved in a way that transcends friendship and romance altogether, and that was taken away from him in mere seconds.

[littlefankingdom]

I need more fics where Dick acts just like in the comics when Jason comes back.

No more "Little Wing! I missed you so much! I'm fine with you killing people, I don't care! You're right, B is an asshole."

Bring back the original "Jason?! Wtf are you doing??? Stop killing people, you little bitch! I'm gonna kick your fucking ass! B is way too nice to you, because it would be me, you would be in jail!"

[hurlingdown]

I know he is not everybody’s type.. but I want to fuck the ever loving shit out of Usopp.

I want him in ways no other character had brought out in me, I hated him when he was first introduced but now I basically live to bury myself between his imaginary thighs. Licking through panties listening to him lie and say he doesn’t like it as he creams himself. 😔😔

Anyway. Monster readers are always hot - especially with the dubious-ness of the character wanting it or wanting to get out. I love when a character likes something but thinks they shouldn’t. It makes the payoff so much more satisfying - especially when the pay off is begging to be stuffed full of eggs or monster babies after hours of saying no or trying to convince themselves it’s wrong.

Late night rambles got a hold of me and you’re my horny lord and saviour Hurling.

-🐉

i read your other ask first and got so excited so i'm going to rush this answer

usopp was actually one of the only characters i could never see myself liking or being attracted to in the beginning (mainly because he and kaya are in a healthy canon relationship that i actually for once agree with... their chemistry is just too good man...) but the way you talk about him is so hot. i feel like he'd be a crier in bed, blushing all the way to the tip of his nose as you eat him out sloppy through his underwear, still spouting sweet lies as tears run down his face from the pleasure <3

[ladyluscinia]

Why did they make the romantic wham line of the finale love letter "we've written our names on each other in permanent ink" when a) matching commitment tattoos would be a wholly believable and in-character thing for Stede and Edward to do, b) they explicitly have not done so to the point of deep irony that Edward's full back "trust no one" is the closest thing that comes to mind, and c) Edward does have matching swallow tattoos (canon) and potentially signature related tattoos with a whole different man (and the writers have got to know about that popular theory, yeah)?????

[tysleria]

So I'm still salty we don't have canonical malewife Gonja and did a thing

[earlgodwin]

remember when david oakes posted a letter on facebook to the fans, addressing their campaign #savetheborgias after the show got canceled...

[moregraceful]

max and i are closing in on launching [redacted sports rpf charity fest] and i am once again pondering how do i write "experience with writing form emails and manipulating google forms in ways no one has dreamed of" in a cover letter without saying "i did it for the rpf grind"...like there's no way unless everyone in this microsoft teams meeting gets really cool about a bunch of stuff really quickly. you know

[good-beanswrites]

Fe Aspec Week Day 1: Coming Out

WOO It's aspec week time!! 💜💚 To no one's surprise I'm starting off with Lukas :3 I know we have the wonderful support convo when he and Python sort of come out to each other, but I was always curious about the loose ends that it brings up -- how he comes out to/is treated by his family, the woman he's left behind, his fellow nobles, etc. This drabble doesn't really answer any of those questions sadfsadf but it's coming from that thought 😂

Father,

I am writing to you now, so soon after my previous letter, as there is something I have yet to confess. It may be difficult for you to hear, but

The sentence stops abruptly, a small dab of ink at the corner of the ‘t’ where the pen had rested a moment in contemplation.

A man sits back at his at a desk. His candle illuminates the page, displaying a few brief lines at the top. He dips his pen in ink time and time again, but the page remains mostly empty. 

At first, the man believes his problem to be a lack of words. No title exists for men like him. He’s well-educated and well-connected in the army; he has an extensive vocabulary for how the upper and lower class categorizes its people. Whether it’s a scholar’s dull terminology, vulgar common language insults, or the carefully chosen phrasing of a gossiper, none of the usual descriptors fit him. All he has are the distantly connected criticisms he’d heard his whole life: “heartless,” “cold,” “detached.” 

When the candle burns lower, however, he realizes the real issue. He has far too many words.

Where would he even start? Should he describe his contentment with his life here? How not one of his fellows ever brought up the lack of a woman at his arm, or how dinners with the King and Queen themselves were filled with pleasantries that never touched on his romantic endeavors? Whatever his father had been preparing for, it had never come.

Or should he begin earlier, when he was first accepted by this group of people? He wasn’t sure if he could properly convey all that he experienced on that fateful night, speaking softly with the unit’s archer – a man he’d come to call one of his truest friends. The man had heard for the first time in his life that there were others like him. He heard that they were content. They were whole.

He could go back further and describe the moment that the realization first hit him. How his father had been right in a sense. Just as he said, one day when the man was grown, he would be in the arms of another, and everything about himself would suddenly make sense. There was only one difference. He’d been forced to bury that clarity, since it wasn’t the same kind that everyone else came to.

Or should he start even further back? He could recount all little hints that haunted him across his youth. His dreams for the future never quite aligned with those of his peers. Nothing ever seemed to align. His choice of stories to read, of games to play, of jokes to make. He wouldn’t ever claim he was mistreated as a child, but everyone would agree that the signs had appeared even then.

The man sighs. Where is the beginning, when one has always been this way? 

The clock strikes on the hour. It is late, and he will need to be at his sharpest tomorrow for drills and meetings. He has no more time to fret over words about his past. 

The man tries a new method, and wonders what his friends may write about him. He can’t resist a dry smile. He knows that he can never, under any circumstance, allow them to exchange any correspondence with his family. 

But the exercise gives him an idea.

He writes out a single statement. Then he blows out the candle and heads to his bed. 

there is nothing broken about me.

Cordially,

Lukas

[brother-emperors]

if you've ever wondered how long something can sit in my WIP folder, this one is probably the idea I've been kicking around the longest

so. you see. what happened was.

last year I was reading about socratic dialogues in the renaissance right. only at one point, I got it confused with platonic discussions, and when you start reading about platonic discussions of love, you run into marsilio ficino, and I just kind of. stayed there until I ran out of books to read, and finally decided to finish this up!

Plato's Persona: Marsilio Ficino, Renaissance Humanism, and Platonic Traditions, Denis J. J. Robinchaud

bsky ⭐ pixiv ⭐ pillowfort ⭐ cohost

[cadaverousdecay]

i’m so overwhelmed by things that shouldn’t be overwhelming...

[bittersweetresilience]

it feels cosmically unfair that i think about writing all the time want to write all the time and sit down to write all the time and i come up with two sentences at best. there should be some reward system i think

[happyendingsong]

https://x.com/onlylovewakana/status/1825179001092211075

https://x.com/maskedridernile/status/1825154845889962101

https://x.com/Toga_tjpw/status/1825392487059562952

[saul-goodboy]

tme doesnt even mean anything anymore, it’s just another word for afab

[sukibenders]

Bridgerton really is the only fandom where you could create a random ship for pure enjoyment, that was about the two characters in said ship finding one another and the life they could have together, and yet somehow certain people in this said fandom would go "Okay but what about this person outside this ship (who wasn't even mentioned)? Obviously, if this ship exists they can't be happy, so just stop talking about it in general. Besides, it's not canon so just accept reality. "

[crossbackpoke-check]

Dysprosium, Mary Soon Lee

dysprosium, AN 66, is a silvery-white rare earth metal. its name is derived from the greek dysprositos, meaning “hard to get at”, owing to the difficulty in separating and isolating this rare earth element. dysprosium is used to measure neutron flux, to fuel reactors, and to activate phosphors. terfenol-d is a magnetorestrictive alloy, meaning that it changes shape when a magnetic field is applied, and is used to manufacture underwater acoustic systems.

jason “robo” robertson, dallas stars #21 for @simmyfrobby’s nhl periodic table poems <3