#trigger warning: allusions to body mutilations

[with-love-from-hell]

Transpose

{ft. Solomon}

Part 5 of the Fortification Series  (based on this request)

Genre: hurt/comfort, angst, some fluff

Written for a GN!MC, though the partner is written as male.

WC: ~3.9k

TRIGGER WARNING: Each part contains graphic depictions of various types of abuse, please see specific content warnings for each individual part.

CW: extreme physical abuse, allusion to emotional abuse, light stalking, sexual harassment, torture, mutilation/body horror graphic violence and gore

Be warned, this one has a lot of vivid body horror and torture. I imagine Solomon being as sadistic as Jigsaw in his way of enacting revenge.

Series Masterlist

Note: Though I do have a masters degree in Psychology and clinical training in treating survivors of abuse, I am not your therapist, nor is this fic intended to take the place of professional help. If you are experiencing any type of abuse, please seek support from a professional. Utilize the Victim Connect Resource Center to get connected to the appropriate helpline.

You duck just in time for a glass to explode against the wall inches away from your head. Your heartbeat pounded deafeningly loud in your ears as you tried to focus on your breathing. 

What had you done this time?  

You had no idea. 

Another night spent with your horrid boyfriend always meant walking on eggshells because of how volatile he is, but you hoped that maybe tonight would be different. 

Oh, how wrong you were.  

If your boyfriend was a bit more subtle with his anger, perhaps it would have gone completely unnoticed by others around you. But since coming to Devildom and building connections with the demons you lived with, as well as the exchange students and royals, it didn’t take long for them to catch on. The first to notice things were not quite right in your relationship was Solomon. Being the only other human besides the two of you, he was always around. That, and his room shared a wall with your boyfriend’s room, so it’s not like he couldn’t overhear the yelling and physical violence that would happen to you within. 

After hearing the glass break against the wall, he was immediately listening in to the conversation...well, if you could even call it a conversation. It was all one-sided yelling, as usual. Occasionally he would hear your mousey voice give a response, but it wouldn’t be long before it was drowned out with more yelling, or the sound of his hand slapping you across the face. 

Solomon wished he could intervene; perhaps he could have if his first attempt didnt go so poorly. He regretted trying to talk to your boyfriend the first time he saw the bruise on your cheek from one of his brutal backhands, but the only result that occurred from that confrontation was your boyfriend telling him to fuck off, and then finding that he had hurt you worse the next time he saw you. He was at a loss, really. And it’s not like he could spend any time with you when you visited Purgatory Hall, as the man kept you confined to the small bedroom and refused to let you interact with any of the other dorm residents. He had even been getting you to isolate from the brothers, who were now fully aware of what was going on after Solomon expressed his concerns to Lucifer a few weeks prior. Lucifer asked him to gather as much evidence as he could, and to keep a thorough documentation on what happened within Purgatory hall, as the man was not ballsy enough to inflict any harm on you if Lucifer was near. 

Maybe your boyfriend had caught wind of his report...because tonight was the worst abuse he had heard yet. multiple glass items were heard shattering against the wall, in the midst of his intense yelling and berating of you. Your voice was comparatively so small. He wondered how much it would take to get you to leave the man. Was there anything he could really do? He hated just sitting around and documenting the violence, but Solomon wasn’t really sure what else could be done. Lucifer and his brothers, as well as the angels, all were just as concerned, but stuck in a similar position. In order for the exchange program to be respected by the 3 worlds, certain rules had to be upheld...as shitty as those rules were. Maybe Diavolo could give an exception...

A sudden loud bang against the wall followed by your calls for help stirred him from his thoughts. He panicked, and was on his feet in an instant. He completely pushed all thoughts of formalities away after the man’s sudden threat against your life. If they continued to ignore this any more, you would surely be killed.

“Mc?! Mc, are you alright?” Solomon hollered through the door, trying desperately to listen over your boyfriend’s yelling. After trying the knob and finding the door locked, he gave a threat to catch your boyfriend’s attention. “I’m calling Lucifer!” 

The door swung open and Solomon was met with the irate face of the man who dared call himself your significant other. His chest heaved as he stared the sorcerer down, trying to look imposing. If it wasn’t Solomon, perhaps this technique would have worked. But he had been alive for a very long time now, and he was probably one of- if not the- most powerful humans alive. Most threats meant nothing to him. 

But apparently this was information the man had yet to learn. 

“The fuck do you want?” He snarled, fingers gripped tightly around the door frame to show he would not be moved. 

“Are you kidding right now?” Solomon snapped, taking a step forward. “What I want is for you to leave Mc alone.” 

The man scoffed, turning to glance back at your frail body. Through the gap between his forearm and abdomen, Solomon could just see you slumped against the wall, clutching your right arm with blood trickling down the side of your face. The sight of you was cut off quickly as the man before him moved to block you from his view. 

“Our relationship is none of your business, old man.” He snickered. He really thought nothing of Solomon’s intervention other than he could sick the eldest brother on him, but he intended to flee before that could happen. 

“You made it my business when you decided to lay hands on them” Solomon retorted. While his outward demeanor was calm, his brain was going haywire. Panic was spreading through him as quickly as a barn fire, and he was desperate to find a way to get you away from him. 

“Tch.” The man gritted his teeth and attempted to slam the door in Solomon’s face. 

As if acting on autopilot, Solomon rammed his body against the door as hard as he could, sending the man toppling backwards over himself. 

“Mc, come on. Now!” Solomon called, pinning your boyfriend’s legs behind the door and extending his hand out to you. 

You stumbled toward him as fast as you could, just managing to avoid your boyfriend’s grasp as he finally was able to get to his feet. Before you could even register what was happening, Solomon grabbed your hand firmly and pulled you along as you fled Purgatory Hall. 

Your boyfriend’s screaming threats of killing you could be heard from behind as you ran blindly, trusting Solomon to lead you somewhere safe as the adrenaline fueled your movements. Some lower demons looked on in confusion as Solomon tore through the streets of Devildom with you in tow close behind. After a while, the man’s voice faded away and you were lost in a sea of demons. However, a wrong step resulted in a twisted ankle, you finally came to a rest in an alley a few blocks away from the House of Lamentation. 

Solomon helped you to the ground, checking over your foot carefully before turning his attention to other injuries you may have accrued from the man’s abuse. As he trailed his fingers over the long gash on the side of your head, the adrenaline finally began to wear off, and you felt not only the overwhelming pain of your injuries, but the emotional turmoil and fear creeping into your core. 

Solomon was slightly taken aback as you began to weep, unsure of how to approach the deep sorrow you were releasing. He hadn’t been this emotionally invested in another person in a long time, and he was afraid of doing or saying something to hurt you unintentionally. 

He rested one of his hands gently on your forearm, rubbing his thumb over the skin gently. Slowly, he gathered you in his arms, providing soft words of reassurance that you were now safe, and that he was going to ensure to get you help. He let you cry for a short while before lifting you into his arms bridal-style, and carrying you the rest of the way to the brothers. 

Once at the house, you were immediately swarmed by multiple concerned faces. The brothers each demanded to know what happened, and it took Lucifer’s intense intervention to finally get them to give you some space so he could assess the situation. 

Solomon tended gently to your wounds, being careful not to produce any more hurt than was necessary. As he mended you, he hummed a soft tune to ease your woe. Your crying slowed as he sang, to you, creating a warm aura in the small office you, he, and Lucifer sat in. It wasn’t long before your eyes began to droop, the energy it took to escape and even tolerate the abuse, plus processing it afterwards finally catching up to you. Solomon rested your head on his lap, gently stroking your hair as you slowly drifted off to sleep. He was glad the healing spells he used on you sapped enough of the remaining energy you had so that you could even get some much-needed rest. 

As you lay on the couch in peace, Solomon and Lucifer contacted Diavolo. Something had to be done immediately to ensure your safety, and the slow-moving bureaucracy of the law couldn’t be counted on anymore. 

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Solomon watched on from the distance as your ex-boyfriend exited the back of the bar. He had followed him like a shadow since he had been barred from returning to Devildom due to the danger he posed to you, and Diavolo even went as far as to wipe his memory of Devildom completely...which means even if he recognized Solomon’s face in a weird Deja-vu sort of way, he would have no knowledge of who he truly was. 

Solomon pretended to be a regular at the bar he worked at, keeping close watch on him as he flirted with customers and harassed at the waitresses who worked along side him. He was truly the king of all bastard men, and Solomon had to restrain himself from mauling him the first time he laid eyes on him in the human world after all that had happened. 

Breathe, Solomon. His demise will come in due time. 

Weeks had passed before he finally got the go ahead from Diavolo to inflict his “punishment,” begging the prince to let him be the one to inflict it over one of the brothers. It took a lot of convincing, but he managed to lay out a firm plan to all of them that would surely result in the most torturous death imaginable. And as the man propped his body against the back dumpster and lit a cigarette between his fingers, Solomon decided that it was the perfect time to act. 

He pulled out his grimoire and flipped to his bookmarked page. After a few whispered incantations, a crimson light emitted from the ground where the man was standing. The man cocked his head in confusion, not feeling entirely sure what to make of what he was looking at. But after a moment, he realized that he couldn’t move outside of the magic circle.  

Solomon snapped the book shut and approached him from across the street. The man eyed him suspiciously, confused as to what was happening to him. When he tried to speak, no sound came from his mouth. Solomon stopped only millimeters from the edge of the circle, staring at the man with cold, cruel eyes. The man appeared to be trying to shout at the sorcerer, and Solomon smirked at his attempts at verbal aggression. 

He lifted his hand, and a phantom appendage matching his movements slowly crept up from the ground. Solomon whispered a few more words as he raised his other hand, another matching phantom limb appearing as he moved. The man glared at the actions in confusion until Solomon pulled out a spool of thread and a long, sharp needle, tossing it to the hands who now began to operate outside of the sorcerer’s movements. 

He sat back and watched as the mans eyes widened in fear. More phantom hands leaped up from the ground and held the man still as they came at him with the materials given by Solomon. The man tried to scream, but like before, no noise came out as one of the hands pierced the needle through his top lip. The hands worked in sync, sewing the entirety of the man’s mouth shut in only a few moments. Blood dripped from his lips and spattered onto the ground, only to be absorbed the the circle. The more blood fed the magic, the more intense the light from the circle became. 

Solomon paced around the alley, watching as the limbs slowly disappeared back into the ground. The man sobbed in pain, trying as hard as he could to break free of his small cage. Solomon paused his pacing, turning to look back at the man who now looked desperately terrified at what ever Solomon’s next move happened to be. He gave him a cold smile, and began another incantation. 

“Create a path where there is none.” 

Within moments, the ground below the man split open and he fell through the ground. He fell through the ceiling of a basement and collapsed onto a dusty cement floor, groaning at the impact and becoming surprised at the fact that he could again make sound. Forgetting that his lips were sewn shut, the man tried to scream, only to illicit a shooting pain through his face. He wailed, clawing at the threads in his face. 

Solomon followed suit through his own portal and came to a halt in front of the man. He tried to stand up and throw a punch at Solomon, but his fist was easily caught by one of the phantom limbs from before. Multiple circles lined the walls and floors of the room, and one by one they all began to glow. Solomon’s lips slowly upturned into a nefarious smile, causing a new wave of fear to wash over the man. 

“I believe it’s time you received your retribution.” Solomon hissed as he rolled up the sleeves of his shirt. He yanked the man down by the collar of his jacket, forcing him on his hands and knees. 

The man tried to move to get a swing in, but the phantom hands piled onto his back, rendering him immobile. Solomon muttered a quick incantation and stepped back, watching curiously as the ground began to tremble and groan beneath them. The man began to shake, fearing what was to come.

Then there was silence. 

All that could be heard was the man’s labored breaths, and the gentle tap of Solomon’s foot on the ground, seemingly in morse code. Suddenly, the man began to screech, the pain caused by the binds on his lips numbing to the new pain searing his hands and running up his forearms. The ground continued to grow hotter and hotter until the skin of his hands began to melt into the concrete. The ground bubbled and popped around his hand, fusing the piping hot concrete with his body. It wasn’t long before the skin became a puddled mess, the exposed muscle and bone of the man’s hand peaking through the remaining thin layer of skin. 

Solomon snapped his fingers, and the temperature of the ground immediately shifted. The skin that had melted off the mans hand hardened once more, creating a hybrid appendage. He tried to yank his hands out of the firm, fleshy mass, but was only greeted with pain as the skin only gave way slightly. The threads in the mans face had begun to snap, creating just barely enough room for his screams to manifest. Though, the pain caused by the continuously forced opening against the binds only became more insufferable. 

Solomon kneeled down to the man so he was eye level with him. He gripped his chin and lifted his head to meet him. He tutted as he gave him a once over, becoming displeased with the way he was ruining the threads through his lips. 

“Have you figured out what’s next, or are you still uncertain as to what this is about?” He mused, eager to continue the torture as he toyed with his emotions.

“nnnn....pll...plea-ease.” The man managed to garble out, wincing at the pain caused by opening his mouth to speak. 

“Hm. Well then, allow me to elaborate.” Solomon dropped the mans head lifting himself back up and approaching a small table in the back of the room. the soft clinking of glass on metal could be heard as he spoke. 

“You see, Your relationship with Mc was no more healthy than wading in a pool of sewage.” He lifted a clamp, eyeing it’s width before resting it on his belt loop. “Your constant berating of them, followed by threats that eventually would result in physical violence was...sickening, to say the least. But somehow, you got a weird sense of pleasure from it.” 

The man stared at him, confused as to what he was talking about. How did he even know about his relationship with you? Is he why he hadn’t been able to get ahold of you in two weeks? 

Solomon continued. “You managed to dull their senses with the trauma you inflicted. All they speak of are the things they feel they have done wrong, and expelconstant insecurity and fear that you have put into their head. So I have taken the liberty of closing the trap that gave them those thoughts in the first place.” 

The man gulped, tasting blood in his mouth. 

“Now, as for your hands.” He tilted his head back, smiling coldly as he continued crushing some items with a mortar and pestle. “they have struggled to desire to be touched by anyone at all after all the pain you inflicted with them. You gave them nothing but pain with your touch, So I figured I would remove the ability to touch anything ever again from you.” 

The man began to cry, begging through blubbered sobs for Solomon to let him go. The man tried again to pull his hands free from the fleshy prison, but was unable to before Solomon turned to face him, a small, cupped piece of paper resting delicately in his palm. It was filled with black and green particles. 

Solomon crouched down before him. “Now which sense do you suppose is next, hmm?” 

the man’s eyes grew wide with intense fear as he began to desperately struggle, screaming as loud as he could against the threads in his mouth. Solomon caught his chin in his hand and forced his head backwards. Despite his struggling, the man was no match for the sorcerer. He emptied the contents of the paper into the man’s nose, pinching the nostrils closed with the clamp.

The man began sputtering between screams, intense coughs causing the threads to completely burst open, sending new waves of pain coursing through his body. Though, he couldn’t quite stop to try to sooth the pain, as the burning fire in his lungs only increased, the coughs growing deeper and deeper until blood began expelling from his trachea. 

Solomon chuckled, standing back up to admire his work. “Tetrodotoxin and Ricin. Two toxins that will cause death within a few hours.” 

The man continued hacking, more blood and black, tar-like liquid leaking out of his mouth. Solomon released the clamp, his nose immediately leaking blood at it’s release. The man could no longer smell anything but iron. 

“So this one many be a stretch, but I’m sure anyone forced to put their mouth on yours has smelled that atrociously must-filled breath of yours.” Solomon shrugged. “Or maybe I was looking for an excuse to try that concoction out. Regardless, you still deserve it.” 

“P-p-please!” The man tried to speak though a slew of hacking and coughs. “ ’m s-sorry.” 

Solomon scoffed. “No you’re not.”

He turned back toward the table, grabbing a small paring knife and holding it up to the dim light overhead. 

“But you will be.” 

Solomon motioned for the phantom limps to hold the mans head still as he made quick work of his eyes. He was extra cautious with this part of the body, wanting to make sure to keep them in tact to use for future experiments. The man screamed out as loud as he could, trying to move out of the hands as he severed the nerves, but Solomon ensured the spell for the hands was strong enough that no movement could get past them once their grips were solidified.

Once the eyes were completely removed, Solomon gave them each a once over. The man sobbed, begging for Solomon to spare him. Solomon let out a “tsk” before putting his eyes into a jar, sealing them off from the dusty air. 

“This one should be obvious.” He remarked, turning back to the man and crossing his arms. “You don’t deserve to observe the beauty of the world after all you’ve done to make their perception of it so bleak.”

Solomon paced around the room, his eyes glued to the shell of a man before him. “I had a lot of trouble with this last one, though I am quite impressed with what I came up with.”

The man whimpered in terror, unsure how this torture could get any worse. Because he could no longer see, he was unable to observe Solomon preparing his final attack. He jerked the mans head to the side and poured hot, cursed, wax into the mans right ear. He sobbed at the scalding burns that began lining his ear canal. 

Before doing the left, Solomon leaned down to his left ear. “This one is for the the fact that all your actions put them on edge, causing them to flinch at just the hint of a raised voice or a loudly shut door. If their sensitivity to sound is this severe, I don’t see why you need the function at all.” 

With the last words he poured the hot wax into his other ear. The man sobbed as his ability to hear was suddenly gone. the deathly silence that followed was almost worse that hearing Solomon’s footsteps around him. He couldn’t sense where his presence was at all, his senses completely stifled by the various rounds of torture. 

Solomon took one last look at the man before opening a portal back to Devildom. He smiled as the mans body beginning to convulse, knowing death would come to him rather soon. With his bag of materials in tow, he returned back to Purgatory Hall to rest from the weeks of planning. He couldn’t wait to see you again, and know that you could rest easy without this man in any of the realms to cause you more pain. 

Maybe he wasn’t so good at emotional support, but if he could keep you safe in other ways, he would go to the ends of the earth for you. 

[dooodle-ducky]

List of Trigger Warnings for Dhmis

As the header suggests, this is a compiled list of all the trigger warnings (that I'm aware of) present in the Don't Hug Me I'm Scared episodes, as these videos provide no warnings for such. Therefore, this list is for people who should be aware of such topics present in the episodes before they watch it. However, if you have any suggests for any more topics to be added to this list, PLEASE let me know and I'll make the necessary changes.

Without further ado:

Disturbing surrealist/weirdcore/dreamcore imagery and audio

Major depictions of realistic disturbing imagery of gore, violence, mutilation, and body horror of all kinds

Blood and realistic organs continuously present

Major depictions of flashing/pulsating lights, visuals, and imagery as well as general fast motion/blurring

Major depictions of eyestrain/bright colors

Eye contact/scopophopia (not major focus, but still heavily present)

Generally creepy/unsettling imagery and audio

allusions to psychological abuse such as invalidation

Loud sounds, yelling, screams, and jumpscares

Themes, allusions, and graphic depictions of death and torture

Minor allusions to sexual/explicit imagery

Animal gore, death, and torture

Realistic insects and gore regarding such

Puppets

Themes of manipulation

Generally gross/grotesque imagery (ex slime, viscous liquids)

Allusion to aphobia/homophobia

Graphic depiction of cults, worship, religion, indoctrination, and brainwashing

Fire/burning

Glitching/static

Allusions to grief, loss, crying

Realistic images of raw flesh and meat

Medical imagery (surgery)

Disturbing teeth related imagery

References to alcohol/cigarettes/drugs

Depiction of drowning

And that's about all I can think of if there's any more please let me know, thank you for reading if you did

[hlshai]

Askblog/tws/rules

(updated 2021-02-21)

Hello everyone, I’m pleased to announce that I’m making an askblog as a companion piece to my Silent Hill AU HLVRAI fanfiction! This is a separate version of my AU where the audience can get a different ending. I’ll have it lag behind the main fic a bit to avoid spoilers. 

trigger warnings:

(potential) major character death

unreality (general/videogame)

gaslighting (characters and audience. Silent Hill will lie to you.)

allusions to/instances of various types of abuse (child, domestic, medical)

body horror

blood/gore/violence 

firearms/blunt weapons/knives/etc

self-mutilation

psychological horror

dogs/dog-ish entities

insect/insect-ish entities

child/child-like entities

harm to animals

harm to children

dolls

needles/medical horror

drugs/cigarettes/alcohol

police/law enforcement

unsanitary (general)

emetophobia

scopophobia (eye contact)

panic attacks

discussion of/allusion to suicide

death/corpses

mature/disturbing themes (confinement, paranoia, guilt, isolation, etc)

moving pictures/.gifs (no intentional rapid flashing, but be aware)

references to Silent Hill lore, including the occult/The Order (as easter eggs)

NO SEXUAL VIOLENCE. EVER.

etc (will add as needed)

Everything will be tagged accordingly. Please look through this list and make sure that you have any of your triggers blocked. Only unblock posts if you’re sure you’re in the headspace to handle them. 

  rules:

No nsfw asks/submissions. Flirting is tolerated, but no derailing.

Please don’t use/repost art without both permission and credit.

No magic anons

Please let me know if you need something added to the tw list.

Please tag triggers when reblogging from me (be nice to your followers!)

standard DNI applies (transphobes/terfs, anti-lgbta, racism, sexism, anti-Semites, other bigots etc)

(new!) all anons must have an anon tag (example: pink anon, bird anon, etc) if they are participating in the story. anon tags aren’t necessary for speaking OOC to me (the mod, EC).

etc (will add as needed)

  I reserve the right to not answer any ask for any reason.

  If you don’t use anon, certain characters might call you by name or reference things you’ve said on your blog. This is a very fourth wall breaking experience. Be aware that your actions may have consequences. 

The games this blog are based on are rated M. This blog is intended for mature audiences. Viewers, please use discretion. 

That makes it sound a bit worse than it is, but I’m covering my bases. ✌

reblogs > likes! It helps me reach a wider audience <3

I hope you all have fun!

LINK TO PARENT FANFICTION: [x]

READ BLOG FROM THE BEGINNING: [x] PICK AN INDIVIDUAL SESSION TO READ: [x]

JOIN OUR DISCORD: [x]

CAST: [x] BESTIARY: [x]

[hyu-ck]

MASTERLIST

*The warmth of the trigger on your finger was familiar, easy- the pit in your stomach was anything but.

PART THREE - FINAL

Characters: Mark, Jaehyun, Taeyong, Reader

Pairing(s): Mark/Reader, Jaehyun/Reader

Genre: Assassin!AU // Angst // M

Word Count: 9.7K

Warnings: Graphic Violence (blood and the WORKS be warned), Language, Brief Allusion to Suicide

Fresh blood is warm.

The average human body operates at a temperature of 98 degrees Fahrenheit, organs thriving in their heat, blood pulsing and pushing at their veins. Humans under duress heat up. They blister and sweat and bruise with potent breaths of humility dripping between their teeth, fingers digging into their palms as they wince and wither. They burn and they fry. Pleasure, fear- it doesn’t matter- the body reacts similarly.    

A man panting against your shoulder, with his canines sunk in sex, will probably be sweating. He will probably be thrumming, all his blood rushing down south, and he will probably be a flame to feel. His blood will be molten.

And when that blood coats you like a silver cast, dripping down the sides of your face and leaving a liter of dark, vengeful liquor to stain your blouse- it’ll feel like its burning.

“I-I’m sorry, I didn’t,” Mark heaved, his finger still twitching on the curve of the trigger, “I don’t know why I did that.”

“You don’t know why you just blew the head off our mark?” you growled, dragging a hand over your forehead to smear the blood away from your eyes, “The one that we were supposed to dispose of quietly, and cleanly?”

“No?” Mark stammered, eyes wide.

The inside of your mouth was coated metallic, teeth outlined in burnt red embers, face grim and body grimed. Your stomach was boiling, your skin was slick in warmth.

“Bullshit, Mark! Your finger did not just slip from eight yards away and through the balcony window!”

“It could have.”

You growled, slamming your fist into the wall and leaving a maroon splatter of anger against the crisp, wildflower-patterned walls. “Give me the gun Mark, because I’m going to kill you.”

“We can handle this,” Mark tried placating, his hands raised in surrender. He started walking towards you, stepping gingerly through the shattered frame of the balcony doors, crunching glass beneath his shoes. He winced.

“Fuck no, we cannot handle this, Mark,” you could feel your breath picking up, your own temperature rising, “We are currently standing in the penthouse of a thirty-story building, in the middle of the night, with the headless pulp of Oliver Cromwell still twitching against his Italian Mosaic flooring.”

“Now you’re just being dramatic.”

“You’d be dramatic too if you just took an impromptu bath in someone else’s blood- I smell like Caesar’s ass.”

“Why Caesar?”

“Because he killed fucking thousands of people, Mark, I’ll give you the textbook breakdown of all my analogies when I’m not in danger of going to prison for life, yeah?”

Mark was now beside you, staring forlornly at the tuxedoed hull of Daniel Carr- whose handsome face was now dispersed about his home like holiday tinsel. “What should we do?” He pushes his toe into Daniel’s shoulder, watching the body roll over.

You heaved a breath again, scraping under your eyes with your thumbs and blinking quickly, trying to clear your vision of red, dancing lights. “You’re going to call Taeyong and ask him for one of his many contacts, I’m going to take a shower and find Mrs. Bonaparte’s closet. Then, we’re going to fix this fuckery.”

A stern glare over your shoulder sent Mark’s face burning in your mind, and he turned, looking all-too-nonchalant for the events at hand.

“I’m sorry?” Mark shrugged, shoving his gun into the back waistband of his dress pants, “At least his hand isn’t shoved up your skirt anymore.”

You stopped halfway to the hallway, turning back on Mark as he stood in a puddle of blood near the foyer, his arms crossed. Your lips pursed and he looked up from the body, furrowing his brows at your expression. “What?”

A breath, long and despondent, collapsed from your mouth. “If the reason you just blew that man’s brains to next Thanksgiving is because he got too friendly with me…”

“You were telling him to stop.”

Your hands dropped at your side, fingers caking together as the seconds ticked by.

“Mark-“

“You were telling him to stop.”

His voice was fraying into the erratic; a tunnel-vision escapade that threatened his usual clarity. His hand was searching for his gun again, something familiar, something to hold onto. He needed something. The trigger was a constant, the blood was a constant. It was all he had.

He latched on finally, taking it out from behind him and letting it hang against his palm, the slate gloss flinching. “You told him to take his hand away, to stop kissing you, you told him no- and he wasn’t listening.”

“It wasn’t your place, Mark. You should’ve controlled yourself,” you said, not noticing the way it sounded like a plea. He was binding himself to the floor somehow, staring into the discarded mutilation of his innocence as it leaked out over the tile. His fingers played a tandem game, over the barrel of the gun, over the band of his watch, around the tip of the silencer like it was a lover’s mouth.

“I should control a lot of things,” he muttered, “I’m having issues with that lately.”

You realized then that it was too late.

All those wasted, baited nights of prayer towards an unknown god for him to stay- well, you didn’t know what he was supposed to stay. He lost his purity much like you had: with a knife, a quick whispered tip of ‘ear to ear’, and a firm push to the back. He’s killed, he’s watched from behind the glass as someone shivered under lacerations, he’s bonded himself with pride and Ares’ war call. There’s no salvation to battle against six feet of soil and rolled grass anymore.

He wasn’t any better than you on paper, a little less staining on his hands, but malevolence draped over his shoulders just the same. He was your Greek tragedy, too far gone.

But you wanted him to keep the smile, the light behind his eyes. You wanted him to stay belligerent against fortune, against the fate you knew too well. You needed him to stay away from your sins, to wash in the waters of forgiveness. You needed him to stay good.

Now he stood before you, near midnight, a fallen angel choking on the vines of retribution.

It was too fucking late.

You wanted to take his hand, take the gun from his shaking fingers, wrap him in your arms under all your gore. You wanted to kiss him until the blood left your lips, till the blank stare slipped away from his face.

“Call Taeyong,” you told him from your place on the cutting room floor, turning your back as he nodded. You could almost hear his wings hit the ground.

♤♤♤♤♤♤

You paid little mind to the swirl of blood down the drain, your toes curling into the grain as you dragged your fingers through your hair. The shower began to clog with salt and clots of flesh, the water pooling around your toes as you turned the heat up, letting it scald you, purify you. You scrubbed and scrubbed again, the scent of the body wash choking you with steam until you could no longer smell it, until the rag was just scratching your skin red.

Clean. You need to be clean.

You dropped the rag somewhere in the water, but it blended in with pink.

The blood wouldn’t leave your skin, wouldn’t leave your eyes. The water burned faintly now, your body adjusting to the temperature until you couldn’t feel it at all. Your stomach and shoulders were raw and pink, but you couldn’t tell if the color was from Daniel’s brain or the gruff of your palms as you scratched against your body.

Down on your knees you pulled the blockage from the drain, digging bruises into your legs. The moisture wouldn’t leave your eyes.

Soon the bathroom was left as it once sat before, only fog against the glass and your heart left in the gutter. It wouldn’t be lonely amongst the ruin.

You still saw flecks of crimson on your hands when you glanced down, but they weren’t there. You rubbed, they wouldn’t move. Then, they’d be gone.

Mark sat on the couch in a fresh button-down shirt and a new watch, his gun on the clear coffee table and a burner cell beside that. Mrs. Carr’s dress was too loose on your waist and chest, and the color clashed with the curtains in the room. None of it mattered. You sat down beside Mark, your hand resting too close to his knee.

“Did you call?”

“He’s sending a woman named Valentine, she’ll be here within the half hour.”

He smiled at you, like he didn’t recall the last twenty minutes.

“How much time do we have to fix this?”

“There’s a couple hours till his son will be home; he works until two at a gas station downtown.”

“Then I hope Valentine knows punctuality- I wouldn’t want to add to her already gracious workload.”

You could play along.

“Is there ever a moment you aren’t planning someone’s death?”

“I could ask the same of you, Mark.”

He nodded acceptingly, and you settled into an empty silence, waiting for Valentine. You let your mind veer off in the quiet, wondering what was to come through the door when your salvation arrived. The name Valentine offered little to no substance to your fleeting recollection of Taeyong’s numerus contacts, as he preferred to keep every trick up his sleeve till the last possible moment, pushing everyone into the dark before he revealed his cards with grander.

Ten minutes creeped past before a light knock pushed you to your feet, Mark close behind you, gun in hand. Carefully stepping around the still spreading puddle of blood you grasped the doorknob and cracked it open, carefully angling yourself to block the sight of Mr. Carr’s misfortune and Mark’s gun that hung beside your hip.

A woman with impatience smeared across her angled brows stood in the hallway, tapping a heel-clad foot and clutching a briefcase against her thigh. She leaned to the side to peer through the opening of the door, her hair falling off her shoulders as she cleared her throat impatiently. “Taeyong called?”

“Valentine?”

She nodded, pushing you aside as she walked in, dutifully noting the surroundings and humming as she set down her case on the top of the coffee table. Hovering at the doorway still beside Mark, you exchanged looks of confusion before closing the door and coming towards the mysterious Valentine.

“Taeyong mentioned he had a couple of associates who had made a bit of a problem, I hope I’m not wrong in assuming it’s the both of you?” she asked, swiping her thumb along the underside of her lip to clean the bleeding edge of her lipstick. As both of you stared dumbly at her she just rolled her eyes and smiled, turning back to click the locks of her briefcase open.

Mark cleared his throat. “Yes-yes, we’re who Taeyong called for, sorry about the rush…” he trailed off as she pulled out a box of latex gloves, a roll of trash bags, a small flip phone and a few rags- the contents of her luggage seeming unending.

She tied her hair up quickly and discarded her suit jacket, rolling up the sleeves of her shirt. She jolted suddenly, as if she had forgotten something, and turned back towards you and Mark.

“Terribly sorry! I seem to have forgotten my manners,” she said, holding out a hand towards you, “You both can call me Val.”

Taking her hand, you pumped it twice and responded in kind, a feeling of uncertainty settling over you as you watched Mark do the same. Who the hell is this?

“Mark, could you be a dear and run out to my car and grab the bleach? I didn’t have enough hands on me to get it earlier,” she requested, tossing you a pair of gloves with a pointed look and then handing Mark her keys.

“Sure,” Mark drawled, returning the same look that was plastered across your face as he slipped out the door.

Valentine took it upon herself to stalk towards Mr. Carr’s body, squatting down beside him and moving his neck so she could observe the bullet holes. Her manicured nails dug into the bloating swell of his flesh, the demure beige paint seeming to disappear into his pallor as she prodded him.

“How long has he been dead for?” she asked, voice strangely clinical in comparison to the light cadence she had only seconds earlier.

“An hour- hour and a half, at most,” you told her as you squinted, slowly pulling the bright blue latex over your hands.

“Who shot him?”

“Mark, through the balcony door,” you pointed towards the shattered glass with a wince as Valentine’s expression darkened.

“Now, that would’ve been nice to know earlier,” she mumbled, standing and grabbing for the burner phone as she began punching in a few numbers.

Mark came through the door then, balancing jugs of bleach in his arms and kicking the door closed behind him. Valentine smiled around her conversation, pointing towards the kitchen isle for him to place the containers down. Hanging up, she turned to you, her smile disappearing. “Is there anything else I should be made aware of?”

“We only have two hours before his son gets home.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

♤♤♤♤♤♤

You met Daniel’s son at the threshold of the lobby with a bag of his Father’s guts grasped in your fist, the red cord of the trash bag cutting into your skin as if it wanted to carve away your fingertips. He was handsomely tired, with purple bruises under his eyes that made the blue stand out like superficial waters, his kind and decent smile homely, but sad. He held the door open for you as you slipped past him into the night air, his palm flat against the heavy glass. You wondered if he would offer such neighborly courtesy if he knew your hands were full with death, scrubbed clean of the same blood that ran through his veins, that pumped his heart and carried oxygen to the same brain that offered petals of decency to strangers until he himself began to wilt. Would he wilt when he walked into his home? Would he know the second he smelled the air, felt the empty atmosphere? Would he notice that the glass was new, that a man had shattered his window earlier with a lead-cased bullet? Or maybe he wouldn’t realize, maybe he would simply think his father had stepped out for awhile, maybe he would rationalize his absence for a couple days before he grew worried; maybe, in the end, he would thank you.

You lofted the last bag into the trunk of Val’s car, rubbing and pressing your fingers with your opposite hand to relieve the lingering pressure. For a moment it felt like you were smearing blood across your palms, but when you looked down, only clean, raw skin stared back.

“That was him, wasn’t it?” Mark asked you from his place against the car door, his arms crossed against his chest, his eyes still watching the building like he would be able to see the son as he waited in the elevator.

“Yes,” you answered simply, slamming the trunk close with both hands, listening to the latch. It almost sounded like a gun’s safety going off.

“Do you think he’ll know? That he’ll realize?”

“Know what?” you asked for show mainly, for the glitter and gold that kept you sane, for the delay in truth before the magician would reveal his doings.

“That his father died tonight.”

“I don’t know,” you said, “He might not even notice his Dad’s not home right now, he may notice the second he passes through the door- I don’t know.”

“Well what do you think?”

“Think?”

“Yeah,” Mark pushed away from the door, walking towards you and the back of the car, his head angled upwards still, now at Daniel Carr’s apartment, “What do you think is better?”

“I don’t know.” You shrugged. What was better? What was better was if his father was still breathing, waiting for him on the couch with a scotch in hand, maybe a lukewarm beer. It would be better if he had a chance to right his wrongs, to say goodnight to his son once more before he had his smile hung on the wall in a whole new way.

You wondered how the son would feel. Would he feel as you had? Numb? Would he cry for hours, quit his job and quit his care, or would he move on like nothing had happened: go to work tomorrow, go to school when the next semester started, go on a date with his girlfriend all while pretending his father was not dead, that maybe he had just left. Delusion was a man’s best friend.

What if they had fought that day, an hour before his son left for his job? Maybe they had yelled at each other over nothing, left without a goodbye, door-slamming.

You felt sick suddenly, all the blood rushing to your head in a great wave, your stomach tossing. A hand shot out to grab your waist as you vaulted forward, cold and frigid through a shirt you did not own. Was this what guilt felt like? Did guilt manifest like the flu, affliction at its finest, most malicious state? Or were you just tired from the cold, tired from the lies.

“Y/N?” Mark whispered into your ear as he struggled to keep you upright, eventually hooking an arm around your waist to steady you against his shoulders. He was so cold. Or maybe you were just too hot.

“I’m fine,” you struggled for air, “M’fine.”

“Christ,” Mark muttered, moving the hair out from in front of your face, his frigid hands scorching your skin, “Do you want to sit down?”

“N-No,” you curled your hand tight into your stomach, “Just wanna go home.”

You just wanted this to all stop. You wanted so many fucking things. You wanted to smile again, you wanted to go back and chase Mark into the arms of someone better, someone softer and less ruined, wanted him to grow up well instead of into this hell of earth that’s been crafted for him, wanted to never kill, never see blood except in the movies. You wanted to smile again.

“You’re gonna have to wait a minute, love, just hold on, Val will be back in a second and then we can go, promise.”

“No, Mark,” you fought against a bile that kept burning your chest and throat, coating you with bitter flames that wanted to drown you out, serenading you with regret, “I wanna go home, but I don’t know where that is.”

“Okay,” he breathed, “okay, Y/N,”

You felt like crying, but then you realized you couldn’t. The pressure behind your eyes would simply live there like a serpent underfoot, fangs retracted but still present like a promise. The feeling was unbearable, like a train slipping from the tracks slowly, knowing what will happen, what you need to happen, but you aren’t ready and it just fucking won’t happen.

“I think I need to go, Mark,” you hushed him and his hands as they soothed you, petting your skin, cooling your arms.

“No,” Mark shook his head and pulled you closer, “No, Y/N, not this time.”

“Mark, let go.”

“No.”

What did it matter anymore? You’d already left him broken-hearted.

♤♤♤♤♤♤

Taeyong never failed to look the picture of pale paragon, his hands indefinitely steady, his face impeccably silent with beauty, eyes irreversibly all-knowing. You always thought you hid it well, but before him, you were stripped back until you were pink with callowness.

You sat a few feet from the bar, far enough that no one would care to listen to your conversation, but close enough that the green glass bottles still reflected on your skin like greed. The bar itself was fairly calm, not empty but not swarmed with people, a heady thrum of drunkenness soothed the low-lighted atmosphere even more, drenching the air with a whiskey buzz. The old leather seat of your chair matted to your thighs with sweat, reminding you of your Grandfather’s summer smoking habit and new ballet shoes you never got to break in.

The woodwork of the table you sat at was surprisingly beautiful, with natural curves from the forest, smooth glass casing to avoid stains, a mahogany color scrubbed into the rings of the wood. It made you think of Taeyong’s smile as he watched you thoughtfully, swirling a brand of cognac he had always hated in his glass. They were similar, somehow, with their glass casing that protected themselves, that reflected the gold lighting of the bar like stars, that only let you see the depth it covered as it chose for you to, clear mystery.

“I think this may be the first time you asked to see me,” Taeyong startled you form your study, your eyes flicking to see him staring into his glass, black eyes curious. He leaned back, crossing his ankle over his thigh and holding it with his free hand, his suit jacket dropping open. The pocket square tucked against his chest drew your attention, the a blood orange shade that was patterned with a white design, shocking against the casual blackness of the rest of Taeyong’s ensemble, bare the deep ghoulishness of his skin as it was revealed by the two unbuttoned top buttons of his dress shirt.

His shoe bounced in impatience, your steady silence drawing for a minute too long, your eyes peering too closely for Taeyong’s liking.

“I think this may be the first time I’ve seen you order Cognac on your own volition.”

He smiled again, this time knowingly.

“I thought it fit my character today,” he shrugged.

“Your ‘character’?”

“Precisely,” he chuckled, “Do you think I have the pleasure to be myself?”

You opened your mouth to respond but Taeyong didn’t offer you the chance, skipping the quips and sparring- a man who lives for pacing.

“I know why you’re here,” he told you as a man coughed at the bar. You drifted your gaze towards him for a moment, seeing the hunched shoulders and fourth finger tan-line your too used to seeing, disinterested.

“Why’s that?”

“You already know the answer to your question, Y/N,” Taeyong sighed, “I can’t help you get out.”

“I just need to know where he is, Tae,” you pleaded, leaning forward, “That’s it. I’ll leave you alone after.”

“I can’t tell you that.”

You groaned, frustrated, pressing your fingertips to the nape of your neck as you leaned into the table. This is the only route you had to take. Taeyong was the only breathing man on this earth that would know where he was, and he was turning you away like a salesman on his doorstep, no sympathy in his ever-dark eyes. You felt your eyes sting, but not with sadness or fear, but with frustration- desperation.

“It’s a location, nothing more, nothing less,” you tried again.

“Too much.”

“It could be as broad as a fucking country at this point, I don’t really care,” you dropped your shoulders, widening your eyes, searching his gaze, “I need a starting point.”

Taeyong was unmoved, his face set in stone. Walking into this bar you knew the chances of getting what you needed were slim to zero, but hope had weeded its way into your chest surely enough, uprooting reality with its warm tendrils. The task was much the same as convincing a conman to pity a banker, changing a fundamental belief of Taeyong’s was unheard of, impossible. He was a confidant for the devil himself, priest swallowed by flames unholy, and that deal would always uphold, save his own life. And Taeyong, like every piece he preached, was selfish.

“You need to accept reality,” Taeyong levelled, “The day you accepted the knife was the day you accepted all of this. You chose your end of the ultimatum, nobody forced your hand.”

“Nobody forced my hand? Are you kidding me?” you scoffed, rolling your eyes, “Your telling me after being primed in your youth to kill, after years of brainwashing to the point of frothing at the mouth at the idea of blood, after being shut in a dark room with a splay of weapons on the table with one simple objective- you think I had a choice?”

A brass flicker crossed Taeyong’s eye. “You could’ve ran.”

“From him? Honestly, Taeyong, how far do you think I would’ve gotten?”

Silence.

He set down the glass he had still been swirling in his hand, all the ice melted into a watered down concoction he would never drink. It hit the table with a hard thud, casting the liquid up the sides. Your eyes dodged Taeyong’s fixating on the few droplets as they sat gracefully upon the table’s glass.

“Chicago.”

“I’ll send you postcards when this is all over.”

Taeyong smiled, ever-slight, but for the first time it felt genuine.

“You’ll never have a place to address it to.”

The problem with living a life unknown, unplanned, and entirely out of your control was just that- you were never the one making decisions, especially in relation to your heart.

“I haven’t seen you in awhile.”

There was a definite crassness to your emotions, one you never could fight or ignore, a sense of violence deeply rooted in your bones since birth. It exposed itself with delight every chance it could, gorging itself on negativity of until its cruelty was plump and full. Until it made you sick. There was a time you thought you had controlled it, nights where you misplaced your reality in the body of someone else, deluding the hunger with diets of false-love and tears of ecstasy instead of sorrow. You were always much more foolish than you tried to reckon- especially with the way your heart would beat.

“I know, I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay,” he said, smile soft, eyes warm and caring. These were times you thought maybe you weren’t alone in such ruthlessness of feeling, because how could a man look at you like that and pretend it wouldn’t crack your ribs open till the fruit of your want spilled out. A heart could not be pure after it pumped blood into the hands of a killer- he was no better than you. He just hid it well, hid it behind eyes with turned-down affection.

He always poured you a drink when you saw him, something smooth that burned the bitter taste right from your mouth. You would never be able to say you didn’t appreciate him, because lying about something so great would surely condemn you more than you were already. Your skin crawled at the thought of him no longer trusting you, and it was selfish- a pitous greed that begged you to hold his hand one more time, feel his lips upon your neck, let him carry the weight of your pulse.

“I have to go away,” you said, drinking to hide the downturn of your lips.

“How long?”

Time. It constricted you, shoving itself down your throat once more with its rough bloatedness, pulling the air from your lungs. TIme was unforgiving, it was callous, but time was also your only companion. In time, this would all be past memories; in time, he will not linger on your picture; in time, you would be able to be honest to yourself, honest to your greed. The monotone climax of a ticking clock would always comfort your mind. Even in the darkest pathways of your conscience time would pass and run with gravel in its heels, never stopping, never giving in. You would give into time, and soon he will too.

“Forever.”

Wide-eyes. A deer caught in the headlights, two ex-lovers under the mistletoe. He was quick to recover, exhaling.

“Would it be wrong to say I knew this was coming?”

“No,” you answered, “It would be right.”

“I still hoped though,” he laughed, not sounding bitter- just bored, disappointed, “I always held onto this idea that maybe you would meet me in the middle one day, that you would somehow come to feel the same.”

“I’m sorry-”

“Don’t apologize,” he cut you off, “There’s nothing you need to be apologetic for, really, I was the one who tricked myself. After awhile I was more curious how long it would take, counting days on the calendar like it was a game. Strangely it felt like scratching out tallys on a prison cell wall, but instead of freedom at the end there was execution.”

It’ll pass, it’ll pass.

“I would never have been enough for you, you know? I never could have been who you needed. I’m too far gone for that,” you told him, cementing your hands together as to not reach out for him, knowing that it wouldn’t be fair to.

“That’s not true, is it?” he seemed to ask himself, getting up from his seat across from you and walking towards the darkened window, “Why did I want you so badly, then?”

“We have a tendency to want things that are bad for us,” you said, “I’m just as guilty as you are- more so, really- I took you like a drug. It was numbing, for a while, relieving to me when it was dark outside. I used you as a way to fill the silence. I used you. Don’t you understand? I fucking used you up, Jaehyun, every part of you for granted.”

“Stop,” he told you firmly, and you watched the muscles of his back tense as he peered through the window harder, as if he was searching for a reason.

“You’re right,” he said, “You used me, but damn me if I didn’t want you to. It’s all I know, Y/N.”

“What?”

“I said,” he turned around, and his eyes were burning, “It’s all I know. I was taught to be used, by money, by men in higher places, by women with checkbooks and lonely smiles. I am meant to be used. In any way- every way- I am a tool, just a hand attached to the gun.”

“You were meant to be so much more.”

“Empty dreams go just as far as the bedside, Y/N, that much we both know.”

You could tell he felt like crying, but at the same time you knew you would never see it. People like the two of you had used up all your tears by watching others sob. After awhile you don’t deserve the relief.

You stood up, and while your feet pulled towards him you forced yourself away and to your coat that hung on the wall. “There’s more in life than love, Jaehyun.”

“But it’s the only thing I’m allowed to use.”

Your coat scratched your arms as you pulled it on, and his gaze scratched your skin as you opened the door.

“Thank you, Jaehyun, for France.”

In time, you’d only be a memory.

♤♤♤♤♤♤

You took a train to Amsterdam with a thick scarf for company, the bitter cold flushing your nose through the thick fabric. The station was drenched in melted snow, puddles of icy slosh dotting the cement like clipped angel wings, dripping icicles looming overhead as if prepared to grant nightship, a winter renaissance requiem. The black vinyl of your boots caught reflections of the straggling passengers, the station near empty, all the passersby with coat-collars upturned. You studied the ground in silence, peering at your pant legs where they met your boots, soaked half-through and branding red cold into your legs. No trains would come for another hour, the second leg of your trip over the horizon of hiatus, and liminality plagued you.

One more trip on a metal railroad, the low thundering to lull you asleep, and you will be stepping past a line unmarred. There would be no turning back, no chance to fall back to Taeyong’s feet or meet Jaehyun’s eyes again. You already said your goodbyes, maybe not in so many words, but with casted down eyes and an empty chest. One more kill. One more body to lay rest to, to dissolve itself into the snow until the blinding white overtook him, no more protest on his lips.

A lonely cast iron bench tucked against the ticketbooth, shielded from the patches of night sky that broke through the architecture with a red hangover. The brick wall was a sallow white, creased with darkness like wrinkles on the pale face of your grandmother weeks before she passed. You moved towards it with a daze in your legs, eyes trained on the cool metal, on the flat light that casted upon it. There was no one around anymore, the five am train long off.

Footsteps approached your slumped figure, your nose tucked deep into the soft gray scarf around your neck and cheeks, your hands wrapped around your waist, hidden by your camel coat. You peered up, eyes heavy, feet cold, and found a blackened figure before you. A man with broad shoulders and a longline coat, hands in pocket and shoes toeing the ground.

“Taeyong told me you may be here.”

You wish you felt relieved instead of sick.

“That doesn’t sound like Taeyong,” your voice came out muffled and the figure drew closer, his face washed by the lamp about your head, gaunt cheekbones and wide, childish eyes. He sat beside you, wrapping his coat tighter to his body.

“He must be going soft, then,” Mark said, “How else would you know where you're going?”

“Why’d you come here, Mark?” you ignored him, staring off to the tracks as they sat empty, only the ghost of the trains and sparking metal flashing like delirium in front of your eyes.

“To say goodbye,” he said with a shrug, “because we both know you sure as hell weren't going to.”

You’d had too many goodbyes in the last dregs of this winter season, all too close together, each a different color of pain. This one burned the brightest, though it left a black hole in your gut, systematically breaking the rules of your upbringing. Mark had a habit of ringing out your fundamentals till they bled.

“Mark…” you sighed, sitting up, forcing yourself away from his warmth as your scarf dropped from your mouth.

“I couldn’t go with you, could I?”

You looked at him, but he was facing the tracks, lashes brushing his carmine cheeks with each gentle intake of breath. He shook his head slowly, laughing to himself, his shoulders shaking with a mix of frustrated misery.

“What am I saying?” he chuckled, “Of course not. Never. Because you always have to do things on your own.”

“I have to.”

“You choose to.”

He sounded angry, bitter like unripe blackberries, juice tinged with just enough sweetness to swallow but the bite would settle and stay in your mouth, coppery like blood. You wanted to be cruel back, ached to argue with his assumption, wished to tell him the truth. I’d take you with me if I could. I’d fucking tie you to my side if it was possible. I need you.

The problem with living in a selfish world was that other people were selfish too, and your heart was one of them. The muscle would pound against your chest, violent and sound, telling you what you already knew. ‘You can’t do that to him! You can’t, you can’t!’ it said with each tremor, with each breath you took that fueled it. Your heart was selfish to protect him, even though you knew it was too late, cause time is on a schedule you can never keep up with, no matter how fast you run. This fact caved every other inch of your body, the one with a fervent desire for company, for freedom, and sang a tune of cupidity to your ears. Sweet melodies, warming like honey, so enticing...but you couldn’t. Your heart was much too strong now, too powerful after all the allowance you’ve given it, especially when Mark was right there- inches away but too far.

“What else did Taeyong tell you?” you asked meekly in favor of the words in the back of your mouth.

He looks to you now, and the defeat of his face is dooming. Your hands itch for him, fingers curled tight in your coat instead of the nape of his neck, legs crossed away from him instead of pressed along his side, mouth shut tight instead of on his, his neck, his cheeks, beside his ears to make empty promises. After all he had seen his eyes were still bright as they looked to you, full of memories and realization. Maybe he had accepted it before he came to find you here, a broken girl on a bench that stung like ice, hiding from the world in plain sight. This was the last time he would see you.

“That you were heading to the States,” he said, “that this was the last job you would take, and then… well after that he said he didn’t know. Said you probably didn’t even know.”

“I don’t.”

“Then that’s it?” Mark asked incredulously, but his eyes weren’t angry, just tired, always exhausted with the weight of other people’s lives built upon him like feet of dirt above his grave, “You’re just- you’re gone?”

“I can’t do it anymore, Mark, can’t make it a game. I can’t compete with other people’s lives like the Queen of Hearts anymore, they’re not pawns. We aren’t gods.”

You were curling in on yourself, you could feel it. The mask was slipping, wilting into a dead brown shade of shame, of guilt. You were tired of dehumanizing every man and woman you stumbled upon, tired of forcing yourself to not meet their eyes, to not smile. Because what if they were the next person you’d have to drain the life out of? You were tired of being lonely.

“You’re right,” he nodded, “because we’re chess pieces too, Y/N, maybe not pawns, but something worse. We both know what you’re going to do when you leave, you’re going to kill the player.”

“Have to take the head, yeah?” you said without humor, ignoring the tremor in your hands. For the first time since you were six years old, the thought of blood made your stomach hurt.

“I hope for your sake two won’t grow back.”  

A silence washed over the two of you, unspoken words leering at your faces, phrases stuck in the backs of your throats. You could feel yourself growing colder, but you couldn’t tell if it was the wind or your body simply giving up on feeling, a numbness that started in your feet crawling upwards, upwards. Mark leaned back into the bench, sniffling at the frozen air, head lolled to gaze at the aperture that loomed beside the canopy, before the covering that shielded the platforms. It hadn’t brightened an inch in the sky, still vantablack with ease, the rest of the world sleeping as you tucked your want away with locks and keys strong enough to force the stars back.

You thought for a fleeting moment what life would have been like if you grew up with a mother, an older brother, a baby sister on the way as you should have. If your suburban dwelling would be orderly and pale blue, your walls changing color as you changed over the years. What kind of music would you have listened to? Would you had been popular, a loner, a girl in the back of the room with rotating hair styles and shades? Maybe you would have met Mark one day, in a library or a coffee shop or in college in some boring class neither of you could understand. Have you had seen him across a room with his gentle eyes and thousand-watt smile of innocence, maybe you could have fell for him the right way.

Distress uprooted you from your musings, reality chilling you again as wind swept through the funnel of brick mortar and white-knuckled fingers. There was no other life but this one, you had made up your mind about that years ago when you stopped wearing ribbons in your hair, and avoiding that truth would always send spirals of panic in your legs till they were shaking. The possibilities, the what ifs, they rattled you more than a set of empty eyes and a parched, chapped mouth could ever. You had a carnal want to change the past, as anyone stuck would, but you can not ever do that. Only make new decisions. Only say goodbye.

The whistle of the train pierced your ears from a distance away, and you glanced down to your watched as it peeked out from your sleeve, noting the five minutes you had left before you would turn your back to the one thing you had always wanted to run towards. Mark seemed to stiffen, previously distracted to the sky and the shifting smog that ruled it, his eyes refocusing. He made no move to stand, no twitch to walk with you. You drank him in one last time, the slight curl of his dark hair around his ears, the dry pink of his lips as his tongue swiped across them nervously, the width of his shoulders you wished to hide in, his hands as they were smoothed on his legs, and finally his eyes, watching the spark fade as you stood.

Not being able to bear it anymore you turned your back, holding your coat tight to yourself, blanketing yourself in reviere. The temptation to turn back, to touch him, was suffocating, making your neck pang, your hairs stand on in. The stone clapped out your retreat as you walked, the train drawing in closer and closer with a flowering chrun. Time seemed to be dragging on, only now slowing when you need it to sprint, your watch ticking on with a menacing glare. You could still feel him watching your back, willing you to turn. You couldn’t. You can’t, not here, not now, no, no, n-

“Y/N! Just- wait, okay?” Mark yelled from behind you, suddenly standing and rushing forward as the train started roaring, deafening in the previous silence that you made home with. You refused to turn around, fingers pressing the buttons of your coat until they made your skin bright red.

His hand grasped your shoulder as the train slowed beside you, slowly moving forward, barely breathing. Forced to turn you shut your eyes childishly, asking anyone to listen to rant you the willpower. His grasp slipped down to your waist and pulled, and you fell, hands still stuck between the threads of your buttons, seconds from tearing. He wrapped his arms tight around you, bracketing you to his chest so tightly you swear your breathe melted away into a puff of white. You could feel his nose beside your ear as he buried his face in your hair, and warmth blossomed in your bones, teetering on the edge of overwhelming.

Hands shaking, blistering to reattach to your coat you allowed yourself to reach out, allowed yourself to tuck them inside Mark’s coat collar, allowed yourself one taste of comfort. Now, seconds before you had to disappear, how could it hurt to just say goodbye?

He pulled away, hands suddenly framing your face as his eyes implore you, searching for a sign. You shut your eyes again at the honesty that dug into his skin, that flooded into you though his fingertips. You felt like sobbing, like laughing, like swallowing all you had planned for this beat of a moment.

And he kissed you softly, with chapped lips that taste like cheap toothpaste and hotel coffee. A longing rooted itself inside you then, unresponsive to the way your lashes stuck together, inadmissible to your fingers as they pulled him gently towards you. A longing that you could not pinpoint, as it washed over all of you, through every muscle and nerve and it hurt.

You pulled away after a moment, lips still a hair’s breadth away, oxygen mingling, feelings colliding. You wanted to kiss him again, harder, softer, everywhere in between, wanted it so badly you almost took it. But the train had stopped behind you, and you had a job to do, had a new life to find. One without Mark, and maybe, maybe one day you’ll be okay.

Yet when you opened your eyes and saw his shut tight, saw the storm that controlled his features, saw him fighting everything that he too, wanted, when you stepped away and let his hands fall from you with what seemed like a limp. You knew you never would be.

So you took hold of the train door so you could have something to hold as you stared at the way Mark’s eyes were closed, in a way that spoke the ‘I love you’ you knew he could never say.

♤♤♤♤♤♤

Finding him was unnervingly easy. Alarmingly simple when this was the man who taught you how to be invisible, how to live a life without attachment or trail. It was so elementary, in fact, that it frightened you.

You spent a long time in Chicago through your sorry childhood, divulging your senses in the miscreant population until you felt at home with them, dirtier your hands until bleach couldn’t even make them clean. He had said it was the perfect place to learn your trade, to perfect your skills. Large, bustling with self-centered activity and a self-serving attitude, filled with dark alleyways and people whose own parent wouldn’t miss.

Walking through the city again made you want to retch. Each smell was nauseating, each whiff of smoke throwing you into your memories with flaming palms. There was no one here to catch you but yourself, your heavy coat and frown-etched face. Thoughts saved you from your own gun on silent nights in shitty motel rooms you paid for with cash, but the idea of never having to kill again was taunting. You supposed however, when your finger ran over the clean metal, petting the trigger, that that was taking a life as well. But this one you wouldn’t have to look in the eyes afterwards because the darkness would envelope you whole, welcoming you.

You never would have the guts to do it though, the idea of Mark somewhere, even forever out of your grasp, somehow finding out was too much for you to consider. Heartbreak was not a feeling one could repeat, not something you could be homely with. He deserved to be able to know you were alive, at least. It was all you could give to him now.

The man was routine, insufferably so. A morning walk from his apartment to the cheap cafe down the road, a newspaper on his way back. Later he would come out, cigarette weeping in his hand, sitting on a bench outside the building alone as he inhaled and exhaled slow, measured breaths. A part of you contemplated if the smoke stream was the same everyday. He then would put the bud out, tossing it into the broken clay pot of some used-to-be tree and fumble his way up the steps, back inside. At night he would appear again, catching a cab to a dive bar where he would play pool or poker or simply just drink with the same three guys you had seen every night. At midnight he would take his leave, placing a tip on the counter with a kind nod to the bartender and he would go home. The next day: repeat.

You kept waiting for him slip up, to turn down a dark alley one night with stealthy looks over his shoulders, either that or stop in his tracks and flip around, locking eyes with you and laughing at your misfortune. That he would jeer and clap, asking if he had you fooled, asking if you thought you could really beat him at the game he had taught you. But such things never occured. Sometimes he would feed the birds as he smoked, or would leave the bar early only to go home and read a book, or maybe chat with the man who sold him his newspaper every morning, but nothing to profess his lifestyle.

He made no notion of realization to that of your presence, but the fear still grappled with your deduction, yelling profanities through your skull til doubt made your tongue thick. You were wary to act, though younger, more limber and adapted, still standing on the thin ice of deluding yourself that he would win because he always won. The one man you could never beat.

You watched for two weeks, barely eating, only sleeping when your eyes forced themselves closed. You pondered your options, pondered the methods til killing made you dizzy. It came crashing in during the morning, a dull daybreak with gray-blue skies and shuddering trees. He was coming back from his coffee, cup cradled between his two hands to warm them, steam escaping the small hole of the to go cup, a jovial smile on his face. He seemed to be enjoying himself, breathing in the air with relish, turning his countenance towards the sky every few moments and closing his eyes. He was in a good mood.

It pissed you off.

This is a man who reaped your youth from you with a beckoning hand towards the smoking gun, who punished you by locking you out for days when you were nine just for crying. The same fucking man who was gleeful in the morning dew used to burn toys you found on the street in front of you, preached hours of solitude, of making through life independently of feelings, those wretched little bindings. You felt like ripping apart your own chest, felt like using your nails to kill him right after, this man, this son of a bitch who somehow had the audacity to be happy when he had tore the joy out of your flesh before you got to experience it.

You found yourself waiting for him, fuming, eyes spiked with red mist that dripped carnivorously. The alleyway was warm, boxed away from the wind by the two buildings that walled it, heavenly dark and silent. You kept your foot from tapping impatiently, your hand clutching the handkerchief you had tied your hair with that morning, now unravelled and sticking to your neck with a sweat that spoke rage. Now that you were seconds away, now that you could here the infernal tune of his whistling, you almost began to laugh. How humorous was it that you were going strangle the joy out of him, the same way he took yours, and how nicely it is that he is happy now, so that the fear will be so much greater. Sadistic amusement shawled you, and you cradled it close, relishing in the cordial familiarity it baded you.

The gloves on your hands were as a second skin, and you were glad you would be able to feel it this time. Feel to make sure his pulse was gone, run your fingers over his veins as they ridded themselves of warmth, of life. Your meticulous watching, your options, your planning was all scrap now, having rushed to this alley, having seen his mirth.

He was taking a sip from his coffee when you took ahold of him, grabbing his arms and shoving him into the brick wall, his head slamming back and coffee sloshing. The liquid scalded the both of you, your wrist turning pink with the heat as it soaked your shirt, but he was the only one to cry out, you had more important matters than pain, now. His eyes were wild in recognition, mouth opening to say something, but you did not want to hear him speak- not again, not ever again.

You used the handkerchief to stuff his mouth as you kneed his stomach, hearing the groan through the muffle, but you alloted this was all you could do, and if you were to hear anything that dripped poison it may as well be his suffering. He collapsed to the ground with the impact, back leaning on the brick wall, his hands clutching his shirt as the coffee cup lay empty beside him, a dark stain on the floor beside it. You kicked him deftly so that he was sprawled on his side, hands digging into the gravelled pavement as he buckled, legs dragging underneath him. You hated how clean his shoes looked.

Dropping yourself on top of him and rolling him over to face you, he faltered, his throat constricting and legs twitching. Grasping his throat you began applying pressure tightly, not bothering to waste time as he began thrashing, but he was already hurt, and you had him caged beneath you tightly. His hands clawed at your forearms, leaving flourishes of blood in their wake, but you couldn’t feel anything but the way his throat moved under your hands painfully, the way his breath hitched and spluttered maniacally. You were suddenly repulsed by the feel of his skin, of his bulging eyes as a blood vessel popped and colored his blue irises with ruby flecks. For a second, you swore there was fear in his eyes. Yet you pressed harder, more force, leaning into him and looking at his nose, not able to see such a familiar gaze. After a long moment he shuddered greatly and seized, body becoming limp underneath you. You leaned away, scrambling off him with fervor, snatching your handkerchief away so that you may burn it later.

You left his body where it was, unafraid of who find him for you knew the nature of Chicago and you knew you existed to no government, no matter. With a wave you sunk away from the shadows and into the morning chill, physical exhaustion inundating your body as your hands throbbed.

“Goodbye, Father.”

It was the last farewell you would allow yourself to make.

♤♤♤♤♤♤

Two Years Later…

Mark had been free for three months, twelve days, and fourteen hours. He had been looking for you for two years, four months, two weeks, and six hours. Taeyong had sent him copies of every postcard you left him, each a new city, new country, new short message. You would profess your security, your ease, your most recent endeavour whether exploring Paris or swimming in Spain, drinking in Ireland or Moscow, you would send something. This was all he had to go on, and they were thin needles in the hay that buried him alive, that stuck him deeply and would not leave until the month came and went and a new card slipped under Taeyong’s door. Mark had not yet lost hope though, because now, now he was liberated like you. He had finally repaid his debt, worked loose the chains of his contempt until they rusted into his wrists and ankles.

A summer in Italy, deep in May where ochre dripped from the skies like a rich gold pollution, painting his skin with cinnamon strokes. He was tired, craving a glass of something he shouldn’t have, the thin cotton of his shirt too stifling as the sea rolled turquoise and vibrant white behind him. Sunglasses slipping down his nose bridge, lips and nose healthy with rosiness, he saw you.

Quietly sitting at a cafe table, umbrella overhead, legs crossed underneath the glass top. You wore a white sundress and dove-grey sunglasses, a lovely tan warming your skin with a vibrance he had begged to see for years. It was like seeing an angel for the first time, your hair kissing your shoulders as you sipped a glass of something cool, a book opened before you as you bobbed your sandal-clad foot to an unheard tune.

Mark was frozen, overwhelmed with luck and exuberance as he stared open-mouth and ripped his glasses from his face. Squinting through the sudden light he realized that it was true, that you were before him like a blessing, and his feet felt like lead weights beneath him. Moving towards you he watched as you curled hair behind your ear, a few baby hairs curving to your neck with humidity, and he swore he felt your skin underneath his hands again. You noticed his approach when he was still five feet away, head swiveling to take in the image of this oncoming stranger, your senses still sharp to the world in way he would forever admire.

“Mark?” you breathed, unsure if you were seeing things, dropping your glasses down some to peer over the tops of them and Mark’s heart stopped for the fourth time in the last three minutes. Your vision gripped him painfully, and suddenly he needed to be near you, his stride sure as he pushed past the last barrier between you.

“Y/N?” he responded in kind, voice breathy with a daze that could not conclude if this was real or not, that maybe you would disappear before him, a simple mirage to his heat drenched brain.

“How did you..?” you asked, trailing off as you set your glass down and discarded your eyewear completely.

“I don’t know- you were- are here,” he grinned widely now and you matched it, before it crumbled, worry stroking your features.

“Are you here on a job?” you whispered out, almost too afraid to ask. Not wanting to hear the answer.

“No,” Mark wanted to kiss you, “No I’m out, I’ve been out.”

“How long?” you stammered, lifting your glass to your cherry flush lips as your throat constricted.

“Months.”

“Have you been looking for me?”

“For years.”

You smiled, setting down your glass and taking Mark’s hand, the cool sweat of your drink slipping against his feverish palms, but he still loved it. Loved the way it seemed right, the curve of your palm molding with his, your delicate fingers slotting right between his bigger ones. He raised your knuckled to his lips, pressing the lightest kiss to them as a blush feathered your cheeks.

“You found me,” you sighed.

“I did.”

And this time he didn’t have to let his expression speak for him, he didn’t need to wait, didn’t need to let go. He would yell it if he needed to, scream from a rooftop villa in the mountains, surrounded by fields of rolling, tossing jade and your arms.

FIN.

a/n - thank thank thank u to everyone who was super patient with me!!! hope you enjoyed reading!

[laoch-rua-blog]

Mythologising the Hero; ‘Dulce et Decorum est pro patria mori.’

Achilles drags Hector’s corpse before the Gates of Troy, fresco from the Achilleion palace in Corfu. 

 If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood 

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs, 

Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud  

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, 

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest

To children ardent for some desperate glory, 

The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est 

Pro patria mori.

   (Wilfred Owens) 

 This quotation from one of Wilfred Owen’s poems vividly illustrates his experience as a WWI soldier.  A rude awakening to the realities of war versus the idealised image that had been indoctrinated.  He was educated in the Classical civilisations and would have been instructed in the Latin and Greek literary traditions.  The Latin phrase Owen used is borrowed from Horace’s Odes, which in turn was adapted from Hector’s speech in The Iliad.  However, Horace re-using of this snippet from Homer’s epic fails to capture the complexity of the original.  Hector expressed that sentiment facing into combat with a raging Achilles, with the knowledge of his own impending death.  Hector does not have a choice, he must fight and he will die.  Horace evokes the memory of the hero Hector in his repurposing of the line to convey a sense of patriotism but not the despair and the inevitability of death in war.  Contrary to the line of Horace’s poem, as Owens’ unfortunately discovered, there is nothing sweet or proper in the horrors of war.  When segmented or summarised, the heroic discourse is frequently interpreted as honouring the glory of war.  The narrative is often appropriated in order to create an image of idealised heroes to serve social or political interests.

 Heroes have been repeatedly misappropriated and reinterpreted, portrayed contrary to the original intent.  Pádraic Pearse, the Irish revolutionary of the 1916 Easter Rising, who in death would become a national hero himself, knew the value of this.  He summoned the warrior Cú Chulainn from Ancient Irish mythology to fulfil this purpose.  Pearse was an educator and wanted his pupils to follow in the footsteps of the warrior.  Pearse claimed the hero Cú Chulainn as a role model for his students, promoting him as an ideal despite him possessing what would have been considered at the time as many undesirable traits.  For example, Cú Chulainn often lost his temper and could not control his rage, transforming into a monster (ríastrad).  These aspects are deemphasised, instead choosing to focus on the self sacrificial hero, one Pearse used to forward his cause of an independent Ireland.  On the commencement of his school St Enda’s, he told the pupils,

 ‘We must re-create and perpetuate in Ireland the knightly tradition of Cú Chulainn, ‘better is short life with honour than long life with dishonour’;

‘I care not though I were to live but one day and one night, if only my fame and my deeds live after me.’’ 

(Pádraic Pearse quoting Cú Chulainn in The Murder Machine 1912) 

School book from Pearse school, St Enda’s

 The heroic sentiment conveyed in Pearse’s lines are strikingly similar to the story of the Greek warrior Achilles.  He knew that he could either have a short life with fame or a long life in obscurity.  With the perpetuation of Achilles’ hero cult through other channels such as condensed mythology compendia, etc., it is natural to assume that The Iliad would be a panegyric to the warrior.  However, synopses cannot give a true understanding of the intricacy of the epic.  The heroes are not monochromatic as those portrayed in Tyrtaeus’ poetry or in Perikles’ funeral oration [https://online.hillsdale.edu/document.doc?id=355].  The Iliad is not in celebration of this paragon of the hero but as a response to it.  Homer composed a narrative wrought with digressions and uncultivated social topics, in order to encourage audience exploration.  The audience is mindful of Achilles approaching death but it is a not neat line to this outcome.  If the plot is to be viewed in simplistic terms, the end of the poem does not hold any resolution; Troy is not sacked and Achilles is not dead.  The exclusion of these narrative ‘goals’ force the audience to narrow the focus on what is in between.  Attention is placed upon the warriors’ individual perspective as a participant in the war or the audience to probe the unexplored dimensions of the hero. 

 Let us examine the character of Achilles and his progression through the narrative, to illustrate how Homer problematizes the heroic paradigm.  The Iliad portrays the brutality of the Trojan War.  Nine years away from home and removed from society, tensions build and the social structure that bind the community together breaks down.  This disintegration can be viewed through Achilles’ character.  The depiction of Achilles prior to the war shows him to be even-handed, perhaps even lenient in comparison to the other commanders.  Hector’s wife, Andromache describes how during the sack of her native city, Achilles as the aggressor, stipulated on a burial for her father and chose to enslave her mother rather than kill her (6. 413-428).  Achilles also showed mercy to Priam’s son, Lycaon, selling him into slavery prior to the war (21. 35-41).  This is in contrast with the policy employed by those in charge, Agamemnon and Menelaus chose to annihilate all Trojans, demanding that ‘not even a man-child which a mother carries in her womb’ should survive (Homer, 6. 58-59).   This image of Achilles’ clemency juxtaposes with the degradation of his humanity as the poem proceeds.  After the death of friend Patroclus, Achilles does not feel pity for the supplicating Lycaon and initially denies funeral rites to Hector, ridiculing and mutilating his body, despite Hector’s dying pleas.  

 What provokes Achilles to reach this state?  In the opening of the epic, Agamemnon publicly insults Achilles and threatens his status.  Status is currency.  It is only through this τιμή (honour/value) that the hero can achieve κλεος αϕθιτον (imperishable fame) and in sense, immortality.  Agamemnon breaches warrior convention, he seizes Achilles γῆρας (prize), the captured daughter of Briseus.  In this way, he also his seizes his τιμή and the constructed social framework, which the hero has lived by, is weakened.  Τιμή motivates the warrior to fight and γῆρας is the physical representation of this.  Publicly challenging Achilles, threatens his τιμή and the destruction of this code means he earns no value as a warrior.  The removal of this social order destabilises Achilles; the Θέμις, the conventions the warrior ordinarily lives by, are voided.  When Agamemnon sends the embassy to restore Achilles’ τιμή and in an attempt pacify his anger, offers to pay additional γῆρας, he rejects it.  He desires τισις, payback.   Achilles argues that fighting is futile as each warrior receives the same μοῖραι [1] regardless of ability (9. 318-320).  The motivation for the warrior is lost and he not longer partakes in the reciprocal mores.

 Homer is exploring the heroic ideal; problematizing the motivations of the warrior.  The older warrior Phoenix encourages Achilles to question the position he is in, using the tale of Meleagros as an analogy.  This action of Phoenix mirrors the questioning function of Homeric poetry, a tale to provoke exploration.  Meleagros fought without γῆρας and his τιμή was meaningless.  Phoenix advises Achilles not to return to the fighting without consideration of this (9. 597-605).  Achilles rejects the need for social recognition, ‘I have no need of such τιμή: I think myself to be honoured in the apportionment of Zeus’ (9. 608-609). [2] Achilles no longer lives by θέμις.  This reiterated when Achilles expressed inconsequence at the gifts being presented after the death of Patroclus (1. 146-148) and those proposed by Priam (24. 560-570).  This rejection of the social ties of reciprocity, which is a fundamental of the warriors’ social order, expresses his withdrawal from the group and from society.

Amphora by Exekias painter, Achilles and Ajax playing game, c.540–530 BC, Vatican Museums

 Αριστεία, excellence, is another aspect of the Homeric hero, which is commonly portrayed as an attribute of the warrior.  The warrior can accomplish great heroic feats through their Αριστεία.  During their Αριστεία, the gods repeatedly breathe μένος, surging strength into the heroes in preparation for combat.  Μένος can be translated as bodily fluids, blood or semen, ‘the essence of life,’ but also be used to convey a rush of vigorous force by the hero.  Both understandings seem to be unconnected, however it is their connection, which is fundamental to the feeling of μένος.  The fluids give the hero impetus to surge and are also the consequence of μένος.  This μένος can also be destructive as it overpowers, verging on μανια, ‘uncontrollable frenzy’.  Andromache warns Hector, ‘Man possessed, your fury (μένος) will destroy you’ (Homer 6.407).  Diomedes is another character who possesses μένος.  His account is paralleled with Achilles, in that Agamemnon likewise publicly disrespected him (Homer 4. 370-400), however contrary to Achilles he does not become enraged (4. 413 & 5. 606).  In Book five Diomedes is filled with μένος, even attacking the gods Aphrodite and Ares.  Nonetheless, he exhibits self-control as he faces Glaukos in combat, when he discovers that they shared mutual relations.  The significance of Diomedes use of restraint is amplified by his continual comparison to his father Tydeus.  According to Apollodrus, during the war of Thebes, Tydeus was on the verge of achieving apotheosis for his heroic deeds in battle, when he descended into anthropophagy (Apollodrus III. 6).  The repeated allusion to Diomedes’ father, combined with his surging μένος, gives the impression that Diomedes could possibly have the same culmination as Tydeus and lose his humanity to cannibalism.  

 The death of his beloved friend Patroclus triggers a transformation in Achilles.  He rejoins the battle in a battle frenzy.  A sense of being on the threshold of cannibalism is also prominent in Achilles’ ἀριστεία.  Achilles informs a dying Hector of the futility in appeals to his humanity in requesting pity, as he is on the brink of bestiality.

 'Dog – do not entreat me by my knees or my parents’ name!  I wish there was a way that my heart’s fury could leave me to carve and eat your flesh raw.' (22. 345-347)

  Although Achilles does not succumb to savagery of Tydeus, he does struggle to contain the bloodthirsty μένος, escalating to μῆνις, god-like anger.  As an ἡμίθεον (half-god), a μεγᾰλόψῡχος (big-souled), Achilles’ humanity is stretched, as the force that compels him to excel in battle can move him to the verge his mortal limits.  Homer portrays the degradation of humanity as a ramification of warfare.  When these details of Achilles descent into the bestial are recognised, then the warrior or war itself does not appear in a favourable light.  Homer shows that war pushes the combatants to the edge of their humanity.  We meet Achilles again in The Odyssey as the eponymous hero travels to the underworld.  Odysseus tells Achilles’ shade that he is worshipped as a god on earth.  To which Achilles responded,

‘Don’t sing praise to me about death, my fine Odysseus!  If I could live on earth, I would be happy to serve as a hired hand to some other, even to some man without a plot of land, one who has little to live on, than to be king among all the dead who have perished.’ (11. 467-460) [3]

 He would rather be a poor landless peasant and alive than be a deified hero in death.  Homer questions this romanticised hero.  Yes, Achilles achieved imperishable fame, but to him it was meaningless.

 It is possible to examine The Iliad in terms of its didactic nature.  The knowledge is not given openly, but it is necessary to explore between the lines of the text in order to derive substantial meaning.  The Homeric hero is questioned as the model of a powerful warrior who attempts to create κλεος αϕθιτον, in order to be remembered, celebrated and worshiped as part of the hero cult.  The Iliad demonstrates the other side of war, the torment of the individual warrior and their struggle to keep their humanity.   Achilles’ character is pivotal to express this struggle as he is offered two prospects, long life in obscurity or certain death and fame.  In response to the custom of the celebrated idealised hero, Homer provides his audience with narrative in which it is possible to question the social milieu by presenting the internal struggle of warrior.  

 [1] Share/fate in life, as in each warrior comes to the same end, death.  This wisdom is reinforced in the divine realm as gods are repeatedly reminded not to save particular heroes as the all share the same moira.

[2] This quotation is from M. Clarke’s translation.

[3] Taken from Powell’s translation.