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ignisnocturnalia · 4 years

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Hehehe I lied, but it is here now! Had a crisis about being done with my Band director's bull and wanting a grade on something really bad, did the former and decided to simply disintegrate once Friday hit. Drifter HCs will follow this, also may I say Caiatl. That is all.

Nokris x Reader

“You are a child reaching for a flame; the Taken Queen would not have you burnt.”

You were on point during the Strange Terrain strike, but you had never thought you would run into Nokris again. Granted, you realized, his death was on the physical plain while his Throne World still stood. Considering he never directly addressed you, you assumed that he either didn’t remember you or he chose not to, as oddly disappointing as that would be. The timbre of his voice unsettled you, but it was not as wracking as Xol’s; in fact, it was rather pleasing to hear.

The proposition itself was unexpected, and against Eris’s previous warnings you stopped to listen to what the Hive heretic had to say. Trekking quietly along the broken path of the distorted realm, you stopped occasionally to stare at blights littered over walls and floating in the air to see if you could catch a glimpse of the desecrated prince. The telltale sign of Taken emerging from their portals filled the air, and you genuinely prayed that you’re next decision was a wise one.

Your ghost was probably screaming on the inside as you placed your guns to the floor, bringing your hands into the air while staring into the gleaming eye of a Knight. Grabbing your arm roughly, it tugged you through a massive doorway leading to a room that was strikingly similar to the Court of Oryx back at the Dreadnaught. The portal at the center of the room shimmered invitingly as the bony bastard himself came out; even in death, he appeared to be in his prime.

“I see you have heeded my advice; come, hope of the Light, see the Darkness.”

His claws are cold as he grasps at your shoulders despite the solar flame surging over his arms. Feeling bold, you let your own solar light extend past your body, lying comfortably across his neck with a warm glow. As a creature who worships the Darkness facing a servant of the Light, he reasonably withdraws with a hiss at your gesture

You won’t say it out loud because he obviously carries himself with extreme pride, but you can’t help but feel bad for him. How can one person be an exiled son, heretic, servant, and now puppet?

“I won’t serve Savathûn. But I think I wouldn't mind spending time with you.” Before he can question you, you are promptly pulled from the realm by Eris.

Cue Vanguard interrogation once you return to the Tower. The talk is so egregiously long you make a move that would make Cayde damn proud: “GuArDiAn, We’Re NoT yEt FiNiShEd WiTh ThIs DiScUsSiOn!” Hopefully your shining reputation will save you from any dire repercussions...

Tracing your steps back to where you first met, you look around suspiciously following the lack of noise inside the Hive breeding grounds. You had cut your comm ages ago, the constant ping of Commander Zavala’s hailing grating your ears. The ground beneath your feet crunched wetly with every step, and distantly you heard the first Hive screech. Turning in a guess to the source of the sound, you set off in a quick pace, gun in your hand.

Upon entering a new chamber, you froze in surprise as you saw Nokris lifting a Knight by the throat. Taken magic pooled in his palm and raced over the armor of the smaller Hive, the bone turning black and a bright white glow shimmering across its legs. Still gripping the soldier, Nokris slowly angled his head to look down at you.

“Little. Light.” Dropping the Knight with no grace, his imposing form closed in on you with haste. Before you could take a step back, his claws came up to close around your jaw and upper neck. The rough of his talons dug into your armor, and for a moment you worried he would pop off your helmet and let your blood boil throughout your body in the harsh atmosphere. Instead, he pulled you closer to his face and brought up his free hand to grasp your forearm.

Nokris easily dwarfed you; even if you stood on your own shoulders you wouldn’t be taller than him. Passively, your thighs rubbed against each other at the realization. A detail he decided he would catch. Teasing mirth danced in his three eyes, hidden malice swimming just behind small organs. Internally, you were probably going to pop your helmet off yourself if you got kink shamed by a Hive prince of all things.

You squeaked quietly in surprise as he lifted you off the ground, the hand on your lower face readjusting to your hip. His hand, quite literally, engulfed your midsection as he brought you closer to him for inspection. This close, you could see every imperfection on his face. Second hand leaving your arm, you shivered as the prince ran a digit up the side of your leg and continued his way up, stopping thoughtfully at the junction of your jaw.

Staring into the glowing green embers of his eyes, there was no mistaking the murderous glint in them. At the same time, curiosity had made its home among his more dangerous faculties.

"You found me once, you came to me twice. Find me again, at the other side in the field of ash under the dark tower.” Letting you to the floor, Nokris turned his back and departed to Traveler knows where through the portal with the long forgotten Knight. Sinking to your knees in stunned silence, you looked down as a nearly imperceptible squeal broke the quiet. In front of you, was a Hive worm.

“No.” Before you could even speak, your Ghost gave its earful.

“I can’t not take it! I probably need it to find him. Either way, I told you one of these worms would be coming home eventually, look at its wittle face.” Your Ghost made gagging noises as you fawned over the wriggling creature you held between your hands. Tucking the three eyed larva under your arm, you set out to find the way back out.

____________________________________________

The next week felt like hell. The worm continued to get bigger with every mission you went on and keeping it a secret from the Vanguard was close to impossible. You had been wracking your brain for the answer to his riddle, and to be completely honest, it made you feel inadequate that you couldn’t figure it out. You knew the other side meant the Ascendant Realm, but what was the dark tower? Where was the field of ash? You had initially thought it was at Skywatch, what with the Hive ship jutting out of the ground and the small pile of chitin inside the cave not too far away, but there wasn’t enough ash for it to be a field, nor was it under the ship point.

It wasn’t until a light snow dusted the Tower one evening that it all clicked. He didn’t mean ash ash. He meant snow!

In a rush to the hangar, you waved a hasty goodbye to Holliday and transmatted into your ship, pulling out a layer of blankets to reveal your now cat sized worm. The grub squeed and reached its head up to your palm, crawling sluggishly into your hands. Holding the worm to your chest, you settled down in the pilot ship and gave your Ghost to plot a course. There was only one place on Earth constantly coated in snow with a structure that could be considered a dark tower.

“Ghost, set course for the Plaguelands. He’s at the Doomed Sea.”

You hadn’t been to the ravaged lands since the Siva Crisis; the whole territory gave you heebie jeebies. And yet, you were returning because one of humanity’s imminent threats wanted a chat that, realistically, ended with your head rolling on the floor.

The closer you got to your destination, the more restless the worm in your arms got. In fact, you could swear it was whispering something. Your skin crawled for a moment as you felt the phantom brush of his claw up your leg.

The moment your feet touched the ground, the world around you stuttered as the colors faded into grayscale, giving way to the Ascendant landscape. Below you, there was no mistaking the keen whispers of the worm. Its words were encouraging in a macabre way, praise and blatant lies; speaking of how well you fed it, talents being wasted on a god that heeds you not, urging you towards the ominous building looming over the shoreline.

Dust swept across at a rapid pace, as usual, in the warped realm. Coming up to the alcove, you saw him with his back turned to you. In a smooth turn, he faced you at last. Beautiful, blazing emeralds.

Relationship HCs

His idea of a relationship has wildly different parameters than any normal human would put up with

No matter where you are, or what you're doing, you can feel him at the back of your mind like a fog; it's a bit disconcerting to hear him talk in your head at first, but it becomes normal and he's actually quite helpful when you're out on missions

He expects you to help him study thanatonautics since you can die and be brought back within moments, but that's up to if you have enough charisma to convince your Ghost to let your bone boyfriend crush your skull repeatedly to see what you can learn about death

The relationship feels more like a symbiotic one rather than a romantic one, but you occassionally catch him practicing human gestures you've seen couples perform in public if he's feeling particularly good on a day

You're probably the only person who listens to him talk about all of his schtick and is able to give viable feedback; he is more thankful than he will let on about this fact

He does not like it when you try blocking him off from your thoughts and will demand to know everything you've done in the day when you see him again. In his perspective, he thinks you're trying to leave him behind like everyone else has

Will not handhold, because his hand can literally fit around your torso and because he thinks it's weird. He will, however, carry you places if you're going the same direction

He also thinks kissing is weird, but will (surprisingly!) actually let you give him kisses on his teeth; the sensation of soft flesh on his cold bones is unusual, but something he finds utterly riveting. Not that he'd let you know

Also doesn't like the amount of straight barbarity you inflict on the battlefield, but can appreciate your efficiency with your job; this is him silently worrying about your safety but refusing to acknowledge his crush on the flame throwing ape

His communication regarding affection is terrible, and if you couldn't tell shame on you. His favorite thing about you, that you will never hear from him or anyone else, is your face. He likes the way it changes into different expressions, the life in your eyes, and your lips because Hive physically cannot emote as expressively as humans do; you are an open book he has yet to read, adding new pages everyday

Nsfw 👁👄👁

First off, however you get the size difference to work, congratulations. His height over you is something he enjoys immensely when you two get into it, and it goes without saying he also likes how you "hug" him

He will fuck anywhere, literally anywhere. The floor? Yes. Against the wall? Yes. Hope you're somewhat of an exhibitionist, because he is not ashamed if any of his or Savathûn's troops walk in on you and will keep going

He bites a lot, and is not afraid to make you bleed because your Ghost can just patch you right up

Likewise, he will scratch you everywhere but he does stop to play with the softer spots

He is rough and fast, going after his own release rather than yours; however, he has high stamina so chances are you'll be overstimulated before he finishes

Absolutely a dom, he will not meet in the middle about anything of sexual nature

If you don't actively fight for your life during his build up, he will take that as the go ahead. He may be a Hive heretic, but he has standards

You don't really have the opportunity to find his sensitive spots as he usually restrains your arms, holding them above your head or pinning them down at your sides

He rarely makes actual noises, but he does hiss lowly whenever he makes particularly hard thrusts

He knows that copulation won't result in little Hive/Human hybrids running around with his blood in their veins, so 9 times out of 10 he will hilt himself and come inside you

Fluff

Uhhh, a w k w a r d

Anything that's fluffy is strictly delivered by you, and occasionally returned by Nokris since he doesn't get the point of such pleasantries

If you're fast enough, he will never get upset if you can sneak up on him for a smooch

Whatever he is doing, if you are available he much prefers having you by his side to have an extra set of eyes to help him observe (at least that's what he says)

Since his physical marks are healed quickly, he gifts you odds and ends from old planets his people have pillaged and little items you can wear on noticeable places

Hides it very well, but is extremely thrilled when you come to him when you want to do or learn something new

When you're particularly frustrated by something, he will comb his claws through your hair to his best abilities

Whenever you're with him, his demeanor is typically calmer; Savathûn's presence and influence over him is highly diminished in the face of your Light

The one thing he will willingly do with you that's remotely romantic is stargazing; not because of the romantic element, oh no, but because he wants to catalogue any changes and is very invested in teaching you about space faring

Has nicknames for you like Little Light or >Insert any game seal<

#destiny 2 #relationship headcanon #nokris #nokris x reader #eris morn #oryx the taken king #commander zavala #savathûn

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theeasternempress · 4 years

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Baby’s First Stuffed Animal

Chapter One of “All in One Day”

There are going to be four total “Baby’s First”s in this part, which is different from what I’ve done before.

Summary - A stop at a local market gives Din and his son something that money can’t buy.

AO3

Just like every morning since they left Nevarro after their final fight, Din woke up calmly without jolting awake like he used to. The time Din was spending with his son had left him the happiest and most relaxed he had been in decades. The baby was still sleeping in Din’s lap, snoring softly. Looking out the windows of the cockpit, Din saw that the snowstorm from yesterday had ended and a blanket of snow had fallen across the ground. It was only a few inches, so it wouldn’t cause any problems for their trek to the market. The early morning sun reflected against the ground, highlighting certain spots to make them appear as if they were glowing.

Din preferred going to markets early in the morning because there would be less people and he would draw less eyes. The child was still asleep, so Din tucked him into his bassinet and began the walk to the market with the bassinet floating at his side. The child would wake soon and would cry if he saw that his father was not near. Din also wanted to buy the child some new toys and clothes and wanted the child’s approval before he bought them.

The snow crunching under Din’s boots was the only sound of the early morning in the market town. The few people awake at this hour were either merchants or other people who wanted to shop without the presence of large crowds. Din wanted to stock up on supplies for at least another month, but he also wanted to buy some street food for the child and himself as a special treat. The child loved any kind of meat that Din provided for him, so he was sure that he would find something from a street vendor that the child would gobble up.

The first stall that Din came across sold portions of veg-meat and polystarch bread, of which Din bought many. They also sold dried fruit, which contained many of the same nutrients as regular fruit but didn’t go bad as fast, so Din traded credits for those as well.

Moving on, Din heard soft babbles from the bassinet on his right and looked over to see that the child was awake and staring at him. Din reached out to affectionately stroke one of his son’s ears and the child sighed sweetly in response.

The next few stalls had nothing that Din was interested in, but he could see that the child was absorbing everything he saw with curious eyes. Din eventually found a stall that sold clothes and found a set of pants and shirt that would fit the child. As Din reached into his pocket to pay, the vendor, who had just finished with another customer, asked, “Is that your child?” as she pointed to the bassinet at Din’s side. The child was peeking his head out and staring at the clothes in front of him with wide eyes.

Din responded with a quick, “Yes,” before dropping a few credits into the vendor’s open palm.

“If you are looking for supplies for a child, there’s an old woman named Eila a few stalls over that sell things for children.” The vendor said, pointing Din in the direction of said stall. Din nodded and began his way over to said stall. Even from a distance, the stand stood out to him because of the colorful toys on display. The child must have noticed as well because he began to coo excitedly.

A woman with grey hair, whom Din presumed to be Eila, noticed him making his way to her stall and smiled at him with a, “Welcome, Mandalorian. What can I help you with?”

Din nodded at her and said, “I’m looking for some toys for my son.” As Din finished his sentence, the child reached out of his bassinet and grabbed the table, using it as leverage to pull himself out. Din instantly reached out to grab him and pull him to his chest, but Eila only laughed.

“It seems he is excited for some new toys,” she said with amusement in her voice. The child was reaching above his head with grabby hands, clearly seeing something he wanted. Din looked to see what it was and saw that it was a stuffed animal in the shape of a mythosaur. Its face looked almost identical to the pendant that the child refused to part from, which was probably why he was drawn to it. There was only one problem; the stuffed mythosaur was at least three times the size of the baby. If he kept it in his bassinet, which he was bound to do, it would easily engulf him with its size.

Eila laughed again and said, “He likes the mythosaur. I admit that I’ve been trying to sell that for a while, and no better client than a Mandalorian’s child. Would you like to have it?”

“Yes, please. How much do I owe you?” Din asked, putting the baby back in his bassinet.

Eila shook her head as she pulled the mythosaur down and placed it in Din’s hands, “You can have it free of charge. I haven’t seen a child this cute be this excited over a toy in a long time.”

Surprised by her kindness, Din only managed to say, “Thank you.”

Seeing the toy he so desperately wanted in his father’s hands, the child reached out of his bassinet and grabbed at the toy while whimpering. Quick to stop any possible crying, Din placed the mythosaur into the child’s outstretched arms. He quickly disappeared behind the huge toy, but Din saw him wrap his arms around it and snuggle into it.

“May I ask you a question?” the vendor whispered, pulling Din from the moment he was having with his son. He nodded, knowing she was probably going to ask him a question about his culture.

“Do you remove your armor to hold him?” she asked unexpectedly. Din had never thought to do so as the child seemed perfectly content whenever Din held him.

“No, I do not,” Din replied.

Eila nodded and expressed, “Babies form better bonds when they can feel the warmth of their parent’s skin. I understand that you are a Mandalorian, but surely you are able to take a private moment to remove your armor to hold the little one. Skin-to-skin contact is necessary for proper development in children and while I know nothing of his species, I’m sure it would only help him.”

Din wasn’t sure what to say back. He wanted to be the best possible father to his son, so would that mean removing the armor that was meant to protect himself and his son? It would not be against the Creed to remove his armor to hold his son, so why did the idea of doing so scare Din so much?

“I’ll think about it,” was Din’s response. For most, such a phrase has a “no” hidden behind it, but Din is someone who chooses his words carefully to ensure the meaning behind them. The woman smiled and replied, “I understand. May I recommend some other things for you to take home with you for your little one?”

In the end, Din walked away with several illustrated children’s books, a music box, some art supplies and paper, and two more sets of clothes for the child. Din also purchased two meat kebabs from a vendor as breakfast for himself and the child. Happy with his purchases for the day, Din began to make his way back to the Razor Crest. The child was still happily snuggled into the belly of his new toy, grasping it tightly as if he never wanted to let go.

Once back on the Razor Crest, Din began to put his purchases away while the child ran around the ship, dragging the mythosaur behind him by its tail and giggling loudly. Din couldn’t help but smile at the happy image of his tiny baby dragging his huge toy behind him. Din’s thoughts brought him back to the words of Eila and he sighed deeply. As he watched his son run in a circle with the mythosaur at his heels, he was reminded of the fact that he would sacrifice everything for this child. He had already risked his career and life for his son, now he would sacrifice his armor.

Din began the process of removing his chest and shoulder plates while continuing to watch his child playing. After running in a circle for so long, the child became dizzy and tired, plopping onto the ground and breathing heavily. Din reached down to pick up his son, who was more than happy to be held. Pressing him to his chest, Din heard the child sigh at being able to feel the warmth of Din’s chest. He brought his little hands up to grasp at his shirt and rested another hand over Din’s heart.

The affection and love of the moment brought a flow of unstoppable words from Din’s mouth, “Listen, little one, I’ve never really had another person to spend my time with so I’m not really good with my words or actions. I … I want to be a good dad to you, but I’m not sure how to do that. No matter what, I promise you that I’m always going to take care of you, protect you, and keep you happy. You make me very happy and if you’re even half as happy in my company as I am in yours, then I think I’ve succeeded.”

As Din continued to feel his son against his chest for the first time, the words just continued to spill from his mouth. He told his son of his own parents and how they sacrificed themselves for him and that Din was prepared to do the same for his child. He told him how the foundlings were highly valued among Mandalorians and that family was extremely important to them. How to be a Mandalorian was to be prepared to lay your life down for your family at any time.

“You are my ad, my son, and I am your buir, your father. I will protect you always and I will love you always,” Din finished, leaning down to press his forehead to the top of his child’s head. The baby cooed and Din leaned back up to look at his son. The baby grabbed the fabric near his shoulders to pull himself up in order to wrap his arms around Din’s neck in a hug. Din sighed and embraced his son, grateful to the wise old woman who had helped him bond with his baby.

#The Mandalorian #Star Wars #Din Djarin #Baby Yoda #Fluff #Din loves his baby boy #Baby Yoda loves his dad #Baby's First series #my writing

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naomiknight-17 · 4 years

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Hello Fresh Meal 8!

I was really looking forward to this one - Pesto Chicken with Lemony Couscous & Zucchini Salad!

This was another night where neither hubby or I felt like cooking, so we both ended up cooking. I took the lead getting all the produce washed and prepped, including zesting, juicing and slicing the lemon, grating up the garlic, and chopping the onions and parsley. I should note that this was supposed to come with pre-chopped red onion, but due to a shortage (another salmonella outbreak apparently?) They substituted shallots I had to cut up myself.

Once all that was prepped, the chicken had to be patted dry and seasoned with salt and pepper, then browned in a frying pan.

Look at these chicken breasts.

One is roughly a third of the size of the other. And I know chicken breasts aren't always the same size but when you're choosing ones for a recipe where you're gonna brown them and then finish them in the oven, they need to cook at the same time. They need to be closer in size, come on. Save the weird sizes for recipes where they'll be stir-fried or something. Oh well.

(Can you tell I like to complain? It's fun. Maybe I should look into being a food critic.)

Anyway. Once the chicken was browned and in the oven, it was time to start the couscous. Look at the SIZE of it! It's much larger than the kind we had before, and is called Israeli Couscous. I call it Fatass Couscous. With love.

So the onions/shallots sweated it out for a few minutes before the dry couscous was added to the pot to toast, along with the garlic (which may have burned a smidge? Oops. Shouldn't have stopped stirring to take pics.) Then water and salt was added, the pot was covered and brought to a boil then turned down to simmer. It said 8-10 minutes, but ours needed a couple minutes more to absorb all the liquid and become tender.

While the couscous was doing its thing, I prepped the dressing - half the provided pesto, with the lemon juice and half the zest, and a little oil. Once the coucous was ready, hubby took over and tossed together the couscous, zucchini, parsley and dressing to complete the salad. Then he sliced the chicken breasts and tried to split them fairly between our plates, topping them off with some pesto warmed in the frying pan, and a generous sprinkle of feta cheese.

This was pretty good! So says I, anyway, hubby said it was FANTASTIC!

The couscous was an interesting, almost chewy texture juxtaposed with the wide zucchini 'noodles' delicate crunch, the dressing was flavorful, and the feta added a briny, salty punch. The chicken somehow came out fine.

Work and timing-wise, this was maybe 45-50 minutes? Though it occurs to me that, besides our low-energy asses slowing us down, I keep interrupting the cooking process for taking pictures. So. If I was focused on the cooking it would probably shave off a few minutes.

All in all, this was a nice meal that I'd happily make and eat again.

BONUS REVIEW

As a special gift, Hello Fresh sent us a couple of cans of Remedy brand Kombucha to try!

Sugar-free, sweetened with stevia. Organic, brewed the old-fashioned way for 30 days, with live culture... all the things you want kombucha to be!

I hated it.

It tastes like beer. Bad beer. With a very faint apple-y aftertaste. Stevia is the last ingredient. It needs to be moved up. This stuff tastes like absolute ass. Does all kombucha taste like that?? I almost gagged on it. How dare it claim to be apple crisp flavored? Apple crisp is full of brown sugar and cinnamon and toasty oats. This... is not.

I swear I tried to come at it with an open mind, but I don't think kombucha - of any brand or flavor - is for me.

Hubby said "It's not bad, actually!" And claimed he could taste the apple. Perhaps his palate is more refined than mine.

He finished my barely-touched can.

So I guess if kombucha is a thing you like, this stuff may be for you! For the rest of us, it seems it may be an acquired taste... one that I don't think I'll bother acquiring.

The final meal for this week is another burger... but this one is chorizo-based. I am intrigued. See y'all soon for that one! Thanks for reading!

#cooking #food #review #food review #hello fresh #kombucha #i made this #with hubby's help ofc

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morwenna-crows · 4 years

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#SkulduggeryBites: Interactive Twitter Short Story

The #SkulduggeryBites choose-your-own-adventure story ran on Derek Landy’s Twitter page, starting on March 20th and finishing on April 1st.

The story updated daily for almost two weeks; at the end of each update, readers were given the chance to vote on what should happen next, influencing the direction of the plot.

The whole thing is about 10,000 words long. Apparently, the plan is that it’ll be edited, and then included in a future short story collection. I’ve put the original under the cut.

The corpse hung by its neck from the tree like an oversized Christmas ornament, each gentle sway teasing a groan from the branch.

There were corpses hanging from the trees on either side of it, and more beside them, forming lines that curved slightly to become an expansive circle — a border within the woods.

Valkyrie Cain observed this boundary of dead bodies.

“That,” she said, “is ever-so-slightly ominous.”

Skulduggery Pleasant stepped up beside her, adjusting his hat. The suit was dark blue today, a three-piece with a white shirt and a blue tie. The face he’d been wearing as they’d talked with the sheriff flowed away now, revealing the skull beneath. His shoes, polished to a shine, sank into the soil. He didn’t seem to care.

“This display does more than offer a warning,” he said. “The moment we step through, we’re in her territory.”

“The monster’s female?”

“We’re dealing with a witch,” Skulduggery said, nodding, “one of the old-fashioned, non-human variety. The kind that would pluck little children from their beds and nice old ladies from their gardens and gobble them all up.”

“She hasn’t eaten these people.”

“No,” he murmured. “She hasn’t. I wonder why.”

“We should probably go ask her,” Valkyrie said. “You know, before she eats anyone else in the town. I doubt they’d be able to handle many more unexplained disappearances.”

He dipped his head to her. “After you.”

Valkyrie raised an eyebrow, and stepped across the boundary. Twigs crunching beneath their feet, they moved through the wood. Valkyrie had never been to this part of America before.

The sky was the colour of a bad mood and the air couldn’t quite summon the energy to become warm. The further they walked, the fainter the birdsong became behind them, until it faded altogether.

The wood was holding its breath — the way a child might as it hid beneath the bed while the monster searched the house.

They stepped into a clearing. In the middle of that clearing was a cabin. Its roof dipped. Its windows sagged. Its stone chimney slumped.

Skulduggery nodded to Valkyrie.

“Go ahead and knock," he said.

“You think that’ll be OK?” she asked, frowning. “A witch won’t try to eat me or anything?”

“If she does, I’ve got my old friend here to talk her out of it." He tapped his jacket, right where his gun was holstered.

Sighing, Valkyrie approached the cabin, stepped up on the rotting porch, and knocked.

“Hello?” she called. “Anyone home?”

She heard movement inside. Footsteps. Shuffling. The door rattled, a heavy key turning in an old lock, dragging back the latch. The door opened.

A little old lady, wrapped in a shawl, peered out. “Hello?” she said, her voice weak and hesitant. Nervous. Scared, even.

Valkyrie put on her best and most reassuring smile. “Hello there,” she said. “I was passing, and was just wondering if you’re the one eating people.”

The little old lady blinked in confusion. “I’m sorry? Eating who? What? I’m afraid I don’t know quite what you mean.”

“Oh,” Valkyrie said, “sorry.”

She leaned down until she was level with the elderly woman. “Eating people,” she said, loudly and slowly. “Are you doing it, you decrepit old bag?”

The witch grew so fast Valkyrie barely had time to register it. One moment she was a stooped old woman in a shawl, the next she was twice the size and lunging from the cabin, an oversized fist knocking Valkyrie off her feet.

Valkyrie slammed to the ground and rolled in the twigs and the dirt and the dead leaves, and the witch thundered after her. Her skinny arms were too long for her body and her hands were way too big for her wrists. Her grey hair burst from the shawl like she’d been electrocuted. Her jaw jutted at an angle, her gaping mouth overstuffed with yellowed, broken teeth.

Skulduggery pressed the muzzle of his gun into the side of her head, and said, “I’d stop moving, if I were you.”

The witch froze.

Valkyrie picked herself up, rubbing her jaw. “Ow,” she said.

The witch’s eyes — hazel eyes, they were — bulged in their sockets. “Don’t kill me,” she said. “I don’t deserve to die.”

“And the townspeople you’ve strung up around your home?” Skulduggery said, moving round so that he stood beside Valkyrie. “Did they deserve what you did to them?”

The witch licked her lips. She had a very, very long tongue. It was cracked, like old shoe leather.

“I do what I do for a good reason," she said. "A very good reason. I’m protecting that town.”

“By killing everyone in it?”

The witch didn’t answer.

“What’s your name?” Valkyrie asked.

“Esmerelda Montague,” said the witch. “I have lived in these woods since I was a little girl, and that was a long time ago. I watched the town grow from an empty field to a single lodging to a home for hundreds. I have watched the people from a distance because they don’t like me. They never have. But I protect them, nonetheless.”

“Protect them from what?” Skulduggery asked.

“From the monster,” said the witch.

A sound reached them, bleeding through the trees. A long and guttural roar. It faded, and silence reclaimed the clearing.

“That,” Skulduggery said, “would be the monster, yes?”

“Please understand,” said Esmerleda, “if it gets loose of its prison you will see a slaughter the likes of which you could scarcely imagine. The town I’m protecting. The next town over. The state. The country. It will attack, devour, and disappear. There is no way to track it, and no way to kill it.”

Valkyrie bushed a leaf from her hair. “And you’re the only one who can keep it trapped?”

“Yes.”

“And you do that by killing a bunch of people and hanging them from trees?”

“I have formed a magical boundary,” Esmerelda said. “A border between life and death, a shield against —”

“And you do that by killing a bunch of people,” Valkyrie repeated, “and hanging them from trees?”

The witch faltered. “Yes,” she said.

“See, that’s where you lose me.”

“Take us to it,” said Skulduggery.

Esmerelda sagged. “That is not wise, skeleton.”

“Probably not, but I’m the one with the gun.”

The witch looked at them both, and shook her head regretfully. “Very well,” she said, and started walking. They followed close behind.

“What kind of monster is it?” Valkyrie asked.

“I don’t know,” said the witch.

“Does it have a name?”

“I don’t know that either.”

“How long has it been here?”

“As long as I have.”

“How long is that?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know how long you’ve been here? What age are you?”

“What age is this tree?” asked Esmerelda. “Or that rock? What age is the air? I am old, I know that, and I remember when I was young, and I know that the time between the two has been long, and lonesome.”

“Who named you?”

“I did. I took my name from a young woman I hung from a tree. She wasn’t using it anymore, and names were suddenly all the rage, so I tried it on and it’s mine now.”

“Cute story,” Valkyrie murmured.

Esmerelda stopped walking, and turned to them. “We are close to the monster,” she said, “and so I must beseech you to leave. It’s not too late to walk away and leave this to me. The balance I have struck is delicate. Your very presence may be enough to tip the scales. My way is working.”

“Your way kills innocent people,” Skulduggery said. “It’s time to try something new.”

“You think new ways are better ways?” the witch asked. “Of course you do. You’re centuries old, are you not? I can sense that about you. And yet your clothes, your weapon... you put all your faith in the new. But battling the old monsters requires the old ways. This is something you’ve forgotten, skeleton.”

Her hazel eyes flickered to Valkyrie. “Your mind is more open. Walk away, girl. Convince your friend to walk away beside you, and I will give you a reward.”

Valkyrie folded her arms. “I’m not interested in—”

“You have lost people.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Loved ones. Yes? You’ve lost them.”

“Everyone’s lost people they love.”

The witch nodded, leaned closer. “But I can bring them back.”

“Right,” said Valkyrie, drawing out the word. “So if we turn round, and leave this whole mess to you, you’ll... what? Actually bring someone I’ve lost back to life?”

“Yes.”

“And you can do that? You have that kind of power?”

Esmerelda hesitated.

“That’s what I thought,” Valkyrie said.

“I’m just a witch,” said Esmerelda, “and my abilities are limited. But I possess the knowledge, and that knowledge is a key that can unlock the secrets of life and death.”

“You’re stalling.”

“I swear to you, girl — I do not lie to you.”

“Keep walking, witchy.”

With great reluctance, the witch resumed her march through the woods. Skulduggery followed, just out of range of a sudden swipe, and Valkyrie walked parallel, ready to throw lightning if Esmerelda tried anything sneaky.

“You’ll regret this,” Esmerelda said. “I could have reunited you with a loved one, but you have spurned my offer.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Esmerelda glanced behind her. “And what of you, skeleton? What would you give to have your wife and child at your side once more?”

Skulduggery’s head tilted slowly. “How do you know about them?”

The witch shrugged as she walked. “These are the things I know.”

“So you’ve heard of me.”

“I have not.”

“Well, you certainly didn’t read my mind.”

“True, I don’t have that ability. But I know loss, and I know sorrow. The people I hang from trees, they have all lost loved ones — either to me or to the monster. I reunite them with these spirits in death. I see your wife and child, and I see so many others. I see a scarred man, and a quiet man, and a woman with silver hair.”

A glance to Valkyrie. “And you, girl. I see an uncle, and a... twin? No, another version of you, one without magic. How curious.”

Valkyrie narrowed her eyes. “Just because you can see the people we’ve lost doesn’t mean you can bring them back to us.”

“You are correct,” Esmerelda said. “It is not so simple as that. Not so simple as a click of the fingers or an incantation intoned. But I could have made it a possibility. I could have unlocked the door and allowed you to reach through, to pull your loved one from death. And now, alas, I fear it is too late, for we have arrived.”

They stepped through into another clearing, this one pebbled with tree stumps. In the centre of the clearing was a small circle of trees carved with sigils.

Valkyrie had been around enough of the various languages of magic to at least recognise the patterns of the most popular — but these weren’t even the slightest bit familiar. Something moved within that circle of trees, something dark and something big.

Valkyrie stepped closer, trying to get a good look. Its skin was mottled green and black, and it was so big it could barely turn round in its wooden cell. Its arms were as long as Valkyrie was tall, and there were claws on the ends of each crooked finger.

She spied a mouth, and teeth, and it growled as she neared.

“Hello, brother,” said the witch.

The monster roared at her, a sound so violent it made Valkyrie step back.

Then the roar passed, and the monster glared. It had yellow eyes.

“Your brother,” said Skulduggery.

Esmerelda gave another of her sighs. “I’ve always thought of it as such, but perhaps that’s due to the fact that my life has been so sorely lacking in the love of family that I have latched on to it as my only companion. You must think me pathetic.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” said Skulduggery, trying to get a better look at the monster. “I just think of you as a murderer. Valkyrie, what do you think? Might there be a spare cell big enough for this charming creature?”

“I reckon,” Valkyrie said. “Though we’ll have to call in a squad or two of Cleavers to secure it for teleportation.”

“I can help you with that,” said Esmerelda, turning to them. “I can render the monster—”

She moved without warning, her fist crunching into Skulduggery. Valkyrie raised her arm and poured magic into her fingertips and lightning leaped but she was far too slow, as the witch was already upon her.

Esmerelda picked her up and then brought her down, slamming her into the dirt. The air rippled and struck Esmerelda from behind, making her stumble over Valkyrie, and Skulduggery hurled a fireball that caught in the witch’s hair.

Esmerelda screamed and batted at herself furiously, and Skulduggery’s gun flew into his hand.

Then Esmerelda spoke three words that sliced into Valkyrie’s head, and Skulduggery grunted, and stiffened, and fell backwards.

Gritting her teeth against the pain, Valkyrie released her lightning and this time it found its target. Esmerelda hollered and jerked back, fell, scrambled up. Valkyrie fired again but the witch moved, and the lightning tore a chunk from one of the trees holding the monster.

The sigil burned.

The monster burst from the trees and Esmerelda spun, lunged, trying to grab it, but her legs gave out and she fell, even as the monster loped out of the clearing and vanished into the woods.

“No, no, no,” Esmerelda mumbled, forcing herself to her feet. “What have you done? What have you done?”

“We can catch it,” Valkyrie said, panicking. “We can catch it before it hurts anyone.”

“We won’t be able to contain it!” Esmerelda snapped. “This is your fault, girl! Now I have to take more innocent lives!”

Valkyrie stared at her. “What? No. No, we just have to—”

“You are responsible for what I am about to do,” the witch snarled, and ran back the way they’d come.

Valkyrie got up, rushed over to Skulduggery, pulled him to his feet. “Did you hear that? Did you hear what she said? What do we do? Skulduggery, what do we do?”

“Split up,” he said, snatching his hat off the ground.

“Seriously?”

“I’ll go after the monster. You go after the witch.”

“Splitting up is a terrible idea!”

“Then you go after the monster and I’ll go after the witch.”

“That’s still splitting up!”

“The monster has to be stopped, and we can’t let Esmerelda kill anyone else.”

“Fine,” Valkyrie growled, backing away from him. “But I’m only doing this because it’s my fault if she kills anyone.”

She turned, ran a few steps and then leaped, energy crackling around her as she shot into the sky. She skimmed the treetops and got a blast of cold air rushing right into her face, making it hard to breathe.

She twisted round, flew like she was doing the backstroke, her hair whipping over her eyes. Valkyrie glimpsed the town approaching fast and she took a deep breath and twisted again, swooping low.

She landed in a run that she slowed to a jog, hopping a wall behind a used car lot. She made her way through the aisles of vehicles. A salesman brightened when he saw her, but she just waved and kept walking.

The town was small, and it was nice, and it was quiet, and there was no one shouting or yelling or raising the alarm, so she was pretty certain she’d beaten Esmerelda here. If she knew which part of the woods the witch would be emerging from she could have hid there and smacked her over the head with something heavy — but as it was, all she could do was keep an eye on the treeline.

“Sheriff told me about you.”

Valkyrie turned. A woman stood there, looking at her with red-rimmed eyes. She was in her 40s, and her roots were showing. Her clothes were high-end but lived in. Someone who’d recently taken a substantial knock, then. Someone who’d lost someone, maybe, and hadn’t had the time to deal with it.

“I’m here to help,” Valkyrie said.

The woman nodded like she didn’t believe her. “And your friend? You came with a friend, didn’t you? Man in a suit?”

“I did. He’s in the woods.”

“I see,” said the woman. “In the woods. And why is he in the woods? Is he here to kill the monster, maybe? The monster who’s been snatching away the people of this town?”

“I don’t know anything about any monsters,” Valkyrie said carefully. “We’re just here to—”

“Help,” the woman said. “Yes, I heard you the first time. People are talking about the two of you, talking about seeing you both walk into those woods... Did you know, we don’t go in there? Did you know we never have? I was born here, raised here, and since I was a child I’ve known that you never go into the West Woods. Because of the monster, you understand. The monster.”

Her lip curled. “Grown men and women, talking about monsters like they’re real. Placing all the blame on some creature when our husbands and wives and children go missing and are never seen again. And now look. Here you are, feeding into that... that hysteria.”

“I’m not trying to make things any more difficult than they already are, Miss...?”

“Oh! You want to know my name, do you? My name is Joanne. Joanna Freely. My husband was Jacob Freely. I say 'was' because he’s gone. Snatched away. By the monster, apparently.

But instead of looking for clues and finding whoever is doing this, the Sheriff of this godforsaken town is happy to blame it all on some supernatural being that lives in the trees. So who are you, I wonder, and what brings you to our town? You’re not from here, obviously. You’re not even from this country, are you?”

“I’m Irish.”

“Good for you. Heard it's lovely over there."

“My name’s Valerie. I’m here to—”

“You’re lying.”

Valkyrie blinked. “I’m sorry?”

“My husband lied to me,” said Joanne. “He lied to me about a lot of things, that man. He wasn’t... he wasn’t strong, in the way you have to be strong. So he lied to me and I got very good with spotting lies. And you lied to me just there, when you told me your name. Why’d you do that? What are you hiding?”

Valkyrie took a moment to scan the treeline, then looked back. “OK,” she said. “My name’s Valkyrie. I know you don’t believe that the monster exists, that it’s some sort of town legend, but I know it’s real, and so does my partner, and we’re here to stop it.”

Joanne shook her head. “You people... You come in here charging grieving families to speak with their lost loved ones and you take their money and—”

“We’re not mediums,” Valkyrie told her. “We’re not charging money for this, and we don’t want anything in return. When we’ve done our job we’ll leave and you’ll never have to think of us again.”

“Your job. This is your job, is it?”

“Yes.”

“You’re monster fighters, are you?”

“Among other things.”

Tears came trembling down Joanne’s cheeks. “Do you know what I think? I think you and your friend are behind it all. I think you’re taking those people. I think you’re taking them and killing them. I think you killed my Jacob.”

“Joanne, I’m so sorry for your loss, but I swear to you—”

Joanne had a gun in her hand now, and the tears were coming fast. “Why?” she asked. “Why’d you do it?”

Valkyrie raised her hands slowly and spoke very, very calmly. “Joanne, I haven’t hurt anyone in this town. Anyone at all. You need to put the gun down.” “Why’d you kill him?” “You’re upset and you’re in pain but I promise you I didn’t kill your husband.”

Joanne clicked back the hammer. “Then you’re just here to profit from his death,” she said, her hand shaking. “I’m sick of it. Sick of it all. It stops here. This town needs to wake up and stop dreaming of monsters and creatures and face reality.”

“If you kill me, it’s murder.” “Maybe that’s what they need,” Joanne responded. “A bit of everyday murder to snap them out of whatever delusion they’re under.”

Something blurred behind her, a mass of grey hair and broken teeth, and Valkyrie

tried to shove Joanne out of the way. Joanne jerked back and fired. The suit absorbed the impact as best it could, but Valkyrie still went stumbling away, one hand at her belly. She watched the bullet fall from between her fingers, squashed-up like a crushed soft drink can.

She would have heard it hit the ground if her ears weren’t ringing from the gunshot. Joanne’s gun bounced on the pavement near Valkyrie’s foot. She looked up, saw Joanne’s terrified face as Esmerelda grabbed her. Saw one of the witch’s massive fists swinging for her, and then the world juddered and went away.

Valkyrie blinked. She was blinking. When had this started? When had her eyes opened? She had no idea, and yet here she was, blinking at the blue sky and the trees that slid by.

She went over a root. Hit her head. It hurt. She didn’t like that. She didn’t like any of this. Her jaw was sore, her thoughts clouded. Her hand hurt and there was a tightness around her ankle. She was being dragged. Rustling filled her ears. She was being dragged across the ground in the woods, her hands trailing after her. Dragged by her ankle. Yep, that made sense.

She raised her head. Oooooh, that made her feel sick. That made her want to puke. She put her head back down and closed her eyes and focused on breathing.

When she was confident she wasn’t going to throw up over herself, she raised her head again.

Yep, definitely being dragged through the woods.

Esmerelda gripped her left ankle in one hand and pulled her along behind her as she walked. With the other hand, she dragged Joanne. There was somebody else, an unconscious man, slung over one shoulder. Three of them, then. Three people to be killed and hung from branches. Not if Valkyrie had anything to say about it.

She went to blast the witch with lightning and nothing happened. She examined her hand. A sigil had been scratched into the back of it. A little blood had trickled and dried against her skin. Damn it.

“You’re awake,” said Esmerelda without looking round. “Don’t try to kill us,” Valkyrie said. “It won’t end well for you.” “I have to,” the witch responded. “It’s the only way to save the town.”

“How can you be sure? Have you tried other ways?” “I have tried all the ways.” “I think we both know that’s an exaggeration.” Esmerelda glanced back. “At least your death will mean something, which is more than most can say.”

Valkyrie was dragged over another tree root. “I hate to break it to you,” she said, “but if you do manage to kill me, it won’t be the first time I’ve died. I’ve been around the block with this sort of thing.”

“Sorcerers,” said Esmerelda, and Valkyrie saw the edge of a smile. “Also,” Valkyrie said, “if you kill me, the skeleton in the suit is going to be super-mad at you. Trust me, you do not want that hassle.”

“I will kill the skeleton when I see him again,” Esmerelda said. “It is a surprisingly easy thing, to kill the dead.” “Many people have tried.” “They should have tried harder.”

“You want to know what I think?” Valkyrie said, and suddenly lashed her free foot into Esmerelda’s wrist as she torqued her body violently to one side — but Esmerelda didn’t let go, and she just kept walking, and Valkyrie sighed and allowed herself to be dragged onwards.

“Lame,” she said. “Don’t worry,” said the witch, “we’re almost there.” “Lame,” Valkyrie said again, but louder this time. They passed into the clearing and the cabin came into view.

“Are we going in there?” Valkyrie asked. “We are.” “Is that where you’re going to kill us?” “It is.” “I see,” said Valkyrie, and started

shouting for Skulduggery. “Do you really think that will do you any good?” Esmerelda asked. “He is in pursuit of my brother, and my brother is very fast indeed. They are both a long way off by now.”

Valkyrie glowered. “Well, I’m going to keep shouting, if it’s all the same to you. Shouting and... fighting!” She grabbed a branch as they passed it, sat up and swung as hard as she could at Esmerelda’s arm. But the branch was old, and dry, and the very act of swinging caused it to break in two, and so all she swung was a handful of crumbling wood. “Ah, bloody hell,” she muttered. The door to the cabin swung open.

“Can I walk?” Valkyrie asked. “Can I at least walk to my doom, instead of being dragged? My magic is bound, I’ve got no weapons, and you’re stronger and faster than me. There is no way I can escape. Just... come on. I feel stupid being pulled everywhere.”

The witch stopped walking, considered it, and let go of her ankle.

Valkyrie stood, brushed herself off. “Thank you,” she said, and stepped through the door.

The cabin was wide and cold and smelled of something musty and unpleasant. There was a small bed in one corner, and a large table with a single chair. The table was stained with something dark. Blood, presumably.

Esmerelda came in, closing the door. She put Joanne and the man on the table, and reached for a long, thin knife.

“Woah,” said Valkyrie. “Just woah. Hold on. Slow down. Skulduggery’s going after the monster. You don’t know him, but I do, and generally, when Skulduggery goes after a monster, the monster loses. Now, I don’t want to tell you how to witch properly, I’m sure you do your job very well, but shouldn’t you wait a little before you start killing these people?”

“I am going to wait,” said Esmerelda. “Oh. OK, cool.” “First I’m going to kill you, and when that’s done, I’ll kill them.”

Valkyrie shook her head. “What I’m saying is, you might not have to. Skulduggery will bring your brother in, I’m sure of it. The monster will either be dead, or it’ll be in shackles, or it’ll be... I don’t know what it’ll be, but it’ll be something. I wouldn’t be surprised if Skulduggery rode it back like a horse.” “Your skeleton friend will not defeat it.” “You don’t know him like I know him.”

Esmerelda put the knife into a pocket somewhere in the folds of her ragged clothing. She closed her eyes and breathed out, and it was like she was breathing out her mass, because when that breath was done she was a little old lady again.

Valkyrie watched her hobble over to the chair, and she sat in it with a heavy sigh. “You poor girl,” Esmerelda said. “You have no idea.” “No idea about what?”

“These woods. The town. What’s happening here, between us. The people on this table. Your skeleton friend. My brother. You can’t feel it?” “I’m not entirely sure what you’re on about, to be honest.”

“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised,” Esmerelda said. “It took me a long, long time before I started to sense what was going on. What was really going on.” “Maybe you could tell me.” “I doubt you’d believe it.”

“You’re a witch. My friend’s a skeleton. My own reflection turned into a god. I think my mind’s pretty open to new possibilities.” The old lady did her best to smooth down her hair. “I trapped my brother,” she said. “I made a cell for him, a boundary he could not cross.”

Valkyrie waited for her to continue. “And there’s another boundary,” Esmerelda said at last, giving up on her hair and returning her hands to her lap. “A boundary made from the dead bodies of the townspeople that I have hung from trees. This boundary serves multiple purposes. It keeps unwanted visitors away — mostly — and it gives me the strength I need to do what I have to do. So there’s a boundary outside of a boundary.” “OK.”

“But there’s another boundary, outside of even that. It encompasses my brother’s cell, this cabin, the town, and this county, small as it is. You passed through it when you arrived.” “I didn’t see any boundary.”

“It’s not something you see but it is there, nonetheless.” Valkyrie nodded, like she was beginning to understand, even though she had no idea what the witch was on about. As she nodded she scanned the cabin for a weapon. Couldn’t find one.

“And what does it do?” she asked. “What’s it for, this boundary?” “It changes things,” said Esmerelda. “It changed you. It changed your friend.” “I don’t feel any different.” “Of course not. If you felt the change it would defeat the purpose.”

“And what’s the purpose?” Esmerelda smiled thinly. “There’s very little point in telling you. You’ll be dead soon.” “I wish you wouldn’t say things like that. But hey, satisfy my curiosity before I go.” “Ah, but I’m afraid to, you see. I’m sorry, what is your name?”

“Valkyrie. Valkyrie Cain. My friend’s Skulduggery Pleasant.” “Valkyrie and Skulduggery,” Esmerelda said, and her smile broadened. “I like those names. I’m afraid to tell you, Valkyrie, because I have never told anyone. I have never spoken the words aloud. I’m afraid that when I speak them, they’ll know that I know. If they don’t already know. Which they probably do.” “And what are you talking about?” Esmerelda looked around, like she was expecting the walls to come crashing down. “There are... beings. Watching us.”

“Beings?” “I don’t know who they are or what they are. All I know is that they are watching. And controlling.” “Controlling what?” “Me,” said Esmerelda. “You. These people here on the table. Your friend Skulduggery.”

Valkyrie frowned. “Um... No. Nobody’s controlling me, thank you very much.” “These beings are powerful. You think they’ve endured for so long by being clumsy? Over time, I’ve developed a sense for their interference. When they make a change the air is different, somehow. It becomes charged.” “And what kind of changes do they make?”

“It happened just a few minutes ago, before you started shouting for Skulduggery. It happened in the town, when you tried to push this lady away from me,” Esmerelda said, nodding to Joanne.

“It happened right before you ran after me, and before that, when I offered you the choice between having a loved one returned to you and turning back before we reached my brother.”

“I’m sorry?”

“These beings,” said Esmerelda, whispering now. “They control this little pocket of reality. Do you understand? This is where they play their games. They watch us, and every so often they... they decide which direction we take. What we say. What we do.”

“Are they watching us now?” “Oh, Valkyrie, my dear. They’re always watching.” “And they decide my actions? So they’d decide if I scratch my nose with my right hand or my left hand?”

Esmerelda’s tongue flickered out, like she was tasting the air. “I can feel the charge,” she said. “Yes. They will decide this.” “Uh huh,” said Valkyrie. “OK then, I’ve already up my mind about which hand I’m going to scratch my nose with. You’re saying they’ll decide, is that right? Then let’s see it.”

Valkyrie looked up. “Alright you sick weirdoes, let’s see it in action. Decide for me. Which hand is it going to be?"

She scratched her nose with her right hand, and immediately frowned at it. “Well,” said Esmerelda. “Was that the one you were going to use?” “I wasn’t going to use either,” Valkyrie said. “My nose wasn’t itchy.” She looked up. “You’re saying someone made me do that? Who?”

The witch shrugged. “As I said, I don’t know — but I’ve sensed them for years.” “Why don’t you leave? What’s keeping you here?” “My brother. Making sure he doesn’t hurt anyone.”

“See, now just wait. OK, there might be a group of oddball beings out there, watching us right now, dictating our movements, and don’t get me wrong, that is creeping me the hell out — but let’s not stray too far from the fact that you kill people to stop the monster from killing people. Doesn’t that strike you as the slightest bit hypocritical?”

“My brother will kill a lot more than I ever would.”

The old woman clapped her hands. “But enough of such thoughts! The beings have watched, do watch, and will watch, and I’ve grown accustomed to it! It’s the way the world works. But today, you die so that I can imprison my brother once more.”

That knife again, in her hand, and she stood. “Wait,” said Valkyrie. “Just stop. Before you turn on your full witchy glory, just hear me out. I have a plan. I know how we can get the monster back in his cell and figure out what these mysterious beings are after. I mean, you’re curious, right? After all this time?” “I... yes,” said Esmerelda. “My curiosity is piqued.” “Then help me conduct a little experiment. Will you do that?” “You think you can make these beings reveal themselves?” “And their intentions, yes.” “How?”

Valkyrie tapped her head. “I’m a little bit psychic. I don’t have it all figured out yet, I’m not the most talented Sensitive the world has ever seen, but I reckon I’m good enough to sense them, like you’ve done. And I think I can go further.

They want something, right? They’re watching us for a reason. From what you’ve told me, it could be something as simple as entertainment. These mysterious beings of yours just might be warped enough to derive some degree of satisfaction from watching others go through hell for their own amusement. If that’s the case, I think I have a way to turn that against them.”

“How?” Valkyrie bit her lip. “I don’t know if I can tell you without them overhearing.” “Whisper it.” “Will that work? Can’t they hear whispers?” “Yes,” Esmerelda said miserably. “They can hear everything.”

“Then maybe... maybe I can speak directly to your mind. Can we do that?” “We could try,” said the old woman, and came forward and Valkyrie punched her across the jaw. Esmerelda fell in an unconscious heap.

“Back in a bit,” Valkyrie said to Joanne and the man as she hurried out of the cabin. Boots crunching over dead leaves, she ran to the clearing where the monster had been trapped and took off in the direction Skulduggery had gone. She found his gun, and scooped it up and ran on. She found his hat, and scooped it up and ran on. Then she found Skulduggery. He was standing just before the edge of the woods with his back to her, his arms folded, one finger tapping against his chin.

“Ah,” he said when she reached him, “you’re here. Good.”

He held his hands out. She passed his belongings back to him. “Thank you,” he said. “I almost died,” she told him. “The witch almost killed me.”

“There’s an old saying, Valkyrie: ‘almost’ only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.” “What? What does that mean?” “Old sayings don’t have to make sense. They just have to be old.” “Where’s the monster?” “Nowhere.” “Sorry?”

“I chased it. We fought. It ran here... and vanished.” “It went invisible? It teleported?” “I don’t think so. It just... stopped. Very strange indeed.” “Huh.” He looked at her. “What?”

“I’ve got something even stranger. Esmerelda seems to think there are beings watching us right now that control what we say and do.” “And you believe her?” “I don’t know. A few minutes ago I scratched my nose and my nose wasn’t even itchy.”

“That does sound damning,” Skulduggery muttered. She scowled. “It was an experiment, and it was — shut up. My point is, she might be right. If she is right, then that means they’re watching us right now. They’re listening to everything we say.”

Skulduggery’s head tilted. “Even the boring bits?” “What boring bits?” “Good point. Come, tell me exactly what happened since we split up.” She filled him in as they walked back to the cabin. “I might have a theory,” he said once they were approaching the door.

“Already? OK then, what’s going on?” The door burst open and Esmerelda came sprinting out in all her witchy glory, the knife in her hand, and she leaped at Valkyrie but Skulduggery’s gun was already in his grip and he fired a bullet into her

leg. The leg crumpled beneath her and she stumbled but kept moving, the knife raking across Valkyrie’s suit, barely missing her throat. They went down, scrambling, Valkyrie gripping Esmerelda’s wrist in both hands, keeping that blade away from her.

Skulduggery hunkered down beside them, just out of reach, the gun pointed at Esmerelda’s head.

“I’m going to have to object to you killing Valkyrie,” he said, and the struggling stopped immediately. “I’ve spent so much time training her up and I really don’t want to start again with someone new. I know you’re tough, and you’ve been around a long time, but I assume that a shot to the head will kill you just as dead as it’d kill most people.”

“I assume so, also,” said the witch. “Then what do you say you drop the knife, before Valkyrie takes it from you and rams it into your eye?” Esmerelda smiled. “I think you overestimate your friend’s abilities.”

Valkyrie twisted Esmerelda’s wrist, plucked the weapon from her hand as it sprung open, and tapped the tip of the blade against the witch’s cheek, just under the left eye.

“Oh,” said Esmerelda, and leaned back, coming up to her knees.

Valkyrie wriggled out from under her and stood. “That was risky,” Valkyrie said. “Shooting her leg like that.”

“It was,” Skulduggery murmured. “I should have shot her in the chest. Hitting a leg when the target’s attacking is not something I would generally advise anyone to attempt.” His head tilted. “I’m lucky I’m such an amazing shot.”

“You didn’t have a choice,” said Esmerelda. “I felt it. The charge in the air. The beings took the option away from you.” “Ah yes,” Skulduggery said, “these mysterious beings. Do you have a name for them?”

“As I told Valkyrie, I don’t know who they are.” “But you must have named them. You must think of them as a collective group.” “Not really. I just call them beings.”

“Well,” Valkyrie said, “that’s not gonna work for us. We like things to have names. You get that, don’t you? Why names are important? You took a name for yourself, after all.” Esmerelda frowned. “I suppose...”

Skulduggery lowered his gun, but didn’t put it away.

“From what Valkyrie told me about you, you may have missed out on some of the new rules of magic. And by new, I mean anything that’s cropped up in the last few eons. If we could figure out what these beings are called, or even if we just go ahead and name them right here and now, that gives us a certain amount of power over them. Not a whole lot, but it’s something.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know anything that could help,” said Esmerelda. Then she frowned. “Where is my brother?” “Gone,” Skulduggery said. “It left the woods and it disappeared. You say it’s been around for as long as you have?”

“Yes,” Esmerelda replied. “But what do you mean by ‘gone’? Is it... is it dead?” “Maybe. Or maybe it never lived. Maybe it never existed.” “But... but you saw it.”

He shrugged. “I’ve seen plenty of things in my life, and even I’m not arrogant enough to think that every one of them was real.” “You think the beings who are watching us made the monster?” Valkyrie asked.

“It’s possible,” he responded. “They made it, put it in these woods to act as a threat, and observed what happened next.”

“But who’d have that kind of power? Are we talking about, like, a Darquesse situation? Someone learned their true name, and they’ve been acting as God here in this little county ever since?”

“Perhaps,” Skulduggery said, “but I don’t think so. Someone of Darquesse’s power would be able to control things a lot more tightly. These beings, whoever they are, are limited in the directions they can give.”

“So it’s not a bunch of gods we’re talking about here?” “I don’t think so.” “Have you ever heard about this kind of situation before?”

Skulduggery nodded. “There have been instances over the years of people feeling like they had no input into their own decisions. There were occasions when mages would act out of character, particularly during the 1980s.

I’ve personally known sorcerers who have died in bizarre circumstances undertaking ridiculous tasks when they really should have known better. An old colleague of mine conducted one of the only investigations into the phenomena. He referred to the ones controlling it all as Horts.” “Ah,” said Valkyrie. “So he wasn’t into the idea of giving something a cool name. Good to know.”

“He had a theory that there were both individual Horts and entire Councils of Horts,” Skulduggery continued, “all casting votes to decide the fates of a select, unlucky few.” “And that’s what you think is happening here?” Esmerelda asked. “Can I get up, by the way?”

“Yes, I do think that’s what’s happening here, and no, you cannot get up.” “But you shot me in the leg.” “Well, you tried to kill my friend.” “And who are these Horts?” Valkyrie asked.

“I think we can safely assume that they’re not gods,” he answered, “but they do have a certain amount of power to wield over us.” Valkyrie resisted a shiver. “They probably don’t like the fact that we’re discussing them, do they?”

“For all we know, they’re finding this highly amusing. Or they might be deciding that it’s time we do something exciting, like fight, or kill each other.” “So what should we do?” He pondered this, and then he sat on the ground and indicated Valkyrie to do the same.

“We should not do anything,” he said. “If we commit to inaction, we may force their hand. If something spurs us into motion, then we’ll know that not only are they watching, but they are also listening, and comprehending the discussion we’re having.”

“And what purpose does this serve?” Esmerelda asked. Skulduggery tilted his head. “By forcing them to engage with us, we’ll start to take away their power.” “By merely sitting here?”

“Sitting here peacefully, yes. They might decide to throw a pack of goblins at us, they might send the townspeople after us with pitchforks and burning torches, they might try something else entirely... but once they do any of this, we’ll gain the upper hand.”

“But if they’re listening, then they know that’s exactly what we’re waiting for,” said Valkyrie. “So, like... they won’t do anything, and they’ll just wait us out instead.” “If we’re dealing with a single Hort, yes, that is entirely possible. But if, as we suspect, we’re dealing with an entire Council of Horts, it will be much harder for them to control the outcome. All we need is for one of them to cast a vote, just one single Hort to cast that first vote, and then it will all come crumbling down.”

They sat there and waited. “My leg hurts,” said Esmerelda. “We don’t care,” said Valkyrie. They waited some more, but no goblins attacked, and no townspeople swarmed them with pitchforks and burning torches.

“Nothing’s happening,” Valkyrie whispered. “Maybe we’ve got it wrong. Maybe there’s no one watching us.” And then a rabbit hopped up. They watched it sniff the air.

“Is that something?” Valkyrie asked Skulduggery. “Like, is that the something else you mentioned? Seems a little odd that they’d send a bunny. Or is that just a regular old bunny with nothing to do with any of this, that would have come by anyway?”

“Shoot it,” said Esmerelda. Valkyrie glared. “Do not shoot it.” “I think you should shoot it,” the witch said, nodding. “He’s not going to shoot it,” Valkyrie told her. “It’s a rabbit, for God’s sake. He’s not going to shoot a rabbit.”

The rabbit twisted and contorted and expanded, its teeth turning sharp, its eyes glowing red, expanding until it was the size of a man and growling like a wolf. “Shoot it,” said Valkyrie. “Shoot the bunny. Shoot the bunny in the face.”

It hopped towards them and they got up quickly. The rabbit snarled and Skulduggery thumbed back the hammer on his gun. It lunged and he fired three times and the rabbit whirled and collapsed.

Skulduggery walked over, nudged the dead rabbit with his foot. It immediately dissolved into a red goo that was absorbed into the ground. “Well,” Valkyrie said, “this day just keeps getting weirder. Skulduggery? Do you have anything to add?”

“Not just yet,” he said slowly. “But this is very interesting.” “Is that the word you meant to say? You sure you didn’t mean to say baffling?”

His head tilted. “There’s nothing baffling about this in the slightest. With every decision the Horts make, they’re giving us vital information that we can use to beat their little game.”

“So shooting the giant rabbit-monster was a learning experience?” “Everything is a learning experience, Valkyrie. Except maybe this conversation.” She grinned. She couldn’t help it.

“OK,” he said, “we have an opportunity to fight back. Esmerelda, can you walk?” “I can limp, if I must.” “That will suffice.” “I can hobble, if I have to.” “Yes, I get it, I shot you and it hurts, but we really need to focus on other things right now.”

“Sorry,” said Esmerelda. “Quite alright,” Skulduggery said. “If you want this to stop, if you want to be released from whatever hold they have over you, you’ll walk south through the woods. Valkyrie will walk east. I’ll walk west.”

“And why are we doing this?” Valkyrie asked. “When I was chasing the monster, I did nothing that I would regard as unusual or out of character,” he said. “This is purely a guess, you understand, but if I’m right, which I usually am, it means that the Council of Horts is only able to focus on one of us at a time. If they focus on Valkyrie, like they have done, that means they are not paying attention to Esmerelda or me. When they take their eyes off us, therefore, we can begin to strike back.” “Wait,” Valkyrie said. “So what if they do focus on me again? Then I’ll be the one in danger while you two are off somewhere.” She held up her hand. “And my magic is bound, remember?”

“I can fix that,” Esmerelda said, and reached out and scratched the back of Valkyrie’s hand. “Ow!” “Sorry.” “That hurt! Ow!”

Valkyrie rubbed her hand vigorously, but the sigil had been successfully corrupted, and she could feel her magic again. “Thank you,” she muttered. Esmerelda beamed.

“Are we all set?” Skulduggery asked. “Everyone clear on the plan?” “Not in the slightest,” Valkyrie responded. “What if the Horts focus on you? Then it’ll be me and Esmerelda coming up with a plan and, I’ll be honest with you, my plans usually involve people being punched. But I can’t punch the Horts because I don’t know where they are.” “I also like to punch people,” said Esmerelda. Skulduggery shrugged. “If they follow me, then we’ll have another piece of information that we can use against them. Ready?”

“Not in the slightest,” Valkyire mumbled. “Which way’s east?” Skulduggery pointed. “Right. And we just walk, is that it?” “Walk until they send something after you,” Skulduggery said. “Then run. Or fight. Whatever you’re in the mood for.”

“I’m in the mood for fighting,” Valkyrie scowled, and they all started walking in different directions.

Valkyrie stomped through the undergrowth, kicking leaves and snapping twigs. She looked up at the sky, glimpsed between branches.

“Well?” she said. “You going to do something? Here I am, walking along. That’s not very interesting, is it? If you’re getting bored you should probably throw something my way. Nothing big. Nothing sharp. An idiot, maybe. Someone I can punch and I won’t feel too bad about it.”

She frowned. “But why would I feel bad? The bunny wasn’t real — not really real. And it looks like the monster wasn’t real, either. So whatever pops out at me won’t actually exist — not in any meaningful way.”

Her phone beeped and she took it out, read the screen, scrolled a bit, then put it away again. She walked on, not bothering to even look up now.

“I read this book, a few years ago. Massive book. Anyway, it was about this town that had a horrible thing happen to it, and all the people were forced to do terrible things, and it turns out that it was all because some, like, alien kids got bored one day and decided to persecute a bunch of humans.

They didn’t look at these humans as much more than ants, I suppose. Or maybe less than ants. But is that what this is? You’re playing these games with us because you require entertainment?”

The ground started to slope downwards. Valkyrie leaned back as she went down. She slipped and fell, landing in a sitting position. Her frown deepened. “Was that you?” she asked. “Or was that me? Did you make me slip, or did I just slip? God, this is nuts. This is doing my head in, it really is. It’s giving me a headache. Is this a stress headache? It is. See what you’ve done?” She closed her eyes and gently rubbed her temples for a few minutes.

When she was done, she stood. “Was that fun for you?” she asked. “I hope it was. I hope you were thrilled, watching me get a headache.”

She started down the little hill again, weaving between the trees, placing her hands on the trunks to slow her momentum until the ground levelled out. “A word of warning, though,” she said. “I don’t know how long you’ve been at this, but things are different now. The moment you involved Skulduggery and me, it all changed. You’re not going to win this one. I don’t know if you’ve done your research, but we’re quite well known for stopping bad guys. Which is what you are, by the way. You’re putting people through hell. You’re responsible for so many of those townspeople being killed, for your own, selfish amusement. You’re the villains of this piece. I hope you realise that.”

She shrugged. “I mean, I get it. If you view us as something less than ants, then why would you care? If we mean absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things then why shouldn’t you use us for entertainment? Entertainment’s important, especially in times as messed-up as these, am I right? I’m right. I know I am. But I’m afraid we’re going to have to put a stop to it.”

The ground started to rise and Valkyrie kept going, using the trees to pull herself up. When she got to the top she took out her phone again, used the compass to set her in the right direction.

“You know what I can do, don’t you?” she asked. “I don’t mean the lightning or the flying. I mean the other stuff.”

She tapped her head. “In here, like. You know I’m a Sensitive too, yeah? I’m not the best at it, by any means, but I’ve done some training. What’s the point in having a talent if you don’t develop the talent into a skill, you know? So I’ve got a little skill in the psychic department — enough to scan my surroundings for eager little minds... like yours.”

She grinned. “Oh, I know you’re there. I can sense you. I know you’re watching me. I know you’re listening, and I know this is piquing your interest — some of you more than others. That’s OK, I’m not going to take offense. Some of you may not like to be addressed so directly. To you, I say don’t worry. This’ll be over soon enough.”

Valkyrie entered the clearing where the witch’s cabin stood. Skulduggery and Esmerelda were waiting for her.

“Any trouble?” Skulduggery asked as she walked over. “Nope. Don’t think they even noticed I was walking in a circle. But they’re there. I can sense them. They’re paying attention.”

“I still don’t understand,” said Esmerelda. “This is a device we use for communications,” Skulduggery said, showing her his phone. “I used this to send Valkyrie a message in which I laid out my plan. If the Horts could read the message, they would have immediately done something to stop us returning to your delightful home. But because we are all here, they weren’t given the opportunity to read it — which proves my theory.” “What theory?”

“The Horts aren’t all-powerful,” Valkyrie said. “There’s something else, maybe someone else, choosing what choices to offer them.” “How far did you get with the scan?” asked Skulduggery.

“I did as much as I could without making them suspicious, but I think it was enough. There’s a... I suppose you’d call it a presence, beyond even the Horts. It knows this is coming to a close. I think you’re right — I think it wants it all to stop. It feels it’s time to end.”

Skulduggery nodded. “That makes sense. We wouldn’t have been allowed in, otherwise.” Esmerelda stiffened. “Something’s about to change.” “I can sense it, too,” said Valkyrie.

“I doubt there’s any need to worry,” Skulduggery responded. “The Horts are demanding a choice, but I don’t think they’ll get what they’re after.”

“We're gonna find out,” Valkyrie said, feeling the charge in the air, feeling the fine hairs stand up on the back of her neck. “It’s happening...”

The feeling passed, and she looked around. “Nothing,” she said. “No changes, no nothing.” “That’s never happened before,” Esmerelda said. “As in, nothing has never happened. Something has always happened. It’s the way of things. I don’t think I know what to do.”

“I rarely suffer from that affliction,” Skulduggery said. “Valkyrie, can you sense a mood?” Valkyrie’s thoughts became songbirds and flew away from her for a moment, and when they returned they sang to her.

“Finality,” she said. “It’s coming to an end and they know it.” “Can you tell us anything about them?” “They’re... I don’t know. They’re like us in a lot of ways, I think, but also different.”

Skulduggery nodded. “My colleague who opened the investigation, he had his theories about who the Horts were. At various times he believed them to be a group of high-powered Sensitives, a group of Warlocks, or simply sorcerers grown bored of long life. But he had one theory that struck me as closer to the probably truth. He believed the Horts exist outside our reality — close enough to take a peek every now and then, close enough to interfere in limited ways, but too far to actually live beside us.”

“That would go with what I’m sensing,” Valkyrie said slowly. “But the presence behind them... I have no idea what that is. I don’t know, maybe it’s their god.” She closed her eyes, and raised an eyebrow. “Someone’s definitely amused at that idea.”

“I’m glad we can still entertain,” said Skulduggery. “But this over. The game, the experiment, the trial, the show — whatever this is, it’s done.” There was a deep, deep rumble from somewhere below them.

Valkyrie frowned. “Please don’t tell me that’s what I think it is. Please don’t tell me that’s someone packing up their toys and going home.”

“Actually,” Skulduggery said, “I’d say it’s more like someone wiping the page clean. Either way, we should probably get the hell out of here.”

“But my leg!” Esmerelda said as ground begin to shake. “You shot me in the leg and I can’t run!” “Are you still complaining about that?” Skulduggery said, and gripped her around the waist. “Hold onto me.” “Oooh,” the witch said, grinning.

As they lifted into the air, Valkyrie ran to the cabin. “You go on,” she shouted. “There are two of the townspeople in here! I’ll get—” She barged in. Joanne and the man stood there, looking at her.

“Fun’s over,” Joanne said. “That’s a shame. I was enjoying that.” The man started to dissolve into nothingness, starting at his feet and quickly rising until his head vanished and he was gone.

“Huh,” said Valkyrie. “So... what? None of the townspeople are real? All those folks that Esmerelda killed?” “She didn’t kill anyone. She thought she did... but she didn’t.” “And the town itself?”

“Disappearing even now,” said Joanne. “Along with the woods. There were just fields here before I started. Just empty fields.”

“How long have you been doing this?” Joanne smiled. “A little while — but time moves differently for me. Not faster, not slower, just... differently.” “And I take it you’re not Joanne.”

“There is no Joanne. This is just a mouthpiece I’m using. I just wanted to say hello. Just wanted to say ‘well played.’” “What’s your name?” “You and your lot... always after the names, aren’t you?”

“Are you a Hort, or are you the thing I sensed behind it all?” “I’m a bit of both, actually. I’m the one behind it all but I’m also curious to see what happens. Or at least, I was. Ah, I suppose it was time it ended. I have no regrets.”

The cabin shook, and Skulduggery called her name. “I’ll be out in a second!” she yelled back.

Joanne didn’t have any legs. They’d dissolved, just like the man had.

“The beings you call Horts... once I involved them I had no way of knowing what would happen next. It might have killed you. I’m glad it didn’t.” “Yeah, me too.”

“I’ll miss it. I’ll miss Esmerelda. She was fascinating to watch. The things she did to the few in order to save the many... Your world will be a less interesting place without her in it.” Valkyrie frowned. “What do you mean by that?”

“Her kind,” Joanne said, “they live for a long time. But not this long. She became, however, a vital part of this entire experience, and I couldn’t have done it without her. Will you tell that I said thank you? Will you tell her that?”

“I don’t think I will, to be honest. You’ve ruined her life, and now you’re ending it. You get that, don’t you?” Joanne shrugged, and then her shoulders dissolved. “Ah,” said Valkyrie. “To you, she’s not really real, is she?” “Not really.”

“And I’m not really real either, am I?” “No. I mean, you’re more real than Joanne, or the town, but... not by much. You’re mostly make-believe.” “Says the floating head.” Joanne laughed. “You have a point, Valkyrie, yes you do.”

Gaps appeared in the cabin walls. Through them, she could see the woods. The woods, also, had gaps in it. “Right,” Valkyrie said, “we’re off. You want my advice? Never come back here.” “A threat?” Joanne asked, amused.

“Very much so, yeah. There’s a reason you haven’t told me your name, isn’t there? Because you know that we’ll be watching for you, and we’ll be ready, and if you do come back, we’ll get a fix on your position, we’ll find your dimension, and a load of us will shunt over and kick your ass. You got me?”

Joanne laughed, and then her head vanished. Valkyrie spun, energy crackling, and she burst through the gaps in the roof and joined Skulduggery and Esmerelda and they flew the hell away from that place. *

Esmerelda sat on the stump of a tree and looked out at where her woods used to be. “So my whole life,” she said, “has meant nothing. And now even that is going to cease to be.” Valkyrie glanced at Skulduggery, and they both stood there, and didn’t say anything.

“I’ve been alive for all this time and I thought I was... I thought I was helping people and saving lives and none of it mattered. Not one little bit. All those people I killed...”

“Well that’s the good news, isn’t it?” Valkyrie asked. “I mean... you haven’t killed anyone. Not really.” “But I thought I did. For all this time, I thought I did.” Tears ran down her cheeks. “I spent my youth here. I grew old here. My life has been a waste. My power...” She looked up. “I could have helped people. I could have healed people. I could have brought people back from the dead.”

Valkyrie frowned. “You were serious about that?” “I’ve been serious about everything,” the witch said. “My whole life. But I don’t have that power anymore. I did have it, when I offered you the choice.”

“But that wasn’t my choice!” Valkyrie said, tears springing to her eyes. “That decision was made by the Horts! You said so yourself!”

Esmerelda nodded. “Maybe they knew what they were doing when they cast their votes, or maybe they didn’t quite realise the opportunity that lay before them. Maybe they didn’t believe that it would have been so easy.”

“Please. Please, you said it was knowledge, right? You had the knowledge that was the key to life and death. Tell us. Tell us and we’ll take it from there.” “I don’t think I have the time, girl.”

“Please,” said Valkyrie, “just try.” Esmerelda smiled, started to speak, and grew so old so fast that she turned to dust. Valkyrie stared. The breeze picked up, tossed the dust into the air and swirled it around.

“I could have done it,” Valkyrie said. “I could have brought one of them back.” “It wouldn’t have been as easy as that,” said Skulduggery. “There would have been complications. Loopholes.”

“I could have tried, at least.” “No,” he said. “You couldn’t.”

He put his hand on her shoulder. “You didn’t have a choice.”

END

#skulduggery pleasant #skulduggerybites #@the nonny who asked for this: I hope the formatting is okay for you?#i wasn't sure of the best way to include the polls but I didn't want to leave them out #long post

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butterflyinthewell · 5 years

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Godzilla’s mom! (Heisei era)

Godzilla’s mom was already quite ill when Godzilla hatched from the egg she laid, so he has no memory of her when she was healthy and energetic. She had a very slow growing brain tumor that was putting pressure on her optic nerves. It left her blind and over time it slowly paralyzed her, and she died when it crushed her brain stem against her skull. Not a nice way to go. Godzilla remembers his mother as being gentle, laying down a lot and, towards the end, so thin her bones showed.

Sometimes I wonder what it would’ve been like if she lived to get mutated too. I have an idea in my mind of what she will look like, what she would be like and what her name would be.

I call her Okaajira.*

She would be about the same height as her mate, Gojira, so about 164 feet tall (don’t forget, Heisei Godzilla is so much bigger because of “modern” 1970s nukes) with very irregular dorsal spines(fewer than her mate, though), soot black hide** much darker than her mate’s charcoal coloring, long claws (typical for female godzillasaurs) and striking yellow eyes. All yellow, not gold with an orange rim like Shezilla.

Her eyeballs alternate between being crossed (strabismus) and twitching (nystagmus). Had she lived to mutate, she would regain some eyesight because she grows a neocortex just like Godzilla and some of the pressure is taken off her optic nerves, but it won’t undo the damage already done just like mutating didn’t heal Godzilla’s heart defect or take away his palsy.

So any improvement in sight won’t be much for her; the best she would be able to see may be light, shadow, some shapes if the contrast is high enough, and some color. Forget about depth perception, she figures that out via sound because visually she has none. She can find a full moon at night, but not see the stars. She can tell if the sky is blue or cloudy. She can see if there’s a big dark brown boulder on pale sand. She can see the flickers of sunlight sparkling on water. At night she will see the different colored lights from buildings in a city. With no light she is totally blind, and shining bright lights right into her eyes gives her a total whiteout.

The tumor pushing on her optic nerves will go into permanent remission and not metastasize because her internal radioactivity keeps it from changing. Now, if she got shrunk in the Shrinking Project? That would kill her because she won’t be radioactive enough to keep the cancer in check and it will explode in size and get all over her body in a span of days.

Mutated godzillasaurs maintain a very delicate balance. They are as fragile as they are seemingly indestructible because changing anything about how their body works can either kill them or make them stronger.

It may take kaijuologists years to figure out she is blind, because she still turns and tries to look at things out of reflex, so they will need closeup views of how her eyes cross and twitch before they realize she doesn’t use them much. It will take them longer to realize she has some visual perception, and even then they will never know exactly what the world looks like to her.

If Okaajira walks into a city for the first time, she’s going to bump into things and sniff the edges of buildings. She will touch, nibble and mouth things to feel them like blind humans use their hands to examine something. She’ll think the cars on the streets at daytime are moving water at first because of the sparkle, but realize that’s wrong as soon as she steps on them and they go crunch. She will sniff and smell everything until she finds a path to and from a power plant that doesn’t require going through too many buildings.

After a few trips she will memorize how her footsteps echo off things and know she’s close to her target by the soundscape created by her footsteps. Sometimes she will stomp her foot, slap her tail down or roar to get echoes back and figure out where she is. This is more to find gaps between buildings than anything, and it’s not perfect. Cities are noisy and sound waves get absorbed. The weather can affect this too. Fog or snow muffle a lot, but rain is helpful.

While Okaajira can forage alone quite well, she’s more likely to come with Gojira and follow him around. He would totally leave a scent trail for her to follow if she decides to forage alone, but the humans will get wise to it pretty fast and start covering it up with something unpleasant in attempt to deter her. Then she’ll start following the stink and it’s back to square one, lol.

She has been blind for a very long time, so much that she hardly remembers when she could see, so she won’t be much of a scaredy cat until the JSDF and G-force show up. The loud, sudden noises and pain are likely to scare her until she realizes they don’t injure her, then it’s game on.

And God help you if G-Force or the JSDF “corner” her. (She can think she’s trapped when a clear escape path is right next to her, but obscured by smoke, or if there’s smoke all around.) She will crash into things trying to escape. She will whip her tail out to protect her back. She will follow the noises made by all forms of vehicle and take a few beam shots at whoever shoots her. She is more likely to miss than land a hit, but the property destruction will be astronomical, so much worse than Gojira or Godzilla could do. Once you set her off she will blast her beam at any sudden noises. That includes honking car horns, screaming humans and sirens.

She would have the strongest and most destructive violet (purple) beam. Think Shin Godzilla’s beam with a little less range...yeah. You won’t see her use it too often purely because it will cause her visual whiteout, so most instances of her firing it are because she’s pissed off or scared.

Now, her personality... oh boy. Godzilla didn’t get his loud, curious and flirty nature from his daddy. Okaajira likes to talk to anybody and everybody. She likes to explore and check things out. If she hears or smells something weird, she’s going to go sniff it or go find it. Gojira might do most of the hunting and foraging, but if Okaajira comes along SHE is the one calling the shots and saying the godzillasaur equivalent of “Honey, here’s the shopping list. You be my eyes. I’ll handle the rest.”

She is a gentle soul. If somebody is yelling in pain, she’s running over to see what happened and if she can make it better. Godzilla fell down and hurt himself a lot when he was first learning to walk. She kissed the tears off his face, kissed whatever part of himself he hurt when he fell and encouraged him to keep trying. She would still do that today if she was alive.

But as sweet and gentle as Okaajira would be, crossing her is a mistake. She won’t be great at distance combat, but get in close and she will rip you apart with her teeth and claws. This girl isn’t a graceful fighter like Shezilla; she fights dirty. She won Gojira’s heart by kicking his butt and sitting on his chest to dominate him after he underestimated her strength. “If you’re such a tough guy, why did a blind girl beat you up?” Gojira both fell in love and voluntarily admitted defeat for the one and only time.

Okaajira has perfected the Mom Growl. Every mom has The Look or The Noise they make to let their kids know they dun goofed. All she has to do is growl, bare one fang and hiss and Godzilla knows she disapproves of what he’s doing. AND IT WOULD STILL WORK TODAY, TOO. 🤣

And no matter how old Godzilla gets, he is always going to greet his mom the way he did as a hatchling. He will lean over so his nose is under her chin and bump upward to nuzzle her, and she does the same back. It’s because he still thinks of himself as being smaller than her despite knowing he actually isn’t.

He loves his mommy, that’s all. 💕

➖➖➖➖

*Okaajira is taken from okaa-san, which is how Japanese people refer to mothers who aren’t theirs. It’s basically Momzilla or Motherzilla in English. The term ofukuro is for talking to your own mom.

**Godzilla’s grandson, Kage, has black hide, one eye that is yellow and one eye that is brown. He got his dark coloring and yellow eye from his great grandma! The brown eye comes from Filia, Godzilla and Gojira. (Junior’s eyes look kinda brown in some light, but they are very dark hazel.)

His overall appearance is inherited from Junior, since I headcanon that Survival timeline Junior looks like MireGoji. That’s due to being mutated by radioactive chemicals in the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster, which were different in composition to what mutated Gojira and Godzilla.

So Kage is a little shadow colored MireGoji-shaped goober who has heterochromia and the palsy like his grandpa. 💕

If you want to know how Filia and Junior met and got hooked up, go read my huge Legacy of Gojira post. https://butterflyinthewell.tumblr.com/post/187359259748/legacy-of-gojira

This post is just an exercise in wondering if a certain character had lived. Okaajira would change the timeline a lot by existing in it and right now I don’t have the energy to write it all up.

And I really hope tumblr doesn’t shadowban this post out of tags. I spent a week working on it ffs. 💥

#godzilla #heisei godzilla #godzilla family #okaajira #disability headcanon #headcanon

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jflashandclash · 4 years

Text

Tales From Mount Othrys

Ajax: Fidget Spinners XI

When Pax reached the top, he wasn’t in a dancing-with-weasels kind of mood. However, he’d spent years perfecting a realistic looking smile. After their father finished beating or lashing Pax in front of Axel as a way to punish Axel, Pax knew that he had to pretend it was nothing.

As Pax climbed over the ledge of the rock, feeling sick with worry about Lou Ellen and horrified that they had no plans about how they’d get out of Greek Hell, his smile almost faltered.

At first, he thought Prometheus was dead, and Pax was figuring out how to break that news to Lou Ellen. “I know you lost your limb and didn’t save Prometheus… but at least we got some cool Tartarus-stained cotton ball souvenirs!”

There was a massive gash along his torso. The titan’s skin was sickeningly pale and coated with sweat. His hair slicked wet to his scalp. Scars littered him from head to toe. And, his organs…

Pax had another flashback to Alabaster’s sausage intestines. He sent a quick prayer to Tyche to thank the goddess of luck for keeping Alabaster’s intestines in his stomach and to always keep them in there. On this trip, Pax had enough intestines and sausages to last him a year if not more.

The gloves had proved exceedingly useful to avoid total grossness while climbing up the rocky edge and even provided a bit of an extra danger as latext+blood+slick obsidian=death. When Axel pointed to Prometheus’ cuffed hands and said, “pick these,” Pax realized he owed Lou Ellen way more than a hug for the latex gloves.

Pax remembered how Mercedes said he would be ready for a real mission to New Rome soon. She warned that he would need to perform quickly, under pressure, and with high stakes. (Something he’d barely avoided turning into a sex joke. Mercedes swatted him when she saw the look on his face). He hoped New Rome would have less blood.

Pax knelt down into something surprisingly soft and giving. It made a crunching exhale of air, like biting into a mille-feuille or some other aerated puff pastry. The sound and feel made Pax’s stomach do some jumping jacks when he examined Prometheus’ chains and figured out what he was kneeling on.

Those cuffs were completely crusted with layers and layers of blood. Upon a closer look, Pax realized the metal must have been thinner than they appeared—centuries of rubbed off skin, clotted blood, and sweat must have rusted away the surface and combined to make a film of coagulated grime.

Pax felt woozy, swaying slightly. Axel put a gentle arm on his shoulder. Pax opened his mouth once, closed it, swallowed, and said, “At least, if I throw up, I know I won’t be the only one who lost my stomach.”

Prometheus’ body shuddered with what Pax knew, in horror, was a laugh. Seeing the titan’s internals move with the motion—Pax very happy his father had never pushed him to be a surgeon. Killer and a drug dealer? Sure. But never a surgeon.

Axel knelt beside Pax. His older brother set a sword down beside the two of them, the blade sinking an inch into the cushion of gross. Axel tore off a piece of his pant leg and scrubbed at one chain, carefully avoiding Prometheus’ emaciated wrist underneath.

After a moment of watching the crust peel away, Pax swallowed again and leaned forward to help Axel. “It’s no fair if you both get to slay the eagle AND do the clean up,” he said.

Between the two of them, cleaning off the crusted gunk took longer than it should have. Pax thought about Lou Ellen’s gangrene ridden stump each time he scrubbed. The thought, in combo with Prometheus’ open eagle-buffet stomach, was not helping.

The metal was the size of a dog collar. They were 3/4th through cleaning it when Pax felt a sinking feeling inside his stomach. Beside them, the titan appeared to be rousing from shock or whatever immortals felt when they had their insides ripped out.

If Pax remembered correctly, this happened to Prometheus every day. “Another day in Paradise?” he mumbled.

Pax almost screamed when the titan responded. He didn’t think Prometheus was aware enough to do so. “Thank you…” the titan’s voice was weak, but still rattled and radiated with a dimmed power. “… for slaying that eagle.”

Axel paused. When Pax looked at him, his brother’s face was contorted with sympathy. Axel gently squeezed Prometheus’ forearm, his fingers unable to curl around the giant limb. “No one should be punished for trying to better the world.”

Pax finished cleaning around the full cuff. His heart nearly plummeted when he discovered his worry was valid. “Axel,” Pax said, hating to break up the new bromance. “There’s no lock to pick.” On Pax’s side of the chain, he’d found something horrifying for a lock picker—a fused piece of metal. As he’s suspected, the ring had been fused shut.

Axel sighed, his shoulders slumping in exhaustion.

Prometheus mimicked the deep exhalation. “In a bout of delirium… I may have… informed Hades that…. I appreciated him putting in keyholes… as forethought for future rescues.” He released a pained laugh. “Knew they would fuse them shut… couldn’t resister urge to point out… Hades’ folly…”

Bile threatened to rise up Pax’s throat. He handled what was happening to Lou Ellen and where he and Axel were, but only with the condition that this guy came back with them.

“Dude, you’re a titan,” Pax said, remembering all the crap Luke had proselytized on about with Kronos. “Can’t you like, breath fire or something?”

Prometheus released another pained laugh. “I can tell you your horoscope with 90% accuracy.”

“Cool, but less situationally useful,” Pax said.

Axel let go of Prometheus’ arm and lifted his sword from the blood-crusted rock. “You can also regenerate your spleen overnight. Can you regenerate your hands and feet?”

Axel rose. His body trembled. When Pax got up here, he thought Axel looked terrible. Now, Axel looked like he thought Armageddon was going to start and he was going to cause it. Though, Pax has to pause, wasn’t that the whole point of the whole Kronos thing?

The titan released a pained laugh. “Oh, Mother Gaea, you, wonderful, clever asshole. Are you sure you’re not just my next punishment? I take it no strength of Hercules?”

Axel shook his head. His lips twitched to a deeper frown. “I’m sorry. No. I fight with Mist, strategy, and speed, as you saw.”

“I suppose it will be better than Mirmir,” Prometheus said, his voice choking up, “Such is the fate of those who grant wise counsel.”

Pax knew that they were all miserable, but he wasn’t sure what caused the sudden shift to guilt. “I don’t get it,” he said, glancing from Axel to Prometheus. “Did Mirmir give bad horoscopes?”

Axel swallowed. “Ajax, climb back down. Check on Lou Ellen. I don’t want you complaining about having nightmares for weeks.”

Pax was about to protest, too late, when Axel drew lines in the grime on Prometheus’s wrists and ankles. By the time Pax made it to the ledge, his brother was already raising his sword above their alley’s arm.

***

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed! I hope it detached you from current events for a little bit, but not from any of your limbs.

I hope all of you are staying safe and healthy. Tune in next week for the second to last chapter of this “short” story where you find out what Pax wants for Christmas this year.

#Tales from Mount Othrys #TFMO #PJO #HOO #Percy Jackson and the Olympians #Heroes of Olympus #writing #Axel #Pax #Lou Ellen #A dinner party #Prometheus' horoscope reader says anyone under the rock is having a high chance of rain #I need sleep XD T.T #Also Kally the cat says hi.

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bookandcranny · 4 years

Text

Stone Heart Gambit

Part 1 - Chapter 5

It starts with clothes. Wearing rags might have worked for Adami when he was made of stone, but not so much now that he’s walking around. Finding something that would fit his broad, inhuman frame was a challenge, but eventually Soso pins down an online seller who stocks a full range of extra-large sizes and provides fast delivery. Adamantius had looked so confused at the offering, and it occurred to Soso suddenly that he probably wasn’t someone who was used to getting gifts. Thus, since then she’d begun bringing new things with her every visit, to get him accustomed.

It’s little things. Today Nessa, awake and active before nightfall for the first time that Soso has ever seen, indulgently leads her through a beginner’s lesson in baking. It had seemed like a good practical gift, since Surehouser only cooked when he fancied the diversion. There was always plenty of food in his home, but only when he bothered to remember that there should be. Something to do with the passively magical nature of the place, he said, though as always the simple answer was wrapped in a layer of riddles and vaguery.

The result is a batch of cookies so hard and dry that one bite has Nessa diving for the milk. Still, she thinks, not terrible for her first try, and Adami will probably be happy with literally anything she brings him.

The outside of the library is looking well restored from Halloween’s havoc, with the exception of the conspicuously missing statue, although the interior is more chaotic than ever before. After a brief investigation, the events of that night have been officially written off as a large-scale prank. It eases Soso’s nerves a little, knowing that she isn’t about to be interrogated at any given moment, but doesn’t solve the main problem. No amount of new clothes or socialization is going to make Adami able to walk the streets freely looking like he does, and harboring him at the library will only work for so long. Not long at all, if he can’t learn to play nice with his host. The fact that they haven’t been caught yet feels like a miracle.

“Nothing so dramatic,” Surehouser says. “Humans are remarkably good at looking the other way when the truth is inconvenient to them. The unseen bleeds into your world more than you realize. This spot, Ensfield- although it didn’t have a name much less a town at the time- rests on what’s essentially a faultline of wild magic, magic that’s not attached to or being used by anyone. It’s a powerful point of contact between the two worlds. One of a handful scattered all over the globe.”

He had explained some of it to her, though of course not as much as she’d like. You could only keep the human world so distant from its shadow without having some bleed-through. Underhill and Overhill were in many ways mirror images of another, hanging in a precarious balance. In order to keep that balance in check, there were a lot of rules about the way faefolk were to conduct themselves while in Overhill, and breaking them could be met with consequences ranging from a slap on the wrist to being banished from Underhill altogether. The general consensus, it seemed, was that the human’s domain was a fun place to visit but not one anyone wished to stay in.

Soso, who has no basis for comparison, wonders if she should be offended.

“So, out of curiosity,” she says. “Just how much trouble would you be in if your bosses found out about big boy over here?”

He snorts. She likes the man but he has the uncanny ability to make her feel like an idiot whenever she opens her mouth about anything fae-wise. “You assume you’d be exempt.”

“Wouldn’t I?” Uncertainty creeps into her tone. “I mean, this is sort of my turf. Because human?”

“It does muddy things,” he admits. “I can’t say I know what they’d do.”

“Give me a best and worst case scenario.”

“Best case, I lose my position and standing and become the laughing stock of my court for failing a task that was essentially ‘make sure this rock doesn’t move’. Worst case, the library gets a few new lawn ornaments.”

She grimaces. Yeah, that’s pretty bad.

Adamantius comes in from the other room and makes a face that she recognizes as his version of a smile. The mouthful of teeth and tusks don’t lend themselves well to the expression, but the nuances between happy monster and angry monster and bored monster are ones she’s coming to appreciate.

“Lady Willoughby, I was not aware it was you. I’ve been instructed to stay hidden at the sound of the door,” he says. “Then I remembered that I’m not bound to the commands of faeries.”

Surehouser rolls his eyes theatrically and takes a bite of a proffered cookie, wincing at the crunch. “Have some, abomination. Your jaws are probably much more suited.”

Soso’s face heats. They aren’t that bad, are they? Adamantius takes two before she can stop him, rumbling with contentment as he chews, and she wonders if it’s for her sake. He can be remarkably astute when he wants to be.

“You could maybe be a teensy bit more careful about being spotted.” She gestures around her. The quirky but overall neat hideaway in the woods Soso knew has been growing more disorganized by the day. Apparently Adami has been trying to catch up his limited knowledge of modern-day Overhill by tearing through the library’s main collection. She can surmise by the look of the place that his attention span is even more erratic than her own. She can nearly pinpoint the exact moment Surehouser must have given up. “Like, just in case anybody else ever stops by.”

“Let them come. I don’t fear any man.”

“Well, I personally fear lots of men.”

Adami clenches one oversized fist. “I would not let them harm you.”

And that instant leap to violence in my defense is a big part of why. Soso’s trying to think of a gentle way to explain this, when there’s the sound of knock on the door. Surehouser leaps up and ushers him out of the room, much to his annoyance, just as the door cracks open.

“Oh hey, I wasn’t sure you guys were open,” says the visitor. It’s a man, still young but old enough that, upon sighting Soso, his face slips into that condescending smile that every man over twenty-five seems to default to around her. Her height and the softness of her features often paints her as younger than she is. She’ll be getting carded for another ten years at least.

“Yep, the librarian’s just, uh, taking a break.”

“I see. And you’re…?”

“Ah, Soso. I’m… an intern?” She resists the urge to slap herself and appends, “I’m new, sorry.”

She’s relieved that the visitor doesn’t call her bluff. She can feign confidence with the best of them but it doesn’t help matters that this guy is uncannily good looking. He’s dressed like he’s just come from an office job, the crisp white sleeves of his button=up rolled to the elbows and his sandy brown hair ruffled in a way that seems somehow calculated and effortless all at once.

“Nice to meet you, miss intern,” he grins. “Can you help me out with something? See, I’m a reporter doing a story on an incident that was reported in the area a few nights ago. You know what I’m talking about?”

Soso stiffens. “Oh yeah, those crazy kids and their pranks. I hate to ruin your scoop but there really isn’t anything to tell about it.”

The man stalks towards her, his smile never wavering. “Really? Because what I heard was that the culprit still hasn’t been caught.” He gives her a casual once-over. “Culprit, or culprits.”

The insinuation irks her. “What makes you think you’re going to find anything about it here?”

He shrugs. “Sources tell me this library is a common target for ‘pranks’ like these. Maybe you saw something?”

“We were closed that night,” she bites out. Something about this reporter’s cocky attitude sets her on edge.

“Maybe I should talk to your boss. He lives out of this same building, right? Anthony Surehouser?”

Her frown deepens. A lucky guess? An attempt to bluff his way in? That itself seems odd though. Who puts this much effort into sleuthing out a story about a supposed prank on a night notorious for stupid pranks? Something isn’t adding up.

“What did you say your name was?”

“I didn’t, but neither did you.”

“I told you, my name is Soso.”

That actually throws him for a second. “Oh that’s your name. I thought you just had a stutter. My fault.” He puts out his hand. “Jamison D’Leon. Sorry, as a kid my grandma always told me never to give my name to someone who wouldn’t give me theirs first.”

“It’s okay. It’s an unusual name, I know.”

“I’d say unique.” He has the audacity to wink at her as she shakes his hand.

“Mr D’Leon-“

“Call me Jamie, please. I’m not ready to be a Mr D’Leon just yet.”

This guy is too much. “Okay, Jamie, I can tell my boss you came by, but like I said neither of us saw anything, so unless you’re looking for a book or directions to the highway, I can’t help you.”

For the first time, Jamie’s grin falters. “You are a tough one.” He takes a phone out of his pocket and selects the first contact on the list. “Bancroft, my darling, are you still sure this is the place?” A beat. “In that case, I’m gonna need some backup. Mhm, mhm.”

He ends the call and reclines into a lazy lean against the circulation desk. Feeling at a loss, Soso is contemplating calling for some backup of her own when the doors open again. This time the newcomer is a serious looking woman with long dark hair, dark skin, and a dark suit to match.

“Excuse me, who are you?”

The woman adjusts her glasses. She’s looking around at the room, hardly taking notice of Soso, like she’s just a part of the scenery and an uninteresting one at that.

“Agent Dana Bancroft,” she answers.

“Agent?”

“What’s the verdict?” asks Jamie.

“No doubt, this is the place.” She looks at Soso as if her presence has only just registered. “Oh, you need to leave.”

“What are you talking about?”

“This building is a powderkeg of ma-“

Jamie clears his throat loudly. Soso narrows her eyes. She thinks of what Surehouser had said, about faefolk walking unnoticed among common men. These two don’t look like magical creatures in disguise, but then, neither had he. That’s the point.

There must be some sort of tell, she thinks, otherwise how would those in the know recognize one another? She feigns obedience under their intimidating stares and moves to gather her things. She might not know just who or what these two are, but she can still recognize bad news when she sees it.

Rifling through her bag for a way out of this, her hands find her camera. She still carries it around with her as a habit even though she hasn’t used it much lately. Surehouser is averse to having his picture taken, and she finds herself too unsure to ask Adami even if he would most likely agree. That line of thought causes her to consider, would a glamour- the illusory magic the fae use to disguise themselves among humans- show up on camera?

“Hey ‘agents’, say cheese.”

No sooner has the shutter clicked than something like a purple bolt of lightning shoots it from her hands. When she scrambles to pick it back up, the smoldering plastic sparks and she yelps in pain and shock.

“Bancroft, was that necessary?”

“She knows,” the agent says with cool certainty. Her hands are sparkling with that same iridescent energy.

At this point several things happen at once. Bancroft raises her hands, gathering more power to her. Jamie is saying something to her, trying to talk her down or maybe just throwing around ideas about where to hide the body- Soso can’t focus on that either way because she hears heavy footfalls swiftly approaching and seconds later Adamantius bursts into the room, nearly upending several shelves and roaring like a zoo lion past feeding time. He picks up the agent closest to him, Jamie, and tosses him. His partner whirls towards him and sends a blast of that built up energy directly into his chest. The area glows for a moment like iron in a forge, and then fades, the raging man unaffected.

Surehouser comes in hot on his heels, red in the face. She imagines it was a struggle for him to keep him subdued for as long as he had. The woman readies another attack, shaken but not stalled, and Adamantius seizes and encircles her hands with his own, bearing down like he intends to tear them off before giving her the chance.

“Wait!” Soso yells, but he’s too far gone now. He doesn’t seem to even hear her.

The woman cries out in pain and Soso, panicked, lobs a cookie at his head. It crumbles on impact, but it at least gets his attention. While she has an opening, she rushes him head-first. He doesn’t so much as budge as she rails into him with the full force of her weight. He shoves the agent away just long enough to keep her from braining herself, for all the good it does. She swears she can feel her brain bouncing around the inside of her skull.

“Tha’s enough,” she slurs, shaking her head clear.

“I heard you scream,” Adami protests, eyes wide.

She holds up her hands. The one that touched the camera is burned slightly, the skin at the base of fingers turned paler than that surrounding it, but it’s nothing severe. He must come to the same conclusion, although he still doesn’t look happy about it.

“I’m fine,” she insists. “Things got a little crazy there, but we’re gonna sit down and talk it out like adults.”

“No more talking!” he roars. “All you ever want to do is talk! Why will you not allow me to defend you!”

Agent Bancroft, holding herself up by means of shaking legs and sheer will, opens her suit jacket to reveal an ornate patch stitched into the lining. At a glance it looks like a family crest, split into quarters with each section containing a discreet, delicately embroidered symbol.

“Oh fuck,” sighs Mr Surehouser, so abruptly that Soso almost laughs. “It’s the goddamn feds.”

“Federation of Magical Affairs,” she corrects in between labored breaths. “May I sit down?”

He pulls out a chair. Several rows down, the other agent picks himself up off the floor and limps over.

“Knew I shouldn’t’ve left my sword in the car,” he grumbles.

“Lady Willoughby,” Adami is all but pleading with her now. “Please let me remove the intruders. They are a threat to your safety.”

“Oh we’re a threat!” Jamie scoffs. “You-! You are getting such a citation, mister.”

“I think I’ll be fine,” says Soso.

“Can we agree on a temporary truce?” Bancroft asks. “I think there’s been some confusion. Jamison and I are agents of the FMA assigned to investigate reports of an incident that signaled a potential rogue element. You,” She looks to the librarian. “You’re the watcher assigned to this area, going by the name Anthony Surehouser? We’ve been trying to contact you. You’re running late on your annual report.”

He looks caught. “The date must’ve gotten away from me.”

Jamie says, “We were told to look for a lone building past the woods with a big gargoyle out front. Well we found the building, and now I guess we’ve found the gargoyle too.” He glares at Adamantius, cradling his injured arm. “What is this? Some kind of botched animation spell?”

He growls warningly.

“Adami,” Soso says, trying for a calming tone but landing somewhere closer to tired. “Will you get me some ice for my hand? And for our, er, guest’s arm?”

“Leave you alone with them? The woman reeks of magic.”

Said woman is looking more intrigued by the second. “What did you just call it?” she asks Soso.

A protective impulse flares in her chest despite it all. “His name is Adamantius.”

“The son of man,” she finishes, her eyes alight with wonder. “A feat of magic and science combined, leagues beyond anything created before or since. I thought he was a myth.”

A tense quiet falls over the room.

“For pity’s sake,” Surehouser pipes up at last. “I’ll get the ice.”

An involuntary hiss escapes her as Soso nurses her burnt hand.

“I could heal that for you,” offers Bancroft. She’s currently checking her partner’s arm for breaks, a soft light emanating from her fingertips, smoothing out the lines of tension on his brow by degrees.

Soso would like to accept, but Adami looks like he’s about a wayward glance away from snapping again and she’d rather not push her luck. His eyes are locked on the sorceress’ hands, even as the violet glow dims to nothing.

“Is it always so… sparkly?” Soso asks, and immediately feels foolish for it.

Either she doesn’t mind the question or she is very good at faking it. “Not always. Spellcasting doesn’t necessarily need a visual aspect, but healing isn’t my foremost specialty so it’s good to be able to see what I’m doing. Wouldn’t want to accidentally fuse any joints together.”

“Again,” Jamie mutters.

“Hush.”

When they aren’t being all secretive and posturing, or throwing balls of lightning around, these so-called agents aren’t bad company, Soso thinks. Though she would wager she’s alone in that sentiment. Adami is still... Adami, and Surehouser seems to be waiting for the other shoe to drop and someone to announce that he’s headed straight for fae jail, if there is such a thing.

The Federation of Magical Affairs, she learns, is an organization whose purpose is keeping the balance between the two worlds. Underhill has its own governing bodies, its countries and courts and what seems to be an awful lot of political drama, but compared to most human government structures their control over the citizens is fairly lax, which means that those who live on the Overhill side of things, human and otherwise, often have to pick up the slack to make sure the majority of humans don’t find out about the faefolk and wind up setting off another war.

It’s the TMA that conducts the regular check-ins with Surehouser to make sure that the contents of the library-beneath-the-library remain preserved and undisturbed, as they have been for the past several centuries. When word came in that there had been a disturbance in the area, possibly of an inhuman nature, Agents D’Leon and Bancroft were sent to investigate.

“The best in the business!” Jamie boasts. He cuts himself off with a whine as his partner pokes his still tender arm.

“I believe we rank seventy-sixth on the leaderboard right now, actually.”

“That’s not so bad,” says Soso. She figures with a job as important sounding as theirs, there must be hundreds, maybe even thousands of agents.

“Out of ninety-nine.”

Or not. “I feel like I should be offended that some mysterious magical agency thought our town was under attack and only sent out a C-rank team to handle it.”

She shrugs. “It was an isolated incident, no real casualties, plenty of signs pointing to a possible hoax. We’ve investigated a lot of hoaxes recently.”

“But it only takes one real one flying under the radar for this whole thing to fall apart,” argues Jamie. “Isn’t it worth following a few false leads if just once we manage to stop something big?”

Dana levels Soso a conspiratorial look. “Jamison fancies himself a knight in shining armor. In reality, the job’s mostly de-escalating minor incidents and filing a whole lot of paperwork. It’s nothing fancy, but there aren’t many good job opportunities for mages these days so…”

“Well it sounds exciting to me,” Soso says, and means it. She can’t imagine getting so used to a job involving real magic and monsters and mystery that it would become mundane. If only this sort of career track had been offered to her in high school. How does a person even get into this business, she wonders.

There’s a none-too-subtle exasperated sound to her right and she’s brought back to the situation at hand.

“Is there any chance this could be written up as one of those false alarms?”

The agents look at one another. Jamie barks a laugh.

“We can’t just not report something like this. We’d lose our jobs, or worse. Plus, a mythical monster warrior living on the outskirts of a human town does seem like kind of a safety concern.”

“You should be very concerned about your safety shortly,” threatens Adamantius.

Surehouser glances worriedly between them. “Isn’t there any way we could keep this under wraps a bit longer? I’m not ready to return home as a disgrace.” Soso clears her throat. He sighs. “And, while I had my doubts, I must admit the beast has been fairly well-behaved since he was released. Technically speaking, no real harm has been done, and he’s served a long enough sentence. In the days of old it’s said the warrior Adamantius served humanity, now it seems he’s chosen a new master, and one less given to warlike tendencies. That can only be an improvement.”

“I don’t want to be Adami’s master,” Soso argues. “He isn’t my servant or my soldier, he’s- he’s my friend. And I think after a thousand years the least he deserves is a chance.”

She looks up at him, and he at her. There’s a look on his face Soso has yet to identify, but behind all the hardness and fire in his eyes, she sees the face of a good man, a man who is more than the monstrosity assigned to him.

“That’s sweet,” says Jamie. “But I don’t know how well the power of friendship defense is going to hold up before the federation. And I gotta say, after being thrown into a wall, my vote is not with you.”

“He was trying to defend me,” Soso insists. “After you guys blasted my camera to bits.”

“Your camera?”

She shrinks back a bit. “I was trying to see if they were, you know, glamoured to look human by using the camera.”

Surehouser claps his hands together. “Soso. That was smart. That might have actually worked.”

“You don’t have to sound so surprised.”

“I’m trying to pay you a compliment.”

“Well, keep trying, I’m sure you’ll get there eventually.” She rubs her thumb over the burnt skin of her hand, no longer hot to the touch but still tender. She doesn’t even want to look at her poor camera.

Bancroft at least has the decency to look guilty about it. “There is a lot of magical energy in this place, a lot of wild magic. It makes me jumpy.”

Surehouser coughs pointedly. There’s a glimmer in his eyes that even Soso doesn’t all the way trust. “Perhaps I can suggest a compromise?”

Adamantius sneers. “Faeries and their gambits.”

“We’re listening,” says Dana.

Under his breath, Jamie adds, “We are?”

“First let me ask you, how soon does the FMA expect you to be back from your present investigation?”

“Investigations can last anywhere from a few days to a few months depending on the nature of the case. As long as we keep HQ updated, we can be here indefinitely.”

His smile broadens. “Then what I propose is this: collect some more data before you make your final decision. If you close the case now, what do you have? You have a legendary war criminal, a potentially dangerous creature of humanity’s own creation holed up in an unaware human town. That doesn’t sound so good. Doesn’t reflect well on me, on you, on the entire federation. Going back with this story would mean telling the FMA to its face that you’ve all failed your core mission statement.

“They can throw our dear Adamantius in some jail somewhere, call it a day, but when this story gets out, no amount of damage control, no amount of PR is going to cover up the fact that they let this happen, and didn’t so much as send out a response team for days. Anything could have happened in that time! And when they finally do file the paperwork and get a team out here, who arrives? Two agents ranked a hair’s width from the bottom of the barrel. No offense.”

“Harsh, but accurate,” she allows.

“It’s not a good look, I think we can all agree,” he continues. “But if you were to stay, gather more intel, and say, came to the conclusion that a human and a faerie had successfully reformed the biggest bad in Underhill history, why that would be a tremendous success! Proof of the balance- the peace- that the FMA has been working towards since its conception. Don’t you think you owe it to the federation, to yourselves, to give this grand experiment more time. If he fails to live up to expectations, well, at least you tried. And you still get to be the heroes who brought in Adamantius the unbreakable. It’s a wager you can’t lose.”

Unless we’re wrong, Soso adds internally, hoping her worries don’t show. Unless Adami really is violence and rage all the way down. She shakes herself. No, it helps nothing thinking like that.

The agents step away to confer amongst themselves, while Surehouser dabs away a drop of sweat with the cuff of his shirtsleeve. Adamantius is as stoic as Soso’s seen him since he was a statue. On impulse, she reaches out and touches his arm in a way she hopes comes off as reassuring. She’s never been the best at this sort of thing, and she can only guess at what’s going through his mind right now, but she wants him to know he’s not alone.

At length, the pair return to the group to give their verdict.

“We will take you up on your offer,” says Jamie, holding himself so rigid you’d think he was pleading guilty to murder. She almost prefers him smirking and swaggering. “Agent Bancroft and I will stay and survey you until we feel we’ve collected enough information.”

Relief washes over her. It’s not a solution, but it’s the next best thing: time. Still, something nags at her. “You mean you’ll be surveying Adami, right?”

“We’ll be watching all of you,” Bancroft corrects. “As far as we’re concerned, you are all under suspicion for the time being.”

“Suspicion of what?”

“Just under suspicion,” she says. “We’ll be taking notes on everything that goes on here and reporting anything suspect.”

The librarian tenses but keeps his expression carefully neutral. “That’s… fair, I suppose.”

He puts out his hand, and she takes it. A small spark of magic flickers between them upon contact.

“I am bound to my word,” says the sorceress.

“And I mine,” the faerie man replies.

Soso isn’t entirely sure what’s just happened, but the tension in the room is thick as pudding and it’s making her want for an exit.

“Adami,” she says. “Let’s go, uh, over there.”

“Mind if I join?” Jamie chirps gleefully. “Of course you don’t! We’re all going to become real good friends, aren’t we?”

Soso’s stomach drops and Adamantius bites down on a low growl. What have they gotten themselves into?

#original writing #fantasy #writeblr #project: stone heart gambit #apologies for the length #this is the final chapter for part 1! if youve read this far big thanks!

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dearlazerbunny · 5 years

Text

Lie to Me (Ch. 11 of ?)

Pairings: Loki x Reader

Genre/Ratings: M eventually (aiming for a slow burn here); warnings for kidnapping and subsequent anxiety/PTSD (will be marked before every chapter)

Words: 3200

Summary: If you had to guess what the captured, traitor, trickster god Loki Laufeyson wanted or needed at this moment, a babysitter would be far, far down on the list. (Set after the events of Avengers 1.)

SHOUTOUT TO @molmcb and @jessiejunebug for giving me mouth to mouth when I fainted from writer’s block those five times

Requested Tags: @deraniel @iamverity@yasnooshka24@wegingerangelica@themusingsofmany @dark-night-sky-99@tarynkauai@stuffandstuff-stuff @angelicshinigami@my-current-fandom-is @geekysimmerthings

Something has changed between you and Loki.

You can’t describe it exactly, other than as a shift in understanding. A fundamental change in cognition. Somewhere along the way, he became not a burden, but a friend. You go to see him when you aren’t required to, even if it’s just to tell him about the annoying temp who spilled a full cup of coffee onto your lap. He never seems to mind. You go out of your way to try and make him laugh. He calls you Witling without the harshness in his voice or contempt in his eyes, and now the nickname makes you smile. You smile a lot around him, actually, especially when his eyes ever so slightly light up when he sees you in the doorway.

It’s strange until it isn’t, and you ponder it until you don’t. Somehow your relationship- friendship, whatever- has slotted itself so seamlessly into your life you can’t remember a time when you didn’t favor your green hoodie over the other ones just because it makes him smile and tease when you wear it, or falling asleep without his stories playing lazily in the back of your mind.

You can tell your coworkers think you’re a bit crazy, but who ever cared what they thought, anyways?

“Hey, Trickster.” You bound into the room with a little more energy in your step than normall, toting an unassuming bag over your shoulder. “I’ve got something for you, I think you’re gonna like it- Trickster?” You’re accustomed to him sitting up in his bed, straight as an arrow, maybe a soft smile on his face as he waits for you. He is in his bed, but rather than looking pristine and regal he’s laid underneath the thin piece of fabric that passes for a blanket, curled in on himself. It’s incredibly weird, seeing him in a semi-vulnerable position. A pang of worry shoots its way through your chest, but that’s absurd- it’s not like anything could have happened to him in here. “Did you fall asleep on me?”

There’s movement, but it’s subtle. You wait for him to sit up, but he doesn’t even make a move to look at you or acknowledge your arrival. “Trickster. Hey. You’re scaring me.” You set your stuff down and carefully tread over to the glass wall separating the two of you, and place a gentle hand against the barrier, since you can’t place it on his shoulder. “Is something wrong? Are you sick? Can gods even get sick?”

The blanket gets pulled up over his head.

Alarm bells are going off somewhere in the back of your brain. Why, you can’t be sure, but something is wrong. You can feel it. The air has some sort of heaviness to it, weighing on you and the man in the cell, and you don’t like it one bit. “Loki,” you say gently, trying to coax him out. “What’s going on?”

You can almost hear the indecision coming from him. But eventually, he does come out, and force himself into a sitting position with apparent difficulty. You take him in- same raven hair, same pale skin and emerald eyes, though they’re duller than you’ve ever seen them.

But then you freeze, blood turning to ice. Because covering the lower half of his face is something completely and utterly vile.

It’s a mask of some sort, made of metal, chained around his neck and the back of his head by heavily tied restraints. It completely covers his mouth and chin, turning his handsome face into something from a B-roll horror movie. “Loki?” You whisper. He shakes his head mutely, and with one finger taps the mask- the muzzle- with horrific defeat.

He can’t speak.

They chained his voice away.

You see absolute red when you notice scraped flesh around the edges of the contraption from where it’s been digging into his skin. “What. The FUCK.” Loki’s eyes widen, and your other hand goes to the glass like you can phase through the wall and rip that thing right off of him. “Loki? What did they do to you?” His eyes are so, so sad and so, so tired.

“GUARDS!” You shriek, but you don’t even wait for them to thunder in. You go to the door yourself and fling it open, bodily dragging the pair on duty into the room with you. “What the hell is that,” you snarl, pointing at the ugly device strapped to Loki.

“The prisoner?” One says, confused at your obvious rage.

“Oh, yes, thank you, I thought you had swapped him out with a different Asgardian prince while I was away. On his face.”

“He required restraining.”

“I wasn’t aware restraining involved one’s voice. What was the reason?” You channel as much ice into your voice as you possibly can.

“He was attempting to conjure some sort of spell.”

That stops you short, and you glance at Loki, who is pointedly not looking at the confrontation. “He- was he?”

The agent nods. “He was humming something we couldn’t identify, and based on his history-”

“He was humming,” you say faintly. “Just… humming.” Another nod, but hesitant this time. “And how was it any different than the literally dozens of times he’s done this in the past few months?”

“Um…”

“Right. My guess is, it wasn’t, and you absolute idiots just wanted to jump at the chance to tie him down further.” They don’t argue with you, which is probably wise considering the daggers your eyes are throwing. “Open his cell.”

“Agent, I don’t think you have the authority-”

“Does it look like I care? I am so very, very close to unlocking his manacles and letting him blast you into oblivion with the scariest magic he can possibly muster.” You didn’t have clearance to do that either, but you sure as hell aren’t going to tell them that. “Open it. Now.” At any other moment, the thought of intimidating two SHIELD agents that are nearly twice your size would be laughable to you, but now you’re fairly sure you could snap their necks with your bare hands if you wanted. When he just stares at you, your hand darts around his wrist and you bodily drag him over to the access panel inserted into the cell door. Finally, after a millennia, he keys in a code.

“It changes every four hours,” he warns, but you aren’t even looking at the numbers he types in, just Loki. Only Loki. The panel pops open with a pneumatic hiss, and you sigh in relief.

“Now get out.”

“You-”

You throw him a look so fierce some of the color drains from his face. Without another word, he hightails it from the room, shutting the door firmly behind him.

He’s already forgotten.

You rush to Loki, who hasn’t moved from his position on the bed. His eyes are wider than you’ve ever seen, like he’s genuinely- surprised. At you. And maybe a little… scared? Whatever, you can deal with that later. All you’re focused on is getting this horrible thing off off off-

The locking mechanism is complicated and may as well require six hands to press all the right buttons at the same time. “Jesus fucking…” you’re mumbling all sorts of colorful expletives to yourself as you wrestle with the thing, and you’re probably pulling some of his hair, but you don’t get an ounce of protest from the man sitting quietly in front of you.

Clang. It falls to the floor. With it, words fall out of your mouth so quickly your brain can’t even keep up with them. “Oh my god, are you okay? How long have you been like that? I shouldn’t have skipped our last meeting, I take one weekend off and this is what happens. Christ, when I find out who ordered this I’m going to murder-”

“Witling.” You freeze, as does your frantic babbling. His voice is hoarse and dry, so far from the honeyed accent you’re used to. “I am fine.”

“Don’t lie to me,” you grumble, gently taking his face in your hands and inspecting the raw outline imprinted onto his skin. There’s a few flecks of dried blood crusted around the corners of his mouth. Your finger traces the angry flesh. “Does it hurt?”

He licks his lips. “A little.”

“Okay. Okay. Just- stay here. Don’t move.” You back away slowly, trying to convince yourself he won’t die on you if you leave him for a minute, then flee the room.

In your haste, his cell door remains open.

You’re back in an instant, toting supplies- damp paper towels, a bottle of water. You hand him the drink wordlessly and he drains it, looking a little embarrassed when the plastic crunches under his grip. It gets set on the bed beside him. You fold a paper towel carefully, then inspect him a little more closely before going in. “Tell me if I hurt you, okay?”

You’re expecting a scoff, some retort about a puny mortal hurting an Asgardian- but nothing comes. So you focus on your task, blotting away dried patches and soothing angry marks. You have to change towels twice, and you put that thought away in the very back of your mind so you don’t scream right here and now. “Oh, here.” You pat your pockets until you find a tube of chapstick and hand it to him. He looks at you, mystified. “It’s- chapstick? For your lips? So they don’t- hurt.”

Loki uncaps it, and tentatively puts a little of the product on his fingertip. Apparently satisfied it isn’t poisoned, he rubs a little on the corners of his mouth and gives it back to you.

You let out a breath. He looks a little better, at least. But his eyes are still incredibly lackluster and you hate it so, so much. You want that spark back, the one that keeps you on your toes and makes you laugh and promises endless tales of wonder. You just don’t know what else to do to help.

“I’m so sorry,” you whisper. “I should have been here, and then this-” you press a light touch to his cheek.

“Darling.” His hand steals up to yours, and at first it seems he’s going to push you away, but instead he gives you permission to cup his cheek in your hand, letting you reassure yourself he isn’t seriously injured. “It is not your fault.”

“I’m going to kill them,” you say tonelessly.

“Now, Witling. We talked about this: no picking up my bad habits.”

That makes you smile a little, at least, and some of the light filters back into his eyes. Something catches your attention out of the corner of your eye, and when you glance behind you, your heart stops for a few beats.

You had left the door open.

“I left the door open,” you murmur, eyebrows drawing together.

“You did.” His reply is casual and nonchalant.

“And you-” you turn back to Loki and study him. Not his face, this time, but him. “You didn’t leave.”

“Well.” There’s a hint of a smirk on his face. “You told me not to.” Those few words take something in your chest and twists it into so many knots it physically hurts. It must have shown on your face, because Loki lets his hand slide up and gently presses his fingers against yours until they’re lightly entwined together, still against his cheek. And you look at him, trying to memorize all the lines on his face you’ve never gotten to feel, while watching his eyes come alive again with every beat of your heart.

“You said you have something for me?” It takes you a moment to connect his words together, and you pull away, embarrassed. You’ve been standing there staring at him like an idiot for who knows how long.

“Yeah, I- well, you can borrow it at least.” You go to retrieve a lovingly worn book from the bag forgotten on your desk, then bring it back to him, showing him the cover. His fingers trace over gilded lettering- The D’Aulaires’ Book of Norse Myths. “This was my favorite when I was a kid,” you say, unable to keep the fondness out of your voice. So many nights were spent with this and a flashlight, hidden under the covers from parents who thought you were asleep. “It’s a little… tame, I’m sure. It is meant for children. But a classic nonetheless.” You push it into his hands gently. “Don’t turn the corners or anything, I don’t want it creased.”

A vaguely horrified look passes over his face. “I would never.” You wrinkle your nose at him, which makes him smile. Based on the way he’s talked about his own books, you have a feeling creasing a corner in one of Prince Loki of Asgard’s novels is nothing short of a capital offense.

He opens the cover reverently, and you realize it’s probably been months since he’s had a book in his hands. “I am not quite as adept at translating written word through Allspeak. Yet,” he adds. “But I suppose I have all the time I should need in here.”

Your eyebrows furrow a bit, wondering how magical god powers could require practice, but nevertheless, you take back the book and settle onto the floor next to his cot, resting your back against the cold wall. Skimming the pages, you turn to a tale that very specifically does not mention Thor or Odin. They’re few and far between, but they do exist. Before you can clear your throat- “what are you doing?”

“I would be very surprised if his highness had never been read aloud to,” you tease.

“I believe they all assumed- quite correctly I might add- that I could manage perfectly well on my own.”

“Tough,” you say nonchalantly, and suppress a smile when he laughs like he’s forgotten the days events. Which is of course your goal. “Piss me off and I’ll read you the one with the horse.”

“Spare me,” he says drily.

“Then shut up and listen.”

XXX

You don’t know how much time passes. You also don’t particularly care. Everything in these moments is too perfect to mess up- your voice echoing in the cell, Loki’s steady breathing next to you as he listens. Occasionally, you glance up at him, only to find him more relaxed than you’ve ever seen: hands folded loosely in his lap, leaning against the wall with a slight smile barely on his lips. Once, he catches you looking, green eyes staring straight into you, and it takes a large amount of effort to nonchalantly turn back to your book and keep reading rather than blush up a storm.

Eventually, you’re on the last page of the last story and you don’t realize it until you stammer out the last line with a hitch in your voice. The pages fall closed as you release them from your grip. A few moments pass in silence; the hazy atmosphere of contentment and safety that has descended amongst the tales slowly floats away.

“Is that all?”

“Mhm. In this book anyways.” You rub the back cover, as if more stories will magically appear under your touch. “I’ll have to bring you another, there’s loads more.”

“I would like that very much.”

You eye the cell door, which has been cracked open the entire time you’ve been in here. You couldn’t very well lock yourself in with him, that’d be a bit hard to explain- of course, this whole ordeal was already going to be a nightmare to handle. But oh gods was it worth it. So very, very worth it.

“Do you need anything? Before I go.” You push yourself up off the floor and look at him, still lounging on his cot like having you next to him is the most natural thing in the world.

“No. Thank you though.” You nod and turn to go, even though every single nerve in your body is screaming don’t leave him here, take him and that silver tongue of his and fucking run as fast as you can- “Witling?” You pause. “Thank you.” The genuine warmth in his voice makes it all the more difficult to step out of his room. Your hand lingers on the door as you do battle within yourself. Locking him back in feels so wrong. It feels like you’re a conspirator against him, condoning how he’s being treated-

“Y/N.” Your name in his voice draws you from your thoughts. He nods once, briefly, giving you permission almost. It’s okay. I understand.

And with that, you try to ignore the little piece of your heart that shatters as you snap the door closed with a soft click.

XXX

“Thor?” You find the god in a training room, practicing hand to hand with a lady who may or may not have be the Black Widow. You purposefully don’t look up from your shoes to find out. “Can I speak with you a moment?”

“But of course.” He steps off the mat and follows you into a side corridor you know for a fact is rarely used. Based on the way you’re looking around to make sure you’re not overheard, you definitely raised some concern. “Has my brother done something, my lady?”

“No, no of course not. Um, it’s me,” you confess, wringing your hands in front of you. “I might have, like, broken a ton of rules?” Your voice pitches higher than you’ve ever heard it. “And I need a big favor?”

There’s a rumble low in the god’s throat. “If my brother has convinced you in some way to make mischief, I swear, I will-”

“No, I swear he hasn’t! It was me, all me.” Very briefly, you explain the previous day’s events, with the muzzle and the guards and the aftermath.

“You were in his cell,” Thor repeats, confirming what you’ve said.

“For quite a long time.” You give him a weak smile. “I locked it back when I left, of course.” Even though you really hadn’t wanted to.

“And you want me to terrorize the guards into keeping this little tryst of yours a secret?”

“Um, no, I may have taken care of that myself, actually.” He looks at you, vaguely impressed. “I’m worried about the security footage. I wasn’t supposed to be in that long, so I doubt anyone would check it, but I don’t want to get him in trouble. I just know they’d spin it back on him somehow.”

“I see.” You stand there, wondering if you’ve just made the biggest mistake ever asking him for help, when he pats you on the shoulder with brotherly affection that makes something in your chest unknot. “I shall see what I can do, little one. Fear not, I will not let you be discovered.”

“It’s not me I’m worried about, really. But thank you.” You turn to go, but before you can, his voice stops you, softer than you’ve ever heard coming from the big man.

“Lady.” He has a wistful smile on his face, and he’s studying you with… something, in his eyes. You can’t quite put your finger on it. He is so very different from his brother; being able to read one doesn’t really help with the other. “I give you my thanks. Truly.”

You shrug. “I just… needed to help.” You go before his gaze dissects everything you aren’t saying.

A/N: Fun fact time!

- This is the second chapter I wrote of this fic (I’ll mark the first when we get there) - “it’s strange until it isn’t, and you ponder it until you don’t” is one of my favorite lines I’ve written, I think

- You are canonically terrified of Natasha Romanov

- All-Speak does not require practice with written word, Loki is just desperately trying to think of anything to keep you from leaving

Moving in Wednesday, so hopefully this long chapter will keep you guys tied over if I have to disappear for a bit! Love y’all bunches!

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apparitionism · 5 years

Text

Mercury 11

This is basically just one scene. It was going to be more (and this scene was going to be better), but I’m being fussy about what follows it, so I figured some content, sooner, was better than more later. (Some previous content: part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, and part 10.) I was additionally having a little hiccup of trouble figuring out exactly how to start this part... but “in the middle of things” is usually a good rule, particularly when the “things” in question are important, so “in medias pie” it is!

(P.S. to anon who asked about a masterpost: That’s too much housekeeping for me. But you’ll find I’m diligent with tags, plus my tumblr has search and an archive, so you shouldn’t have to scroll too much. Also, much of my stuff can indeed be found on AO3, where I move it after posting on Tumblr, usually with copy and/or content edits, depending on what seems warranted. Thanks for asking!)

Mercury 11

“But this pie,” Myka said with her mouth full.

“Has rendered you ill-mannered and inarticulate,” Helena said. “Interesting.”

“And here I thought demolishing cars was gonna be the entertainment,” Pete added.

They all had to work hard to be heard over the soundtrack provided by the derby: the roar of engines, the sharp bang and crunch of metal colliding with metal at speed, the shouts of extremely invested spectators. Myka had been paying some attention to it before she embarked on this trip to pastry-girded key-lime paradise. She hadn’t had any idea that bliss was in fact a combination of citrus and... whatever other things it was combined with, here in this very-nearly-literal slice-of-heaven pie, but Pete was right: this had been a really educational trip.

Ida said, “This is closer to what I’d call a show.”

“Here in Wisconsin?” Pete asked.

“Anywhere. Is she always like this about pie?”

“I’ve only known her five years,” Pete said, “but I think it’s safe to go with ‘never in her life has she been like this about pie.’ Or maybe anything.”

“Well,” Helena began.

“Don’t say it,” Pete advised.

Ida temporized, “She doesn’t need to. Everyone understands innuendo. And subtext.”

Myka didn’t care, not even a little—not about the kind of show she was putting on, not about how innuendo-y and subtext-y Helena was getting with regard to what Myka might find heavenly in other contexts—as long as nobody took this miracle of a pie away.

She certainly hadn’t expected this to be the outcome when she, Helena, and Pete had taken the lengthy walk—thankfully, in their normal configuration, with Myka reclaiming her “run interference” slot between Helena and Pete—to the site of the demolition derby, some distance away from the fairgrounds proper, accompanied by what had seemed like an additional fair’s worth of people. Were these things really so popular? Maybe Pete was right, maybe “the IRS” should sponsor one in Univille. For purposes of general sociability, because for all Myka didn’t like the place, she did still care what its denizens thought of her, and if—“Bet these’re cow pastures in real life,” Pete had said, interrupting her speculation. That prompted Myka to start taking careful note of where she was placing her feet during that long walk along not a path as such, but rather through grass that had been marked at irregular intervals with spray-painted arrows.

“You’re so prissy,” Pete said.

Myka shrugged that off. “Maybe. But cows. Or rabbits. Nobody with sense in their head want to walk in anything they leave behind.”

Helena said, to Pete, “Are you as unnerved by bovines as you are by lagomorphs?”

As a dig, it seemed mild, even polite, but Pete reacted as if she’d reached across Myka and slapped him. “Leave me alone! I’m not scared of anything unless it’s freakishly huge!”

They were passing the cars’ inspection area: the same spray paint had been applied to a piece of plywood, leaning against a fence enclosing those cars, to spell “INSP AREA.” It could have meant “inspiration area,” Myka supposed, but people with clipboards had seemed to be inspecting rather than inspiring, or being inspired... she tried to think of another word that began with “insp.” Nothing came to her.

“Size-wise,” she told Pete, “the bumpers on that Sable over there must be giving you nightmares already.”

Pete looked where she’d indicated. He did a cartoon double-take. “Are those even legal? I think I just found my horse.”

“I like the Pinto next to it,” Myka said.

He scoffed, “Nobody likes a Pinto.”

“The ponies enjoyed a brief vogue when I was a girl,” Helena mused, as if to herself. “Would that the car were painted like those...it’s a shame that a pinto—and, in fact, a sable—shouldn’t resemble their namesake animals in some way.”

Myka said, “I guess we can call my Pinto a Palomino, then. The color’s why I like it.”

“That’s not a good reason,” Pete said. “Not for a demo derby.”

“It’s a great reason. Look.” Myka pointed toward a corral ringed with bleachers. “There’s a lot of mud over there, where I assume they’ll do the demolishing, right?”

Pete nodded. “Mud slows ’em down. Safer, plus it’s a better show. Upset it’s gonna be such a messy show, Miss Prissy?”

“My point is, the Pinto’s yellow, so I’ll be able to keep track of it through the muck, while it does its demo-ing. Or gets demo-ed. As I watch it happen, because I’ve got a horse—almost literally—too. Do you want me interested or not?”

He glanced at the Pinto, then looked back at Myka. “Not sure,” he said, like he thought she was trying to trick him.

“You wanted us here so bad you won it,” she reminded him.

“Mostly wanted to make you suffer.”

“Then I think your win is more of a ‘win,’ because I refuse to suffer,” Myka told him. “Not about this.”

She was holding Helena’s hand. She had been, for the entire walk, “because I didn’t get to on the Ferris wheel,” she’d said when she first reached for the contact, her voiced reason in response to Helena’s questioning did-you-not-recently-express-objection-to-public-displays eyebrow, and it was true as far as it went. But what had compelled Myka to make the small display, really, was that she’d needed something, and this was simple. Uncomplicated. Something to bank against whatever was going to happen later, in the hotel room. Which she was, she had to admit to herself, doing some pre-suffering about. Because she didn’t know.

Helena declared, as if to assure Myka that she too felt both the simplicity and the need for it, “I’m not suffering either. Not about this.”

She gripped Myka’s hand tighter. It did feel good. Myka echoed the pressure, and one corner of Helena’s mouth curved up.

Pete rolled his eyes. “You two are gonna wish so hard that Myka won that duck bet.”

“It was a bet that concerned ducks?” Helena asked.

Myka grimaced. “I’ll tell you later.”

“I wonder,” Helena said, jauntily, “whether the poultry competition might include a Rouen or two.”

“I’m gonna regret this, but: okay. That’s a...?” Pete prompted.

“Giant mallard,” Helena said, with even greater cheer. Pete groaned, and Myka found herself wanting to kiss Helena: for being clever, but also as yet another instance of that bankable, uncomplicated touch. She almost said that out loud—“I want to kiss you,” simple, like that—but she understood that if she did, she’d have to deal with Pete about it. Because of ducks.

“Well, I don’t see any of your probably-made-up freak-ducks around,” Pete said. He added a taunt of, “I do see the two of you practically sittin’ in a tree, though.”

“Mature,” Myka said.

“Water off a Rouen’s back!” Helena announced.

Her insouciance made Myka again want contact, like a kiss, but more than that—but still simple. Basic. The most basic.

Pete must have seen and read that thought as it crossed Myka’s mind, crossed her face, for he said, “Jesus, Mykes, just jump her and get it over with. Get yourselves behind the bleachers and take care of business.”

Nobody had taken care of any behind-the-bleachers business, of course, but Myka had kept on holding Helena’s hand, even as they sat on the uncomfortable aluminum of those bleachers and listened to engines rev in preparation for entering the corral. Pete had taken it upon himself to explain the derby’s rules to Helena: “...and they all go in and they have to hit another car every minute, or maybe it’s every two, but anyway if your engine bonks out you get a little while to try to restart it but if you can’t you’re out, and they break that piece of wood by your window to show that you...” Myka listened with one ear, but mostly she concentrated on not finding a reason to loosen her clasp. The interlacing of their fingers had moved from “this feels good” to Helena’s barely fleshed bones pressing too solid against Myka’s, giving rise to an uncomfortable ache... but that ache was no reason to let go; rather, it was a reminder not to. Bodies, real ones, felt pain. So Myka sat on aluminum, listening to engines rev, not letting go. Banking it.

She’d been banking it, still, when Ida arrived, asking, “How did we ever live without the ability to text?” (Pete had said, as they sat down, that he would text Ida to join them, “because maybe she’s done with judgy-judge-judge and can bring us some leftovers.”) She’d looked at Myka and Helena—specifically, looked at their joined hands. “Well,” she said. “Another distraction?”

“Maybe,” Myka acknowledged. From something freakishly huge...

“How are you?” Ida asked Helena. “Did your summit go well?”

Helena smiled at the word. “As well as such a thing could. I suppose one might call the outcome détente,” she said. Myka, too, had smiled a little at “summit,” but as for “détente”... well, there was a lot to be said for that in the relations between several of her nearest and dearest. But she wasn’t sure how she felt about the idea of any relaxing of tensions between Helena and Emily Lake’s girlfriend. “It’s been a very strange two days,” Helena went on to say.

“That isn’t news to me,” Ida said, which prompted in Myka another Amen, sister. Ida added, “But I’ve got something that will make everything better.”

“Fruit spreads?” Pete asked, with great hope. He pointed at the small hamper she held. “That looks like something.”

Ida nodded. “Something. But better than fruit spreads.” From the hamper, she produced—with a “ta-da!”—the key lime pie. Pete gave a gasp that Myka judged both overdramatic and unwarranted; it was just a pie, albeit one that nearly matched her Pinto for color; if she’d thrown it at the car, no one would have noticed the spatter, not that she was in the habit of throwing pies at cars. This one hadn’t been thrown at anything, but it did look a little the worse for having traveled in close quarters: not show quality anymore. Given the crumbled edges of its crust and slightly dented surface, it might have been any pie at all. Ida then handed out plastic forks and paper plates, and if anyone near them in the stands around the fenced patch of mud recognized the picnic as larcenous, they kept it to themselves.

Pete took his fork up with his usual enthusiasm, dug in, took a bite, then closed his eyes. “This pie is freaking awesome. In an ‘I could literally die now’ way.”

“I told you, you literally can’t beat it,” Ida said.

While Myka had respected that particular “literally” when Ida said it yesterday, she wasn’t sure she believed it today in any kind of existential sense. Hence her astonishment when she found her own first bite to be... was “rapturous” outsize, as a word or an idea, to apply to the experience of eating pie? It didn’t matter what word she used, though; she wielded her fork with even more gusto than Pete, and she felt a niggling worry that this was, for her, unseemly, yet the combination of the unprecedented pie and the certainty that it was nutritious was irresistible. The mouthfeel alone was enough to knock her out—unctuous, yet with a sharp slash of lime-presence tanging on the tongue... she’d noticed Helena ignoring her own serving so as to watch Myka. “What?” Myka had asked. “It’s good for me.”

“I am prepared to offer to any and all attending deities,” Helena had said, amusement animating her face, “my prayer that your recently espoused belief does not wear off.”

“I’m prepared to livestream it so everybody on the planet can testify later that it happened,” Pete had enthused. “Also so Claud’s head explodes when she sees it.”

And so it was that the only words Myka had managed to come up with in her own defense, “But this pie,” had caused everyone to express even more opinions in the matter.

Fortunately, however, they let her keep eating. “I feel like I’m somebody else, how much I’m enjoying this,” she now said, not bothering to pause before scooping up another forkful.

“Interesting,” Helena said again, and her tone told Myka that something was waiting to be interrogated there... but she was extremely unwilling to turn her attention away from the pie.

Meanwhile, the cars destroyed each other. None of it mattered to pie-intoxicated Myka, except the Pinto, a little, because she could in fact keep track of it in the muck. It was surprisingly agile, “her” Pinto. Or Palomino. And if the derby had engaged only her eyes, that would have been fine, but exhaust and mud and the crowd’s sweaty enthusiasm hung heavy in the air, congesting her nose and clogging her lungs; she resented that it interfered with her experience of the pie. Its rich citrus viscosity was similarly condensed, on her tongue, but far more pleasurable... but wait, she thought, thickness... a dictionary-page memory... “fr. L in- + spissus slow, dense”: “Inspissate!” she exclaimed.

Pete and Ida both said “What?” and Myka looked up from her plate, ready to explain about “insp” and areas—but her neon pony caught her eye at just the right, or wrong, instant for her to witness its driver’s failure to recognize a danger for what it was: it received in that moment a dramatic T-boning from a seemingly unthreatening even-more-compact car. She yelped and upended her plate, which landed face down on the aluminum at her feet. It had held one last bit of inspissated key lime and... whatever else it was combined with, a last bit that she’d told herself she wanted to savor, but that she’d in all honesty been about to shovel into her mouth with abandon. She made a decision that was really no decision: she lifted the plate, scraped the spattered filling up with her fork, and willed herself not to think about dirt.

“Not one word,” she said, her mouth again full, to Pete and Helena. “Not one word out of either of you.”

Neither said anything. Myka chose to ignore their thunderstruck expressions, because she still had that precious morsel of pie in her mouth.

“Good choices,” Myka told them once she’d swallowed. She licked her fork. She took note of Helena’s expression as it shifted from shock to avid appreciation of her licking her fork.

TBC

Again, minimal tags, but here, an essay might mention things like strongly held beliefs, and how our strongly held beliefs shape our behavior, and why we so strongly hold the beliefs that shape our behavior, and that it is indeed interesting when a shift in belief (about anything: from sugar’s nutritional value to who we actually are) leads us to engage in behaviors that make us strangers to ourselves—regardless of whether we know of that estrangement at the time it’s occurring. When you think about it, in terms of selfhood, each of us might be said to be a cult with exactly one member. (I realize that doesn’t entirely hold up, but I’ve spent a little while thinking about it.)

#bering and wells #Warehouse 13 #fanfic #Mercury #part 11

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wildname · 5 years

Text

The Coward's Son

(Below the cut is a bit of backstory for Thalin in Elder Scrolls. It was high on my priority for this to help me figure out how exactly he was outlawed and maybe a bit of motivation. Longest writing I’ve done in a while too.)

Fresh snowfall crunched beneath leather boots as Thalin wandered through the Eastmarch woods. He rose earlier than his company, the somewhat strange woman, Blair, and her young companion, Sven. Bother barely stirred as he first woke up and he didn't intend on bothering either if they wished to sleep. So he wondered out a ways, being sure to keep the smoke from the campfire within sight.

It wasn't incredibly long after they had escaped the pair of vampires that Thalin found his stashed weapons. By Shor, he was thankful for that. A bearded axe and a wide sword rested on his hip. Both were dearer to Thalin than his own life. Smiling softly, he ran his thumb against the top of the axes cold steel.

--------

Thalin was young, a messy top of brown hair covered his head. He sat on a lone stump beside his family homestead. He chucked rocks at nearby chickens, eagerly hoping against all odds they were bread or seeds instead of another rock.

Dirt and bruising covered his cheeks, broken by lines were tears had trailed down. Now and again he sniffed another wave away. Cursing, he threw a stone into one bird's side, sending the whole flock into a panic.

"Thalin!" a voice shouted, and a hand grabbed the boy's wrist. Young Thalin looked up and met the steely blue of his father's eyes. Aslin Wildname wasn't an imposing man. He was tall, yes, but lean to the point of lanky, long light brown hair framing his face, and skin unmarred by scar nor dirt. He would've been handsome if he were a Breton. "By Shor boy, what are you doing?"

Thalin grit his teeth and pulled his wrist free, hoping off the stump to stand. "The other boys are calling me a coward..." He shot his eyes downward, not wanting to look at his father. They always said awful things about Aslin, not just the children but adults too. At least with the boys he could do something. He rubbed his stinging knuckles softly before looking up. "I'm not." He said sternly.

Aslin's face softened and he sighed. "I know, Cub. But getting into fights doesn't prove it. A wise man knows when to draw a blade and when to sheath it." The man smiled and tilted his head to the boy. "You understand?"

He sat quietly as he mulled over things. "But... What if I need to fight?"

Aslin opened his mouth to speak but was cut off by a booming voice behind both of them. "Then you fight with all your heart until they lay bloody or you do." Thalin stared up at the massive frame of his grandfather, Aslmir Wildname. The man was a head above his already tall son, Aslin. Broad shoulders made broader by a coat of pelts and armor, split evenly by a thick and dark beard. Aslmir only recently started showing signs of his age, lines marking his face and the edges of that beard fraying to soft grey. "Now what's this commotion? Who's picking fights with our kin?"

Aslin sighed and stood. "Father. It's just a scuffle between boys. No one's 'defiling our honor' or whatever you think it is." He set his hands upon his hips and scowled, "I'm handling it."

The larger man stroked his beard and grumbled, sizing things up. His eyes were pale and distant, Thalin knew sometimes he would wander from his own mind. "Bah!" he screamed. "The only one defiling our honor is you! Milk-drinking shite like you!" He rested a humongous hand on Aslin's shoulder, causing the smaller man to flinch. "Like that! Bah... Thalin!"

The boy stiffened and looked up, "Y-yes?"

"Do any of these boys have knives?"

"Y-yes... Why?"

A laugh like thunder rolled from the old man's chest. "Chicken-shit troll-fuckers the lot of them!"

"Father!" Aslin hissed. He never swore around Thalin if he could help it.

"Gah. Suck a giant's cock. The boy needs to be more of a man than you ended up. And I will be the one to do it." Aslmir wandered over behind the house, limping as he always had. Thalin never asked about that story. His father warned him that it wasn't one his grandfather was keen on sharing, as wondrous as that was alone. Moments later, the giant lumbered back, arms behind his back. "Tell me boy, what are we?"

Thalin blinked and looked about the yard. "Woodsmen?"

"By trade, yes. But what did I always tell you our name meant? Wildname?"

The boy's brows furrowed as he trailed through dozens of different stories the old man told him. "We... Are blood of the wild. Our real name is only pronounced by bird and beast. Shor wrote it down so only the worthy dead could see it in Sovengard."

The beared parted into a gnarled and rather untoothy smile. "Sharp as ever! Like this," He pulled his hands forward and shown an axe to the boy. Nearly half his height, a curved handle for working, and a beared head with a spike towards the opposite end. Crucible steel caught the light beautifully, and Thalin stared in awe.

Aslin was less impressed, glaring at the old man intently. "He's a boy. He can't go around swinging an axe!"

"Of course he can! I was swinging axes twice as big at his age!" Not calming his son, the old man sighed. "Fine. Boy! I hear one word of you cracking some little shit's head open, your's will be next! Got that!?" He bent down and growled at Thalin.

The boy nodded, holding the tool close. He dared not let it slip from his grasp now, especially to have it taken away.

"Good lad." Aslmir smiled and ruffed up his grandson's hair. "Now, put that thing to work and get some firewood for the hall."

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

The clearing he wandered into was perfect, he thought. Rounded and clear of any low brush. Should anyone try to press closer to the man, they’d be known by him. Unless they chose spell or arrow, of course. Thalin scoffed at the caveat, cowards used such tactics. A real warrior met his foes face first, testing their metal through honest combat.

His face frowned. How often did he truly get a chance at good old fashioned honest combat? His eyes shifted to the whip on his side, a trophy of his escape from the cultists who tried to capture him and nearly succeeded. “Because I didn’t fight fair...”

The outlaw uncoiled the strip of leather, letting the cord fall into the fresh snow underfoot. The weight was fine, his grip was true. He just never had a chance to use the damned thing. Looking across the clearing, he sneered. A dead and hollowed out tree stood opposite of him, nearly the perfect length of his newest weapon.

Thalin widened his stance, drawing his arm back and made a quick jerking motion backwards. The tip of the leather tool snapped up, catching the man in the cheek. “Fucker!” He cursed at the object in frustration, feeling a warm rush down his cheek. No edge nor point, yet it could still draw blood. Thalin huffed an angry breath as he whirled the cord around once more, feeling a tug and hearing a quick snap as his arm made the motions. He finished about six circuits before feeling satisfied. Blue eyes set on the dead wood ahead of him. Now was his chance to try it out.

The nord shifted his footing and set his right foot forward, throwing his arm as though he were throwing a ball or spear. He could never have passed for a mage or scholar, but he was a sharp wit in other ways. His actions mimicked the redguard who had previously owned this weapon, feeling the weight and movement be carried forward until there was a louder crack. The sudden jolt of energy and sound caused him to blink. And thankful for that he was, as a shower of splinters filled the air.

Thalin opened his eyes to spy a corner of the tree, shattered and missing. Dozens of little splinters dotted the snow, creating a messy pattern of brown against the stark white. His heart was pumping now. It wasn’t the same as hitting an axe or sword against wood or maybe a straw dummy. This had weight to it. This had feedback. This could hurt him back.

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

Copper and metallic taste filled the boy’s mouth. His palms and knees stung as they met the cold stone of the bridge. Thalin was in his teens, a tall boy with long braids running through his brown hair. He would’ve been a pretty sight, save for his bleeding nose and lip, and the bruising across his cheeks. “Piss off, Uthigg!” He shouted.

A small group of other boys were surrounding the downed lad, sneering and jeering at him as they hassled each other on. A large set boy in dirty clothes and a shaved head wiped his knuckles. “Make me, whore-son!”

Thalin grit his red stained teeth, pushing himself to his feet. He looked up and found another fist to his face, ears ringing as he fell to the ground. He snorted out a clot of fresh blood.

How many times? He wondered. How many times were these shits going to keep this up? Every week for nearly a year now, Uthigg and his little band of shitheads came to the bridge Thalin needed to cross, hurling insults and whatever else they felt like at the time. One time it was cow shit. Another time it was ice chunks. This time, however, Uthigg wanted to be personal about it.

“It’s not my fault your Da fell!” Thalin shouted, the sting of tears threatening to spill, but thankfully one eye was too swollen to let any out.

“No! It’s your chicken-shit Da’s!” the other boy nearly screamed back. His face was rounded, growing red in his rage. Thalin always called him ‘Berry Pie’ in his head, never aloud. “He left him on that mountain to die! Like the fucking coward he is!”

Thalin spit out a wad of blood and saliva, wondering if he lost a tooth in that. “Still not my fault...” he stated. “He knew the mountain wasn’t safe, but he still went. Pig headed like you are, huh?” He grinned up at the reddened boy. He did have a pig nose too, didn’t he?

His retort was met with a growl and heel to the jaw. “Fucking Wildnames! Cowards and shit! All of you!” The large boy squatted down, pulling the dazed Thalin up by his collar. “Wake the fuck up! You don’t get off that easy!” Thalin’s good eye fluttered open, squinting back. “Your freak of a grandfather is the worst of you all! Always going on about his ‘adventures’ and troll-shit! He left my Granda for dead in a crypt too! Took all the glory for himself!”

Thalin’s brow furrowed silently. He remembered that story. Aslmir had cleared out a barrow of wandering dead with Uthigg’s grandfather. The other man was trying to raid the tomb of treasure but Aslmir wasn’t going to disturb the honored dead. Uthigg was lying. His grandfather got himself killed in those crypts. “Leave... my granda out of this... Berry Pie...”

The boy grew redder than Thalin had ever seen him. He was scowling at his little band, all snickering and pointing at the large boy. He ground his teeth audibly and raised a fist up towards Thalin, readying to strike again.

Thalin winced as he readied himself for another blow, wondering if this one would knock him out finally. Then he felt a rumble. Not powerful enough to be thunder or a horse, but just subtle enough to not be the river beneath them. A lumbering frame stood behind the boys, Aslmir. The massive mountain of man watched Thalin. Judgment painted his face and for the first time in his life, he saw disappointment in his grandfather’s face. Not towards Aslin, but towards Thalin.

Thalin’s eyes began to water, his breathing hitched and he started to pant, his hands balled into fists, and his heart pounded. Uthigg grunted as his fist met Thalin’s hand. And he squealed as his own jaw was met with Wildname’s fist. Thalin kicked the larger boy off, pushing him over to slam his fist over and over into that pig nose. He wasn’t a coward like they say Aslin is. He wasn’t a cheat they all thought Aslmir was. He was Thalin Wildname, and he was finished being the coward’s son.

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

His eyes felt hot. There was no reason for it in the cold winds of Skyrim. But here he was, letting the leather cord fly after every few circles of his recoil. Shards of wood still lingered in the air as they were snapped again by the whip’s course. But Thalin didn’t see his handy work.

He cursed a dozen different names every time he snapped that whip. Each one someone who wronged or looked down on him. The standing log was soon nothing more than a stump.

His whip cracked again, annihilating half of the wood in a single blow. These were weapons of elegance and patience. But the right hand could brute force his way in to turning them into a different kind of dangerous. He spat out a name as the last splinters fell of this blow, “Aslin.” His own father was the source of all his grief and torture. It wasn’t just childhood bullies. Adults would snicker curses and taunts at the boy as he passed them on the road. Or would spill filth on his new clothing and laugh as he just sniffled and fought tears in confusion. “Coward’s son, Aslin’s pup, another Wildname runt,” All things Thalin had heard directed towards him.

The outlaw panted in the cold now. His breath was thick and visible in the morning air. The whip’s leather was hot in his hand. Too hot. He cursed aloud as he dropped the leather cord into the drift. Another name came across his mind, earning a growl from the man. Where he stood, he drew the axe from it’s frog. Crucible steel caught the sunlight, mimicking a running river along it’s head. “Uthigg.”

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

He was a man now. Maybe not in the sense of his own homestead and family, but a man in body and mind. He was large, muscular, and handsome if the gossip of girls was anything to believe. But he didn’t listen. Not anymore. Not to anything anyone had to say about him behind his back.

Thalin had made it clear he wouldn’t take such talk and let it go unanswered. Taunts and remarks were often met with a punch to the jaw, or a tackle to the ground.

Aslin’s reputation, by contrast, seemed to only have worsened. Business venture after business venture seemed to end in ruin. Many whispered that the poor man was just cursed. Every hope for a new logging camp was met with disaster. Spriggans haunting a glade, a troll living in a nearby cave, bandit raids, by Shor, even a giant strolled through one such site. And every time, someone died when Aslin fled. It was maddening to Thalin.

He often came to one tavern specifically, just to drink his rage dull. It was one such night were the taunts and remarks were quiet, almost peaceful in a way. Only a shake of a head, or some drunkard’s scoff. Easily ignored or missed entirely, especially with alcohol in hand.

His hand lifted a tankard up to his lips, furrowing his brow to find it empty and his lips growing dry. “Dibella’s tits...” he sighed.

A fresh mug set on the table next to him almost in an instant. It honestly startled him, but not as much as the owner did.

Uthigg smiled down at the seated man, giving a light chuckle at the sudden reaction. “Sorry Thalin. Didn’t know you weren’t with us at the moment. Do you mind if I sit?” Thalin hadn’t seen this man in years. He had wandered with his mother some time ago, hoping to find good work and a new life with the loss of Uthigg’s father. Was it really enough time to change him so much?

“It’s... no issue, Uthigg.”

“Ah, so you do remember me?” He replied with a smile. With the broken nose and short blonde hair, it wasn’t hard for Thalin to remember this man’s face.

“Aye... been some time since I last saw you. And it wasn’t nice.” He stated, brows furrowing up. The very last meeting the two had ended with both head-butting each other almost into a coma each. Thalin only won because the ground was uneven and his head found that pig nose.

The guest took his seat, motioning to a passing barmaid to refill Thalin’s cup. “No, it really wasn’t. But that was years ago, and we were both just stupid kids then, aye? Now we’re men!” He gestured triumphantly, like it was some feat to live past your acne years. “And men need coin, don’t they?”

Thalin rolled his eyes softly as his new drink arrived. He’d need it if this was what he thought it was. “Been living in Elswyer now? I didn’t take you for the merchant type.”

The other man shrugged, conceding to Thalin. “No, not in coin at least. I’m something of a...” He paused, trying to find the right word it seemed, “Broker of power. My benefactor is very generous and wanted me to start passing around the good word, you understand?”

Thalin’s brows stayed in a state of mistrust. He didn’t like it when the merchants from Elswyer tried to sweet talk him out of his coin purse, and he especially didn’t like it when his childhood torturer tried it now too. “Power? What in Oblivion is a man supposed to do with ‘power’ around here?” He gestured widely to the surrounding building and it’s occupants. All farmers and different forms of laborers. Most never seen more than a hundred gold coins, let alone knew they ever had as much.

Uthigg smiled and leaned closer, almost on a queue. “Not ‘what’ in Oblivion. But ‘whom’.” Thalin remained silent in confusion as the man continued, “Your family shown me the path I needed to tread, Thalin. Sovengard doesn’t await men like you and me. No... Not dirt poor men with only our ancestor’s slandered legacy to our names. But do you know where we are awaited?”

Thalin shook his head, sweat building in the palms of his hands. His leg bounced as he listened, growing more and more anxious as he listened. This wasn’t the Uthigg he knew. The pig nosed shit loved to fight, and always boasted about how he would have the closest seat at the table to Shor himself. Idiot. But this?

The blonde man flashed a glint of metal from his sleeve. A dark band with an ornate skull that bore a crown of spikes met Thalin’s gaze. It’s baleful eyes hurt to look at, yet beckoned him to gaze closer. “Coldharbour.”

Thalin’s brows lifted, shock painting his face as he looked up. There wasn’t a familiar fist meeting his gaze, but an extended hand. It didn’t look right. His nails seemed longer, almost like claws. His skin felt paler than it should’ve been, even for a nord. A faint fog rose from his garments. Thalin turned to the common room in panic. Was no one else seeing him? The room was quiet and normal for the day and time. What was going on!?

“Listen to me Thalin.” Uthigg whispered, almost a growl. It was impossibly deep, and resonated in the man’s chest. “All will serve Lord Molag Bal, or they will die.” Black eyes stared into Thalin’s, another beckoning call with them. “You don’t have to be the son of a coward any more.”

The fear that gripped him suddenly stopped. His grip tightened. “What did you say?” The man almost hissed his question.

“You don’t have to be the son of-”

Thalin stood straight up, slapping the hand and the ring it offered to the side. “Say it again! Call me that again, Uthigg! By Shor, I swear-!” Thalin now was cut off by a cowering scream. Chairs toppled and the shuffle of an audience sounded. But Thalin didn’t keep his eyes off the man.

The man, no, the creature in his hands murmured softly, resonating in his mind. “Coward. We offered you everything you could want, and you deny us? Just as weak as Aslin.”

Thalin’s arm tightened around the being’s neck. His free hand loosened the axe from his side. The weapon sung as a scream echoed in his ears.

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

A loud smack echoed throughout the glade. The head of the axe was buried clean through the remaining wood. Little to no resistance from the panting man’s intent. Thalin’s face was drenched in sweat, hands balled into fists as he stared down at the stump.

That tree was originally taller than he was, or what he found was. Now it was a split stump, surrounded by woodchips. “I hope your master has your soul, Uthigg. Damn yourself like you did me...” Thalin sighed heavily as he dug his weapon free. “At least I have a chance now.”

He looked back down the path he came, hearing the bark of a young canine and catching the smell of cooking meats. It seems Blair had awoken in his memories. She’d ask questions, surely. What would he tell her? She knew he was wanted in Falkreath hold but...

“Training.” he said flatly. “I was... training.” He looked down at the whip in the snow and nodded. Half truths were better than no truths he figured.

( @blairstormheart for mentions.)

#thalin wildname #nord thalin #the elder scolls online #personal writing #the outlaw #blair stormheart #backstory #holy shit this took a minute

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starlightsoulwriting · 6 years

Text

Chaos Theory - Chapter Three

A/N: a.skdjfg;.ewukojhdP:SLK iM SCREAMING YOU GUYS

I'm just really excited about this story and pacing myself is really difficult when I have more than one chapter ready but like I know I need to do that in order to keep consistent updates. I'm also trying to get a job so like wish me luck with that! Let me know what you think! Am I being too cryptic? too obvious? too slow? I need some help lol.

Masterlist

Crossposted on AO3

Chapter Three: Sphinx

11:23 PM

Liana didn’t have to wait long before she was able to see the advancing swarm of androids from over a mile straight down the street, white ants getting ever closer. By the time they would reach the entrance of Recall Center 5, every human would have long since cleared out of the area, prompted to leave by the news and emergency alerts. The block was already nearly deserted, but now even the national guard and SWAT had to clear out. She would be free to move without Perkins fucking things up (again). She stood from her crouch behind the concrete rails and grabbed her things before launching down the fire escape, the cold metal burning even through her fleece-lined gloves.

The National Gaurd had already cleared away all the bodies, leaving the street blue and her soul hollow, knowing her friends had been thrown away like common trash. Stupid Perkins, stupid president. Ruined everything. Her fist curled, nails sharp enough to feel through the leather and heat bloomed in her chest, her brows furrowing. She grit her teeth, before closing her eyes and collecting herself.

Breathe in… Hold… Breathe out…

Focus.

There’s no use dwelling on what’s already done.

Opening her eyes, she then moved to lean against one of the buildings, rummaging around in her bag, wading through the brick-a-brack in search of what she needed. It’s showtime. She just hoped her words of advice to Connor had confused him enough so he would believe her - or at least build some trust. There was no way this would work if he refused to listen. At least he was a deviant now.

A shudder ran up her spine as memories flashed at the thought of Connor’s less than pleasant machine personality. Liana could still feel the echo of mechanical hands tighten around her throat. Fuck. She smashed her balled fist against the brick behind her.

Deep Breath. Refocus.

You’re safe.

She resumed her search, heartbeat more erratic than it was just a minute ago. She finally found what she was looking for in her bag, though, and she was thankful for the distraction. She pulled out two items from her canvas duffel, a smile tugging at her lips despite the swell of nerves and anger in her stomach. Months of work and it all came down to this next few minutes. She was in the home stretch. - if this worked.

If one looked at the two items in her possession, they wouldn’t seem like anything special. Of course, that couldn’t be further from the truth. Underneath, there was previously unheard of technology hiding. They were designed in every way to blend in, just like her duffel bag was. The silver “watch” in her hand had taken considerably more time to perfect than the canvas sack, however - cramming all the same components into a much smaller package was an obstacle befitting a Genius Grant Laureate such as herself. And she had done it, eventually, after months of chugging unhealthy amounts of coffee.

Her colleagues would be so impressed when she finally got the chance to show it off.

The other object was more discreet - a thin, clear, silicone disc about the size of a dime. If looked at closely, thousands and thousands of tiny circuits could be seen, capable of holding several petabytes of code. The code had been the hard part, actually - the memory disc was a standard piece of equipment for Android Techs looking to temporarily add new code to their charge. All they had to do was press it on the androids temple, opposite their LED, and it would be integrated into their systems.

The hard part of Liana’s job had not only been finding the RK800 model’s base codes, but also working with her software team to actually make a dependable subroutine. The AI techs at Cyberlife did not make her life easy, and while that was their job, Liana couldn’t help but hold a grudge against the coding team for making her take longer than she should’ve.

Although, time-wise, the only thing at stake was Liana’s ever-thinning sanity.

All she needed to do now was to get Connor to wear them and then the rest would follow.

The truth is self-evident, if one is able to remember it.

Connor saw her waiting long before they were in speaking distance. The warehouse androids got there first, swarming the street around Liana, pulling down the barriers of the Recall Center and setting their brethren free. The sound of crunching metal was music to her ears. She leaned back on the brick, trying to appear as casual and non-threatening as possible.

Connor, however, had other ideas, and stalked towards her, head down, eyes dark and fists loosely clenched at his side. Boy was he pissed.

He was always unhappy to see her after Markus died.

“Where are the others? What happened?” He was using his interrogation voice, deliberately standing too close, looming over her smaller frame to intimidate an answer out of her. So much for that whole trusting her thing Liana was hoping for. She took a deep breath, trying to remind herself that this was Connor, and she gently pushed him away with one hand. While he was displeased, he took the hint and withdrew slightly, thank fuck. He made her nervous when he was like that. Her lungs burned again with bad memories.

She rung her hands together and steeled her nerves. “Perkins shot them. I was keeping watch on the roof,” She couldn’t meet his eyes, the intensity in his stare too much for her right then. “Even with warning, there were too many soldiers for them. Josh told me to stay put even if something went wrong. Figured if they were dying I shouldn’t go with them.” Josh was unnerved by the thought of someone dying for a cause not their own, even if they were willing. Plus, she really disliked being shot, so she didn’t exactly insist. Besides, the mission was more important than Jericho at this point, unfortunately.

Connor wasn’t any happier with her, but he understood the logic all too well, and knowing Markus and Josh, it was as likely an explanation as any.

“And how did you know what would happen at Cyberlife tower? How do I know you’re not working for them?”

Liana barked out a very inappropriate laugh despite herself. “‘Cus they fucking shot me!” She shook her head, sighing. “More than once, actually.” She looked back at Connor, guessing correctly that he would be wearing a bewildered expression. “They kinda suck.” Liana shrugged at her understatement. “Although, I have found out a thing or two in my campaign against the evil corporate overlords.” She held up the Silicon coding chip. “For one thing, I know that the Amanda program still has a direct link to your head, and since they know you’re working against them, they are going to try to hack you.” She looked him dead in the (very nice looking) eyes just so he would understand how serious she was - how much hinged on him believing her. He was wary enough of the company that she hoped he would believe her. “Now, you could take the chance to find Kamski’s emergency exit from the Zen Garden Program, or you can take this.”

She took his hand in hers and placed the chip in his palm. “It deactivates the Amanda AI, so even if Cyberlife tries to make a connection it won't go through. You don’t have to trust me on this but…” she looked at her watch. 11:29 PM. “You have three minutes until they try to take over your program and assume control of the android rebellion. You can comb through that program in less than a few seconds to see if I’m telling the truth.”

Connor’s LED went solid yellow for a few seconds, his expression blank and eyes glazing over as he processed the information. When he finished, it flashed red for a moment, before returning to a calming, stable blue. He pressed the code to his temple, letting it deactivate the proper AI subroutines. Liana smiled. Step One: complete. His gaze was focused as he searched her face, confused. “How… do you know all this, Lieutenant?”

Aw, the poor thing was used to knowing everything. She crossed her arms and leaned back on the wall, head resting on the brick so she could look at him properly. “You should just call me Liana. Hank and I won't know which one of us you're talking to if you call us both ‘Lieutenant’ all the time,” she gave a soft laugh. Connor was so formal all the time. “but as for me knowing things I shouldn’t? You should be able to figure that out on your own in a few hours, actually. If I told you right now there’s no way in hell you’d believe me, babe.” His LED blipped red again, but Liana wasn’t sure if it was because of confusion or being called ‘babe’ - from her experience, though, it was probably the pet name.

“You said the same thing at the church - that I wouldn’t believe the truth. I assure you, I’m running very low on explanations for how you know all this. I would be glad for any reasoning, however absurd.”

His expression had been steadily softening throughout the conversation until it reached the familiar puppy-dog look that Liana had sorely missed. It had been a while since she’s seen it in earnest. A bloom of warmth spread through her chest and she held back a smile, wary of confusing the poor android further. “Nah, Con, you’ll see for yourself what’s up. Meet me at the café down the block from the station. 9 o’clock on the morning of November 6th, alright? I’ll explain everything to you then.”

Connor’s LED flickered between red and yellow, and he shook his head. “That’s an entire year away, Lieu- Liana.” She just smiled at the use of her name, ignoring his protest, and presented Connor with the silver watch from her bag. Initiate step two.

“Congratulations on saving the day, Connor. I know you don’t need this to tell time, but I want you to have it. As thanks for putting the Cyberlife suits in their place.”

Connor stared at the gift, yellow blinking LED punctuating the ever-increasing silence between them. But slowly, he reached his hand out and took the watch, clipping it carefully around his left wrist. “Thank you. I’ve never received a gift before.” His voice was soft and Liana had to hold herself back again from hugging him. It was almost too much for her heart to handle.

Breathe in.

Breath out.

Focus.

She smiled gently, finishing the conversation. “I’m glad to give it, Con,” She turned her attention to the androids milling about around them and let out a chuckle. “You should probably talk to them, though, too.” He held her gaze for a moment longer, and turned away.

Suddenly, the spell over the two was broken, and Connor was back among the sea of robots around them. Step Two: complete.

As she watched him take the stage and begin his speech to the mass of machines, the clock turned over.

11:36 PM

and then they were both gone

Tags: @rk800downloading

#dbh #detroit become human #dbh connor #dbh oc #detroit become human connor #chaos theory #dbh connorxOC #oc #connor #chaptered #drama #sci-fi

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jcionlittle · 4 years

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thesecretfandom · 7 years

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At First Light: One Year Ago (Prologue)

A/N: I’m very excited to announce At First Light, my Riverdale/Until Dawn AU fic! This has been a huge project for me, challenging and fun. There are a few things you should know before you begin reading. At the end of each chapter you will have a choice (In the form of two options that will link you to the next chapter). Each choice you make will affect the events of the story, so be careful. Also, I will warn you that this is based on a horror game, so I tried to make it as scary as possible. If that’s not your cup of tea, read at your own risk. Otherwise, enjoy!

Word Count: ~30,000 for entire fic.

Rated: M

Warnings: Horror Themes, Major Character Death

Summary: One year ago a group of friends gathered together at the family lodge on Mount Blossom. When one friend, and brother, goes missing on their night of fun, their lives are changed forever. Now, a year later, the remaining eight friends have gathered again to celebrate the life of their friend, until all hell breaks loose. It’s up to you to decide. Who will survive Until Dawn? Choose wisely.

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

“Gather ‘round ladies and gents!” Cheryl Blossom announced theatrically. She made up one half of the twins hosting the party at the lodge on top of Mount Blossom, formerly Thornhill Mountain. The girl with the bright red hair stood in front of the massive fireplace in main living space of her family’s extravagant lodge. Next to her stood her brother, Jason. They were as identical as two twins of opposite gender could be. Skin as white as the snow that fell all over the mountain that cold January night, their hair the same hue of red, almost unrealistically vibrant.

“We’ve invited you all here this weekend to celebrate friendship in a world of fantasy!”

Jason threw an arm around his sister. While Cheryl was loud and exuberant, Jason was a bit more quiet and laid back. They balanced each other out.

“What Cheryl means to say… alcohol is in the kitchen. We have beer, wine, tequila, whiskey, and vodka, as well as various mixers. Food. We have chips, popcorn, trail mix, and whatever else you can find in the cupboards. Nothing is off limits tonight, just don’t jump into the fire or hurt yourself in anyway.” Jason glanced around at the other seven people gathered around him. Josie and Archie cuddled in a recliner, Reggie had already cracked open a beer in the kitchen, Veronica perched on the back of the couch where Kevin sat awkwardly between Jughead and Betty, who kept throwing secretive glances at each other behind Kevin’s back. It was really a ragtag group of friends. Each with such a unique personality that even Jason didn’t understand how they’d all become best friends. “So, no rules tonight. Have fun!”

Cheryl stepped forward, regaining the spotlight. “Speaking of fun… we’re going to be playing truth or dare! And this isn’t some middle school game we’re playing. If your truths or dares aren’t rated at least PG-13, I will give you one rated R.” Cheryl stuck her hands defiantly on her hips. “No arguing, hostess rules.”

The wind howled and the creaky old windows rattled. A loud crash exploded from the kitchen.

“Sorry, dude.” Reggie was standing in small puddle surrounded by shards of glass. “The wind just kind of freaks me out.”

“Jesus, Reg.” Jason sighed. He left his spot in front of the fireplace to walk into the smaller, but no less extravagant kitchen. “The night has yet to begin and you’re already destroying my property.” He joked.

The night proceeded just as any other party made up of nine high school seniors may be expected.

“Jughead, you haven’t had a turn yet.” Archie slurred.

“Ah yes, Jughead. Truth… or Dare?” Cheryl crooned.

“Do I seriously have to participate in this stupid game?” Jughead was as sober as it gets. After dealing with an alcoholic father for most of his life, there was no amount of peer pressure that would get him to take even a sip of the beer Archie had forced into his hand.

“If you don’t choose, I’ll choose for you.” Cheryl replied with a smirk. “Choose wisely. Don’t worry, I’ll go easy on you, just this once.”

“Fine, give me a dare.” Jughead shifted on the lumpy couch. The Blossom’s had really let the place go in recent years. He remembers when they were kids coming up here every weekend in the summer, bunk beds set up in two of the many bedrooms the lodge boasted. Cheryl and Jason’s parents had stopped their regular trips to the mountain, so now the one time of year this mountain was inhabited was when these nine teenagers gathered here each January for a weekend of skiing, drinking, and for some of them… sex.

“That’s my kind of answer.” The room was silent. Everyone in the room waiting for Jughead’s sentencing. Not once had he ever participated in one of Cheryl’s games, so something must’ve made tonight different. “I’ve got the perfect dare for you. Jughead Jones, I dare you to…kiss Betty Cooper on the lips.”

Betty’s cheeks turned a shade of bright pink, while Jughead’s eyes widened to twice their usual size.

“Go on.” Cheryl crossed her arms over her chest. “Pucker up.”

Jughead glanced at Betty, Kevin still sitting between them. “Do you mind?” He said to the boy sitting in his way.

Kevin hopped out of his seat so quickly, it was as if his pants were on fire. He immediately took a seat next to Veronica, though he stared blatantly at Betty and Jughead as the black haired boy leaned closer to Betty.

“It’s just a stupid game.” Jughead whispered. Betty nodded slightly and Jughead placed his lips on hers for a split second before pulling away. Betty’s cheeks had already turned a brighter shade of pink.

“What did I say?” Cheryl said. “PG-13 at the least. That kiss wasn’t even good enough for a Disney princess. Try again.”

Jughead glared at Cheryl and wondered yet again why he’d allowed himself to be dragged into this game. Cheryl fixed him with an equally as intimidating stare, tapping her foot impatiently. Jughead glanced around the room with the hope that someone would talk her out of this so he could go back to hiding in a corner like he was used to. All of this attention, it just wasn't…

Betty interrupted his thoughts. She suddenly leaned into him, kissing his lips. It was barely more than a peck, but apparently enough to satisfy the Ice Queen Cheryl. She threw up her arms in defeat and finally sat down next to her brother.

“You’re up, JJ.”

Jason cringed at his sister’s nickname for him. Eighteen years old and their childhood nicknames could not be shaken. He took a swig from his beer to drown out the reminders of his childhood. Being a Blossom wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Not that anyone would believe a rich kid like himself had any problems, but Cheryl understood. Maybe that’s why they were so close.

“I’ll take a dare too. But maybe be a little more original this time?”

“I’ve got one for you.” Josie piped up. “I dare you, Jason Blossom, to go out to the guest cabin and back. And you have to bring something back from the cabin so you can prove it.”

“Easy peasy.” Jason set his beer on the coffee table and walked toward the door. He pulled his black, winter coat off of a hook, zipping it tightly and donning the hood. “See you on the other side.” He offered up a military salute before disappearing into the freezing night air.

Jason walked briskly down the well known path to the guest cabin. The wind howled through the trees, blistering cold wind whipping over his cheeks. His feet crunched through the rapidly hardening snow as he struggled against the cold.

A loud crack startled Jason and he stumbled backward as the large oak on his left succumbed to the winter storm and fell with a crash in front of him.

“Shit…” Jason brushed snow off of his pants as he stood. The oak tree was now blocking the entire path. He’d have to climb over if he wanted to complete his quest. In the distance, Jason could hear the crunch crunch crunch of footsteps. “What the fuck, guys?”

He was sure it must be his friends following him into the woods to scare him. The footsteps got louder as they got closer. Jason frantically looked around; no one on the path behind him, no sign of anyone in the woods surrounding him, was that a shadow behind that tree?

“Very funny, guys.” Jason back up until his back hit the trunk of the fallen tree. “This wasn’t part of the dare. Go back to the lodge!” He was shouting against the wind, but he could still distinctly hear the footsteps as someone appeared from behind the tree, and it wasn’t one of his friends.

“What the fu-?” Jason turned, scrambling over the tree trunk. A branch caught his legs and he stumbled. The man was still following him, and Jason ripped himself free. He sprinted as fast as his freezing joints would carry him through the woods.

He left the trail, hoping the congestion of the thick forest would slow down the man chasing him. Sharp branches ripped at his body. He felt a slow trickle of blood drip down his cheek, but he had to keep running. He didn’t even know where he was anymore when he suddenly burst out of the forest and slid to a stop overlooking a steep drop-off. The cliff had to be three stories high, with a spattering of rocks gathered at the bottom.

Jason didn’t know where to go. He couldn’t turn back, or the man might catch him, but he would surely die if he tried climbing down the steep cliffside. He didn’t have time to make a decision because the dark shadow of a man emerged from the woods. He stepped slowly toward the boy quivering on the edge of the cliff. He was holding a gun in his arms, his face covered by a gas mask. The strange man slowly lifted an arm to the boy, but didn’t step any closer. It looked like he was trying to…

A series of loud crashes and screams came from the woods and the man spun on his heel, gun lifted as he shot out a burst of flame that didn’t quite reach the trees. When he spun around the man caught a glimpse of the terrified boy as he slipped and disappeared from view. His screams lasted far too long; the man waiting until he stopped screaming before walking to the cliffside and taking a knee. The boy was nowhere to be seen, but he knew the fall would have broken his body and soon… the snow would erase any sign that he’d ever been here.

—————————————-

“JJ should be back by now, don’t you think?” Cheryl was pacing back and forth, having called off their game of truth or dare when Jason left. “It’s been an hour. He should be back!”

CHOICE

Send Archie and Reggie to look for him.

Wait until the morning.

#riverdale fanfiction #riverdale fanfic #riverdale au #bughead #varchie #afl #at first light #until dawn fic #fanfic #riverdale #fanfiction #butterfly effect

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goldenponcho · 7 years

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Battle for Neverland Chapter 4

First Chapter

Next chapter

"Begorra, missy, but the Cap'n seems happier than a leprechaun with a pot o' gold this ev'nin'."

Smee was now trying the fifth out of the ring of keys he held, jabbing it into the keyhole, wriggling it about, then moving on to the next when it didn't fit.

"Yeah?" Riley leaned against the doorframe, attempting to seem calm despite her fingers rapidly tapping against her folded arms.

"Aye! Th' 'ole crew seems teh be in 'igh spirits as a matter o' fact," he grinned deliriously, child-like eyes beaming, "Mason even offered ta show yeh 'round the crew's sleepin' quarters, 'e did!"

Riley faked a surprised gasp, "Did he?!"

"Oh! Aye!" He missed about five times before finally looking where he was putting key seven, unsuccessful again.

"Which one's Mason?"

"Oh! Eh-eh..." he almost dropped the ring of keys, "The ship carpenter; big, strong feller."

She inhaled a hiss, "...great..."

"Happy as clams, the lot of 'em! ...Oh! Eeeh, cept fer Mullins… He seems a tad restless lately. Don't seem teh wanna put down 'is sword fer nothin', neither."

He cackled, and Riley went bug-eyed for a moment, "Oh..."

"Aye!"

There was then a click as he was at long last successful with key number nine. "Ah! There we be!"

Smee finally pulled the door open, motioning for Riley to enter. She had expected to find a somewhat empty room with nothing more than a small cot if she was lucky. So she was pleasantly surprised to find that it was quite generously stocked. The bed was fairly large, actually, though not quite the size of Hook's, and there was a small chest of drawers. She pursed her lips as she wondered if there might be better options inside than her current one.

There was also a small shelf of books, all as worn as the ones in Hook's cabin, and a single large window that let in the light of the brilliant Neverland sun.

Smee cleared his throat, "Well, then, lass, just yeh go behind the partition there and get into yer petticoat."

She jerked her head back toward him, then back to the pile of clothing cluelessly, "Petticoat..."

Smee adjusted his spectacles, "That there white one, lass."

She shuffled through the bundle a moment, seeing that there was indeed a white garment trapped in the expanse of pink.

"Oh…" she dumped the dress to the floor taking said petticoat and stepping behind the partition. Just another layer to more effectively be baked in the hot sun, she thought as she removed her clothes and pulled the scratchy garment over her head.

"Yeh ready there, then, lassy?"

Riley sighed, "Sure…"

Smee had her fasten the corset around her waist and began tightening. She gasped and immediately regretted it. For such a small man, Smee was strong, and she worried that the laces would snap each time he tugged on them. How they weren't cutting into his fingers, she had no idea.

"There! Heh! I hope that's tight enough..." Smee scratched his head, "Alrighty, then, lass. Let's get that dress on so we can make sure she fits."

Riley turned, arms stiff very much like a Barbie doll. Smee handed her the pink bundle, and she stepped back behind the partition. She held it up by a sleeve poof. In less than an hour, people were going to see her actually wearing this. She picked apart pieces of fabric, looking through the fluff for an opening.

She stuck her head in, only to be trapped in a lacy pocket. She growled in frustration, spreading apart section by section of fabric. 'Do I have to teleport into this thing? What?' Her frustration naturally directed itself at the person responsible for her struggles. 'Damn pirate...'

By some miracle, she at last found her way into the overly-complicated garment and waddled back around the divider.

"Well, I suppose that'll about do it then," Smee stepped outside the door, "Cookson'll tell yeh when the cap'n's ready for yeh," Smee assured, "Goodbye, then, missy."

As Smee left, Riley turned toward the mirror and gave a start. "Yeah…" she glowered, her annoyance at Hook growing nearly to anger, "He's gonna know exactly how much I appreciate this mess."

She looked herself up and down and quietly wondered if she might actually glow in the dark. The poofs at her shoulders were not at all flattering, and the skirt of the dress had to be at least five or six feet in diameter. It was obvious now why she had needed the corset; there was no way she could have fit into this monstrosity without one. The only good thing she could say about it was that that it made her boobs look amazing.

She jumped when without so much as a knock, Cookson entered the small cabin. "Eez dinner time!" he announced then left as quickly as he had appeared.

"Kay, thanks!" she yelled loudly after him. Taking one last look at herself in the mirror, she sighed, ruffling her hair in the hopes it would make her look a bit more like herself, "Thanks ever-so-much..."

Fingers floated across ivory keys, and Hook allowed himself to close his eyes, savoring the music as it overtook his senses. It was rare that he was in such a mood that allowed him to play so flawlessly, especially considering his handicap. A mood this good usually involved the capture of Peter Pan, and that hope was exactly what put him in such high spirits today. The most sure way to lure Pan to his doom had always been with the aid of a hostage. The wretch's annoyingly noble sensibilities required that he rescue any innocent in such dire straits. Even an adult.

And the maid's adulthood is what would make it so easy. After all, only children could fly. All he need do was to keep the girl placated until the right time came. He knew better than to let her in on his plan. Women were mothers by nature, and he doubted that she would go along with the idea of him using her to capture a child, no matter how horrid the boy may be. Nor did he think it wise to act as her captor. He had made the mistake of underestimating women in his younger days, and another escape attempt would only put plans at risk. What he needed was to make her seem like a prisoner to Pan while making her feel secure at the same time. It would be a delicate task, but if there was anything Hook was exceptional at, it was manipulation.

The notes halted at the light but quick knock on the door.

He adjusted his cravat as his long strides brought him quickly to the door, and he cleared his throat before opening it.

The young lady's eyes were wide, almost as if she hadn't expected him to answer, but he took in the ornate gown on her, deciding he was glad to have kept it instead of letting it go to the highest bidder.

"You look positively stunning, my dear," he beamed as he took her hand to gently brush his lips against it

Riley's fists grasped at the fluff of material at her side, "Thanks…"

Hook guided her to a seat at the end of a table that had been moved to the center of the room, pulling it out for her, and she sat. After confirming that she was comfortable, Hook took his own seat at the other end of the table next to where Short Tom sat on his perch.

"Neverberry wine, miss?"

Riley jumped at Smee's question, and Hook pursed his lips to stifle a chuckle. Her eyes shifted from the bottle, to Smee, back to the bottle, and then to Hook for a moment before returning to Smee.

"I think I'll pass this time, thanks."

"Oh… eh w-well" Smee stuttered, glancing nervously from her to Hook, who unsuccessfully attempted to hide a look of contempt. "W-would yeh be preferin' rum, then? Perhaps whiskey?" Smee persisted, sensing his Captain's annoyance that he was not properly satisfying his guest.

Hook muffled a barely audible groan of disdain and noticed Riley sink ever so slightly into her seat.

"No, thanks…"

Smee paused for a moment, again glancing nervously at Hook. "Well?" he growled toward the clueless bosun.

"Eh…" Smee uttered, clearly not understanding what Hook wanted from him, "...Cap'n?"

Both Smee and Riley jumped a good two inches when Hook's hook made contact with the table in front of him, "Go get some WATER ya clapperdudgeon LUMMOX!"

Smee nearly dropped the wine bottle with a yelp, "Aye, aye, sir!" and he disappeared out the door at an extremely impressive speed for someone his age.

"Ya lummox!" Short Tom squawked, "Get some water! Get some water!"

Hook took note of the girl's unease and gave her a gentle grin, "Do excuse my bosun, Madame. He is quite incompetent at the best of times."

"… that's alright…" she replied quietly.

"Was the cabin to your liking?"

"Yeah…" she responded simply, turning to the plate of food in front of her and digging in, "it's nice."

Hook furrowed his brow, puzzling over her short answers but quickly shrugged it off. Probably at a loss for words after her previous plight. She also must have been very hungry to eat any of Cookson's swill as voraciously as she was, so he busied himself with his own food, allowing her to have a few quiet moments to eat.

He looked up at her occasionally, each time to find her full attention still on the meal before her, and he felt the beginnings of wear on his sensitive nerves. Was she simply gorging herself to refrain from speaking with him?

"… ahem…"

She finally acknowledged him with eye contact, though she still chewed a mouthful of potatoes and meat.

"I...take it you enjoy the food?"

The question had clearly alerted her to how quickly she was scarfing it down, and she covered her mouth with a hand and nodded, swallowing quickly, "Yes...thanks..."

The roast was quite dry and the potatoes unpleasantly firm. Her answer was either from hunger, or an attempt at flattery. Hook raised an eyebrow as she bit into a dinner roll with a loud crunch, "First time for everything," he mumbled under his breath.

He shook his head subtly, 'Belay that, Hook... How could you expect a Yank to have the same luxuries as a British noblewoman?'

"I'm happy to see that the dress fits you nicely," Hook continued. "I had hoped I would have a use for it after I acquired it from a French merchant vessel. Does it please you?"

This finally seemed to catch her interest, as she finally relented her silverware. "Erm..." she swallowed, wiping her mouth with her napkin, "...well, about that..."

Hook's brow creased again, and he could sense her discomfort increase.

"Not that I don't appreciate it; it does seem to be an expensive dress, but I'd kinda rather wear my own clothes if that's ok."

Hook cocked his head, "Pardon?" He said this partially for clarification and partially because she had said it so fast, he wasn't sure he had heard her properly.

She bowed her head as she continued, "I mean… I… appreciate what you're trying to do for me, but… I think I'd feel better if I could just, ya know, go casual like everyone else…" She paused, attempting to read his expression, "Actually, I wouldn't mind at all working for my stay here…if you want, I could—"

"Oh, dear girl! You need not feel obligated to repay me for my hospitality," he insisted with a wave of his hand, "I do not do this for something in return, but because it merely pleases me to be of service to a young woman in need of assistance."

"And like I said, I appreciate it. I really really do! But I thought, ya know, maybe if I could help out around here maybe you'd have more time to see about getting me home and out of your hair."

A slight frown creased Hook's features. What sort of woman refused free room and board? Gears turned quickly as he mulled her request over. Having her work could easily ruin what he had planned; and while he would have offered a lady food, shelter, and clothing under any circumstances, the dress, in his mind, cemented her role in his plot in a most crucial way. It's what Pan would expect of a damsel in distress.

"You're asking to be a member of the crew?"

She shrugged, "Well, I mean...not permanently, just-"

"Madam," he began pointedly, "a pirate ship is no place for a lady in the first place. I have already gotten objections to your staying here at all." He placed his napkin on his plate, "As I said before, Miss Blade, you needn't repay me for my hospitality. I am glad to provide you shelter and my protection for as long as you remain in Neverland without compensation."

The girl sighed, "Alright…I understand you mean well, but…I didn't ask for your protection. You captured me, remember?"

Hook only let the insult show in his face for a split second, before hiding it behind a desperately charming smile, "Please, Miss Blade..." he purred, "...do not think that you are being held prisoner here."

"Then you wouldn't mind if I left?"

His face visibly stiffened, "That would be unwise..."

"But I could," she placed an elbow on the table, pointing with her fork, "If I insisted."

He felt the irritation scratching at the corridors of his mind, "Then I would have to insist that you not."

She cocked her head with a knowing look.

"I—" Hook countered, but he didn't finish. Instead, he sighed, begging to the gods for patience he had never been apt at wielding "My dear…Neverland is not a place one would want to get lost in."

"Really?" she said snippily, ignoring Short Tom's screeches of 'get lost', "You seem to have plenty of maps lying around. You couldn't bear parting with one?"

He swallowed a growl, his chair screeching across the floor as he stood abruptly and noted with amusement Riley's flinch.

"Neverland isn't a place that a young woman should be roaming about unaccompanied in," his tone challenged her to argue the point further as he paced to the window, "Perhaps, like those wretched children… you think Neverland to be a whimsical, amusive place." He gazed out the window, hand stroking his hook at the small of his back before looking over his shoulder. "It isn't."

He turned to eye her darkly, "This cursed island is a cruel place, Miss Blade. There are a plethora of plights out there that test even the likes of me."

"Like the crocodile?"

Hook's narrowed eyes darted toward her. Who was this girl? She couldn't possibly know his fear of the Croc. He shook off his initial surprise. She had seen the Croc earlier that day; clearly she referred to it merely as an example than a knowing accusation.

"That would be one instance, yes. This god-forsaken archipelago is a breeding ground for chaos. Numberless horrors await a hapless traveler unfortunate enough to stumble into their midst," he paced to leer ominously above her, "If you wish to return home, traipsing about that island on your own is a sure way to insure it never happens."

The girl fixed him with a calculating look, and Hook cursed himself for not being more prepared for resistance.

"Is the dress to protect me too?"

He cursed this girl and her aptitude for asking questions as well. Under most circumstances, his presence alone intimidated anyone into complying without a word. Anyone but Peter Pan...he realized, and his frayed nerves flared at the thought. "I have a standard to hold to on my ship, Miss. As my temporary ward, you will hold to them as well."

"I don't see anyone else in a dress," she motioned in the direction of the main deck with a flippant wave.

He finally let a low growl escape him freely, "I no longer wish to argue with you, my dear."

She finally stood as well, "Well, I do!" The top of her head barely reached the center of his chest, but she didn't seem to be off-put by it at this point, "It's one hundred plus degrees outside, I can barely breath, my arms look like a couple a' raw leg of lambs, and this damn petticoat is itchy as hell!"

The candlelight reflected red in Hook's forget-me-not eyes, "You have no want for complaints of "hell" yet, girl!" she had no time to flinch away as he grasped her chin to force her eyes to his, "I have been nothing but a gracious host thus far. Don't make me change that; neither of us would like it... Now finish your meal," he let go of her chin, finding joy in the angry and embarrassed flush in her cheeks, "My men have to clean this up before two bells, and I don't intend for them to fall behind."

Hook didn't miss the incense in her eyes as she sat down hard and tore back into the rigid bread. He smirked, "Perhaps while you're here, we can work on your manners as well..." He chuckled silently as he caught the bulgy-cheeked glare she fixed him with before turning away, lightly scolding himself for enjoying her discontent so much. But, Zeus, she was making it difficult for herself.

He couldn't find too much joy in it, however, as he unfortunately hadn't given her as much incentive to cooperate with him as he had intended, and he considered having an extra man on watch tonight. Perhaps he could station one of his dogs on the quarterdeck to keep an eye on her door. Yes, that would surely be sufficient. He didn't want to resort to ropes and chains just yet, and on the bright side, having her a tad discontented would further sell his illusion. She would make fine bait for Pan and his cronies yet.

Both turned their surprise to Smee, as he burst through the door and made quick work of filling Riley's glass with water. As he noticed both sets of eyes so intense upon him, he nearly filled it to overflowing before jerking the pitcher away with a slosh of water onto the table.

"Eh...would everything be alright, Cap'n?"

Hook smiled gently to the man, "Positively delightful, my dear bosun." He turned his eyes back to Miss Blade. "No complaints whatsoever."

#peter pan and the pirates #battle for neverland #peter pan #fanfiction #captain hook

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