#you wouldn’t raid a barren farm for crops

[bubble-you]

read a post about if the doctor was a vampire and got snacks from friends. just a bite. and uhh a little horrified because proportionately they’d probably need like 1L of blood at LEAST to be full. And that’s like 25~30% already. So say a snack. But Rory would apparently draw blood for 11 using a needle, and that’s alright, that’s only 5 ml or 10 ml, at most 20. That’s a reasonable snack, if you were to give that away.

It doesn’t dull the dread of if they were to really drink. That’s your strength. Also… the puncture wound needs to heal. Bruises. Anemia. Drained. Unstoppered.

[sonofkhaz]

Patricide: A Prologue

“You have to go in my place.”

Muroco Grimtotem stood looming over his father, Hrumin. The elder tauren lay upon a bedroll, his face sallow, his fur spiked with sweat and grease. Wracking coughs interfered with his words, and beads of sweat formed on his forehead when he suffered another fit. Hrumin was at a venerable age, a feat that was quite an achievement in the Grimtotem Tribe. In the past season he had grown ill and bedridden. While feebleness was considered a burden among the tribe, the authority of elders was greater, so the tribesmen gave him the respect he deserved.

Muroco, however, felt the exact opposite. He was only fourteen winters old when his mother died from fever. After the event, Hrumin changed from a tough-but-fair father to an abusive parent. Every day, Hrumin would force Muroco into grueling training, berating his son for weakness, mocking him when he failed, threatening to have him ostracized from the tribe if he could not be of use. Muroco’s back was a tangled network of scars he had received from the lashings. The fear of being disowned had once churned in his stomach every day as he tried to be brave in front of his father.

That was a long time ago. Where there was once fear, there was now contempt. Muroco could have easily reached down and snapped Hrumin’s neck like a plainstrider bone. It would have been a quick and painless death in comparison to the years of torment, both physical and psychological, he received from him.

He couldn’t do it, as much as he wanted to. The crime of murder would have him exiled, or even executed. And he was so close; once Hrumin died from old age, Muroco would finally take his place as a leader of Grimtotem Braves, leading his tribesmen into battle against the night elves and the Horde.

“Are you too weak to do it?” asked Muroco.

Despite his ailing state, Hrumin maintained unflinching eye contact with his son until another coughing fit came upon him. He pulled furs closer to his neck, a futile effort to keep the cold away. “Do not get pretentious with me, boy. The Razorwing harpies are encroaching on the encampment. The chieftain wants a message sent, and you will do it.”

“Fine,” Muroco grunted, “I’ll be back by sundown. Try not to die until then.”

Muroco grabbed his hunting bow and one of his halberds before leaving the tent. Plumes of smoke from guttering campfires rose into the crisp autumn sky as other Grimtotems milled about their tasks. Some nodded to him, others ignored him, but there was one tauren standing near the edge of camp who glared at him with absolutely malice.

Okonto. Muroco’s younger brother.

Okonto was younger than Muroco, and physically less impressive by large margins. Disease had stricken Okonto at a young age, atrophying his muscles and making him appear lean by tauren standards. Bright markings and tattoos adorned his arms, signifying his status as a shaman.

A shaman who, all accounts, was incapable of properly calling on spirits and the elements.

Since Okonto was too physically weak to be a Brave, he took on the role of shaman, but the elements did not often come to his call when needed. It was a fault that Muroco frequently mocked his brother for; the Grimtotem Tribe often relied on pillaging and raiding to survive the rugged climates of Kalimdor. If Okonto could not counter the spells of a priestess of the moon, or the magisters of the blood elves, then what good was he? The two brothers despised each other, and they both knew it. Since Muroco was the stronger of the two, Okonto had no choice but to seethe in the shadow of his older brother.

Muroco shook his head at his brother’s uselessness and left camp, following the markings left by other trackers upon the surfaces of rocks and tree trunks. The Razorwing harpies living in the next valley over were moving closer to their camp than the tauren would have liked. Where harpies went, game animals died, and the Grimtotem would have no food for the coming winter. If it came to that, they would be forced to raid the Horde’s farms in the Barrens head-on or hunt animals held sacred by the night elves in Ashenvale, no doubt earning the ire of either faction.

Muroco gripped the haft of his halberd as he traveled. He looked forward to the killing.

--

--

Okonto watched with clenched, trembling fists as his brother ventured into the valley. He was off to another errand for their dear father, no doubt. For years, Hrumin had given more attention to Muroco instead of Okonto, opting to groom the elder brother to be the ideal warrior. Okonto had been largely ignored, categorized as a “failure” as he struggled to gain some semblance of control over the elements.

He hated both of them with a burning passion. Hrumin was a horrible father, and Muroco thought he was better than him. The tribe joined Muroco in mocking him, delegating him to tasks too menial or unworthy for anyone else to do.

No longer. Today was the day he removed two birds with one stone.

--

--

Muroco descended into the valley, the area becoming more forested. As he stalked from bough to bough, he noticed the scratch marks on the trunks. Desiccated corpses and bones lay strewn about the valley floor, the remains of victims who fell to the talons and magic of the harpies. The tauren crouched at the base of a small glade, setting his spear on the ground and setting his quiver. He scanned the horizon, watching for anything. There was no movement, no sound; clear signs that the wildlife in the area had been either exterminated or driven from the valley. An untrained outlander would have presumed that the valley was empty, but Muroco knew better; he only needed to wait.

His patience was rewarded when he saw a black blur soar across the sky. Muroco remained still as he observed the harpy land near her nest. The harpies of the Razorwing tribe built their nests in a similar fashion to an oriole’s; a tightly woven pouch hanging from the underside of a tree branch. A harpy’s nest, however, smelled unbearable, as it often held the rotting remains of a victim as well as the creature’s waste.

Muroco’s quarry landed atop a branch above her nest. Black tattoos adorned her body, and trinkets hung from her wings. From a distance, she looked much like a night elf with wings, her beady eyes unblinking as her head twitched erratically to view her surroundings. Shortly thereafter, another harpy landed near another tree, followed by another, and another. Muroco presumed that they were members of a hunting party searching for another poor fool to prey upon. The tauren stood up, nocked an arrow to his bow, took aim and fired at one of the harpies. The arrow landed with a satisfying thud, knocking one of the screeching hags to the valley floor. Wasting little time, Muroco nocked another arrow and fired at another harpy. He was able to kill several of the creatures before they found his location, screeching to one another in their harsh language as they swooped to attack.

Muroco dropped his bow and snatched up his halberd, wheeling it in a defensive stance as the harpies lunged with their talons. He remained within the grove, using the trees for tactical advantage so the harpies could not attack him from all sides. The harpies squawked and screeched in protest as the warrior’s precise lunges skewered their sisters, one by one. A thunderclap rang out, nearly knocking the tauren to the ground as one of the tribe’s matriarchs launched a bolt of lightning at him. Muroco ducked behind a tree, the blast spraying bark and wood in all directions. Picking himself up, Muroco sprinted from tree to tree, his hooves churning the soil as he took cover from the matriach’s magical onslaught. One bolt of lightning clipped the shoulderplate of his armor, causing the tauren to stumble and drop his weapon. With a cry of triumph, the matriach lunged forward headfirst for the kill with a final incantation. Lighting formed around her wings as she soared, intending to fry Muroco to a crisp on contact with her wings. Rather than attempting to pick up his weapon, Muroco stepped to the side, thrusting his fist to strike at the harpy. His punch connected with the matriarch’s nose, her head swinging back with a hideous crunch as her body dropped to the ground. Muroco retrieved his weapon from the ground, his head on a swivel as he looked for the next enemy.

There were none to be found, the dead silence of the forest a welcoming reprieve from the incessant shrieking of the harpies.

Muroco exhaled and searched among the corpses of the harpies’ fallen victims. He discovered a rusty pike, still clutched by the hands of a troll’s skeleton. Ripping it free, he skewered the matriarch’s body upon it. Once, during a raid on an orc’s farm, he recalled seeing a peculiar man stuffed with straw propped up on a stick in the field, which was supposed to scare away birds from the crops. Hrumin had commanded him to “send a message” to the harpy tribe, and he hoped this would be sufficient enough.

Muroco sat down on the stump of a fallen tree, surveying the carnage wrought. The harpies had nicked him several times, but the wounds weren’t deep enough to gash an artery.

He let out a deep breath. Next time, he wouldn’t fight two dozen harpies and their matriarch alone.

--

--

The sun had set by the time Muroco returned to the Grimtotem encampment. His muscles ached from the battle with the harpies, and the sight of campfires was welcoming. Muroco strode through the camp, making his way to his father’s tent. The inside was unusually dark, so Muroco moved forward to light the lantern Hrumin kept to light the interior.

“Father?” said Muroco, turning around after lighting the lantern. “I finished the…”

Muroco’s eyes widened in shock.

Hrumin lay in his bedroll, his aged face a look of pained horror. One of Muroco’s halberds jutted from his chest like a spire, blood soaking into the furs he used as blankets.

“There he is!” a familiar voice shouted. “I knew you would do this to our father, murderer!”

Muroco spun around, leaving the tent. Okonto pointed at him in accusation, a half dozen tauren behind him in a semi circle with weapons in their fists. “Seize him!”

“Have all of you lost your senses?” asked Muroco. “My spineless brother murdered my father while I was away!”

Okonto sneered. “Everyone here knows that you hated our father with a passion, dear brother.” He spat out the last word with venom. “You merely waited until he was too weak and feeble to attack.”

Two tribesmen with cudgels advanced on Muroco, but the latter was faster. Muroco skewered one on his halberd, ripping it free from the tauren’s chest before slashing the other across the throat. More tribesmen were alerted to the fighting, and Muroco soon found himself outmatched.

In that moment, Muroco was forced to do something he was taught to never do. Every fiber of his being, of his perceived sense of honor, screamed at him not to do it, but the cold, rational part of his mind compelled him.

He fled.

Muroco turned and sprinted away from the camp, dropping his halberd and unsheathing the axe he kept at his belt. He was loathe to drop such a valued weapon, but he needed as much speed as he could get. Muroco slashed at any Grimtotem who got near him, those he had once considered friends and comrades.

In one fateful swoop, all of that had been taken away from him.

--

--

Muroco kept fleeing until morning. The Grimtotems had pursued him for some time, but ultimately gave up when he got near the Horde outpost of Malaka’jin. Muroco found a stream, and spent half an hour scrubbing the Grimtotem war-paint from his body. When he saw his reflection, he looked no different than a tauren from any other tribe, albeit one with black fur. He sat on a rock, his head in his hand as he watched the stream. With no home and no tribe, he was an exile. An enemy to all and friend to none. He had underestimated his brother’s devious nature, and it had cost him everything.

What would he do now?

His brooding thoughts were interrupted by the sounds of creaking wagons. “Hey, bub!” a shrill voice said. “Whaddaya think ya doin’?”

Muroco looked up and saw a goblin in a crisp leather tunic looking at him with beady, blood-shot eyes. A beak-like nose protruded from his wart-covered face, and his large ears looked like they were stretching to get away from his ugly face. Muroco glanced to his right and noticed a Horde caravan a dozen yards away. Kodo beasts pulled the wagon as caravan guards, orcs and trolls wearing padded wool and leather, stood guard around the caravan’s perimeter.

The tauren glanced back at the goblin. He opened his mouth to speak in the Taurahe language, but caught himself. “Resting. Thinking.” he said, his mouth moving awkwardly to form the words in Orcish.

The goblin squinted his eyes at the tauren. “Mmm, right, right.” The goblin smirked as he rubbed his giant nose. “Got anywhere ya gotta be?”

“No.”

“I see. Well then,” the goblin produced a piece of parchment from his back pocket and unfurled it. “Gotta caravan goin’ ta Ratchet from Sun Rock Retreat and one-a my guards got eaten by a chimera. Nasty stuff. Gotta position open ‘ere if ya wanna make some good silver.”

Muroco looked at the contract. He had never been outside of the Stonetalon Mountains. No more than a day ago he would have throttled the goblin’s throat simply for not being a part of the Grimtotem Tribe. But there was a whole world out there, one worth seeing.

And one with a lot of enemies to test his skill against.

“I’ll do it.” said Muroco.

The goblin’s eyes lit up with avarice. “Sounds good, champ!” He pulled a quill from his other pocket and planted it in Muroco’s massive fist. It was clammy from being in such close proximity to the greasy merchant. “Just uh, ya know, sign ya name here, an’ here, an ‘here - oh, don’t forget about here! Also, sign ya last name here…”

Muroco paused. If the caravan found out he was a former Grimtotem, they may kill him on the spot. He looked to the ground and saw a rock next to his hoof.

“Rockhoof.” he said outloud, etching the word crudely on the document.

Muroco stood up and took his place at the back of the caravan. Something had ended, but something new would start.

And he would make sure Okonto paid dearly for his betrayal.

[mythologygirlfanfic]

Phoenix Down: Chapter Two

Summary: Her parents must have really wanted a son if they named their only child - a girl at that - Marco. (OC Reincarnation/Rebirth story) Or

An obsessive gamer girl is reborn and now has to navigate the world of One Piece as a female version of Marco the Phoenix. Shenanigans ensue as she drags everyone around her into her delusions do to the trauma caused by the loss of her precious games. So what if she gives her so called brothers a few heart attacks when she pretends to be dead until one of them yells, if not a little dramatically, “PHOENIX DOWN” with an accompanying eye roll, before ‘reviving’ along the way. That’s just part of the fun. The poor Whitebeard Pirates are in near constant exasperation with their sister’s sure, but that doesn’t mean they love her any less. Now, if only she could convince Ace that MMOs were a real thing.

Rating: T

Hellion.

That is what the old biddies in her village called her at least. Well, everyone in the village called her that, but they were all pretty much old biddies, so fuck them.

(Well, not really ‘cause that would be gross. Marco shivered at the thought.)

Who knew that trying to engage this dreary town in a riveting game of Splatoon would lead to her immediate and irrefutable exile from the only place she knew in a world she knew was much more vast and dangerous than most people could even comprehend.

She regretted nothing .

Nothing except maybe not being able to beam the mayor in the face with a balloon filled with pink paint and glitter. Marco had been stopped by the villagers before she could chuck that particular balloon, one of the bastard having snuck up behind her and tackling her to the ground before others jumped on her as well in some sort of impromptu dog pile. It had caused the young woman to be the one to get a face full of the mixture instead of her intended target. It had been a bittersweet defeat.

Now, here the pale blonde stood, not even a full day after what the fiasco the villagers irritably had started calling the ‘Day of Reckoning’ under their breaths, loading the little dinghy her parents scrounged up for her. She was so sure that Original Marco had lived a childhood of bloody strife. Her she was though, getting the boot from her home for simply throwing one too many paint balloons.

True, it had technically not been her first offense. Also true, that it hadn’t really been the worst thing she had done either, but for the people of her home island, it had been the last straw. Marco was pretty sure it was just because the sticks they all had shoved up their asses, that they were all just allergic to fun. The kids of the village could at least appreciate her genius, some having even thrown a mini protest over their favorite playmate’s severe and unjust punishment. Well, until they were threatened with dish duty. That had gotten Marco’s followers to disperse rather quickly. The little traitors.

(She carefully did not look into Mom 2.0’s tearful eyes and decidedly ignored the fact that Papa 2.0’s own looked even more droopy than before, like a basset hound whose favorite bone was being taken away. Marco even ignored the small pain in her chest when she thought of leaving them, that she would miss them.)

The farming life hadn’t been for her anyway. Her boobs made her back ache after all and the physical labor of tilling the land just didn’t justify that pain. Honestly, why did nearly all the girls who spent more than five minutes with Luffy have to have huge tits? (And the original Marco had, they had fought a war together. Screw the fact Original Marco had been a male.) Sure, they weren't as large as say Nami or Robin’s, but they were still annoying as fuck.

She was looking for a quest to complete anyway.

Quest objective: find Whitebeard and join his crew.

This quest sucked. It sucked balls. Hard .

She had been randomly sailing around the seas of North Blue for months. Months . And the teenager couldn’t even say it hadn’t truly been random sailing as she was in no way a navigator. She had slapped herself multiple times for not studying maps, but she hadn’t been planning to set out to sea by herself either. Honestly, Marco had thought Whitebeard and his band of jolly sons, more akin to a massive raid party, would be the ones to find her. You know, at home. On the island she had been born on.

Marco once again cursed the mayor and the citizen of Uptightville. She would have preferred they all would have left themselves, like all the potential critter friends she ignored in Animal Crossing , then have had them figure out the best way to get rid of a shitty neighbor was just to exile them from the town. (She briefly found herself lamenting who her virtual town had more than likely gone completely barren by now, before the thought become to unbearable and she had to shake it off. Sort of like the one Taylor Swift song.)

It hadn’t been all bad. If Marco ignored the fact she had almost starved, dehydrated, gotten nearly eaten by various sea monsters, and other things that had caused some minor bodily harm, the young woman could think of a few things to be grateful for. She finally got to update her appearance!

On the first island she had unceremoniously crashed into (Seriously, she didn’t mean to fall asleep! The sailing had been so boring to the point she had started talking to her own reflection on the water’s surface.), she found herself chopping off most her long, blonde hair. She had cropped it into a sort of mohawk, with the sides of her head shaved and a strip of slightly longer locks remaining on top. Of course, she only did this when she was certain Mom 2.0 didn’t have some sort of radar that would let the older woman know what her daughter was doing. Marco liked her limbs where they were and she wouldn’t put it past the lady to somehow find her due to some sort of messed up need for vengeance.

She had also acquired (Maybe, sort of stole) some new clothes. Nothing against what she had been wearing, the overalls were as comfortable as hell, they just weren’t exactly the best clothes to be traveling the wide up sea in. Marco now proudly donned a light blue corset and with blue shorts that rode maybe a little too low. The young woman had decided to forgo shoes, more so because she had been chased from the store before she could grab a pair. And, hey, this outfit was probably even less practicable than overalls, but if she was going to be a pirate, a pirate in the World of One Piece at that, she was going to looks bad fucking ass while doing.  

She was 18 and partly delirious when she found him. Found the man that had been Original Marco’s Oyaji. The man that would be her Oyaji too. Or at least, she hoped he would as she pulled alongside the massive, whale shaped ship. She was a little surprised that the Moby Dick had already been made and set sail, for whatever reason she was sure Edward Newgate would have had another ship, at least up until Gol D. Roger’s execution. She was happy to see it though. The large whale always looked so happy in the series and it looked even more so in person. If a just a tiny weensy bit intimidating. That and it also brought on the age old question of why it was blue? Had the gigantic man never read the novel? Did the novel even exist here? Wait, she had never read the novel, so this was a moot point.

Marco didn’t waste anytime.

“Make me your kid-yoi!” Her load exclamation caught everyone’s attention as they stared down from the large whale shaped boat at her little dinghy. It had certainly caught Captain Whitebeard’s as she could almost feel the older man’s gaze piercing through her. He was younger, his hair not completely white and his mustache just a tad less magnificent. It was like Mario and Dr. Robotnik’s facial hair had a baby. How much time did the man spend styling it?

“Eh? What was that brat? I didn’t hear you.” Edward Newgate was an incredible man, for that the young blonde girl was certain. His voice carried all the way down to her as if the roaring wind and crashing waves against the hulking vessel he rode upon allowed it passage. The captain before her didn’t even have to yell. Marco admitted she may have been a tad jealous at that.

Marco set her shoulders back further standing as straight and tall as she possible could. Her posture was so stiff it was starting to hurt, yet she had to make this man, the one fated to be the strongest on all the seas, this man with such an enormous legacy, take her on. “I said, make me your daughter-yoi!”

“Why should I?”

Okay, now she was sure the older man was messing with her. Still, she responded, “Because you’re like the final boss after a particularly hard dungeon that one has to level grind for like hours to beat-yoi.” At the confused silence that greeted Marco, she decided to take pity on the poor uncultured souls that would never really know the joys and sorrows of dungeon crawling and elaborated. “I think you're badass-yoi.”

Whitebeard threw his head back and laughed.