#*g: warrior nun | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

possibilistfanfiction · 1 year

Note

PLEASE can I say “argument” for an avatrice prompt I need it

[for @unicyclehippo — bea gets hurt (& gets better)]

you forget, often, most days now, what terror truly feels like.

it’s too fast and too slow and you remember: beatrice’s body — lithe and tough and small, all things considered — flies through the air after a bomb goes off, too close to her, too fast for you to step in front of it. everything flashes before your eyes, the life you’ve built together in your warm, airy house by the sea in the city of angels; where beatrice teaches aikido with a bo that isn’t lethal and smiles at her students; where you bartend part-time at a little mezcal spot near your home, just for fun. where you get to wake up to her every day, her tan skin dotted with freckles like constellations that you trace as the sun floats through the curtains before she’s willing to humor your early rising. where you’re reading in the late afternoon light and she sees you and smiles and puts aside your book and kisses you and fucks you on the couch. where she tenderly does your laundry and you steal her soft, big sweaters and trade who puts away the dishes from the dishwasher, still warm. where you squabble over takeout and what show to watch on netflix and whether or not you should make the bed on sundays — where you love her, and are loved by her, more than you ever could have dreamed.

but beatrice is human, part of the painful and absolute miracle of her love: she needed stitches a few months ago when she cut her hand open trying to pit an avocado; she fell surfing and got caught in a rip near the pier and you had watched in horror — having just been reading and relaxing, mostly to enjoy when she finishes and walks toward you with her wetsuit down around her hips — as a lifeguard fished her out and turned her on her side in the sand, as she coughed up water and took in frantic, ragged breaths, had a cold for days and slept. she is so human, and so fleeting, and so fragile; she’s strong and precise and hasn’t lost a step — but she’s human. sometimes you forget: beatrice can die.

it’s hard to tell all of the damage, really, as you phase over to her and then kneel, send out a halo pulse as hard as you can to buy you time. you hadn’t had to fight in a few months; battles pop up rarely now, and are usually not particularly dangerous. mary is kneeling by your side in an instant and takes over from where your shaking hands had been ineffectively flitting over bea’s still body. there’s shrapnel — metal, sharp and jagged — lodged above her left hip, through her armor; it’s clear one of her legs is at an angle it shouldn’t be, her femur bent impossibly. but worse than that, so much worse, is that she isn’t opening her eyes when you say her name, frantically and loudly: there’s blood coming out of her nose and her ears, and her face is peaceful. you wish, you pray now, more than willing to believe in anything you have to, when you bring your finger to her pulse point, her favorite place for you to kiss, and, consecrate, feel a flutter there. it’s fast, and faint, but it’s there.

‘she’s alive,’ you say.

mary squeezes your shoulder. ‘yes, ava, she’s alive.’

lilith is beside you soon, and takes one look at your face and the shrapnel and blood — beatrice’s blood — and then nods once.

‘i’ll take care of things here,’ mary says. ‘i think you got all the demons, ava. let lilith take you.’

you don’t really give a fuck about demons at this point, and you trust lilith’s care of beatrice, if not for you, enough to know it’s by far the best option. you’re worried about fractures in beatrice’s back or ribs, but you don’t have much of a choice. ‘yeah, okay.’

you haven’t been to jillian’s in a while; you ripple through space and time with bea’s limp body in your arms. jillian has doctors who work with her now, a trauma surgeon on call whenever there are battles, because it’s safest for anyone from the ocs to go here when things are bad. everyone rushes into action next to you — calm, sure, urgent — and secure bea’s airway and breathing once she’s on a gurney, put a c-collar around her neck and cut off her armor. lilith tries to drag you away, and she could, probably, but, in the same way you cannot, under any circumstances, watch beatrice die, you also could never, ever forgive yourself, in this life or any to follow, if you left the room and she doesn’t, eventually, come home with you.

the doctors put gauze around the metal in bea’s side, not taking it out yet. jillian has all kind of fancy technology that lets them do whatever scans they need — beatrice’s leg is broken; her spleen is bleeding; there’s a laceration to her liver; luckily, her skull isn’t fractured and they don’t see any bleeding in her brain, although there is a deep bruise along where her head had hit the wall.

‘we need to get the shrapnel out,’ jillian explains to you, after lilith has bullied you into a chair on the edge of the room. ‘and then we’ll repair her liver and spleen, then her femur. dr. sanders is confident that she’ll be able to fix everything safely.’

everything she’s telling you comes through like you’re underwater, and lilith waits for a moment before she rolls her eyes, mostly for posterity, and explains, ‘she’s going to be okay, ava. we got her here in time.’

‘yeah?’

‘yes,’ jillian says, a gentle smile sent your way. ‘you can see her, for a moment, before we take her back to the operating room.’

your legs feel shaky and you hate it, the splint on her leg and the light blue of the hospital gown they’d put over her and how her eyes are still closed. ‘hey bea,’ you say, pick up the hand that doesn’t have an iv in the top of it, and kiss her knuckles. you brush your thumb along her cheekbone, where her eyes are already bruising blue, and then run your fingers gently through her hair — buzzed on the sides, short and textured on top, dark and neat and soft; she’d cut it a few months ago after waiting for a long time to work herself up to it, and come home from the salon with an unspoken weight off her shoulders, unable to hold back a smile, so beautiful and so handsome and sexy as hell, a gradual becoming that always makes you so proud, and you kissed her and like always, love her more, and more, and more. ’i’m sorry.’ your voice shakes; you will it to be steady: even if she can’t hear you, you don’t want her to be scared. ‘you’ll be okay, baby. it’ll be okay,’ you tell her now. ‘i love you. in this life, okay?’

of course, there’s no response other than her steady, shallow breath, her eyelashes long enough to rest against her cheeks, and mary, somehow fetched by lilith, probably, touches your elbow.

‘ava, let’s go wait in the garden, yeah?’

you clench your jaw but you know she’s right; you let her lead you to a bedroom first, not the same one that you had shared with beatrice, all those years ago, back before you’d kissed her and died for her and come back for her, back before you knew how it felt to touch her in the tender light of the morning. mary leads you by the shoulders into the bathroom, and gestures toward the shower. you hadn’t realized, but when you look down, there’s beatrice’s blood all over your front, all over your hands, dried and dark and flaky, and it makes you sick. you take off your clothes as quickly as possible, a little frantic and your breath coming so fast.

‘ava,’ mary says from outside the door, and then softer: ‘ava.’

it helps you steady yourself; you look around like you’d practiced so many times in therapy and name, to yourself, how many tiles there are above the sink, how you see shampoo and conditioner in the shower, how there are three toilet paper rolls stacked neatly in a little holder by the toilet.

‘i’m okay,’ you say, your voice less shaky than you had feared, and you wait for the water in the shower to warm up and then step in. you know mary is right outside, and you wash the blood off as quickly as possible, not bothering with washing your hair or caring about anything else, having no real desire to take a long time — nothing will be soothing to you right now, so it’s probably better for you and for the sake of the world, the halo smoldering in distress between your shoulder blades — to sit with mary, and probably mother superion, who you imagine is on her way and close already.

‘i’m leaving some clothes,’ mary calls to you. ‘i’ll be waiting outside.’

you dry off in a daze and put on the comfortable clothes mary had brought — a light, loose pair of pants, a comfortable t-shirt, a thick, cotton sweater — and tuck your hair behind your ears before you walk out and find her literally right next to the doorway in the hall. she smiles at you and then takes off in the direction of the garden, where you’re unsurprised to see mother superion, who gives you a tight hug. when she puts her hand to the back of your head, you finally start to cry. you’re angry, because you’ve built your whole entire life with another person: weekly trips to the farmer’s market and a regular sushi place and champagne to celebrate birthdays and fresh flowers, every week, in a vase on your kitchen island. you’re angry because you want to marry bea, because you want her to be your wife. you’re angry because, more than anything in any universe, you want to grow old with her. you want, so badly, to grow old with her.

you don’t need to say any of that; you hold the engagement ring — a simple, thick, expensive white gold band with a small diamond imbedded flat into it — that had been on her finger for the past five months in the palm of your hand. you don’t squeeze it too tight because you don’t trust the halo right now: you’re too emotional, and the last thing you want is to squish and warp an engagement ring and not be able to put it back on beatrice’s pretty hand when she’s out of surgery. when she’s okay, and alive, and inevitably stubborn and grumpy as she heals.

mother superion understands, as she has for a long time, and, especially once camila joins you, chatters on and on about new recruits, and the tech they’re developing, and the small garden of herbs they’ve managed, in tandem, to keep alive. someone brings all of you food, and you force down half a turkey sandwich under everyone’s watchful gaze, although it’s difficult and it makes you want to gag a few times. eventually — like heaven’s gates fucking opening, or bea kissing you for the first time when you came back from the other realm, or three days ago when you’d listened to a new record, lying on the floor together in front of your fireplace — jillian finds you and tells you that beatrice did well. the shrapnel is out, and all of her internal bleeding had been taken care of; they’d put a rod down her femur, a relatively easy repair that, in the long run, shouldn’t bother her much.

‘i’ll set up a cot in her room,’ she says. ‘she should wake up in the next hour. she’s on a lot of pain meds, so she’ll be groggy, but things look good, ava.’

mother superion walks you there, after mary and camila take their leave to go settle into their own rooms for the night.

‘beatrice is strong,’ she says.

‘i wish she didn’t have to be.’ it’s an hurt that’s filled your chest for so long, practically since you’d first met her: you love her now, and know everything important about her. bea had shoved everything precious and holy about herself down, and down, and down, so that there were no decisions to be made about pleasure, or happiness: only service, and sacrifice, and the desperate absence of want. and now she wants you, and she shows you, and she loves you.

mother superion nods. ’i trust that you will take care of her, to help her heal.’ it’s a sort of benediction: you have for years, now, given beatrice the space to feel and desire and laugh and hurt and get better — to wear pants she loves and sleep in and watch stupid tv and cut her hair. ‘once she’s stable, lilith can take you back to your home. camila and i are happy to stay, if you’d like.’

‘i would,’ you agree immediately, because it’s true. you love your family around, especially when you’re scared, especially when it’s hard to remember that this is temporary: stitches and a broken leg and small fractures that will knit themselves back together. ‘thank you.’

‘of course, ava,’ she says, and then hugs you tightly outside of the closed door to beatrice’s room. ‘we’ll be around, if you need.’

‘thank you.’

you take a deep breath and then open the door, and, although bea is covered in tubes and wires and bandages and bruises and stitches, her face is full of color again and her breathing is deep and easy. her head rests softly on a pillow and her hands — when you walk to the side of the bed and lace your fingers together — are warm, and clean, and steady. your adrenaline starts to wear off and you thank the nurse who introduces himself and then brings in a cot; there’s nothing in the entire world that would make you let go of her hand and lie down right now, but eventually it’ll come in handy.

a blessing, though: after about an hour, bea’s eyes flutter open, and you scramble to sit up fully.

‘hi baby.’

she swallows and then squeezes your hand. ‘hey.’

you get the cup of water with a straw from the table nearby, offer it to her, and she takes a few sips before lying back.

‘anything really bad?’ she asks, and her eyes are gold and so beautiful and a little tuft of her hair sticks up behind the gauze wrapped around her head.

you list her injuries, because you know she’ll want to understand.

‘nothing i won’t get better from.’ she says it for you and for herself, then nods seriously. ’i’m really high.’

you pause, just for a second, and then laugh. it feels so good, like stars or the first time you’d eaten a pomegranate. ‘that’s okay.’

‘can we go home soon?’

‘yeah,’ you say, trying not to laugh too hard at her slurred words. ‘once you’re feeling a little better, lilith can take us home.’

she smiles. ‘that sounds good.’

‘yeah?’

‘mhm.’ she lets her eyes fall closed. ‘don’t go anywhere, please.’

‘i’ll be right here the whole time, bea.’ you lean forward and kiss her, so gently, and it makes her hum; you take put her engagement band back on her finger. ‘there’s nowhere else i’d rather be.’

it makes your chest ache as you walk slowly through jillian’s mansion with beatrice, two days later. she shuffles with a big brace on her leg and a walker, a physical therapist on her other side. lilith had — disconcertingly, just a little — brought a duffel of clothes for the both of you yesterday morning. it means that lilith had probably rifled through everything in your entire house, but she had packed all of your toiletries and comfortable shorts, sweaters, t-shirts, and joggers, a pair of birkenstocks bea wears often.

earlier, you’d helped bea into a pair of boxers, running shorts, and a hoodie, carefully pulled warm socks onto her feet, and she’d grimaced and set her jaw and nodded when the physical therapist explained how they were going to get her up and walking, if she wasn’t in too much pain.

‘what’s you pain level?’ she checks in.

bea’s brow is furrowed and her knuckles are white around the handles of the walker. ‘i can keep going.’

‘beatrice,’ you say, a little harsh, and then, softer: ‘please.’

she pauses her slow steps. ‘i — an 8.’

her physical therapist frowns. ‘ideally, we don’t want you above a 5, a 6 at most. i’d like to get a wheelchair to get you back to the room.’

she looks down at her hands.

‘bea,’ you say softly. ‘it’s — it’s okay.’ you’ll get better; we have time, we have time, we have time; i love you.

‘okay,’ she relents, and you stand for half a minute and then her physical therapist comes back with a chair and helps her sit safely. once she’s back situated in bed, you go to the bathroom and let the water warm up and wet a washcloth. you want to cry with overwhelm: you’d been treated so cruelly, for so long, when you needed to be cared for; it is a gift, such a fucking gift, to get to care for the person you love.

‘i figured you might want to wash your face, maybe put some new deodorant on?’

she waits a second, a little unsure, but then smiles. ‘are you saying i stink?’

her small joke lets what feels like a whoosh of air back into your lungs. ‘i would never.’

she squeezes your hand. ‘thank you ava.’

‘of course.’ you show her the washcloth and her facewash that lilith had brought, and you wait for her nod before you carefully wipe her face and then get the facewash to foam before you smooth it gently into her skin before you wipe her face clean. ‘i can do all of your serums for you. a little facial? spa de ava?’ you smile and run a finger along her brow. ‘but i wont do anything you don’t want.’

‘that sounds… really nice. ava.’

you get all of her little skincare serums lined up in the order she usually does them, which you had specifically requested from lilith, and then tell her to close her eyes. it’s not perfect, because she’s in a hospital bed and there’s a big incision down her abdomen, stapled together, that her surgeon had nodded at this morning when she changed the bandage, pleased.

you’re as gentle as you can be, and a nurse brings bea a paid med, and then she’s sighing under your fingertips as you touch her gently, massage her temples, trace a gentle line down her jaw. she falls asleep as you scratch her scalp, just like normal.

she’s so beautiful, as the sunlight filters through the window in the early afternoon. there’s her freckles and her strong wrists and the miracle of her jaw. you realize, all of a sudden, that you haven’t slept in… at least a day and a half, at this point. she’s safe; she’s safe. bea walked today, slowly and painfully and just down the ball, but still — and she let you care for her.

you change into comfortable clothes — one of bea’s thick cotton t-shirts, oversized and expensive and soft, that smells like her cologne; a pair of joggers that fall just at your ankles — and allow yourself to sit on the cot. it’s a blessing, another in a long string of blessings, when camila knocks at the door.

you wave her in and she smiles. ‘i can sit with her, in case she wakes up, if you’d like to sleep,’ she whispers.

‘that would be awesome,’ you tell her quietly, snuggle down underneath the blankets on the cot, and fall asleep, warm and safe, with camila sitting calmly by bea.

it’s true: there is nowhere else you’d rather be than be her side on the couch in your breezy living room, with its perfect fabric and the high ceilings with gorgeous exposed beams, the sea stormy outside. there’s nowhere you’d rather be but you also might fucking lose your goddamn mind.

‘i know you’re bored,’ you say, an argument you’d quietly been having for the past few days since lilith brought you home, ‘but we really can’t go for a long walk just yet. you’re not even really supposed to be out of bed.’

‘i cannot stay in that bed another minute, ava.’

‘oh, come on,’ you say, wiggle your brows in an effort to get her to cheer up, even a little, ‘i’ve never heard you complain about that bed before, especially with me included.’

it works: she humors you with a little eye roll and a huff of a laugh.

you curl a little closer and kiss the top of her head, her short hair clean and soft after she’d finally gotten to take a shower this morning. you run your hand against the grain of it on the side like you’ve learned soothed her in the past few months, and, unsurprisingly, it works — she sighs. ‘i’m sorry you’re so bored. believe me, i know how boring it can be to not be able to do everything you’re used to.’

she frowns. ‘i’m sorry.’

you shake your head. ‘no, i didn’t mean to make you feel guilty. i just mean — it really sucks. there’s only so many puzzles you can do and episodes of housewives you can watch before you start to feel a little crazy.’

she smiles into your shoulder.

‘i know you have a bunch of ramped up physical therapy starting tomorrow, but maybe, if you feel up to it, we could have dinner on the beach tonight, watch the sunset? it’s not much different from eating on the balcony, but you could move around a little. i know you’re a little crazy so maybe it’ll be fun to crutch through the sand.’

‘that sounds wonderful, darling.’ she leans up to kiss you and you do your best to not get lost in it: she may be feeling better, a few weeks after, but you’d gone with her to her post-op appointment yesterday. you’d seen the long scar, just barely healed, running down her abdomen, the jagged, shiny red line above her hip where they’d pulled the shrapnel out and stitched the skin together. there’s bruising, still, all along her back, faded greens and yellows, and she gets headaches if it’s too bright. the brace on her leg is snug and she still puts weight on it carefully, like she’s afraid to fall, even if she won’t say it aloud.

‘you have to promise that you’ll tell me if you’re hurting, okay?’

‘i will, ava,’ she says, extremely solemn, and it makes you want to laugh.

you set up a whole little picnic with her favorite finger foods — aged sharp cheddar, olives, rosemary and sea salt crackers, crisp grapes, a good bottle of pinot noir — and a soft blanket on the beach, and then go back inside. she’s put on sunglasses and a beanie, a warm crewneck. it’s slow going through the sand but you make it, not all that far a distance, and you watch beatrice sit down carefully before you settle down beside her. the sun drifts, slow and lazy, below the waves. you kiss her and she tastes like wine, like bread: the sun drifts and it’s a sacrament, to love her, to have her here.

‘you’re kidding me.’

‘it’ll be easier to breathe if you stand tall,’ bea says, barely sweating at all, the incision in the middle of her abs faded and calm below her sports bra.

‘i swear to god, how are you so fast? it seems like just six weeks ago you’d been cleared to run.’

‘it’s been five weeks and six days,’ she says.

‘oh, my bad. that’s so so so different, sorry.’

she blushes; you can tell, even though it’s warm and sunny out and her skin is flushed from the two miles you’d run along the path on the far edge of the beach.

‘anyway, why don’t we just, you know, get a coffee and a donut and take our shoes off and walk home along the water?’

‘we’re supposed to run home, ava. this was just where we turn around.’

you pretend like you’re thinking about it, deeply, and you wait to see if beatrice will crack first; you’re delighted when she does.

‘fine,’ she says, and you jump up and down in victory, which, after a beat, makes her laugh. you beam at her, in her little men’s running tank and a fresh haircut, gold eyes and freckles, pristine white running shoes and a smile, big and bright, just for you.

‘i fucking love you, you know that?’

she laces your fingers together and strides off in the direction of the coffee shop. ‘i love you too, ava,’ she says, ‘very much.’

#something something there's so much more to this i'll write about one day etc BUT #butch bea my GIRL #ava getting to take care of someone she loves my G I R L #wn #avatrice fic #warrior nun fic #prompts #butch bea 🥺🫡

397 notes · View notes

dark-manga-stuff · 7 months

Text

Galatea - The Eyes of God

Something I love about claymore is how the abilities that the warriors possess, usually have some type of character or thematic significance. Both of those hold true for Galatea, she is the literal and figurative eyes of the organization which granted her the name “God Eyes”.

With her ability to sense yoma energy from so far away, and literally telegraph conversations, she has one of the most valuable skills for the organization. And in the world of Claymore, the organization is the equivalent of a god.

It’s made clear from the moment we meet Galatea, that she will be an anti-hero character. She walks the line between ally and foe, with her ability also comes with the possibility of manipulating the organization, which she does here, she’s playing the middle game.

Right after we meet her, we get the confirmation that she’s a strong claymore and a top 3 claymore at that. And considering Alicia and Beth’s strength, top 3 is ridiculously good. Galatea is made to be a threat which is why she’s classified as a monster by Miria.

We get our first look at Galatea when Clare goes to fight Riful and save Jean. Galatea is still playing the anti-hero role in where she walks the line between helping clare and helping the organization. This character duality shadows her true intentions for the rest of the story.

Galatea has a strong aura of confidence and a bit of arrogance coming into this. She arrives to capture Clare, but she still decided to manipulate the organization and it’s still unclear what she has planned for Clare.

Galatea being “God Eyes” allows here to basically manipulate the battle, her yoma energy reading abilities allow her to harmonize with her opponent, shifting the battle in whatever direction she desires. The fight all comes down to concentration and prediction.

Another detail about Galatea is just how strong is she? With the yoma power she’s number 1. But what holds her back is that she can’t keep this form for long, the higher her power goes, the lower chance of coming back. The only downside to having this immense amount of power.

Galatea eventually reveals her true intentions as she was doing a personal investigation rather than one for the organization. At this point in her character she works for her own benefit and if the organization gets in the way, she makes a way for herself.

This statement is also made before we’re aware that Alicia and Beth can awaken and go back to their normal states. This is an ability far surpassing and shattering the limitations of yoma energy and holds other characters to a greater standard, a complete change of form.

Galatea allows Clare to walk freely, at first she seems very loyal to the organization. But after spending that time with Clare and Jean, I think she just wanted to test their resolve. She seemed hopeful for another meeting, I love how she keeps up the anti-hero thing. The next time Galatea and Clare meet, a lot went down. Galatea left the organization and went into hiding, as a nun. This works thematically & in characteristic fashion cause her title is “God Eye” and she’s doing the thing that would draw her closest to god which is being a nun.

Galatea only grew stronger through the seven years she was in hiding. She completely destroyed her eyes so now she really lives up to the “God Eye” title. Galatea now relies entirely on her energy sensing abilities. She had to adapt or else she’d be dog food for new claymores. Galatea still remains the same after all that time passed, still calm and collected, she doesn’t overestimate her strength but is aware of her capabilities in combat. Galatea still has a master way of turning a situation into a team fight, even if they started as enemies.

The circumstances in her return are also reminiscent of when she was sent to capture Clare. The dynamic shifts when you are the one wanted by the organization. Galatea is now the hunted instead of the hunter. I love the significance of the second meeting between Galatea and Clare, it shows the massive gap that she put between them in terms of power. Clare surpassed her and she did in fact, stay alive. Clare mastered a flurry of techniques and increased her raw skill.

Roles are reversed and Clare is the one that saves Galatea from an awakened being. Clare is also incredibly poised compared to last time which is a perfect way to show her growth, by bringing back a familiar situation. After meeting Galatea back in the Holy City of Rabona, Galatea isn’t too involved in the combat anymore, her abilities simply don’t match up to the 7 ghosts or new warriors but that’s fine since they are the spotlight of the story. I’m satisfied with the shine she did receive.

This is the end of the thread, Galatea is a fantastic character from being a main player to a supportive member, I loved every part of her involvement in the series. This was a very fun thread to make.

Credits: T Water

#manga #manga panel #mangacap #animanga #manga art #manga edit #claymore manga #claymore anime #claymore #galatea

125 notes · View notes