#Like that bird who sharpens its beak on the mountain | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

wickedsrest-rp · 1 year

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NAME: Shriken

RARITY: ★★★☆☆

THREAT LEVEL: ★★★★☆ | Fast, strong, and aggressive. Given their strength and nesting habits, experts will likely need to be brought in to kill it.

HABITAT: Generally found in more isolated forests, as well as in mountain environments, where they nest on cliffs.

DESCRIPTION: Shriken are fierce bird-like demons that are known throughout the supernatural world as both deadly and as extreme exterior designers. Their elaborate nests are best left undisturbed. Up to nine feet in diameter, these nests are often made of branches, rocks, baubles, trash, and flesh. For several hours a day shriken dedicate their time to sharpening branches and arranging them around the nest to suit their personal aesthetic; they then proudly display their kills on these pointed posts which can attract mates. Their fantastically colored feathers only complement their tastes.

Their wings are impressive in size, too – with a 14 foot wingspan, a shriken can swoop out of the sky and pick up anything from a small deer to a child in its giant claws, and carry them for up to an hour before spearing them on its nest. Once shriken mate, they mate for life, sharing a nest and decorating it together. They have razor-like teeth in their beak, and sharp eyes that seem to be watching everything at once. While shriken don’t specifically go after humans, they’re intense predators that enjoy killing even when not hungry.

ABILITIES: Shriken have no magical abilities, but they’re both incredibly strong and fast. Their keen raptor vision means that once they have chosen their prey, they will not lose sight of it. A mated couple’s nest is never unguarded, and shriken are strong enough to slam into fully grown men – even hunters and other supernaturally strong species – and knock them into the spikes. They are almost as intelligent as people, and in the past have been known to steal weapons off of hunting parties coming too close to their nest before attacking.

WEAKNESS: Shriken rely on their eyesight more than their sense of smell or hearing, so a common tactic is to blind them, although getting close enough to do so is a hazard in its own right. Their intelligence can also be used in your own favor. If you dare get close enough to their nest and bring offerings – live animals to impale on the spikes – the shriken will generally accept this and allow for safe passage through the area. Or an opening to kill it. Someone who repeatedly makes offerings to a shriken in this manner may be able to develop some kind of loose arrangement with it – with the shriken offering protection when needed. Exorcists specializing in demons can stop shriken from nesting in an area by performing rituals in and around the nest, preventing the shriken from returning to it. They will give up and fly elsewhere to start anew.

OTHER VARIANTS:

Stryga: Rather than having a lavish nest, stryga will instead claim an entire tree as their own, decorating it with anything shiny they can get their claws on, as well as the entrails of everything they kill. While impossible to mistake a stryga for an owl, they do share a number of common characteristics including the ability to fly silently, the ability to turn their head 270 degrees, incredible eyesight, and tufted ears. Equally as large as shriken, stryga are even more territorial and will dismember and drink the blood of anything that comes too close to their nesting tree. It’s this propensity for blood-drinking that sometimes makes people (even experienced slayers) believe that the carnage of a stryga feeding is the work of a vampire. Stryga make terrible, barn owl-like screeches to disarm their victims that, when in close proximity, may be confused with the scream of a banshee.

Snallygaster: The fearsome snallygaster is a very large and dangerous cousin of the shriken, covered in both scales and feathers. They appear to be a mix of bird and reptile, with a single eye in the center of their forehead. It’s thought that their beak and claws are metallic, and when they feed, tentacles emerge from the beak and break up the food before pulling it into the snallygaster’s throat. They have an aesthetic appreciation for making art of their meals, and will decorate their reptilian tail with the blood of their prey in whatever way they find pleasing. They often make sounds like a train whistle as they swoop down to carry off humans and livestock, but otherwise fly silently. The demonic properties of their scales make them impervious to firearms, which can be difficult to cause them direct harm. However, seven pointed star symbols will frighten them from an area and they’ll die if tricked into ingesting holy water.

(Art credit: dron111 on dA)

#monsters #avian #demon #woods #mountains #skies #stryga #snallygaster #shriken

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genderbinaryisforlosers · 3 years

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i want to talk about the shepherd’s boy

i always want to talk about the shepherd’s boy. for anyone who needs their memory refreshed, which is very reasonable because it’s been nearly six years since Heaven Sent/Hell Bent first came out, this is the shepherd’s boy as the Doctor tells it

There's this emperor, and he asks this shepherd's boy, how many seconds in eternity? And the shepherd's boy says, there's this mountain of pure diamond. It takes an hour to climb it, and an hour to go around it. Every hundred years, a little bird comes and sharpens its beak on the diamond mountain. And when the entire mountain is chiselled away, the first second of eternity will have passed! You must think that's a hell of a long time. Personally, I think that's a hell of a bird.

the Doctor tells this story while he chips away at his own diamond mountain, a wall of twenty-foot-thick azbantium, which is four hundred times stronger than diamond. it takes him two billion years to gouge himself a hole big enough to walk through. he tells this story because he is the bird, and he’s right - it is one hell of a bird.

but he’s also the mountain. he has been trapped inside his confession dial, and for every cycle, secrets are extracted from him. he is resilient, and unmoving - he knows there is one confession he can give to end the torture, but he does not give in. he forces the Veil to come back time and time again, until eventually, it kills him, and in the terms of the story, one second of eternity passes. he is renewed for the next second, and the cycle begins again indefinitely.

but there are two other characters in the story, the shepherd’s boy and the emperor. Twelve embodies those, as well. in Hell Bent, the Doctor’s story begins with him sitting in an old barn, where he used to sleep as a child. where we saw stars reflected in his eyes, one dark and fearful night (in Listen). when the emperor asks the shepherd’s boy his question, he does not expect the boy to have wisdom of infinity from nights sitting under the stars, far away from the dazzling palace the emperor calls home, full of its clueless wise men.

the Doctor doesn’t mention this part of the story when he tells it, but in the Grimms’ version, because the shepherd’s boy could tell the emperor the size of infinity, he was named the heir of the empire. Hell Bent sees the Doctor lay claim on Gallifrey, wresting it from Rassilon’s grasp before he can be cheated of his “inheritance” by firing squad. so the Doctor becomes the emperor - he also has been the emperor all along. he is the man trying to understand the shape of infinity and how he might preside over it. he does with the laws of time and space what he pleases, placing his goals above everything else and holding the universe to his personal standards.

the leitmotif of ‘The Shepherd’s Boy’ appears in another notable scene - in The Day of the Doctor, directly before Twelve’s first appearance. the track is ‘This Time There’s Three of Them’ (2:19-3:20), and the Doctors make the decision to try and save Gallifrey with their combined power. it’s an act of hope, defiance, and unimaginable hubris - kind of like punching through a wall of azbantium over two billion years. it is him staking his claim on infinity, saying “the laws of time and space are mine to control, and this war will not have its way over me or my empire.” because it's also when he takes Gallifrey as his own, the moment that allows him to depose Rassilon in Hell Bent.

that scene from The Day of the Doctor goes on to define Twelve - it's why he chose his face. “Just someone. Please. Not the whole town. Just save someone.” (The Fires of Pompeii) the people of Gallifrey burn, and he can't save everybody. but some of them. he can do that.

“And above all, it’s kind. It's just that. Just kind. If I run away today, good people will die. If I stand and fight, some of them might live. Maybe not many, maybe not for long. Hey, you know, maybe there's no point in any of this at all, but it's the best I can do, so I'm going to do it. And I will stand here doing it till it kills me.”

the Doctor is every part of the shepherd’s boy. that’s why it comes to represent him in his final moments - first as he fights to his death in The Doctor Falls, in the hopes that some people - just a few people, not everyone, but a few - might escape, before he collapses and stares up at the empty sky, wishing he could see the stars. then as he begins to regenerate, and accepts the next cycle. “How long can I keep doing this, Clara? Burning the old me, to make a new one?” he asks in Heaven Sent. “I suppose one more lifetime won’t kill anyone. Well, except me,” he smiles in Twice Upon a Time. the shepherd’s boy is humble, arrogant, helpless, resilient. eternal, and finite. and above all, the shepherd’s boy is kind.

#twelfth doctor #doctor who #meta #dw s9 #obligatory disclaimer: no i don't think this arc is a paragon of storytelling as a WHOLE #but this specific part? the way it comes together into a cohesive story? yeah #riley rambles #the doctor #dw

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myfriendhasaproblem · 2 years

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“The Shepherd Boy” by the Brothers Grimm, told two ways

“There's no theaters in Heaven," Crowley said. "And very few films." "Don't you try to tempt me," said Aziraphale wretchedly. “I know you, you old serpent.” “Just think about it,” said Crowley relentlessly. “You know what eternity is? You know what eternity is? I mean, d’you know what eternity is? There’s this big mountain, see, a mile high, at the end of the universe, and once every thousand years there’s this little bird—” “What little bird?” said Aziraphale suspiciously. “This little bird I’m talking about. And every thousand years—” “The same bird every thousand years?” Crowley hesitated. “Yeah,” he said. “Bloody ancient bird, then.” “Okay. And every thousand years this bird flies—” “—limps—” “—flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak—” “Hold on. You can’t do that. Between here and the end of the universe there’s loads of—” The angel waved a hand expansively, if a little unsteadily. “Loads of buggerall, dear boy.” “But it gets there anyway,” Crowley persevered. “How?” “It doesn’t matter!” “It could use a space ship,” said the angel. Crowley subsided a bit. “Yeah,” he said. “If you like. Anyway, this bird—” “Only it is the end of the universe we’re talking about,” said Aziraphale. “So it’d have to be one of those space ships where your descendants are the ones who get out at the end. You have to tell your descendants, you say, When you get to the Mountain, you’ve got to—” He hesitated. “What have they got to do?” “Sharpen its beak on the mountain,” said Crowley. “And then it flies back—” “—in the space ship—” “And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again,” said Crowley quickly. There was a moment of drunken silence. “Seems a lot of effort just to sharpen a beak,” mused Aziraphale. “Listen,” said Crowley urgently, “the point is that when the bird has worn the mountain down to nothing, right, then—” Aziraphale opened his mouth. Crowley just knew he was going to make some point about the relative hardness of birds’ beaks and granite mountains, and plunged on quickly. “—then you still won’t have finished watching The Sound of Music.” Aziraphale froze.

—Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett

The Doctor: We might take a little while, so do you want me to tell you a story? The Brothers Grimm - lovely fellows, they're on my darts team. According to them, there was this emperor, and he asks this shepherd's boy, “How many seconds in eternity?” And the shepherd's boy says, “There's this mountain of pure diamond. It takes an hour to climb it, and an hour to go around it. Every hundred years, a little bird comes and sharpens its beak on the diamond mountain. And when the entire mountain is chiseled away, the first second of eternity will have passed.” You must think that's a hell of a long time. Personally, I think that's a hell of a bird.

—Doctor Who series 9, episode 11, ‘Heaven Sent’ (written by Steven Moffat)

#good omens #doctor who #neil gaiman #terry pratchett #i fucking LOVE heaven sent #but although i've read good omens so many times i forgot this is how crowley pitches the horrors of Eternity in the book #and now i'm just going to be thinking about how much twelve would hate the sound of music #also i love that aziraphale is the one who suggests a bird taking a spaceship #everyone involved in this post is ridiculous and i love them

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macuilsung · 3 years

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starter for @talesofus!

A citadel as hallowed and ancient as Garreg Mach Monastery, frequented year by year by young students of the Officers Academy with active imaginations, was bound to rack up a number of rumours and urban legends over the course of its long history.

In the year 1180, this still holds true. With new students come tales old and new, be it hearsay from family who attended the Academy in times past or stories concocted over the course of their own time in these old halls.

The Ghost of the Cathedral was one such new rumour. Sometimes, after dark, one may hear music from the empty church across the bridge. For the ghost, its voice and instruments could be heard echoing and reverberating from stone and marble. For Forwin, however, he was just looking for a place to practice with his lute outside of Abyss, out of sight and out of mind.

Now that he got roped into joining the Black Eagles, like Hel would he practice in the greenhouse right next to the dorms. There were way too many familiar faces than he was comfortable being around for long. It would only be a matter of time before he’s sussed out...

And so, to his frayed nerves, music often provided balm.

“There once was a mountain, o’er which the sun shone Though its surface was borne not of ordin’ry stone Of diamond it glowed, from its base to its peak Its summit ‘pon which the bird sharpens its beak-”

#talesofus #{ talesofus—bernadetta }#{ eagle’s scherzo mocks my fate 🎶 verse 🎶 }#{ ooc: don't gotta match length but aaaAAAAAAA I'M EXCITED- }

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simandthedimbulbv2-0 · 4 years

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Took much longer than I meant it to, but it’s finished! The missing part of the drunken conversation from 11 Years Ago. With ladies. And origami.

Featuring the voice talent of the magnificent @abicadabri !

Enjoy

(Transcript included below in case anything is unintelligible; after all, there was alcohol involved.)

Aziraphale

All right, all right, I don’t like it any more than you, but I told you. I can’t disod. disoy…not do what i’m told. ‘M a ‘nangel.

Crowley (after a thoughtful pause, slyly) …Theres no theatres in heaven. And very few films.

Aziraphale (indignant) Don’t you try to tempt me! I know you, you old serpent.

Crowley

Just you think about it! You know what eternity is? You know what eternity is? I mean, d’you know what eternity is? Theres this big mountain, see, a mile high, at the end of the universe. And once every thousand years theres this little bird–

Aziraphale (Suspicious) What little bird?

Crowley

This little bird, I’m talking about. And every thousand years–

Aziraphale (interrupting) The same bird every thousand years?

Crowley

(pause)…Yeah.

Aziraphale

…Bloody ancient bird, then.

Crowley

Ok. And every thousand years this bird flies–

Aziraphale (interjecting) Limps.

Crowley (annoyed) –Flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak.

Aziraphale

Hold on. You cant do that. Between here and the end of the universe theres loads of– (struggling) –loads of bugger all, dear girl!

Crowley

But it gets there anyway.

Aziraphale

How?

Crowley

(Frustrated) It doesn’t matter!!

Aziraphale

...It could use a spaceship.

Crowley

…Yeah. if you like. Anyway, this bird–

Aziraphale

Only it is the end of the universe we’re talking about. So it’d have to be one of those spaceships where your descendants are the ones who get out at the other end. you have to tell your descendants, you say, ‘when you get to the mountain, you’ve got to…” you’ve got to… …what have they got to do?

Crowley

Sharpen its beak on the mountain. And then it flies back–

Aziraphale

In the space ship.

Crowley

–And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again.

(They lapse into contemplative, drunken silence)

Aziraphale

Seems a lot of effort just to sharpen a beak…

Crowley

Listen. The point is that when the bird has worn the mountain down to nothing, right, then–

Crowley

-then you still won’t have finished watching the sound of music! And you’ll enjoy it. You really will.

Aziraphale

My dear girl–

Crowley

You won’t have a choice.

Aziraphale

Listen–

Crowley

Heaven has no taste.

Aziraphale

Now–

Crowley

And not one single sushi restaurant.

(Small pause. Aziraphale groans.)

Aziraphale

I can’t… I can’t cope with this while ‘m drunk. I’m going to sober up.

Crowley

…Me too.

#good omens #animatic #ineffable wives #Aziraphale #crowley #abicadabri

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literallyusuk · 4 years

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Distance (USUK)

Super late prize fic for @a-lfreedom. Bls forgive ;;w;;

It’s Cardverse! With a lotta fluff and some pining, cuz we all like that.

~~~~~

“Arthur, go sleep. You’re obviously exhausted.” Their connection is fizzling at the edges, and Alfred can see the way Arthur’s eyelids are drooping.

“No, I… I’m fine.” Arthur blinks a few times and rubs at his eyes. His image on the waterfall clears and sharpens once more. “I feel like we haven’t spoken in ages, and tomorrow we’re going on another expedition.”

Alfred chews on his lower lip. “More ruins?”

“He’s found a door leading into the mountains, and Alfred, the energy that’s bleeding out from it…” Arthur lets out a sigh. “It’s going to be incredible.”

The King can’t help but to smile at the way his Queen’s green eyes have lit up. “Be careful, though. Last time was a close call, wasn’t it?”

“We err, might have rushed into that one a little bit. But don’t worry, Al. I’m more than capable to face anything now.”

“So you’ll come home soon?” Alfred perks up. “The meetings have been so boring without you there, and-”

“I have to stay longer.” Arthur looks down, fiddles with something out of sight.

“But you said you’re capable-”

“But there’s still so much more for me to learn! It was hard enough to convince him to teach me in the first place, to make sure that this trip wasn’t worthless. If I leave now, I’m never going to be able to come back.”

Alfred’s hands clench at his sides. “You’ve been gone six months, Arthur. Too much longer, and we’ll be vulnerable to an attack.”

“Who’s going to attack us? Diamonds and Hearts are allies, Clubs is still in its honeymoon phase with the new Queen and Jack, we’re fine.” Arthur crosses his arms over his chest. “I need to do this.”

“And I need you here.” Alfred’s voice is soft.

“That’s not fair and you know it. You’re being selfish.”

“I’m being selfish? You’re the one who snuck out!”

“This was the best time to-” Suddenly, Arthur’s mouth clicks shut. “We’re not doing this. Good night, Alfred.”

The connection is severed before Alfred can say another word. Arthur’s image vanishes, leaving just a regular waterfall in its place. He sighs heavily and runs his fingers through his hair, then leaves the room. The Scrying Chamber is home to a waterfall and a small pool that drains deeper into some underground river, and is part of a larger complex of rooms underneath Spades Palace. It all makes up The Queen’s Labyrinth, where all the Queens of Spades have practised and stored their magical knowledge. It’s all very pretty and glowy, but Alfred is wary of it, after he’d brushed up against some statue that had turned him into a rabbit for a week. Better to leave this place to Arthur. But the Scrying Chamber is the only way he can talk to Arthur while the Queen is gone, so every few days he braves the maze of rooms for a little while.

Careful not to touch anything, he makes his way back up to the castle proper. The Jack is waiting for him.

“I’m to assume it didn’t go well?” Yao asks.

Alfred purses his lips. “He’s being stubborn. His precious master’s found some new ruin for them to explore and it’s just-” He starts pacing the room, raking his hands through his hair and making it even more of a mess than usual. “Ugh! It’s so frustrating! He’s so far away and there’s nothing I can do and- and how do we even know we can trust this dude? He just suddenly sends a summons for the Queen of Spades and oh nooo Arthur just has to go halfway across the fucking world because there’s no other way and he has to go alone and-” He cuts off with a wordless, jumbled groan of frustration.

Yao schools his features into something less amused when the King looks to him. “You’re right. We can’t trust this master.”

“See-?!”

“But. But we can trust Arthur. Do you trust your husband, Alfred? Do you trust your Queen?”

The King deflates like a limp hot air balloon. “I…do.” He paces over to the other side of the room and slumps into a chair, head in his hands. “I just don’t like being so far away from him. So…unable to protect him.”

“Arthur would kick your ass if he heard you say that and we both know it.”

“Yeah.” Alfred chuckles along with his Jack. “Yeah, he totally would. But he’s not here to hear it, so lemme say it just this once.”

“My lips are sealed.”

“Good.”

Yao clears his throat. “While you were in there, we’ve had another message come in…”

Alfred groans again, and takes a deep breath. “King’s work is never done, eh? And now I get to do Arthur’s paperwork, too. Lead the way, Yao, let’s get this over with.”

~~~~~

He waits by the waterfall for two hours, but Arthur doesn’t show yet again. Alfred’s starting to get worried, and his stomach clenches. “Arthur!” he yells, as if his voice could somehow activate the magic needed for him to see his husband.

But he doesn’t know the spell, or any magic at all, so of course nothing happens. Magic is the realm of the Queen, and somewhat the Jack. It’s never been kind to Alfred either. Usually, one of two things happens; it doesn’t work, or it has the exact opposite effect. Arthur’s a natural with spells, though, always has been, and Alfred could watch him work with it for hours. But here, in the most magical place in the castle, he’s powerless and unable to reach Arthur.

His eyebrows are knitted together when he finally gives up and leaves the room.

“There you are! I nearly sent someone in there after you!” Yao strides towards him. “Did you speak to Arthur?”

Alfred shakes his head. The Queen wasn’t dead; he and Yao would feel it if that came to pass, but anything else is fair game. Sick, poisoned, unconscious, weak… Alfred’s stomach churns even more. “Where is he? What’s he doing?”

“You know how stubborn he is,” Yao ventures forth. “If he thinks you’ve slighted him…”

“I didn’t slight him! I said I wanted him back home, safe, with me! That’s all!”

“Still, if he’s offended-”

“I’ll send a bird,” Alfred mutters, heading for his office. “I’ll need your help with enchanting it.”

“Of course.”

At his desk, Alfred crafts a letter.

Artie.

I’m really sorry if I said something to piss you off or upset you. It’s been days, and I’ve been waiting for you but you never showed and I’m getting so worried. Please, write back, or something, to let me know that you’re okay. I love you so much.

Alfred

Once it’s done, Alfred carefully starts folding the paper into the shape of a bird, long and sleek. Technically the enchantment doesn’t need a particular shape, Alfred could just roll the paper up and send it on its way, but both he and Arthur like the extra touch the folding gives it. Makes it just a bit more magical.

Arthur was the one who showed him the steps, and while he can replicate the general shape, Arthur’s birds always look prettier than Alfred’s. This one’s beak is crooked, and one wing is shorter than the other. He gives it to Yao anyway, and watches as the Jack enchants the bird and tosses it out the window. It falls for a moment, then flaps its wings and soars northwest. To Arthur. Oh, how Alfred wishes he could join it.

“Now we wait,” Yao says, turning to him.

Alfred sighs, and slumps back in his seat. He rubs his fingertips together, spreading the ink stains on them. “Now we wait.”

~~~~~

Alfred doesn’t know what’s woken him, but when he opens his eyes, Arthur is at the bedside. “Arthur!” His delighted smile withers away when his hands pass right through the Queen, and it’s only once he blinks that he realises there’s a faint glow around his husband.

The image of Arthur lets out a soft chuckle. “Sorry, love. Not yet.”

“How are you-?” Wonder overtakes Alfred’s face as he reaches out again, this time stopping his hand before it reaches the image. It gives his eyes the illusion that he’s touching Arthur, at least. “I’m not in the cave.”

“You’re not.” Arthur looks smug. “I was right, the stuff in those ruins… I’ve learned so many new spells, and some ways of conserving my own magical energy.”

“I’m happy for you.” And he is. He really is. But the ache in his chest won’t abate until Arthur is back home.

Something of that must show on his face, because Arthur looks away. “I got your bird. Your folding still needs work.”

Alfred brings his hands back to himself. “Yeah. You’re better and making ‘em than me.”

The image of Arthur sits down on the bed next to him. “…I miss you too. Very much. And it wasn’t right of me to say that you were overly selfish for wanting me back home.” His voice is soft.

“I love you, Artie. So much.” Out of habit, he leans over to rest his head on Arthur’s shoulder and squawks when he ends up falling sideway onto the mattress instead.

Arthur chuckles behind his hand. “Silly.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Alfred grumbles, but he’s smiling too. “So when will you be back?”

“Soon. There’s a particular spell that I still need help to master. Once I’ve done that, I’ll return home.”

“Okay.” Alfred stifles a yawn into his arm. “What kind of spell is it?”

“It’s a secret. But you’ll like it. I’ll show it to you once I’m back.” Arthur’s face softens. “You should go back to sleep now. I didn’t think about the time difference.”

“I can stay up a bit,” Alfred insists. “I wanna look at your face some more.”

“Oh, just my face?” Arthur snorts.

“And listen to you pretty voice for longer.”

“Flatterer.”

“You like it.”

“I do.” Arthur makes a motion as if to stroke Alfred’s hair, then remembers the limits of the magic. “You spoil me far too much, but I can’t help but love it.”

“Spoil you just enough,” Alfred corrects.

Arthur’s smile is fond. “Just enough, then.”

For a moment it’s quiet, with Alfred just gazing at Arthur’s softly glowing form and Arthur looking back at him just the same. Then, Alfred speaks again. “I’m gonna throw you a party. When you get back, that is.”

“Oh?” One of Arthur’s impressive eyebrows rises.

“Yeah. Dunno if we should invite the others, though.”

“Hmm. Would be nice. We haven’t seen anyone since the Club wedding, and I’d like to get to know Elizaveta better.”

“She seemed intense. Different to Ivan, but I dunno if it’s a good or bad thing.” Alfred suddenly chuckles.

“What?”

“Clubs is kinda like us. Intense King and Queen, reserved Jack to keep ‘em in line. Or try, at least.”

Arthur smiles. “I suppose that’s true.” He suddenly looks off to the side. “I have to go. We want to get one more training session in before we eat, and you need to sleep more. I love you.”

“I love you too.” Alfred yawns, then gives Arthur a soft pout. “I miss you.”

“I know. I miss you too.” Arthur reaches out, creates the illusion that he’s caressing Alfred’s cheek. “I’ll be home soon.”

“Promise?” Alfred asks, still petulant.

“Promise.” Arthur blows him a kiss, and then the image disappears.

~~~~~

There’s a dragon in the woods.

The knight who reports the news seems oddly unbothered, but Alfred is too focused on the information to notice. He starts to call for the Ace to dispatch to deal with the threat, but the knight clears her throat.

“The dragon wants you specifically.”

Alfred blinks. “How do you know?”

“That’s what it said.”

“It speaks?! Yao, do dragons speak?”

“There’s been no record of it,” Yao says, then shrugs, “but that doesn’t mean that it’s impossible.”

“Alright-”

“Bear in mind,” Yao continues, “that this might be some sort of trap. I would not advise you to go alone.”

“I’m not that much of an idiot,” Alfred says, standing.

“Hmm.”

The King ignores him and gestures to the knight. “You’ll lead us there. Get something to eat and drink after your journey but be ready to leave in half an hour.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.” The knight bows and leaves the room.

Alfred gathers a group of twenty knights, and the Ace. His cousin Madeline might not look the part of a fighter, but her strategy and ingenuity are enough to rival Arthur’s, and she’s incredibly proficient with her chosen weapons. Her eyebrows rise up at the news of a dragon, but she’s ready to go in minutes. Dragons are rare, but not unheard of. The last sighting had been a century ago, in Alfred’s great-grandfather’s time.

He can’t imagine what this one might want. Gold? Jewels? Surely it would just take them by force. A princess? Spades didn’t even have a princess. A treaty of some sort, then? Alfred doesn’t even know what sort of treaty a dragon might propose. All he does know is that so far, the great beast hasn’t been hostile.

The knight leads the way to where the dragon is laid out, in a clearing in the forest about half an hour’s march from the city. They hear it before it comes into view, its breathing rumbling through the air like a huge bellows.

Its scales are a vibrant, iridescent green, and shimmer like jewels in the sun. The dragon is about five times the size of a horse with a wingspan that covers half the clearing when it unfurls its wings. Though at first it’s wary, it seems to relax once more when it sees the Spades standard. The dragon’s head is framed by golden spikes which continue down its spine.

Beautiful, Alfred thinks. “I was told you wanted to speak to me,” he then says.

“I do, my King,” the dragon says, voice reverberating within Alfred’s head.

Alfred’s eyes narrow. Then he abruptly dismounts from his horse and steps forward. His suspicions are confirmed as the dragon smirks. “…Arthur?”

A purring rumble of affirmation comes from the dragon’s – Arthur’s – throat, and his head snakes forward. “What do you think?”

Alfred lets out a cry of amazement and rushes forward, hugging Arthur’s snout tightly. “Oh gods, Arthur! What- How- Did you get cursed?”

Arthur laughs, pressing his nose up against Arthur’s chest with force nearly enough to knock the King over. “This is the spell I was talking about a few nights ago. The spell we found in the ruins, the power that was seeping out.”

“Whoa…” Alfred runs a hand across Arthur’s cheek, marvelling at the texture of the scales. But how…?”

“The dragons are dwindling in numbers. Because of hunting and sickness and just time. They’re powerful, though. So much more powerful than we can imagine, especially with magic. They can fragment off a part of their souls and bond it with a human’s. The human then changes, becomes not quite human, not quite dragon, but able to shift into both. Able to further both legacies.” Arthur’s form shimmers and buckles, and a moment later Alfred has the familiar, slight figure of the Queen of Spades in his arms.

“Whoa… That’s really cool,” Alfred says, but he’s slightly distracted now that he’s got Arthur’s body in his hold to touch and caress.

Arthur chuckles again, knowing this, and leans up to press a kiss to the corner of Alfred’s mouth. “I’m home now, though.”

“Welcome home,” Alfred replies, beaming as he twirls Arthur around and then leads him back to the horses.

#hetalia #usuk #aph america #aph england #Hetalia Fanfiction #oneshots

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bookshopsandbentleys · 5 years

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Hello! I wanted to ask what are the big differences between the book and the tv show? I know that they have different endings, but what else is different or is cut from the book and wasn’t included in the tv show? Hope this isn’t much of a trouble

Oh, how detailed do you want me to get? I’ll do my best to hit on the main things, but I will say it’s been a few years since I read the book (and I think I only read it twice), and I’ve recently rewatched the show for the third time, so I might miss some things. All in all, the show is probably the best book adaptation I have ever seen, but there are some differences. Ok, here we go:

If you didn’t already know, they’re set in different time periods. The book, radio drama, and the tv series are all set during the year they came out, giving them all a slightly different spin on things, which I think is really cool. So, the book is set in the 90′s while the show takes place in the present.

Crowley’s in snake form in the first scene. Kind of a minor detail, but it’s what came to mind.

Gabriel is not in the book, though he is mentioned once.

The book explains some of the rare Bibles Aziraphale has, which is a really amusing part.

In the book, Crowley has a much longer drunk speech. He uses the metaphor of a bird sharpening its beak on a mountain to describe eternity in a truly spectacular fashion.

I’m pretty sure it’s implied that Crowley and Aziraphale aren’t the nanny and gardener. Heaven and Hell have another angel and demon doing those jobs and Crowley and Aziraphale are just observing. I think it makes much more sense to have them in those roles, though.

At Warlock’s birthday party, he steals a gun from a secret service agent and almost shoots Crowley, who isn’t paying attention. Aziraphale turns the gun into a water pistol without thinking about it and then is embarrassed.

CROWLEY BRINGS THE DOVE BACK TO LIFE, NOT AZIRAPHALE. (This might be the only change I actually have a problem with.)

Crowley does not slam Aziraphale up against the wall when he calls him nice. Instead, he interrupts him, essentially telling him to shut up. I’m not complaining about this change in the slightest.

When Aziraphale is describing the feeling of love in Tadfield, Crowley asks “Do you mean like-?” but then he hits Anathema, and everyone wants to know how that sentence was going to end.

We get to see a little more of War, Famine, and Pollution in the book.

Shadwell can hardly be understood.

The show doesn’t talk about Greasy Johnson and his gang (the rival gang of the Them). Fun fact: Greasy Johnson is also the third baby from the baby swap. The nuns had him adopted and he has a tropical fish collection.

The book does not include Crowley and Aziraphale’s love story through the years, and that is my favorite addition to the show.

Crowley did not write a memo to Hell accepting credit for the Spanish Inquisition. Rather, he received a commendation, had no idea what it was about, and when he went to investigate he was absolutely horrified.

There’s no dramatic break up scene and no Crowley begging Aziraphale to run away with him. Aziraphale’s just so caught up in reading the prophecies that they just don’t really talk. But when he figures things out, his first thought it to call Crowley before he realizes he should call Heaven, he wants to call Crowley.

We don’t see Aziraphale go to Heaven when he’s discorporated (actually, we never see Heaven or Hell), we just see him start possessing random people. This string of people includes a televangelist in the middle of a sermon.

Crowley doesn’t go mope in a bar. He sees Aziraphale’s notes in Agnes’s book and follows them to Tadfield.

The show leaves out the Other Four Bikers of the Apocalypse, and I can’t do them justice in this post. This is another one of the only truly disappointing changes, but I understand that cuts had to be made.

As ridiculous as the Newt and Anathema scene is in the show, it’s handled a lot better than in the book, where Anathema’s basically just like ‘Ok, Agnes says we have sex now, so let’s get to it.’ At least in the show it seems to be by choice.

It’s such a minor thing, but in the book, Death is totally out of this element when they’re starting the Apocalypse at the airbase because he doesn’t do technology, and it’s hilarious.

Since there’s no Gabriel in the book, it’s Metatron that shows up at the final showdown.

Satan doesn’t actually show up in the book. Adam puts a stop to him before he arrives.

Crowley steals a military jeep to drive home, and is sad that the music never changes to Queen.

As you already touched on in your question, there’s no final prophecy and no face swap. Heaven and Hell are too embarrassed and choose to pretend nothing happened.

Well, that was probably much more detail than you wanted. Sorry, I’m a super detail-oriented person. To make a long story short, the show is a brilliant adaptation; however, each adaptation of this story has something the others don’t. I wouldn’t say that one’s better than the other (though I have a hard time ever not choosing the original book over an adaptation), rather they both surpass the other in different areas. I strongly encourage reading the book and listening to the radio adaptation, if you have not done so.

#good omens #go book #go tv series #crowley #aziraphale #ask #anon #book

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celticfeather · 4 years

Link

Chpt 1 Here

Chapter 7: Yatagarasu

-Uchiha Itachi-

Itachi dragged his thumb through the blood and smeared it to a pattern on the dirt. Smoke overtook the scent of blood, and he saw soft light gently reflect on scaled black claws. Itachi did not know if he could trust his partner to help him, but the alternative was death.

"Bring me Kisame."

The four-spiked eye of a martyr blinked animally, and the toothy choanal slit inside its beak separated the fading light as his messenger cawed its obedience. Air and dust from the downstroke puffed against his face, and Itachi was terrifyingly, relievingly, alone.

Itachi focused on breathing. In and out, like the waves on the sand of the mangrove shore. He wanted to cough, but some still-reptile part of his brain advised him that was unwise. The vibrant world of the sharingan had faded in the sad colors and weak detail of an ordinary human eye, and then to something less than that. Itachi did not know if he closed his eyes, he did not know how blind he was, some things he saw from multiple angles at once... He drew gentle swirls with his fingers in the mud. Tiny Vs like rising crows, no, they were gills, three tight chevrons next to esurient silver eyes. Why was there mud beneath him? The summer was hot and dry.

He could see a dead weasel on the ground next to him. A convocation of crows gathered in an impatient funeral. With plunging swordlike beaks they tore out the weasel's tongue. They raised its tiny black eyes, tender as berries, and the nerves slithered down their throats. A crow hopped over the corpse's ribs, it had three legs. They tore open Itachi's chest and bore into his heart and all was hot and red, and then, nothing.

He heard a hiss. Samehada, no, heal him damn you!

He felt wind on his face, and his head swung dizzily, though he didn't remember telling his legs to move. The being who smelled of ocean's salt took him somewhere; its humid scent was unfamiliar to him.

Two strange tall birds looked at him. One was orange with violet eyes and the other was violet with orange eyes.

"He needs a healer," the breath of salt sailed to the violet bird.

"I'm a sensory ninja. Not a medic. But there's a doctor in a village nearby."

The world shifted as the ocean bowed. "I'm sorry for assuming."

Shivering steel chilled Itachi's wet skin. A bee stung him on the arm. Someone gave him a glass of orange juice with a straw. It was sweet, tangy and delicious, bright as an orange blossom on a mud puddle. His attention drew to this glass of juice, and his surroundings sharpened. He became aware of a stranger in a white coat in the background.

"The IV will ease the desanguination. However, proceeding further has drawbacks..."

"Like what?" the ocean voice said.

Itachi was out of orange juice. He tried to get the doctor's attention, but he was busy. A blue hand gave him another juice. What a kind hand.

"Chakra-healing him will cause permanent scar tissue damage in his chest cavity. If we go through with this, he could have endurance problems for the rest of his life."

"And if you do nothing?"

"The internal bleeding will rot his organs, and in two days, sepsis will kill him."

"Please do all you can."

The doctor placed his cold hands on Itachi's bare chest. He felt he should have shivered, or flinched, but his body would no longer respond to its nervous impulses. A pulsing like ripples on a puddle spread across his body. It warmed his limbs like alcohol but dispelled the delirium like icewater.

Itachi coughed the blood clot that previously must have held his lungs together. The doctor grimaced.

"Excuse me," Itachi apologized through bloody teeth, looking up at an unfamiliar doctor from the red soaked towel.

The doctor's eyes traced to the medical-waste bin adjacent the chair, and Itachi deposited the towel there.

"How do you feel?" the doctor asked.

Itachi did not feel like answering. He looked instead at the two other menacing individuals in the room with him.

"You are, as usual, praised for your discretion," Konan, the violet crane, told the doctor in what was both thanks and a threat. She drew a black velvet pouch from her robe and paid him in gold coins. It seemed Konan at least was unconstrained by Kakuzu's budget. The pleased doctor accepted the gold without concern.

Itachi examined the treatment room. The equipment was modern, but it was on the ground floor of an ordinary building, with mud walls, and a glassless sunny window. Konan and Kisame stood backlit. He had thought he'd seen Pain, but their leader had not accompanied them to the doctor if he had been there at all. Itachi was not sure what he had imagined of the last hours and what was real. In as subtle a way as he could, he pressed his fingertips over his own eyelids, his tongue against his palette, to make sure they were real. That no crows had picked them out.

He looked at Kisame, his silver eyes were like cautious mirrors. In front of this doctor and Konan, Kisame's expression maintained a perfect mask of normality. Itachi was tempted to probe his thoughts, cast aside the flimsy tin shields guarding the man's mind and dive beneath. He could do it, but he didn't.

The three Akatsuki exited the building. Konan, tall for a woman at his height, walked on his right side with Kisame on his left. Her amber eyes slid to Itachi with aloof concern. "Who did this?"

"Anbu got a hit in while we slept. We took care of them," Kisame answered for him.

"It happens. Have someone professional clean your robes," she advised. She gave them each a gold coin. Little did she know they were already loaded with stolen cash. But they took the gold anyway.

She flared her angular paper wings, and Konan left the fire and water pair to their devices.

"Do we stink?" Itachi asked, turning the gold coin.

"Yes. Well, you do. I can't smell me."

The chakra healing left Itachi feeling disquietingly whole, minus a tightness in his chest. It had been since his Leaf Village days that he received effective treatment. The closest the Akatsuki pack of killers had to a field medic was Kakuzu, and well… fortunately Itachi had never needed his reattachment specialty. Or Sasori, who after a battle might aloofly recommend a certain plant. 'A purple mountain bloom with heart shaped leaves, but chew only its roots, for the pistil metabolizes a stealthy toxin when combined with hydrochloric acid…'

A stealthy toxin.

Kisame gave him a wary, perhaps expectant, side eye as the two men walked silently abreast.

"A question for you, Kisame."

"Yes?"

"You do understand, entrapping me would not be wise for your health," Itachi warned, eyes straight forward.

"You think I set you up."

"I entertain the possibility. You repeatedly asked me about the Infinite Tsukuyomi, interrogated me on the whisper of disagreement, and Zetsu reported it to Madara."

A daring smile. Kisame halted on the path. "Why don't you just look in my head and find out?"

Itachi used no genjutsu on Kisame. When he didn't, Kisame spoke.

"When you disappeared from that orchard, I imagined you and our leader had some Uchiha secrets to discuss. Or you pissed him off. That raven of yours found me, and with one look at your sorry carcass, I knew that you definitely pissed him off.

"But, if Madara wanted you dead, I would not have been able to help you."

Kisame's statement did not exactly exonerate him of double play. Obviously Madara had still had a use for Itachi in letting him live, and therefore Kisame would be instructed to treat him. But it did explain Kisame's train of thought. He believed Kisame was innocent of conducting any purposeful snare against him, for now. Perhaps in asking his questions, the wandering Kisame had just been curious on his worldview. And Itachi realized, he wanted to investigate his partner's principles as well.

"What happened after Madara took you?" Kisame asked.

"Madara used his ability to teleport me somewhere, through some other dimension. We exchanged words, then blows. When he let me live, I vowed my hatred."

"Hopefully he'll credit your rudeness to you being delirious from pain," Kisame continued. "Otherwise, you've got a problem on your hands."

Somehow Kisame's chastation relieved him.

"I know," Itachi agreed. "You need not worry about me. I'll hunt this beast of his — I would prefer not to die."

A short, sure laugh from Kisame.

Itachi's contract with Madara stood: the Leaf would be safe from him as long as he fell in the Akatsuki line. And Itachi would do whatever it took to serve the Will of Fire. Itachi was, for better or for worse, a master of small evils.

"In my hallucinations, I saw the three-legged crow, Yatagarasu. In the myth of my country, he heralds the emergence of gods," Itachi said.

"You've got some weird religion in the Leaf," Kisame dismissed.

"What is the folk religion in the Mist?" Itachi asked.

"Our elders say the world was born on the back of a giant turtle. And when that turtle dies, the world will sink back into the sea."

"So you learn how to swim," Itachi noted.

"I'm not saying I believe in giant turtle gods."

"What does Hoshigaki Kisame believe in then?"

A grunt, apparently.

Kisame was a being on the hunt, the hunt for some sort of belief system. He sought belonging in serving something greater than himself. So he attached himself to Akatsuki and the Infinite Tsukuyomi. Without it Kisame had no purpose and no self.

No, that last part was false.

"Thank you for helping me," Itachi said. "I apologize for accusing you of betraying me."

Kisame looked away from him and said, "Not a problem."

Itachi viewed the sky with his Sharingan. He searched for the ultraviolet aurora of the earth's magnetic field. Perhaps in a peaceful century, the Uchiha clan would reveal to scientists that this was the mystery of how birds migrated: they could see these magnetic, purplish, static in the sky that indicated latitude and north. But Itachi's ancestors taught him early to never reveal exactly how the Sharingan worked to outsiders. The magnetic field hazed in a weak aurora far to the northern horizon, indicating that they were further south than previously.

"Where exactly are we?" Itachi asked.

"Can you smell it? Land of Tea," Kisame answered.

An idea germinated in Itachi. It would be on the way. He thought of banished Susanoo, who wandering earth after his crimes, found his greatest weapon, his Totsuka Blade, in the belly of a giant serpent he had slain.

"I would like to speak with someone here."

"Never took you for one good at making friends."

"I'm not."

"Anything I should know about them?"

"If he licks you… bite him."

Kisame, expression amused, gestured for Itachi to lead the way.

In a few hours, the two dangerous men had arrived in an equally dangerous place.

With his Sharingan, Itachi noticed a small camouflaged snake emerge from a crack, flick its tongue, and recede. He was unsure if his target would answer his summons but it was worth trying. No, he would be answered. This man's greatest sin was curiosity. He would not be able to resist wondering why Uchiha Itachi was on his doorstep, even if it killed him.

The stonework hidden under the jungle vines began to tremble. Itachi had not seen this individual since their last clash in the Akatsuki. Itachi had paralyzed him with a glance and struck his body full of rods. He had not even needed the Tsukuyomi.

A slender white-skinned demon stepped from the revealed earthen cave. His venom-smooth androgynous voice coursed unruffled to the two ninja.

"The young crow approaches the snake at its den. Not how I expected your revenge, Itachi."

"If I wanted you dead, I would have done it already," Itachi commanded.

Orochimaru, somewhat more diplomatic than Itachi, narrowed his eyes. An uneasy wind blew between the two Leaf Rogues as Orochimaru waited for more information. Itachi was too merciless to speak twice.

"Orochimaru of the Sanin," Kisame broke the silence, stretching his lips over his teeth and maintaining eye contact in something between a greeting and a threat. "Good to meet you at last."

"And who are you?" the Sanin returned.

"Hoshigaki Kisame, formerly of the Hidden Mist. A pleasure."

"Mhm," Orochimaru hummed smug as a song, and his vertical pupils traced back to his main interest. The question was an insult: the most knowledgeable being in the five nations surely already knew who Hoshigaki Kisame was.

"I require information," Itachi said. He had reserved fatal judgement on Orochimaru at their last encounter in hopes that this Sanin's talents could be subverted. And one way or another, Itachi would collect his debts.

"Concerning?"

"Forbidden jutsu."

A sly, approving, perhaps flirtatious noise. "You know who to ask."

Orochimaru headed into his dark den, exposing his back in a gesture Itachi found coquette and arrogant. Orochimaru turned his head for Itachi to follow, and paced forward into the darkness. Kisame made eye contact with Itachi, sensing the matter was far more personal than it seemed. Perhaps Kisame's pause confirmed that he was welcome.

"Come," Itachi said. They needed to get away from where Zetsu could see them. And, he could use an ally's eyes in a house of the enemy. Itachi was not arrogant enough to think he was above being outsmarted by an Orochimaru with years to ruminate against him.

Like down the esophagus of a snake, the two rogues walked an earthen corridor after Orochimaru. Flaming sconces gleamed green on modern scientific equipment, and animal specimens lined the walls in glass jars. The jars contained mostly reptiles, but Kisame looked at a shark pup and a crow, and back at Itachi.

In the belly of his lair, Orochimaru halted before a green flaming hearth in a great stone hall. Library halls of tomes and scrolls stretched behind him. He faced Itachi with the flames at his back.

"How truly desperate you must be to come to me for wisdom, Itachi. However… my knowledge has a price."

Itachi did not come to trade.

"I've come to reap your debt. Your cooperation is wholly optional." Itachi's Sharingan spinned Mangekyou.

The fire at the hearth extinguished and it was completely, disorientingly black. Itachi and Kisame were blind. Itachi could not use his genjutsu without light. But he knew snakes could sense heat signatures as precisely as an eye could light. He felt Kisame tense next to him, and his arm reach for Samehada.

Stay calm, Itachi thought at Kisame. He would feel it in his body.

"There's no need for that," Orochimaru deescalated from the darkness. Apparently he had changed his mind on the payment.

"Good," Itachi maintained curtly. "We will continue this discussion in the light."

The green fire returned. Samehada slid back into its hilt. Itachi's eyes retracted to their normal red.

"So," Orochimaru said.

"Tell me all you know about the Second Hokage's instant transportation technique."

An amused purr. "Teleportation. My, my, who has got you on the run, Itachi?"

"We've got places to be," Kisame maintained. The Mist ninja was right.

Itachi cared little about being on time for their next mission in the Land of Rivers. But he had to conceal the exact target of his question from both Kisame and Orochimaru. Madara had no doubt used something related to the Second Hokage's technique for his dimension-hopping. And until Itachi had a way to bind Madara to this plane, Itachi knew he would lose their next fight.

"As much as I respect the Second, it was the young Fourth who was the true master of space-time techniques," Orochimaru said, stepping towards his library.

"I understand. The Flying Thunder-God technique gained the Yellow Flash a run-on-sight order from the enemy alliance, and created the illusion that he was in multiple places at once."

"You are not completely uneducated," Orochimaru pulled a scroll from the wall.

"I would also like to know how to disable it."

Orochimaru paused. "You mean, how an enemy could theoretically stop the Fourth from transporting himself."

"Yes."

"There is some research into this."

"By who?"

Orochimaru pulled a second scroll. "Minato himself. However, Minato's research went incomplete. It involved a sealing jutsu currently unreplicatable."

Orochimaru opened the scroll to Itachi. On it was written a simple character in a brownish ink.

"Human blood," Itachi noted. Aged.

"Minato's blood, specifically. Unfortunately, as you know, Namikaze Minato has been a corpse for thirteen years."

"There must be another way," Itachi said.

Orochimaru closed the scroll. "You could ask him."

"Make no jokes, or worse, threats, Orochimaru," Itachi warned.

Orochimaru dipped his sly head without submission. "I apologize."

Itachi examined Minato's blood scroll. "Are these two all you have on the transportation subject?"

"All that would be of succinct use to you."

Itachi turned the scroll in his hand. He would keep them both for study. Orochimaru was too wise to comment or object.

"We'll be taking our leave now." Itachi said.

"A moment."

Orochimaru presented Itachi with a snake's egg. It was rubbery and pill shaped, rather than hard and tear-drop shaped like a bird's.

"If you need to come here again, do be polite and use this."

Fair chance Itachi would awake to a snake hatchling poisoning him in his sleep, or find himself strapped on the demon's dissection table when activating it. But Itachi accepted the egg anyway. Same as the original Orochimaru, it could be researched, repurposed, or destroyed.

Itachi walked out of Orochimaru's lair, the two scrolls under his arm, purposefully slow and dominant. Then he and Kisame ran briefly in the daylight trees, not wanting to dwell in Orochimaru's territory, and slowed again to a walk when they thought themselves far enough from any possible backstabbing. Kisame extended the first of the two scrolls before him.

"'Mark the jutsu formula on the target...' how are we supposed to use this? We can't teleport ourselves to this country if we've never been there before."

"Indeed we cannot," Itachi said.

"Well!" Kisame closed the scroll with unusual enthusiasm. "Too bad your transportation idea didn't work. I suppose we'll have to travel to the Land of Rivers my way."

As he spoke, Kisame looked through the jungle trees at the emerging ocean.

Your way? Itachi battled a sinking premonition. "Does it involve giant sharks?"

"No."

Good.

"Just one question for you, Itachi."

"Yes?"

"Have you ever taken over a ship before?"

Author's note:

Aaand next up is chapter 8, the KisaIta zany sea adventure!

Many thanks to beta SilverLion for her help reviewing this chapter!

Thank you readers for being patient with this chapter. I had an especially difficult time navigating current world events and I had to leave my home. But it's important to weaponize your creativity when you're stuck in the unknown. Please share this story with your friends if you like it, and let me know what you think :D

Steadfast,

Kelto

#campfires #itachi #kisame #kisaita #akatsuki #fanfiction #naruto #celticfeather

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thecactifindahome · 4 years

Text

“I mean, d'you know what eternity is? There's this big mountain, see, a mile high, at the end of the universe, and once every thousand years there's this little bird-"

"What little bird?" said Aziraphale suspiciously.

"This little bird I'm talking about. And every thousand years-"

"The same bird every thousand years?"

Crowley hesitated. "Yeah," he said.

"Bloody ancient bird, then."

"Okay. And every thousand years this bird flies-"

"-limps-"

"-flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak-"

"Hold on. You can't do that. Between here and the end of the universe there's loads of-" The angel waved a hand expansively, if a little unsteadily. "Loads of buggerall, dear boy."

"But it gets there anyway," Crowley persevered.

"How?"

"It doesn't matter!"

"It could use a space ship," said the angel.

Crowley subsided a bit. "Yeah," he said. "If you like. Anyway, this bird-"

"Only it is the end of the universe we're talking about," said Aziraphale. "So it'd have to be one of those space ships where your descendants are the ones who get out at the other end. You have to tell your descendants, you say, When you get to the Mountain, you've got to-" He hesitated. "What have they got to do?"

"Sharpen its beak on the mountain," said Crowley. "And then it flies back-"

"-in the space ship-"

"And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again," said Crowley quickly.

There was a moment of drunken silence.

"Seems a lot of effort just to sharpen a beak," mused Aziraphale.

"Listen," said Crowley urgently, "the point is that when the bird has worn the mountain down to nothing, right, then-"

Aziraphale opened his mouth. Crowley just knew he was going to make some point about the relative hardness of birds' beaks and granite mountains, and plunged on quickly.

"-then Nevada still won't have finished counting their ballots!"

#a good omens joke? in 2020? it's more likely than you think #the tracker says they GAINED 40k more votes to be counted in the last two hours with no change in vote totals #nevada that mouse you trained to count ballots fucking sucks #us politics

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voicethatmademecry · 5 years

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“I mean, d'you know what eternity is? There's this big mountain, see, a mile high, at the end of the universe, and once every thousand years there's this little bird-" "What little bird?" said Aziraphale suspiciously. "This little bird I'm talking about. And every thousand years-" "The same bird every thousand years?" Crowley hesitated. "Yeah," he said. "Bloody ancient bird, then." "Okay. And every thousand years this bird flies-" "-limps-" "-flies all the way to this mountain and sharpens its beak-" "Hold on. You can't do that. Between here and the end of the universe there's loads of-" The angel waved a hand expansively, if a little unsteadily. "Loads of buggerall, dear boy." "But it gets there anyway," Crowley persevered. "How?" "It doesn't matter!" "It could use a space ship," said the angel. Crowley subsided a bit. "Yeah," he said. "If you like. Anyway, this bird-" "Only it is the end of the universe we're talking about," said Aziraphale. "So it'd have to be one of those space ships where your descendants are the ones who get out at the other end. You have to tell your descendants, you say, When you get to the Mountain, you've got to-" He hesitated. "What have they got to do?" "Sharpen its beak on the mountain," said Crowley. "And then it flies back-" "-in the space ship-" "And after a thousand years it goes and does it all again," said Crowley quickly. There was a moment of drunken silence. "Seems a lot of effort just to sharpen a beak," mused Aziraphale. "Listen," said Crowley urgently, "the point is that when the bird has worn the mountain down to nothing, right, then-" Aziraphale opened his mouth. Crowley just knew he was going to make some point about the relative hardness of birds' beaks and granite mountains, and plunged on quickly. "-then you still won't have finished watching The Sound of Music." Aziraphale froze. "And you'll enjoy it," Crowley said relentlessly. "You really will." "My dear boy-" "You won't have a choice." "Listen-" "Heaven has no taste." "Now-" "And not one single sushi restaurant." A look of pain crossed the angel's suddenly very serious face.” ― Neil Gaiman, Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch

#good omens #crowley #aziraphale

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alltheprettygirlsintheworld · 5 years

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Love and its decisive pain

My entry for day seven of @ineffablehusbandsweek

Day Seven Prompt: Eternity/Destiny/Ineffable

Words: 1248

Summary: Crowley had thought he was dreaming. That first night, the night the world hadn’t ended. Aziraphale, his never-make-an-unplanned-move, quiet, slow-paced angel, had sat down next to him on a bus that would not be going to Oxford.

On Ao3 here

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Let me tell you about dreams.

The falling, spinning, twisting nature of them. The shifting from one place to another, from one person to another. The joy and terror that could come from a single night asleep was something that the real world hardly ever emulated. In the moment, as long as you can remind yourself not to think, everything makes sense, no matter how odd or confusing it should be. Whatever happened was just how it is.

Crowley had always dreamt, had always imagined.

He had chosen to dream of an angel. Of curled blonde hair and ethereal blue eyes, of white tartan outfits and old books. Most people didn’t remember their dreams- Crowley could never forget his. Could never forget the way that Aziraphale kissed him softly and called him “dear.” There had been other dreams too, of bare skin and lips and hands and so much more that Crowley would not think about while sober.

Sometimes though- sometimes the dreams were too close to reality. Too close to how Aziraphale’s eyes would light up when Crowley offered him the last bit of his dessert; to the slight smirk and flushed cheeks that accompanied an evening of drinking.

Crowley had thought he was dreaming. That first night, the night the world hadn’t ended. Aziraphale, his never-make-an-unplanned-move, quiet, slow-paced angel, had sat down next to him on a bus that would not be going to Oxford. Aziraphale had sat down next to him and taken his hand. Crowley hadn’t said anything, he had been tired and he didn’t want to say something that might ruin this. So, he stared straight ahead, tracing small circles on Aziraphale’s thumb as neither of them spoke, the silence heavy between them.

Let me tell you about time.

There is a story that was written in the eighteen-hundreds (Aziraphale would know the exact date, but Crowley only remembered hearing it). The story said that somewhere out there was a mountain of pure diamond. It takes an hour to climb and an hour to try and go around it. Every hundred years, a little bird flies up to the mountain and sharpens its beak on the tip. The story says that once the bird has chiseled the entire mountain away, the first second of eternity will have passed.

Crowley had been alive for an awfully long time.

He had pecked at the mountain that was Aziraphale for millennia. A bite to eat here and there, a temptation every once in a while, every peck a whisper of words that he dare not say aloud lest the angel turn from him.

How could Crowley go slow when every atom in his body had been telling from the first day they met that they belonged together?

He would say something about pulling the angel vaguely towards him, how he had temped Aziraphale into sin with lunches and late nights at the bookshop. But the reality was that he was only tempting himself. Only testing his self-control. Trying not to brush off the drop of wine on Aziraphale’s lips with a kiss.

Aziraphale was holding his hand and, while they had done that before, out of necessity and out of custom, it had never been like this. Not the I need you here with me, please don’t go away again, I don’t think I could handle it if I lost you again that Crowley tried to convey with a squeeze to the angel’s hand. Aziraphale squeezed back, a soft sigh leaving his lips as he rested his head on Crowley’s shoulder and closed his eyes.

Let me tell you about eternity.

The vast, spiraling infiniteness of forever. Too grand and large for any being ethereal, occult, or otherwise to properly comprehend. What was the essence of eternity, the essence of time? What or who determined how long was forever?

Crowley couldn’t answer that. Those were questions that Aziraphale would go into at length and talk about for hours, and still not be able to provide a solid answer.

What Crowley could say was this: a small eternity passed as they sat together. As they rested, joined at the hand and hip and shoulder, letting themselves be still together for the first time in the little of eternity that Crowley had experienced. The bus pulled up in front of Crowley’s flat, and they stood up together, walking hand-in-hand into the cool night air of the city. The door of Crowley’s flat unlocked automatically as he stepped up to it, opening itself so they could walk inside. Crowley let go of Aziraphale’s hand, trying not to quiver at the slightly disappointed look in the angel’s eye.

“I’ll be back soon, just give me a minute to change, clean up.” Crowley had whispered. Aziraphale nodded, understanding in his eyes. Crowley had gone to his rather large bedroom and miracled the ash and soot dirt off of his body and changed his clothes. He could have miracle himself a new set, but he needed the feeling of removing them, of removing the burned remains of bookshop and Bentley and replacing them.

Crowley returned and found Aziraphale standing in the middle of his plant room, staring up at the vibrant green leaves (they straightened up as soon as they saw Crowley at the edge of the room). Aziraphale gently stroked a leaf, an expression of wonder on his face. And to Crowley, well, Aziraphale looked every bit like an angel from a renaissance painting. Striking and beautiful in the dim light. Crowley cleared his throat, letting Aziraphale know he was there.

“Hello again my dear.” Aziraphale smiled at him, and the wall that Crowley had been holding up between them for the past fifty years crumbled. He strode into the room, took the angel’s face in his hands, and kissed Aziraphale they way he had wanted to for millennia, surprised and delighted when the angel kissed him back with a matched passion. Aziraphale reached up and removed Crowley’s glasses, letting them fall to the floor as he angled his head to deepen the kiss. It was not the first time they had kissed either, but it was the first one where both of them were free to feel and express everything that had gone unsaid.

Let me tell you about ineffability.

A plan too divine, too holy to be properly understood. A cosmic queen on a multidimensional chess board.

But love was also ineffable. A demon falling in love with an angel on the gate of Eden, an angel realizing he had fallen in love with a demon in the rubble of a church. Crowley apologizing, begging for Aziraphale to run away with him, and Aziraphale forgiving him, but refusing to leave. Crowley, heartbroken on the ground in the book shop and then racing towards his angel just to make sure that he was alive. Ineffable was a demon falling asleep with an angel in his arms, and waking up to find him still there, realizing that it wasn’t a dream. Ineffable was them tricking heaven and hell so they could stay alive, for themselves and for each other.

“To the world.” To you, to you and me and us together.

After dinner they Crowley had taken them for a walk in Berkeley Square, and when he was absolutely certain nobody was watching, had kissed Aziraphale underneath the branches of an oak tree. Why not, he had six thousand years of longing behind him.

And eternity to make up for it.

#Ineffable husbands week #ineffablehusbandsweek #ineffable husbands week 2019 #Ineffable Husbands #Aziraphale #Crowley #Day Seven Prompt: Eternity/Destiny/Ineffable #Dreams #eternity #destiny #ineffable #title from hozier #good omens fic #good omens fanfiction #also on wattpad

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