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abarbaricyalp · 2 months

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I thought there was a Post-TFATWS space, but there's not, so have another Free Space fill! @sambuckylibrary

Based on a Daily Fluff Diary post! // cw: injury in the last section // AO3 Link

Knock Before Entering

It's not that Joaquin hasn't seen them make out before. It comes with the territory of spending long amounts of time with two people not only deeply horny for each other, but also just deeply in love. He tries not to think about it. Tries to forget that Barnes clearly needs an outlet for adrenaline after a fight. Tries not to pay attention when a closet door shuts on the jet. Tries to ignore the eyes Sam shoots Barnes that has them both vacating a shared space.

They're good about it. Don't get up in each other's space intentionally when he's around. Barely even touch if they're all sharing a room. One time, Barnes had even slept on the floor instead of sharing a bed with Sam. Though Joaquin had woken at some point in the night and found Sam's arm hanging off the bed and Barnes's arm reaching up so they could hold hands anyway. At least it was his prosthetic arm, so Joaquin assumed he didn't need to worry about a blood rush.

The point is, it's not a secret that Sam and Barnes are together. And they're usually pretty good at keeping to themselves.

Which is why it shouldn't be surprising but certainly is when Joaquin walks back into Sam's office from hunting down the new drone prototype he'd been reporting on and finds Sam half sprawled across his desk with Barnes crowded between his legs, following him down.

Joaquin smacks a hand over his eyes like a child. It means he drops the drone, but it's live, so it just hovers next to him. "Guys, gross!" he snaps, also like a child. It did kind of feel like seeing his parents making out for the first time.

_____

He can hear them spring apart, like it's a surprise that he's back. He'd literally been gone for five minutes tops. He just had to run to his room and get this. He'd told Sam where he was going. He hears a slight exchange of shoves and elbows before Barnes says, "Drop your hand, kid."

Joaquin does after several more seconds, when he's sure the coast is clear. Sam's behind his desk again, Bucky leaning a hip up against the side of it like he belongs here.

"Where did you even come from?" Joaquin asks finally when it seems like no one else is going to volunteer anything.

"World War II," Barnes answers like the smartass he is. "Brooklyn."

“I was gone for three minutes," Joaquin clarified through his teeth. He wants to sit down, thinks better of it, stays just inside the doorway. "What if I was someone else?"

Barnes's mouth quirks a little. It's as much a confirmation as Joaquin will ever get from the man that they are kind of their own little triumvirate. If it had happened under any other circumstance, Joaquin would be elated. Right now, he is not. “But you’re not, so relax, Tweety.”

Joaquin rolls his eyes and walks into the office, giving that side of the desk a wide berth. He sets the new drone down, along with a makeshift manual.

“Don’t go gettin’ attached to that side,” Barnes says.

“Don’t,” Sam warns.

But Barnes pushes on. “I’ve hauled him up on that side too.”

Joaquin doesn’t even both to groan. He just leaves the room again.

. . .

“Ready or not!” a small, but very loud, voice calls from somewhere else in the building.

Bucky ducks into Sam’s office because AJ is fast and if he doesn’t take cover now, he’s going to get caught. There’s a gorgeous wardrobe with a false back in the far corner, but Cass had hidden in there two rounds ago, so it’s likely to be one of the first places AJ looks. The desk is too much on AJ’s level for Bucky to hope to hide well under. By design, Bucky is too big to fit into the vents.

The curtains that hang from the windows don’t quite make it all the way to the floor, but Bucky figures his dark boots will blend into the shadows if he stands far enough to the corner. He can hear AJ’s sneakers on the tile, hurrying down the hallways and checking doors, so he jumps behind the curtain and tries to hold it still.

He jumps behind the curtain and directly onto Sam’s feet.

“Ow! Hey! I’m already here. Go find your own hiding place!” Sam hisses, shoving at Bucky’s shoulder futilely. Bucky intentionally digs his heels down into the ground. Sam glares at him, then takes a deliberate step closer. “If you don’t move, we’re both gonna get caught,” he threatens. “And you know AJ will go after you before he comes after me.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow in doubt. He was almost positive AJ and Cass were teaming up to find Sam, who had not been tagged ‘it’ yet in this game. Mostly because he kept cheating by using all his flight training to get up into the rafters where, even if he was seen, no one could climb up to tag him. Well, Bucky could, but it was too much work, honestly.

“I’m faster than you,” he points out. “And I’m not above tripping you.”

Sam rolls his eyes, leans in, kisses Bucky. It’s enough for Bucky to stop digging his heels in, but Sam gets just as distracted. Actually, instead of shoving Bucky out of the hiding spot, he halfway tries to climb up Bucky’s body. It sends Bucky stumbling back, the curtain getting tangled under his foot, and they both end up crashing against the window, curtain falling away in time for the office door to get pushed open.

“Ugh,” AJ says with so much disdain Bucky kind of can’t believe it. “I knew that’s what you two were doing instead of actually hiding. It’s no fun if you don’t try!”

“It’s all Sam’s fault.” Bucky accuses. The elbow into his ribs exacerbates the ache from falling into the window sill too. Still, he puts himself between Sam and AJ. “Go find your brother.”

“Nuh-uh,” AJ insists. “I found you two. I’m gonna tag you two.”

Sam snickers behind him, squirming away from the pinch Bucky’s trying to land on his hip. “You only need one of us,” he points out.

AJ’s mouth curls to one side with frustration. “I can’t find Cass,” he admits. “I need help.”

“Alright, alright,” Bucky concedes. He steps away from Sam, towards AJ. Waits for Sam to relax. Then he grabs Sam around the waist, holding him still so AJ can run forward and tag him as the next seeker, much to Sam’s loud protests.

“Cheaters!” he cries between laughter. “Betrayal!” But it is ineffective in the long run.

. . .

There should be no one else at the compound, so Bucky’s lazily making out with Sam in his desk chair, Sam across his lap. Joaquin is doing Air Force stuff, the other young heroes are out of state or busy, the older heroes don’t really hang out there. There are no meetings scheduled, no tours, no new introductions. It’s just him, Sam, and the sunshine streaming in from the window.

It’s been a while since they’d been able to do something like this. Cap duties had taken Sam away and Bucky had been pointedly kicked off of the jet. He was still piecing it together, but he thought it might’ve had to do with Hydra. Why he was kept out of the loop with those things, Bucky couldn’t begin to guess, but whatever. In the time Sam was gone, Bucky managed to get himself hurt (which is why he should’ve been allowed on the jet) and Sam had come back so exhausted that, even when they were alone, they mostly just took the security of each other’s company to pass out for hours at a time.

But a quiet weekend and a, so far, quiet week had done wonders and now Sam is getting handsy as Bucky absently pets his chest, over his shoulder, and back down his arm. Contrary to what Joaquin thinks, they haven’t ever actually desecrated the office, but Bucky’s willing to break the streak. Especially when Sam’s fingers fall to his waistband and begin to rub out the indentions of his jeans from his hips.

“Come on, let’s break in the desk,” Bucky cajoles, opening his mouth, deepening the kiss as he licks into Sam’s mouth with more intensity than the afternoon had called for.

Sam laughs unexpectedly, sits back, stares. Bucky can tell when the answer is going to be a straight no. This is not necessarily a straight no, which is almost hot enough to get the job done on its own. Sam’s a daredevil. An adrenaline junkie. People think Bucky’s the bad influence, but it’s not always his fault.

Sam’s just about to pass his judgment, is already moving off of Bucky’s lap to sit on the desk, when the door opens. There’s no one there, which has Bucky pulling Sam away, halfway tossing him towards the window for a fast escape. His mind is already racing with the potential threat–a smoke bomb, a grenade, some other small danger that he can’t see over the width of the desk. He hears Sam grab the shield, a sure, defiant presence behind him.

No bomb goes off. Instead, an orange cat jumps up onto the desk.

“Goose?” Sam asks, lowering the shield.

“Danvers’s cat?” Bucky clarifies. “Oh, shit. No, get down!” he shouts, lunging for the cat sitting on top of Bucky’s leather jacket. But it’s too late. The cat vomits tentacles and ray guns and a glove (or maybe a hand) and slime all across the desk.

“Argh!” Bucky shouts, yanking his jacket free, which makes Goose hiss and jump down. Too late for that, Bucky hisses back in his head.

It’s only a split second later that Danvers appears, just as Goose is running out. She watches her with surprise, then looks at Sam. “Cap, I need your help,” she says. Then her nose scrunches and she looks to Bucky and his jacket. “You need to get that cleaned.”

Bucky really considers throwing it at her.

. . .

The reporters are following Sam, who is trying to answer their questions but it’s weirdly difficult to when they’re walking on his heels. The smoke of the battle is still wafting off of him, which he can’t even smell because of the concrete dust in his nostrils. The cameras flashing in his face are doing nothing to help the migraine digging through his head. He needed a med crew to tell everyone he was probably concussed and to leave him alone.

“Captain Wilson,” someone calls. It still sounds weird to hear it. That’s not really his title, but he’d stopped fighting it after the first few months. “You saved more than a dozen people in midair. How did you react so quickly?”

Sam’s shoulders and back ache at the reminder. “It’s my job,” he says. “I’m supposed to save people. These wings aren’t just a fine accessory, y’know.”

“Captain, how did you figure this plane would be attacked?” someone else asks. His office is so close. The door locks now. He has a couch with a weighted pillow that he can put over his face and drown out the lights and the noise.

“When we realized the target wasn’t physical riches, but riches of the soul and mind, it was a quick hop to the plane carrying the summit awardees and delegations.”

“Mr. Wilson, you saved lives and hope tonight. How many future conflicts do you think you stopped tonight?”

“What?” Sam asks. The words just will not slot into a logical order in his mind. “I can’t tell you anything about the future. Very good people were targeted tonight to stoke division and fear. They were targeted by bad people to get back at other bad people. It was a wholly unfair situation. I am grateful for the lives we were able to save. The damage was still large and there’s yet more clean up to do that affects hundreds of other good people. Please turn your attention, time, and resources towards doing something productive too. You don’t need wings to make a difference.”

The reporters mutter amongst themselves and Sam uses the opportunity to get a hand on the door knob, a foot halfway into his office.

“Sir, is there any update on Sergeant Barnes?”

The image of the building coming down on Bucky as he evacuates civilians flashes through Sam’s mind like a hot sword. The crackle of his comm device as it went dead mid-sentence. The silence that followed. Sam’s heart begins to thrum uncomfortably in his chest, rising up to choke out his throat. He can’t cry on camera.

“As far as I’m aware, no one has made contact with Sergeant Barnes as yet,” he starts to say.

Then the door opens. Bucky’s standing there, looking like a sight. There are bandages wrapped around his head and half of his face is bruised into a sickly black and purple. He’s covered in gashes and scrapes. His right arm is wrapped in a sling. He’s hobbling with one boot on and the other foot and ankle wrapped in even more bandages. He’s clearly in so much pain that all Sam wants to do is shove him down on a bed and keep him asleep until the serum can repair everything.

“I was dug out by the same people I had just gotten out of the building,” Bucky chuckles at the camera, like this is a normal press conference. Actually, that’s not true. If this was a normal press conference, he would be in a back room somewhere, glowering at every reporter and cameraperson he saw. He did not like public speaking. But here he is, looking like it’s his natural calling. “They made quick work of it too. Dragged me off to a med-tent. Felt right at home, huh?” he says, directing the last bit at Sam, since it’s usually Sam dragging him to medical.

Sam can’t answer. Can’t breathe. Bucky’s alive. He’s moving. He’s swollen six ways to Sunday, but he’s making jokes. He was in Sam’s office. Waiting for him.

“Excuse me, guys and dolls,” Bucky says with a wry look at the media. Wry, even though the bruising. So unfair. “I gotta do something real quick.”

And then he’s kissing Sam. It’s awkward and too warm. Both of their faces are different landscapes after the fight. They both smell terrible. Sam keeps getting medicinal alcohol in his mouth and Bucky accidentally peels off two of the butterfly bandages on Sam’s cheek as he holds his face.

It’s one of the best kisses of Sam’s life.

This time, he doesn’t let anything interrupt them.

If you enjoyed this, please consider leaving a note or kudos on AO3

#sambucky #sam wilson #bucky barnes #captain america #sambucky fanfic #the falcon and the winter soldier #writing #sbvday2024

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bestworstcase · 25 days

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Do you think Weiss will get a romantic relationship?

i don’t think so, and i’m skeptical as to whether she is even really interested in romance at all; notably her core relationships are all with her family, winter and klein and whitley and (to a lesser extent) her mother. her interest in neptune in v2 is superficial and evaporates over his flirting with other girls in v3, and then in v9… lmao well

i know v9 was widely perceived as ship-teasing and the going assumption in the fandom these days is weiss/jaune endgame, but aside from the fractal ozlem problem there (both salems) what strikes me is that weiss specifically expresses physical attraction to jaune at the lowest point in his life; he looks like that because he’s been miserable and not taking care of himself for years. and then when he acts like someone who’s miserable and isolated and not taking care of himself weiss is like oh he’s crazy, we can’t depend on him, which he hears and gets understandably upset about. that fissure is repaired but that it happens at all speaks to a fundamental emotional disconnect.

like imagine the bees in an equivalent situation, if yang was stranded in time and aged several decades before blake found her again in such a haggard state—lank hair, prosthetic arm covered in rust, visibly exhausted. can you imagine blake’s first/only reaction being “yang looks hot!” in that moment? with weiss and jaune it’s played as a joke and the humor comes from weiss leapfrogging over “holy shit is jaune okay?” to “jaune’s hot!” and blurting out something completely insensitive. it’s very sun referring to blake’s avoidant self-destructive behavior in v2 as blake being “all… blake-y.”

and then

in terms of the fractal ozlem narrative—like, weiss is the girl in the tower who creates her own knight in shining armor. that’s the conceit. i think the point of her with respect to ozlem is to interrogate the idea that the girl “saves herself” by asking for help; weiss summons her knight but it isn’t the knight who rescues her, it’s klein—her father-figure—who helps her get out, which makes a pretty straightforward implication about salem. the girl who is her own knight leaves her tower through the genuine love of her father-in-all-but-blood; the only way for the girl to leave the tower without being saved is if her father is kind, and salem’s was not.

(<- which is all wrapped up in ozma’s self-hatred; he writes the fairytale as if the hero was merely the inconsequential tool the girl used to free herself because he feels inadequate—he died and left her behind, he couldn’t save her in the end, he was too cowardly to take her hand, therefore he never saved her at all and really she was the one who saved herself.)

anyway the point being, there’s a strong thematic incentive against giving weiss a romantic partner because her character poses this counterfactual question—what if salem didn’t need ozma?—which reifies that salem did need ozma, because her father was cruel and would not let her go. a salem who did not need ozma is necessarily matched by an ozma who did not need salem—they must be equals, always—and the question then is what would bind salem and ozma together if he is not her freedom and she is not his sanctuary. do they fall in love at all? probably not.

and it does look to me as though that’s where weiss’ character arc is headed, with how hard she’s taking the fall of atlas and the open question of what reclaiming the legacy of the schnee name from her father’s wrongdoing looks like now that the whole kingdom is gone

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xjustakay · 7 months

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(10/13) prompt: party — 1,160 words (so “your worst nightmare” and a zombie walk into a halloween party…) @jegulus-microfic

Regulus leans his elbows against the balcony railing, back facing the view so he can watch the Halloween party inside continue. Honestly, he’s still surprised he showed up. He knows why he did, of course —as much as he swore to his friends that it was for his brother, it’s not just that. He lifts his drink to his mouth for a slow sip, one brow arching as he notices someone dart past the sliding glass door to the balcony in a hurry.

Seconds later, however, the person backtracks —fully walks a few steps backwards from the direction they’ve gone to instead peer outside at where he stands. Naturally, he’s been found out in his moment of quiet solitude away from it all. And of course it’s James who’s had to notice him.

Rolling his eyes, Regulus lifts one finger from around the edge of his cup in some vague semblance of greeting. James seems to take it as an invitation instead of continuing on his merry way. Regulus isn’t willing to admit that he’s a little bit glad for a moment alone with him. God forbid he has to own up to his feelings.

James slides the door shut behind him when he steps out onto the balcony, a bright smile on his face. He moves to stand beside Regulus, facing the opposite direction so his hands can settle on the railing, like he needs something to do with them.

“Avoiding the party?” James asks.

“Considering I didn’t want to come?” Regulus retorts.

“Then why did you?” James challenges. He sounds a little too knowing, a little too sure of himself for Regulus’ liking.

“My brother asked me to.”

“No he didn’t.”

Regulus scoffs. “What do you know?”

“I know Sirius didn’t ask you to come. He literally told me he wasn’t going to bother because you think Halloween is annoying.”

As if his brother’s right there on the other side of it, Regulus glares at the glass door back into the apartment. Feels a blush color his cheeks and tries to cover it up with a long gulp from his cup. He doesn’t say anything more, but James is undeterred by his silence.

“What are you supposed to be anyway?” He asks, eyeing Regulus like he might be able to figure it out.

Wordlessly, Regulus half turns so the right side of his chest is more visible, then points at the sticker placed on his plain black t-shirt. It’s one of those stereotypical ‘hi, my name is’ ones with the blank square left for filling in. In Regulus’ handwriting, it says ‘your worst nightmare.’ James’ eyes land on it long enough for a quick read before he scoffs.

“Oh, come on, that’s so boring,” He complains.

“We can’t all be as obnoxious about Halloween as you, James.”

Regulus makes it a point to look him over. He’ll never admit it, but it’s actually a pretty awesome look he’s got going for him.

James fully committed to the costume choice perfectly, complete with torn clothes that are stained with fake blood and dirt, and special effects makeup that gives him fake open wounds in a couple places up his arms and one in his cheek that falsely exposes what are meant to be his teeth. Either James spent an extensive amount of time learning to do it for himself or he had McKinnon do it for him. Regulus is willing to bet it’s the latter, considering the undead football player the blonde is currently walking around as.

“It’s cool, right?” James asks, catching him staring at the prosthetic piece on his cheek.

Regulus isn’t giving him an inch. “Bit grotesque, actually.”

“Well, I am a zombie. They’re kind of gross on principle,” James muses.

“Yeah? And what’s your excuse on a normal day then?”

“You wound me, love.”

Oh, Regulus is not touching that with a ten foot pole. No matter how much his stomach suddenly swoops at the casual endearment.

“You’ll survive.”

“And if I don’t?”

“Then I guess you really will be a zombie.”

James’ eyes shine with mirth as he knocks his elbow into Regulus’. “If I were, I’d definitely eat your brain first.”

“Well, I’d eat your heart, so.” Regulus sniffs shortly, glancing at him sideways. It’s less a joke than James’ cheesy flirtatious intention, but the vague warning seems to do nothing to stop him from remaining lighthearted.

James pats twice at his chest with both hands before splaying his arms outward, grin unwavering from his face. “It’s all yours, Reg.”

Regulus squints at him over top his cup as he finishes off the remainder of his drink. He sucks his teeth after the fact, wholly ignoring the annoying pitter patter of his heart in his chest the longer he looks at the pleased expression on James’ face.

“I’m going back inside.” Regulus pushes off the balcony railing, needing to get out of James’ orbit before he flies too close to the sun and goes up in flames.

Before he can get too far, James catches him by the arm. “Hang on, you’ve got a bit—”

Unhelpable, Regulus’ eyes widen as James brings a hand to his face, wiping over his top lip with his thumb. Like it’s the most normal thing in the world. Like this is just a thing that they do.

James leaves his hand against Regulus’ jaw for a moment, smile turned soft with an unbearable affection that makes Regulus consider vaulting over the balcony’s edge. It’s just four stories, he could live, maybe.

“For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t consider you my worst nightmare at all,” James says, voice lowered.

“Right…” Regulus breathes.

Hazel eyes drop down to his mouth even as James’ hand falls away from his face. He turns toward Regulus more fully, fingers delicately brushing down the outside of his forearm.

Oh, this is dangerous. Regulus is going back inside. He’s walking away before—

The balcony door slides open, loud music and chatter spilling out into their charged silence.

“James, get in here. Sirius is drunk and thinks actually bobbing for apples is a quintessential Halloween party experience or something. You don’t want to miss it.”

“I’ll be right in, Pete.” James nods at his friend.

The door is pulled shut, muffling the noise of the party once again. Regulus clears his throat, shifting on his feet.

“You should go before my brother manages to drown himself in a bucket,” He mutters.

“But we were—”

“We were nothing.” Regulus moves to the door himself. Pauses with his hand on the handle to look back at where James suddenly looks notably disappointed instead of the consistently bright that he had before. “Please, I’m not kissing you for the first time while you have a fake hole in your cheek, James.”

James’ eyes slowly grow wider, his mouth twitching at the corners. “Wait—”

Regulus rushes back inside with his own secret smile before James can say anything else.

#jegulus #jegulus microfic #they’re so flirty and annoying and i love them dearly #this also was almost my original zombie prompt microfic but now it’s for party #-jazz hands-#kay’s microfics #kay’s writing

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ad0rebrial · 1 month

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I Can’t Breathe (Please Don’t Say You Love Me.)

Cross-posted on Ao3 under the same user!

Character:Sal Fisher

Warnings: Murder, blood, gore, violence, death.

Sal's gaze remained fixed on the door, its Ferncolor seemingly captivating him. He had been in this position for quite some time, completely motionless and devoid of any expression in his eyes. It was as if he had transformed into a statue, a peculiar figure standing there in an almost deranged manner.

Not like anyone was going to see him anyway.

One after another, each neighbor met their demise. They were perishing rapidly, akin to flies succumbing to the chilling touch of a steel knife. With utmost swiftness, he executed his stabs, ensuring they struck vital organs to expedite their deaths smoothly. Efficiency was paramount in his methodical approach. Yet, his actions were not driven by malevolence or pleasure; they stemmed from a sense of protection and necessity. He had no choice but to take such extreme measures, as the consequences of inaction would inflict suffering upon everyone. The weight of his task was not to be taken lightly. These individuals were not mere neighbors - some were cherished friends whom he held dearly and would never harm. Until now, that is.

He had a special place in his heart for someone truly unforgettable. This individual held a cherished spot in his life, as he adored every little detail about them. From their hair to their eyes, their scent to their fashion sense, their smile to their unique perspectives, they were his world. He had known them since the day he moved into the dreadful apartment complex. At the age of fifteen, they had moved in next door to him just a week after he had settled in. It was like fate had brought them together. Ash had introduced them to his circle of friends, and from that moment on, everything changed.

The moment they walked into the room, his breath caught in his throat. They were stunning, with features so striking that he couldn't take his eyes off them. Despite feeling a twinge of shame for his intense gaze, he found himself unable to look away. And then they spoke. Good Lord, their voice was like music to his ears. He couldn't help but feel a fluttering sensation in his stomach. It was a feeling he tried to suppress at first, but now, looking back on it, he has no qualms about admitting that their voice was downright sexy. As he got to know them better, he learned about their life before they moved to Addison Apartments, the type of music they loved, and their hobbies and interests. It was a privilege to get to know them, and he cherished every moment spent in their company.

he wished that he could take all of this back. He wished that things could end up differently. He didn’t want to do this, but he had no choice. He didn’t want to put them in any harm. He finally realized that this was his only choice, He broke down into misery. He didn’t want to hurt them, he didn’t want to hurt anyone. all of these people, including them are his friends, one of them being his lover, who has fallen into his deadly grasp of death itself. right next to his apartment which is listed as 402, stood your apartment, 403. You two are side-by-side. his eyes board into the three digits on your apartment door. He did not want to raise his fist to knock on your apartment door, knowing that you’d end up dead when he came out, he had to put on a fake act just to kill you right here right now in your very own home all by yourself your parents aren’t even here. Hell, he had even taken off his prosthetic mask just so that you wouldn’t be able to see the blood that was left on it by your dear neighbors. He pulled down his shirt over his jeans to cover up the blood that was on the hip of his jeans. You’re all by yourself nobody to defend you, even if you try to defend yourself you’d be trying to protect yourself from your lover, Sal Fisher.

when he knocked on your apartment door after standing there for so long, he could hear your footsteps creeping closer and closer to your front door. He dreaded that you were awake around this time. He thought that you’ll be asleep then maybe he’ll be forced to inside your own home and probably kill you in your sleep.

He would rather do that.

“Sal? What are you doing here?” he should’ve just killed you right then and there to make click and easy but he wouldn’t be able to do that. He just couldn’t. That’ll be too short. He had to look at the beauty of your face one last time he just had to he didn’t want you to die so quickly he wanted to be able to see you to hear you to be able to hug you, he wouldn’t be able to do that if you’re lying on the floor and your pull blood that will not be a pretty sight to see. He hates himself for this. He feels like some sort of fucking maniac. Well, he is a maniac now. But his point still stands.

“Yeah, I just thought that I would come over if that’s alright with you?” He said, forcing his voice to sound calm and collected, trying not to allow you to see what a monster he had become. he felt the knife in his back pocket. If you were just one of his neighbors and not his lover he would’ve sliced your neck right now, but in this case, you weren’t just a plain old neighbor or a friend— you are the love of his life that he hadn't killed yet, the one that made him feel alive, which was ironic at this point because he was going to kill you he was going to live. You didn’t understand you didn’t see it. You can’t see it. You don’t know the only one inside his apartment complex. You don’t understand that he is doing this to protect you, that made him feel alive, which was ironic at this point because he was going to kill you he was going to live. You didn’t understand you didn’t see it. You can’t see it. You don’t know the only one inside his apartment complex. You don’t understand that he is doing this to protect you, you will never understand because you'll only see him as a murderer. An emotionless murderer who killed your friends, your neighbors and now he’s gonna kill you.

“Aww, now you know I won’t mind! Come on, I made some spaghetti!” You said as you took his cold hand in your own and dragged him into the comfort of your home. The feeling of your hand nearly made him break down into pathetic tears. He realized that he wouldn’t be able to feel your warmth ever again after this.

Sal sat down at the dinner table as you got the two of you’s plates ready. He couldn’t believe that he was sitting at your table right now, getting ready to eat with you before taking your life. The pit in his stomach grew.

he remembered the first time when he tried your cooking you claimed that you’re cooking wasn’t all that good but when he got a piece of it in his mouth, he disagreed completely. He remembers when you both were younger he would nearly go to your house and have dinner with you and your family almost every night or so it wasn’t only just your family cooking that was good, but it was yours too. he shared how he would come over and get himself a small plate of your cooking because he loves it so much, even if it’s just a plain basic meal he would get up and get some seconds. There was no doubt that he would miss cooking. He will miss everything about you. The smell of spaghetti filled what was left of his nose as you sat a plate full of spaghetti right in front of him and a glass of some tea. You sat down across from him on his right.

“How has your day been?” You asked him with a smile as you put some more cheese on your plate.

“Good,” that was a bullshit lie a pitiful lie, a dumbass lie he knows that his day was not fucking good. He knows that his night went fucking terrible as if he didn’t just kill 14 people in this apartment complex. He knows what he’s doing. “what about yours?”

“It was…okay. I’ve just been pretty lonely.” You said with a soft shrug. Yeah, your parents have taken a trip and you didn’t want to go. He wishes that you did. “But when you came all of a sudden, my night has gotten better!” You added on. He stared into your eyes longingly. You always look so heavenly he loved you so much. He does. He wants us to and he doesn’t want to make you guys so quickly. He wants to be able to look at you. He was available to be with you this last time. There isn’t any tomorrow, there isn’t any day after tomorrow. There just isn’t. He has to make this your last day on earth and his last day being able to look at you this way.

he doesn’t want you to leave. He doesn’t want to be the one to take you out of this world. He wants to be with you forever if he kills you, he loses everything. He loses himself. He loses his sanity. He loses you.

Wait, he has to remember that he’s doing this out of protection. Yeah… he’s doing this protection. He does not enjoy doing this to his peers. He does not enjoy any of this. He has to remind himself of that. He doesn’t like doing any of this, right?

… he isn’t crazy. He is fine. He isn’t crazy. He loves you more than you’ll ever know, right?

Does he love you?

Does he enjoy killing?

…No. He doesn’t enjoy it. He hates it. But that’s what truly makes him mad? he isn’t insane. No, no, no.

Oh, how dreadful he truly is. How mad he truly is. how disgusting he truly is. He’s nasty. He’s dirty.

Sal feels his mind start to spin. It got faster, and faster, and faster, and faster, and faster and faster. he felt his hands get sweaty. He felt his head hurt. He felt his mouth become dry. He felt dizzy. He felt sick.

Is this what madness feels like?

Is this what the loss of sanity feels like?

No. Nononononononono. He isn’t mad. He isn’t insane. He is completely fine. If anything, he was smart. he was very smart for doing this. Now, he can protect you.

Or was he?

Sal started to grow pale in the face. He started to sweat in the face now. His eyes grew blurry his breathing quickened. No, he has to keep his cool, or else you’ll suspect something. He didn’t want you to suspect anything of him right now. He couldn’t. So he tried to hide the fact that he was losing his cool. His act is not working right now. He tried to intake, deep, steady breaths, but they all came out shaky and quivered.

“Sal? Are you okay..?—“

“Yes. I’m fine.” Fuck. For fucks sake he replied to your worry too quickly for your liking. His voice didn’t come out smoothly either. Instead of that, it came out as wavering and slightly cracked. “S-Sorry, I’m just thinking about…about…YOU!” He suddenly said loudly. “I-I mean…yeah, I was thinking about you…”

Despite him acting so strange you smiled at him. This does show that you never cared about the way he acted or the way he looked. That’s one of the reasons why he fell so hard for you. You didn’t pay attention to looks, you paid attention to character.

looks like it was collapsing around him. Your smile was driving him crazy. He won’t see your smile ever again. He won’t be able to see you happy like this ever again. No, he has to calm down. He’s getting so worked up. The dizziness, the heavy breathing, the headache, the sweating, the pain, the feeling of dread, the feeling of insanity— he couldn’t allow this to affect his plan. He planned that he’d get you to go to bed and then from there, he would kill you as swiftly as he could. you wouldn’t feel a thing due to you being asleep. His nails dug into the rips of his jeans. He tried to get all of this stuff, but he just couldn’t calm me down. He struggled against his mind, his self, his issues, his problems, his dread— he tried everything to get the stop! Why wouldn’t leave him alone? He didn’t want to end this way, he didn’t! Calm the fuck down!? why is he struggling this fucking bad? Why!?

NO! You looked over at him with much more worry this time. You had tried to call his name but he wouldn’t answer to you. Now, you done caught up to him. You caught up to the fact that he was acting strange by the second.

No…No. No. No. No. No. No. NO! This can’t be happening—he had everything under control! He planned this all out mentally with the last hits of sanity he had within him but why does it just crumble down into pieces? Why is it with you he feels up with so much anxiety like this? He already knows your fate but why is his plan faltering? WHY IS IT NOT GOING THE WAY HE WANTED IT TO GO!? He wanted to make sure that you don’t feel ANY pain! So—so why!? Why is he struggling so badly right now!? Why did you have to catch on!? Why didn’t he just slit your fucking throat right then and there as soon as you opened the door!? Why was he so desperate to see you? To see you one last time!? Why!? Oh fucking god—fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, FUCK!—

You let out a loud high-pitched scream of terror as Sal whipped out the knife that was snuggled in his back pocket and shot up right from his seat. Before you could try to run out of your seating he grabbed you in an iron grip and pulled you right back. You thrashed around helplessly as your free hand clamped around his wrist that held the knife. Sal’s eyes stared down into your fearful ones, his eyes blown out. You then forced the impact of your body into his own, making him release his grip on you as he fell backward onto his original spot in his chair. This also caused the plates of barely touched spaghetti to hit the floor and caused the plasters of the noodles and sauce and broken glass of the plates to fly down onto the floor. You ran right out of the dining room and into your bedroom, slamming the door shut loudly.

“SAL..! STOP IT! Tears streaming down your face were a painful reminder that the doors in this wretched place could only be locked from the outside, leaving you defenseless. With all your strength, you pushed against the door, using every ounce of your body weight to keep him out. It felt like a never-ending tug of war between you and Sal, as he relentlessly tried to force his way in while you fought to keep him at bay. The fear in your voice grew louder as you shouted, pleading for him to stop and wondering why he was behaving so aggressively. The door swung back and forth violently, causing your heart to race with each slam and open-close motion. Amidst the chaos, your eyes caught sight of a nearby chair, and you quickly grabbed it, dragging it towards the door. With trembling hands, you strategically placed the chair beneath the doorknob, creating an additional barrier to hinder Sal's entry. Watching the chair's presence, you hoped it would be enough to keep him out and provide you with a momentary sense of safety.

Should you jump out of the window? Hell no…it’s too far down you’ll die.

There were no good hiding spots in your room. Absolutely none. There was underneath your bed and the closet but both of them weren’t good enough…

Your ears caught a sound of scrapping and stabbing and you turned only to see that he was making fucking dents in your door. Your eyes widened in horror at the knife exiting in and out of your door as you saw pieces of wood fly out of the door. You rushed towards your closet and pushed it open, squeezing yourself in and shutting closed. Due to your closet doors having lenses, you had to squish yourself up against a corner and hide amongst the many clothes you had in there, trying to keep yourself unnoticeable as much as possible. Your heart felt like it was going to burst out of your chest due to its beating. You still couldn’t bring yourself to understand why Sal was doing something like this…why was he trying to kill you? Why? He was fine yesterday, and for the rest of the day, he was fine! But what could’ve possibly happened to make him act this way? You held a hand over your mouth as you squeezed your eyes shut.

A feeling of dread washed over you as the sound of the door creaking open reached your ears. How did he manage to enter unnoticed? The chair you had placed as a barricade was right there, and yet he found a way in. Panic set in as you realized the vulnerability of your situation. The room was eerily quiet, even though it was evident that he had infiltrated your sanctuary. Fear gripped you, as you pondered the possibility that he was patiently waiting for any sign of movement to pounce on you from your hiding place. Uncertainty clouded your mind, leaving you clueless about the appropriate course of action. All you could do was maintain absolute silence, hoping that it would somehow protect you.

Please…any strong deity out there, please keep me safe. Please keep me out of the hands of this monster. Please, please…I beg of you. Please give me strength, please allow me to make it out of here alive and unharmed. Wrap your arms around me and shield me from the danger. Keep me safe. Please protect me with your shield and all of your strength. I beg of you, please just—….

In an instant, the words of your prayer ceased to resonate within your mind, leaving you stunned and speechless. Your eyes widened, capturing the terrifying scene before you. Waves of agony surged through your heart, causing it to beat rapidly against your chest. Fear consumed every fiber of your being, rendering you completely paralyzed and incapable of even the slightest movement or blink. As if in response to your terror, a sudden gust of wind swept across your face, sending a shiver down your spine. The frigid touch of the wind mingled with the dampness of tears staining your cheeks. With an unwavering gaze, you looked up at the figure that greeted you, only to realize that it was not the divine entity you had fervently prayed to for salvation. No, this was a monstrous being known as Sal Fisher.

At a speed faster than light, Sal aggressively seized a handful of your hair, causing you to emit a painful scream as he forcefully pulled you from your hiding spot in the corner of the closet. Your terrified cries echoed through the room as you struggled against his firm grasp. Despite your efforts to resist, he managed to get you on your feet as you continued to push back against him. "STOP! LET GO OF ME! LET ME GO!" you yelled out in desperation. Sal gazed down at you with one eye wide and fixed on you like a predator. The two of you collided with the walls, dresser, and mirror in the room as the intense struggle unfolded. With a menacing growl, Sal forcefully pushed you to the ground.

As tears streamed down your face and sobs escaped your throat, you found yourself engulfed in an overwhelming wave of despair. Sal, on the other hand, remained motionless, his gaze fixated upon you without uttering a single word. His presence seemed hauntingly still as he stood there, his eyes locked upon you, seemingly dissecting every emotion that poured out from within you. Despite the torrent of tears and the overwhelming anguish, your vision remained clear enough to perceive Sal's unwavering stare, which seemed to penetrate through the depths of your being.

Just as if he had been anticipating it, he positioned himself on top of you, causing you to struggle for breath as you desperately attempted to distance yourself from him. With a firm and forceful grip, he clutched onto your shoulders, his intense gaze fixated upon you. Tears streamed down your face as you gazed up at him, silently pleading for him to release you from his grasp and allow you to be.

“…You look pretty. Even when you're like this.” Sal said softly. His voice was still as sweet and gentle as ever. He raised a hand away from your shoulder and onto your wet cheek. His blue eyes stared down at you, looking at your teary-eyed ones. it was true you did look so pretty in this moment despite the fear written all over your delicate face the way your tears shined in the moonlight, making it visible the way your eyes were puffy and red, and the way you were practically tumbling underneath him. How could he not say that you looked so pretty?

“W-Why are you doing this…!? Sal, what has gotten into you..!?” You shouted in a panicked tone. Oh, how he wishes that he can give you a straight answer. He doesn’t know what’s going on with him either. It’s either he does or he just doesn’t want to tell you because he knows that it’ll break your heart if he did. But hasn’t he already done enough damage? What’s any different about it just by him telling you what has gotten into his mind? I guess you can’t say that he is terrified of telling you the truth despite the damage he has already done and is about to commit to doing.

“…All of them are dead.”

“W—What…?”

“You heard me, Y/n. All of the people inside this joint are dead. It’s just me and you.”

Sal saw how your face had gotten pale. If you weren’t scared shitless before now you are. Did your friend? Your boyfriend? Kill the residents inside of the Addison Apartments..? Did he do that…? But why? He couldn’t have possibly done something like that!

To be completely honest, you were completely oblivious to the situation at hand. The mysterious phenomenon of the Red Eyes spreading throughout the vicinity was entirely foreign to you. It was all because Sal deliberately kept you in the dark, ensuring that you remained ignorant about the eerie happenings. Once your relationship with Sal evolved beyond mere friendship, he took it upon himself to shield you from the sinister activities unfolding within the confines of the apartments. His main objective was to safeguard you from the unknown entities lurking behind the walls. Presently, he is actively engaged in fulfilling this duty of protecting you.

“No…”

“Yes.”

“No..! Sal, stop it. You’re scaring me!—“

“What don’t you fucking understand?” Sal sneered down at you. Were you stupid? Slow in the mind? What don’t you understand? He’s not doing this just for fun or out of pure malice—he’s doing this to protect you! You shouldn’t be scared of him, you should be afraid of the Red Eyes that are spreading across Nockfell. Not HIM. “I’m protecting you! I’m the one keeping you safe and this is how you repay me?”

“KEEPING ME SAFE FROM WHAT!?” You screamed in his face. You glared daggers at him. “YOU’RE THE ONE WHO TRIED TO ATTACK ME! THE ONE WHO TRIED TO KILL ME! I'M MORE SCARED OF YOU THAN ANYTHING!” You cried out. Scared? Of him? You were fucking unbelievable.

“The Red Eyes, god damnit! I need to stop the goddamn spread! You're acting like I wanted to do this—I’m hurting too. I don’t want to do this, okay? You don’t realize how much resilience it took me to bring my ass over here to YOUR apartment door just to get you like this!” Sal’s voice bounced off the walls as the iron grip of his hands on your shoulders made its comeback once more. You winced as he continued to shout and screech in your face, claiming that you were the one who needed to understand this.

What the hell was he on about? His words seem to emanate from a disordered mind, for fucks sake! How he forcefully grasps you, bellowing in your presence, bears no resemblance to the composed and gentle Sal you have known throughout the years. Never before have you witnessed him raising his voice in such a manner, nor experienced his ironclad grip or witnessed him behaving in such a manner.

“GET THE FUCK OFF OF ME!” You shouted suddenly before grabbing a fallen hard-cover book and swinging it at his face. The sudden collision to his face made Sal fall on the ground to your left, also relinquishing his grip on the knife he had. The knife clanked on the dresser and you stood up on your quivering legs. You snatched the closest thing that you could reach and that was a metal baseball bat. It belonged to your late grandfather back when he used to play baseball. You still remember the day you showed it to your friends including Sal. It was horrendous that soon this precious item would be used to defend yourself against someone that you love all so dearly.

Sal rose to his feet, his gaze widening upon witnessing your firm grip on that formidable baseball bat. Were you contemplating striking him on the head with it? Surely not... it is evident that you possess a prudent caution, rendering you unwilling to commit such a bold act. Sal’s eyes made contact with did silver gleam of the knife before taking a lunge to grab it at once.

In a swift motion, you tightly shut your eyes and raise your metallic weapon, forcefully bringing it down upon his head before he even has a chance to fully grip the rough handle of his knife. The impact is met with an excruciating screech of pain from Sal, one that is undeniably unbearable. As the blow connects, he can feel the warmth of his blood trickling down from his wounded head, slowly making its way down his face. This agonizing sensation only intensifies the already persistent headache that has plagued him ever since he arrived in this place. Despite the excruciating pain in his head, his hand wavered as he finally grasped the handle of the knife. You let out another war cry before swinging it towards his already deformed face. Why the fuck did you choose to strike him in that specific spot? Wouldn't it have been more suitable to deliver another blow to his head rather than subjecting him to further damage on his already severely injured face? Hell, I guess you didn’t care where you hit him in the first place. Sal's agonizing cries echoed through the air as the bat made contact with his body once more.

“YOU’RE NOTHING BUT A MANAIC!” You shouted at him. Your voice boomed off the walls of your room. “YOU ARE FUCKING INSANE! YOU’VE GONE MAD COMPLETELY! THE OUT OF YOUR DAMN MIND!” You belittled him in such a manner.

He was deeply appalled by your audacity to utter such words to him. It is unjustifiable for you to label him as mad, crazy, insane, or even a maniac. He is none of those things. On the contrary, it is you who displays signs of irrationality, madness, and insanity. It is utterly incomprehensible how you could treat him in such a manner, especially because all he was attempting to do was safeguard and protect you. Your behavior can only be described as ungrateful and despicable. It is important to note that following your hurtful remarks and attempts to belittle him, he underwent a sudden and drastic change in his mental state.

You were filled with a sense of dread as he suddenly pounced towards you, knocking you off your feet and onto the bed where you both landed. "YOU WILL NOT TREAT ME THIS WAY! I AM NOT INSANE!" He yelled in your face, his voice growing louder and more strained. Sal lifted the gleaming silver blade of the knife and held it menacingly over your stomach. Your eyes widened in terror and disbelief. "NOT YOU! NOT ASH! NOT TODD! NOT LARRY! NOT LISA! NOT MY FATHER! NO ONE!" The blade descended, piercing your stomach and causing you to emit a strangled scream as blood rose in your throat and spilled from your mouth. With a swift motion, Sal withdrew the knife from your abdomen only to stab you again, eliciting another cry of excruciating pain. He continued to stab you repeatedly, the sheets beneath you becoming soaked with blood as your weakened body struggled to fend off his relentless attacks. Your feeble hands pressed against his chest, a futile attempt to shield yourself from his merciless assault.

Sal was breathing heavily, his eyes fixed on you as you gasped for air and struggled to catch your breath. Your hands were clenched into fists, covered in his blood-soaked shirt, as he leaned in closer towards you. He gazed at you for a brief moment, recognizing your presence. Sal slowly wrapped his arms around you protectively before planting a ginger kiss on your cold cheek. “I-I-I..can…t…breathe…—“ Those words left your mouth so weakly. Sal smiled down at you despite the pain in his face due to the metal bat’s impact.

Sal's words echoed in your ears, "I love you." The sheer shock of his confession caused your eyes to widen in disbelief. How could he possibly love you? Was this some kind of sick joke? The audacity of him to utter those three words to your face like it meant nothing. It became apparent that he truly didn't care about the consequences of his actions if there were any. It seemed that he took pleasure in observing you gasping for air, desperately trying to hold onto the fragments of your crumbling life.

“P…Please….d-don’t…s..say..you…love m…me.”

Sal’s eyes widened at your words. What do you mean? No, you weren’t supposed to say that. You were supposed to reply by telling him that you love him too… not that. You were never supposed to say that. No…How could you? How could you do this to him? In your last breaths, you’re just going to tell him that!? After he saved your fucking life you’re going to look him in his face and say something so heartless!?

“…You ungrateful bitch.” Sal glared down at you. “After I saved your damn life you’re going to say that to my face? I should’ve slit your throat right as soon as you opened your door, that’s what I should’ve done. YOU'RE NOTHING BUT UNGRATEFUL!” Sal screamed at you. He stared down at you as he panted heavily.

…

Sal’s eyes squinted as his brows furrowed slightly.

…

“Y/n?” He moved the fallen locks of your hair out of your face softly, rubbing his thumb on your cheek.

“…Did I…kill…” Sal’s eyes started to water in utter horror as he continued to stare down at your lifeless body. You were no longer warm—you were cold. “…Did I kill, Y/n…?” Sal whispered to himself. He shook your body softly, patting your cheek. Sal shoved his head into your neck before letting out a cracked scream of horror, his arms hugged you tightly. “NO! NONONONONO! IM SORRY! IM SORRY! OH FUCK IM SO SORRY, Y/N!” Sal let out an excruciating sob that was muffled, his shoulders shook as screams and sobs ran through his body. He took your life. He took you away. He took you away from your friends. He took you away from your family. He took you away. He took you away from this world.

He took you away from himself.

He was aware of your overwhelming fear and understood that his drastic appearance would only intensify it. The thought of encountering him in such a state terrified you to the core. All you yearned for was his return to a state of serenity and rationality. Deep down, you were well aware that he was not alright. Right from the beginning, you sensed that your boyfriend had lost himself, and this realization instilled fear not just for his well-being, but for your safety as well. Despite these fears, you decided to let him enter your home for one final conversation, knowing it could potentially be a risk.

Sal looked over at your window as he heard the sirens of police cars. He saw the flashing blue and red lights shine so brightly through your window. He turned back over to your lifeless body.

He knows that he definitely will not be getting a visitor in prison.

#sally face oneshots #sally face #sally face imagine #sally face drabbles #sal fisher #sally face angst #sal fisher x you #sal fisher x y/n #sal fisher x reader #angst #hurt no comfort #tw death #sally face x y/n #sally face x you

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snowe-zolynn-rogers · 5 months

Text

Pairings: None

Word Count: 1,997 Words

Summary: The daycare crew are having a normal night. Or so they think.

Warnings: Injury, Blood, Gore, Amputation, Stabbing, Broken Bones, Eye Trauma, Bruises, Waterboarding, Aftermath of Torture, Aftermath of Violence, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Controlled Shock, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Prosthetics, Blindness, Partial Blindness, Trauma, PTSD, let me know if I should add anything else.

Abnormality

Tonight was unusually…normal. Sun was cleaning up the daycare for the day. Moon helping with things that needed fixing like the one bent bar in the play structure he was currently bending back to normal. Lunar was preparing for tomorrow like he usually did.

The only thing really missing was Solar. He wasn’t sitting at the security desk taking inventory of the children pre-checked in for tomorrow. Usually Solar would take great pride in making the list and taking note of any children with accommodations and making sure everything needed for the accommodations were taken care of.

But he was notably absent. None of the three had noticed this until almost halfway through closing procedure since Solar was usually to himself about it. But his occasional muttering that was not there was weird not to hear at this point. It was unnerving not to hear it, hear him giving little chuckles when the known rowdy or rambunctious kids were on the list.

“Sun, have you seen Solar today?” Moon asked.

“No, why, have you?” Sun responded almost immediately, almost as if he’d been waiting for the question to be asked.

“Guys, if Solar’s missing or something, we’ve gotta find him. He’s our brother too!” Lunar told them from where he was just finished with the coloring pages and crayons.

“I agree. I have to patrol soon anyway, I’ll go look-“ Moon was cut off by the heavy daycare door being opened and a form collapsing on the ground. It was a barely recognizable figure but he still knew exactly who it was.

The collapsed heap on the floor was dripping water, blood, and oil. Their right arm entirely missing with wires exposed and fizzling still. Their hair was clumped and tangled with water and oil and blood and what looked suspiciously like acid of some kind.

Their back had two knives stuck into it still, their face sitting against the floor with their clumped hair shrouding it. Their clothes were waterlogged and bloody and oily. Moon could also visibly see that their leg had been broken in two places at minimum.

“What the-!” Lunar screeched, looking at the person in horror at their state. In truth, Moon was shaken by it too. He knew he’d have to fix it, but the sheer amount of injuries was horrific. He couldn’t imagine how they felt.

“S-Solar?” Moon asked, shakily kneeling by him and moving his hair off his face. Moon almost vomited at the sight. Solar’s right eye was hanging from it socket and he had a large stab wound in the other, which was fizzling with severed wires.

“Please, no more.” Solar had a fraction of his voice, his voice box sounded broken and crushed, actually. And it was letting out white and jarring sounds as he begged for an end to the torture that had already ended.

Moon could see the damage to it visibly. His throat had handprints on it, deep and bruised in already. It sent fire through him. He wasn’t scared anymore, he was absolutely livid. He gently held Solar’s remaining hand and he didn’t care that his hand got covered in liquids as he put his hand on Solar’s head and pet his hair as best he could.

“You’re okay. You’re safe, Solar.” Moon tried to assure him.

“Please, Crescent, stop!” Solar’s voice broke and whirred like gears and a few musical notes played in Solar’s distress. But the words had hit Moon harder than Solar’s panic.

Crescent? The same Crescent he’d ran away from? Moon felt a whirl of emotions as he got Solar into his arms as carefully as possible, avoiding the knives that would have to stay in for now. They hadn’t just basically allowed Solar to be tortured all day with their neglect to check on him, but they’d left him at the mercy of his abusive brother who had somehow managed to get through dimensions.

“That’s…Solar…” Sun’s horrified voice came from nearby and Moon nodded to tell him he was correct. Moon could hear Lunar throwing up into one of the trash cans.

Moon felt something before he saw it, having been touching Solar. It felt like jolts. Moon’s horror grew seeing Solar had a few sparks and glitches before Solar let out a scream, filled with glitches and whirs as a controlled shock wracked his body.

With his proximity and contact, Moon felt the volts of it and it made his endo ache with sparks but he refused to put him down. He refused to let his brother hurt alone. He tightened his grip to give Solar what comfort he could and held him until the shock ended.

Solar fizzled and jolted with aftershocks, his body twitching and his mouth leaking oil and blood at the toll the shock took on his already battered body. He didn’t deserve this but Crescent had decided he did for whatever reason.

“Sun, take care of Lunar. I need to fix him.” Moon told him and called his fly wire. The hallway to his room would be too long of a walk. So fly wire to get up to the balcony it was.

Moon was at this for hours, Sun and occasionally Lunar coming in to check on them. But finally Moon had fixed Solar as best he could.

Solar’s leg had been set, the endo fused on the breaks and plating put in to support it. His new ‘prosthetic’ arm was tuned successfully and connected properly to Solar’s wires and his systems. Moon had managed to replace Solar’s right eye but the wires in the left weren’t salvageable so he’d put in a spacer replacement eye until he found a way to fix the wires and replace the eye properly.

Moon was working on washing Solar’s hair and face off the blood and oil when Solar finally woke up from his temporary power off. Solar jolted up, fighting something Moon couldn’t see and screaming once he felt the water and washcloth on his face and protecting his head.

In a blind panic, Solar swiped at Moon’s arms and it caused him to drop the bowl of water he was holding onto the floor but Moon gently held Solar’s hands, shushing him and slowly calming him down.

“Don’t do that again! Please, Crescent, please!” Solar hiccuped.

“He’s not here, it’s okay. It’s me, it’s Moon. You’re safe, Solar.” Moon assured him, bringing him up to sit so Moon could hold him.

“I…I was so scared…” Solar’s voice broke and it made Moon’s heart ache.

“I’m so sorry, Solar. I’m sorry we weren’t there when you needed us. But Crescent will never hurt you again, I promise.” Moon assured him, rubbing his back.

“N-No water. No more water.” Solar sniffled.

“Why no water?” Moon asked. Then the realization dawned on him. The water in Solar’s artificial lungs that he’d had to siphon out. The way water had only doused Solar’s face and hair.

“He waterboarded me. Please no water.” Solar hiccuped.

“Okay, we’ll use the sanitizer station instead. That way there’s no water.” Moon assured him.

“Don’t leave.” Solar whispered.

“I’m not leaving. None of us are leaving you alone. Not until we get that asshole and make him pay.” Moon rubbed his back as he helped him up. Solar was shaky on his net fixed leg but Moon held his arms around him to support him relearning to use the limb properly.

Moon got him to the sanitizer station and went in with him since he wasn’t stable yet and let Solar hide against him as the machine beeped and filled the pod with sanitizer mist.

Solar trembled a little bit Moon made sure he was comfortable against him and pressed his head against Solar’s, tucking Solar’s face into his neck. The machine whirred and dropped down the machine that Moon carefully put Solar’s hair into for it to use steam and sanitizer to wash it out.

For how scared he’d been, Solar was being incredibly brave at the moment, letting the machine clean him without water while he clung to Moon. Once Solar was sanitized, Moon grabbed a towel once the machine stopped and wiped off Solar’s face softly, avoiding his mouth and nose so it wouldn’t send him into a panic again.

He wrapped the towel around Solar after and led him out, drying him off of the mist and more so hiding his body so Solar felt like he had the security of not being nude. Moon didn’t mind to see his siblings naked, but Solar was newly traumatized, Moon didn’t want to add another layer of stress to the situation.

“I have clothes for you in your room. Do you want me there or to help you?” Moon asked.

“I can do it.” Solar told him. “Stay outside?”

“Of course.” Moon agreed, leading him to his room and Moon stood outside waiting as Solar shakily closed over but didn’t shut the door.

“How is he?” Sun whispered.

“He’s alright now. I’m gonna kill Crescent and present Solar his head as a trophy. The damage was so extensive I had to replace most of his internals.” Moon whispered back.

“It was that bad? It didn’t look that bad…” Sun looked at the closed over door in confusion. Sun was right, it hadn’t looked as bad as it had been.

“A lot of blunt force trauma to his internals. His abdomen was beginning to swell by the time I found the bleeding because it was so full of oil and blood.” Moon sighed. Solar had been in such horrible condition, he was glad he’d had enough parts on hand to replace everything and his computer had been able to synthesize new parts and the prosthetics.

“Moon? Sun?” Solar asked, slowly opening the door. Thankfully he’d managed to get dressed successfully, and he hadn’t needed help. Moon was a bit proud, he thought it would take longer for Solar to accustom himself to his new eye and new arm.

“Hey, Sol.” Moon gently brought him in for a hug.

“I’m really hungry. Can I eat?” Solar asked.

“Yeah, I knew you would be. I replaced your stomach. I told Lunar to make something light so you don’t stress all the new internals.” Moon smiled. He would be happy for Solar. Protective more so than normal, but happy Solar was home and he was safe and recovering.

“What did he make, do you know?” Solar asked.

“Well, he knows your food sensitivities so he made smoothies and chicken and pasta soup for dinner, I think.” Sun piped up.

“I’ll have to thank him.” Solar gave a little smile as he let the twins lead him to the kitchen in the break room that was usually for the daycare kids but they used it as their own kitchen as well.

“You don’t need to thank anyone for anything, we’re your brothers. We love you and we want to see you healthy and happy. Doing these things for you like making you food or fixing you even are small in comparison to how much you mean to us.” Moon ruffled his hair and Solar couldn’t hold back the teary smile and Moon loved seeing him smile. Solar was such a hard-working sweetheart, it was nice to see him relax and be taken care of , especially after something so horrible happened to him.

“I hear my big brothers!” lunar called out.

“Yeah, you caught us.” Sun chuckled.

“Get those tall butts in here and get your food. I already fed the kitties too.” Solar gave a laugh as he pet one of the cats sitting on the far end of the counter.

“Hi Ratchet.” Sun greeted his cat.

“My god, his name is Ratchet?” Solar asked with a laugh.

“Well, there’s Ratchet, Hatchet, and Bubble.” Sun told him.

“Moon?” Solar asked for Moon’s attention.

“Yes?” Moon asked back with a little chuckle.

“We’re never letting Sun name a cat ever again.” Solar snorted.

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rukafais · 5 months

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This is maybe a complicated question but what sources (which for this purpose includes both novels and sourcebooks) would you recommend for learning about drow lore?

For Forgotten Realms drow lore specifically... I haven't read all of it by a long shot! Keep in mind that Menzoberranzan is one of many cities while you read these!! I haven't gathered all information about what different drow cities are Out There, but out of what I've read, I would recommend:

Sourcebooks:

Drow of the Underdark (SECOND EDITION DND, this is the TSR one. You want the one written by Ed Greenwood, NOT the third edition sourcebook of the same name). Some of it is editor mandated (such as prosthetics) but it's still a pretty good source. Should be available on archive.org or floating around on websites, I don't know if you can actually pick it up physically anymore.

Menzoberranzan Box Set (AD&D box set): Available on archive.org if you can't find it elsewhere. No account needed. Explicitly expands on Menzoberranzan-as-trade-hub, more details about the Houses, etc., all things that don't fit in novels.

Underdark (3rd edition supplement) - Play supplement for the Underdark. Expands more on non-Menzoberranzan locations and Underdark adventures and resources.

Out of the Abyss (5e adventure module) - covers a lot of the Underdark, including Menzoberranzan. You get a snapshot of Menzoberranzan in 5e as well as a bunch of other Underdark stuff.

Novels:*

War of the Spider Queen (Dissolution, Insurrection, Condemnation, Extinction, Annihilation, Resurrection): Six books, takes place during an event called the Silence of Lolth. Varied perspectives. Gives different views of various parts of drow society.

Liriel's trilogy (Daughter of the Drow, Tangled Webs, Windwalker): Three books by Elaine Cunningham. Very different protagonist from Drizzt, gives some context and greater fleshing out of the conditions priestesses go through in Menzoberranzan.

Side stories: Rite of Blood (prequel), The Direct Approach (takes place mid-trilogy), Answered Prayers (epilogue). You can find Rite of Blood in Best of the Realms vol 1. Direct Approach and Answered Prayers are in Best of the Realms vol 3, which can be found online in (cough cough) places, I don't think it's in print any longer. Drizzt's books: The character that quite literally started it all in Forgotten Realms, at least as far as drow publishing history goes. If you're buckling in for the marathon: Here is a slideshow of what to expect, with a text transcription.

Here is a reading order.

If you just want a crash course to get basic Menzo lore into your face:

Dark Elf trilogy (Homeland, Exile, Sojourn only if you're invested in Drizzt's story because that's his story of how he gets to the surface). Generations (Timeless, Boundless, Relentless). Generations revisits the Homeland timeline from the view of Jarlaxle and Zaknafein, both characters you'll be introduced to in the Dark Elf trilogy. *There is also Lady Penitent, that follows on from the end of WotSQ. I have read it, but it's not included in my overview because it explicitly addresses drow lore about their origins that as far as I can tell has been retconned as the editions advanced. However, if you are interested in reading it regardless, it is a trilogy with the books Sacrifice of the Widow, Storm of the Dead, and Ascendancy of the Last.

Peripherals:

(insert screaming about polyhedron and dragon magazine, i haven't even begun to go through all that yet, but if you want another example of a 'good drow' in the 2e era that isn't Drizzt, I recommend Polyhedron 97 which you can find here, which gives an example in Dusk, a drow tutor.)

ANYWAY UHH hope this helps a bit lmao. There's so much! And a lot of it is not consistent between editions either!

#rukamemes #theres so much and i have yet to go through it all #b

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lovelywingsart · 3 months

Text

//AU// Final Revelations

-- Karl Heisenberg X OC (AFAB, She/They) --

This one is a lil short but I finally had the mental power to work on and edit... Maybe not the best, but I like it more than others!

Also: If you've read my updates before, that means yes- this is actually the 'final' written story until I start on the new sketch comic which will be the actual fight itself and takes place after this! It will be a monumental task and we'll see how long it takes me ALSKDJSAS-

Anyway, enjoy a smol chapter update!

**Remember, check out the Masterlist for more!**

-----

Warnings?: Mention of lies with explanation(and what those lies were), mild hostility, not much else???

Summary: The time has come, and meeting with the other current survivors is necessary... But so is confessing.

The sound of crumbling ground and curling mold was everywhere, filling what had once been a deafening silence after screams and gunfire. Long black tendrils covered the fields and houses, with Lycans running amok and even dying by the vary substance that created them as it erupted at random and impaled the poor creatures that ran over it. Emelia scurried her way through to a small clearing on the outskirts of the village itself, her chest heaving with occasional snarls and screeching at the creatures if they crossed her. She barked orders at the creatures in their own tongue to make them move, not slowing her own movements for a moment.

She had to hurry... She had left the now empty scrap metal heap left in the field of the factory once her family was safe, listening to the other sounds around her. ANY other sounds that weren't the ones that filled the air. Anything that could tell her where the rest of the small group of mutants remained.

She had ordered her son and partner to run. To go back to their hidden home. They HAD to run. The boy was far too young to fight, and his father... Her throat tightened as she heard frantic speaking above the mold as she neared the smallest clearing. His father had died once already. The man was worse for wear, barely walking by himself with the mangled prosthetic he managed to pull with him at the last second.

He was angry... He was PISSED. Pissed he wasn't able to fight like he wanted to, like he planned for years on doing. It stung him worse than being murdered by the very one those plans were for, but even he knew he had no choice with the state he was in. And so the two boys ran to a place the parents had only discussed while she chose to fight, a decision that even she wondered was for the best now- but she still had work to do. She made it known.

She came to a sudden, choked halt as she finally caught sight of the group she had left to meet, first noticing the now frazzled, once-white dress of Alcina. Her gaze moved between the remaining three Lords, her heart beating out of her chest with an angry anxiety as if finally settled on the one who brought them together-

Winters.

Ethan Winters.

The man who had beaten her partner close to death. The man who, despite having turned the other Lords against the common enemy they all were about to face with some mild reasoning, decided to look for their son and fight them both without speaking a goddamn word about it until the end. No, to him, Heisenberg was simply a threat, and so was she by extension until she had tobeg for her life- beg for her boys lives. It was his actions that weakened Heisenberg. That weakened HER. He didn't ask questions, he just moved, doing what they thought was trying to take their son. He didn't listen until the last moments, and it made her blood boil. Sure, he may not have known, but a simple question would have left them all fine...

But even then, despite all that, her rage towards him couldn't help but slowly trickle away into a small anger. She knew why he did what he did. And his simple reasoning was something even she couldn't argue with, even if it had caused them this pain that could have been so, so much worse.

She only started moving towards the group once more as the sounds of the mold grew, breaking her from her thoughts and forcing them to the back of her mind as she wiped away the last of the tears that had fallen without her noticing.

Donna had been the first to notice as she approached, her head snapping up with the sound of her footsteps as the Angie began to squirm in her grip.

"EMELIA!!!" She screeched, nearly hopping out of the woman's arms once the grip was loosened. Emelia flinched as all attention was suddenly on her as Angie darted towards her, and she kneeled to meet the doll in a light embrace before picking her up.

"We... We didn't think you'd make it..." the woman said quietly, her voice wavering from a mix of anxiety and fear as Moreau suddenly scuttled forward to follow the doll.

"Oh Emmy, where were you?? Are you ok???" The man said, instantly grabbing her other hand as Angie clung to her shoulders. The poor thing was almost as beaten as Karl, but he was still standing even with the green-ish red blood that covered his back and face. She managed a small smile to reassure him.

"I'm... I'm alright... I'm here." she said. She then looked up at Alcina, who's face had twisted into a strange mix of relief and confusion. "Where are the girls...?"

"With Duke." The woman said simply, though there was a clear amount of worry that appeared more on her face. "I only trust they will be safe with him, as much as I would like them to stay home..."

Emelia nodded.

"Good... Good. He knows where to go. Even I can promise they will be safe and away from this mess." She assured, and the tall woman seemed to let out a breath of full relief. She then looked to the side as she heard footsteps approach closer, only to see the stunned face of Ethan as he limped towards them.

"You..." he said, his own voice a mixture of confusion and caution. "I thought you said-"

"Save it, you bloody prick." She growled lowly. "I have a job to do, and you won't stop me from doing it..."

The other Lords were silent as she glared at him lightly, and he lifted his hands slowly in a surrendering motion while taking a step back.

"I won't. You made your point before." He spoke simply, and she nodded.

"Good..."

Her tone eased slightly as Donna approached on her other side for Angie. Alcina was the first to speak, her now suspicious gaze flicking between her and Winters.

"And, dare I ask... Where is that buffoon? Heisenberg?" She asked, the corner of her mouth twitching as Emelia flinched and Ethan began to speak.

"He's-"

"He's resting." Emelia interrupted quickly, glaring at him again with a silent warning. Another look of confusion entered the mans beaten features.

"But I saw him, he-"

"Leave it, you ignorant wanker." She snarled. "He is resting from his injuries that you had no help in. He's fine."

"But he was dead!!"

The words tumbled out of Ethans mouth before he could stop them despite the clear warning tone in her voice, and a sudden dead silence fell over them. The trio of Lords looked at him as Emelias face went slightly pale.

"D-... Dead...?" Donna nearly whispered, her voice that of mild horror as she stared at him with a wide eye. Ethan shook his head almost frantically, looking to Emelia with his own pale jolt.

"I-... It wasn't me who killed him...!! It was Miranda-"

"But you beat him to the point of weakness even more severe than them!! You LET him die by her hands!!" Emelia growled, her lip curling just slightly. She took an angry step towards him, feeling that small rage bubble up once more. "Had you listened to us, had you even bloody ASKED, he'd be HERE right now instead of-"

"Thats enough!!" Alcina raised her voice suddenly, causing the five heads to turn to her. She turned to Emelia. "If Winters claims he is dead, than how is he alive, according to you?" She asked, and her face fell immediately. "Not that I'd completely believe a man-thing, but he's managed to convince us all of his motives thus far, even by... questionable means..."

"I saw Miranda kill him...!" Ethan said, looking back at Emelia as well, who now looked mildly uncomfortable. "She tore him apart before she got to me. How the fuck is he still alive??"

More silence. All eyes were on her now, and an explanation for the given situation all but demanded simply by looks alone. She looked at them one by one, feeling her breaths become quick and panicked as her mind raced... and then her gaze fell upon Moreau.

Moreau, the only one who had known all those years ago, told a lie to save their skins. Moreau, the one who she knew would have kept the secret, who would have helped them if he could, chased off by anxieties and fear.

Moreau, the one she knew would be the most hurt if she told them all the truth now given the circumstances... but she had to.

She had no choice now.

She shook her head, taking a shaky breath and reaching to rub the back of her neck.

"He was... revived." She said finally, her voice quiet with a nervous tremble. She was met by silence once more, followed immediately by confusion.

"What do you mean 'revived'??" Ethan said, and she frowned.

"I mean exactly that." She spoke, attempting to regain what little confidence she had but failing. She froze as Moreau squeezed her hand.

"Revived... how??" The fish man asked, and she swallowed hard. She stared at the ground for a moment in attempt to think, only finally looking at him with a sad smile.

"By our son." She admitted quietly.

Ethan stared at her, slowly putting the pieces together in his head and the realization settling in his features.

"Wait, you mean... that kid in the factory...? Heisenbergs kid?" Ethan asked, his eyes widening. "You're his..."

"Yes, you bloody idiot. Who else would I have been speaking of when I begged for our bloody lives??" She snapped, only calming down as the fish Lord jumped next to her. She glanced at her friend briefly before returning to the man, keeping her gaze on Ethan hard, but steady. She watched as his face fell, and he took a step back. A small gasp was heard from Donna, and Alcinas brows raised. But she turned her gaze to Moreau, who's confusion grew almost exponentially as he listened.

"He is resting alongside Karl, as he should be..." Her voice suddenly dropped, a proud, calm expression on her face as she lifted her chin. "His power is greater than ours. More potent, even without a Cadou, though we are unsure how... Potent enough to save his father and still stand. He is far more capable than the two of us combined, but he's only a child... We won't let him fight."

"You had another baby??" Moreau asked suddenly, making her flinch while followed by a disbelieving scoff from Alcina.

"'Another'?!" The tall woman said, and the dollmaker whimpered.

"... There was... a first...?" She said quietly, as if events from years prior were suddenly clicking on her mind. Alcina crossed her arms.

"And when would we have learned of this information?!"

Emelia shook her head, waving her off just slightly.

"N-No, no... He isn't 'another', he was the only one... I..." she tried, feeling their eyes burn into her skin. She attempted to find the words, only to sigh and let her hand fall from Moreaus grip. She went quiet, her gaze falling to the ground once more.

"... I lied, Salvatore..." She whispered finally, heavy guilt evident in her voice as the confused- and now somewhat betrayed- stares made an unpleasant chill race up her spine. "I lied when I told you it was gone..."

He stared at her.

"... what...?"

The small squeak in his voice made her flinch.

"It wasn't my idea, and I regretted it every bloody day afterwards... Hated myself for it for years." she continued, looking up at him again to see a nearly hurt expression in the mans face. Fuck... "It was Karls suggestion, but... I agreed to it out of fear, even though I questioned it." She frowned. "I didn't want to lie to you, Sal... But we had to make sure she didn't find out. Every precaution had to have been taken to get this chance, to make sure she didn't rip it from me... And I listened to him."

"... I wouldn't have told her..." the man replied quietly, taking another step back. "I promised..."

"I... I-I know, Sal... I know, and I'm sorry..."she tried, kneeling down just slightly to stay level with him. "But she would have gotten suspicious if I continued to go to you, or bloody god forbid Heisenberg let you in often to check on me..." her voice was torn, that of regret and apology. "She would have known the moment she saw me... I couldn't have even gone to the surface and risk one of her damned birds catching that scent... Even the Lycans would have been tailing me."

The man was silent as she spoke, but nodded slowly as he let her words seep in. It seemed like he understood, but the hurt in his mangled face still sent a massive wave of guilt through her chest, amplifying it completely.

"It's not your fault, Sal. It was different than the shifting of Cadou effects..." she tried, earning another round of confused stares from the other two women. "I could hide that... Hell, I still can. But I couldn't hide the pregnancy... It changed me far too much, far too quickly. She would have known if she saw me a month later after we found out, and we couldn't risk anything... I didn't want to lose a chance at what I wanted for so long due to her selfish needs. I didn't want her destroying this chance like she had so many times before."

Her voice remained quiet as she spoke, the attention still causing shivers... But Moreau soon nodded, shifting slightly on his feet.

"I understand..." the fish Lord muttered, putting his hands together and fiddling with his fingers. He was quiet again before looking at her with the smallest spark of hope in the dark sea gaze. "What's his name...?"

He seemed to relax as she gave a warm smile.

"Adalwulf." She replied quietly. "He's 10 now... He was born healthy, and he's all I could have ever wanted."

"Adalwulf..." the man tried, struggling slightly with the name, but managing well. He seemed to ponder a moment before he managed a small smile and nodded. "I like that name..."

Emelia gave a quiet chuckle.

"He reminds me of his father, in the best possible way... he's a fine young man already." She held out her hand for him, relieved as he did the same. She held it tightly. "He's a kind boy... Always has been since he could walk and speak. I would love for you to finally meet him after this... I talk about all of you quite a bit."

Moreau opened his mouth to speak with a small growing excitement, but stopped as a small rumbling was heard. The group was startled as yet another mass of black mold tendrils erupted from the ground beside them, and Ethan cleared his throat.

"Look, I'm sorry to interrupt..." H started, gesturing to them. "This is... nice and all... But we need to hurry. I need to get my daughter back..." He looked at Emelia, "And you have a kid to raise."

She went quiet, but nodded as her demeanor changed almost instantly. Her expression hardened and she felt her parasite squirm in her chest, making her arm tremble just slightly in an oddly excited anticipation.

"And Miranda needs to die." She growled. Ethan nodded.

"At least we can still agree on something..." He muttered, simply looking at the other Lords. "We need a plan, and we need one quick..."

They looked at each other, their minds clearly working. Alcina frowned.

"We mustn't go in recklessly." She said. "Even I know she is powerful, even more so when desperate."

Ethan nodded.

"I got that..." he sighed, looking at the mold. "Any suggestions?"

There was silence for a moment as Emelia walked to him, joining his side as she examined the tendrils surrounding them. It only took her a few moments until something clicked, and she suddenly turned to them.

"I have an idea..." She said, earning looks once more. "It'll sound mad, and it's of the utmost importance that we're all careful... especially us." She looked at the three Lords before them as well as gesturing to herself. "But it may be insane enough to work."

Ethan looked between them, though nodded as they huddled together once more.

"Alright then. Let's hear it."

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legolasghosty · 5 months

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Robots & Androids ‎AU plus Small Town AU

OKAY I AM FINALLY GETTING TO THESE I'M SORRY I'M SO BEHIND!!!

Okay. So.

Humanity kinda developed a LOT of health issues in the mid-late 23rd century. It was all a long time in coming, but it was a bit of a shocker still when people started breaking down. And there just wasn't enough people to keep up with the demand for new organs, tissue, blood, etc. The human race was basically failing. So, in a semi last ditch attempt to keep people alive, cyborg technology was put to work. Scientists had been messing around with the theory of it for years, since robots and androids were getting decently advanced. But they never had the support to actually try a clinical trial. Until now.

Some of it worked better than others. And it was HIGHLY controversial. Though maybe less than it should have been, considering the lengths the research team was permitted to go in order to get this stuff sorted out... Mainly that they were given legal permission to try it out on patients without their express consent, mostly in situations where the person was in a coma/on life support with no real hope of recovery.

Towards the end of her life, Rose was offered the chance to try getting a cybernetic lung transplant to replace the one that had been damaged beyond repair by her cancer. She refused, as it would be super risky and be more likely to kill her than help. She would rather die in her own whole body than risk losing her last few weeks with her family.

After she passed, the remaining Molinas moved out of the city, to a small town a few hours north, to escape the grief and the terrible air quality that had been a part of Rose's quick decline in health.

Unfortunately, they just happened to pick the exact tiny town that the government had picked to dump their cyborg... pet projects. The ones who hadn't actually consented to their surgeries but had ended up surviving. Best to keep everyone with those stories contained while they championed the cyborg advancements. Especially since there were plenty of side effects...

Julie meets a lot of odd people on her first day at the local high school. These include a dude that never lowers the hood of his pink hoodie, a bassist in a leather jacket who never seems to stop smiling, a skater with a rather odd limp, and a boy with shaggy hair who never seems to hear what people say to him, always grooving along to some music no one else can hear. There's also a few other adult oddballs around, but I don't got the energy to write all those out.

Under the cut, it gets a little more specific about injuries and alterations to specific characters, so read at your own risk!

Turns out that all four of those odd boys are unwilling cyborgs who were a part of some of the first rounds of tests. Hey, they were all gonna die anyways, the government decided they might as well use them.

Willie was in a nasty car crash that smashed both legs and a few ribs. He has pretty good prosthetics now, but they don't always function properly. And if he keeps his hair long to cover the incision scar on the back of his neck, that's no one's business except his own.

Luke, Alex, and Reggie all nearly died of food poisoning back in LA, but due to a combination of slightly different reactions to the battery acid/food poisoning and scientists wanting to test out different tech, they all have different issues now.

Luke got some synthetic tissue repair on his organs and around his throat. But there was also some damage to his airways cause of throwing up so much, so there's some wiring stuff in there so he can still sort of smell... however that got a bit mixed around and so his hearing is pretty weak and the music he has stuck in his head tends to sound like it's coming from outside to him.

Reggie mostly got away without any organ damage, but his face got kinda messed up. Now he looks pretty normal, except his jaw and lips can't move a lot. So he's stuck with a permanent semi-smile. It's not creepy usually, just kinda sad. He tries to stay upbeat to match his face.

Alex got the worst damage to his digestive system. The connections between his organs and brain are mostly man made now, whether that's wires for neurotransmitting or fake tissue on the lining of his stomach. However, when the scientists realized they had someone with a diagnosed anxiety disorder, they... well they might as well try, since he's probably dead anyways. So there's also a metal panel on the back of his head. It didn't work, and the hair won't grow back around it. Hence the hood.

Somehow they all become friends and help each other kinda come to terms with their lives. And also play lots of music. Though the shadow of the head researcher, Dr. Covington, looms over them all... OKAY that's what I got for tonight! More thoughts may come later, but that's my rough idea! I hope you enjoyed!!!

#legolas tag #julie and the phantoms #legolas answers asks #jatp #jatp fanfic #alex mercer #willie jatp #julie molina #luke patterson #reggie peters #I have more thoughts about how everyone else fits into this story #I just don't have the energy to type it out #ask me later #if you want to know

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remingtonisleithal · 2 years

Text

I just think that what mcr did at the wwwy fest is beyond words, but I'm going to try anyway.

As a self proclaimed emo, I naturally feel nostalgia towards the 2000s emo culture, with the release of three cheers and the black parade albums, with fall out boy, with paramore, all of the songs with lyrics now written in our hearts being new. I feel incredibly nostalgic, but the interesting thing is that I'm nostalgic for an era I was barely alive to see. I'm a 2000s kid, I was less than a year old when three cheers was released. But I feel nostalgic towards it, I feel like things would have been better if I was born earlier to experience it.

But what MCR have done is they have said, to the media, to nostalgia, to the corporations bringing emo back for profit, not for sub-culture, is a big, total "FUCK YOU". And I think that's beautiful.

See, what my chemical romance is, and will always be, is something that you don't understand. That you can't quite grasp. Every time you think you know them, and decide who they are, they will do something so batshit to say "No. That's not us, we are whatever the fuck we want to be and we are proud of it." They did this in each era. They eyeshadow, they kissed each other, they wore all black, they wore bright colours and sang about a comic they made. They faked their fucking death.

So they wore their Revenge era outfits to the when we were young fest. This is already tongue in cheek, wearing something from when they were young to a nostalgia trip of a festival. But then adding in the prosthetics. Bringing you back to the present. Reminding yourself that that's not where you are anymore, the past cannot come back. And that's a good thing. Because they played all their hits, none of the niche stuff the mcrmy has a passion for. They didn't talk between songs and played the band they were supposed to be, pigeon-holed into for the longest time. So much so that it was killing them, it's why they split up. Because if they didn't, if they stayed the way they were told they were supposed to be, they would have ended up dead (evident by their outfits, particularly mikey, I haven't seen a single photo of his outfit and I heard that he was covered in blood, no prosthetics, which can be read into as something bad happening to him, leaving him to die young, which would have been the harsh reality if they pushed themselves into this).

My Chemical Romance has always and will always tell you who they are, which will always be the opposite of what people tell them to be. And right now, the media is making them into some sort of glorified revival band, but that's not it. They're just them. They don't want the fucking nostalgia to take them back to a place that nearly killed them. They never wanted to be pigeon-holed into being emo, even speaking out about hating the stereotype (which changed so much from what it was when they were growing up, it shifted into some kind of store-bought ripped jeaned teens with a passion for razor blades instead of angst souls surviving through music) and yet the same stereotype--which was once protested as being anti-religious, propaganda, a suicide cult and more--is being paraded around as a nostalgic gem to be worshipped. A trend. And you bet your ass that ray toro, mikey way, frank iero and gerard way are going to shit on all of that.

It was never about the money. The hits. The costumes. The crowds. It was about saving lives by being yourself, and looking into the past, reminiscing over how things were through the rose-tinted lens of time, isn't going to save anyone. It's going to leave you without anything in the present. You have to evolve. And bullshitting yourselves into being something you're not, or believing the grass was greener is only bullshitting yourself. It's not rebellion, it's suicide. The exact thing my chem is trying to stop. The haunting prosthetics serve as a reminder that while it's fun to revisit the past, you cannot stay that way. You have to carry on.

#mcr #wwwy #when we were young #my chemical romance #my chem #gerard way #ray toro #frank iero #mikey way #emo #music #wwwyf #revenge era #old man my chem #return era #fandom essay

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mishwanders · 1 year

Text

Prologue {Heisenberg}: God Help You Dumb Boy

Pairing: Karl Heisenberg x GN!Disabled Reader

Summary: Ethan agrees to help Heisenberg, the old man decides to give him a helping hand.

Warnings: ghosts, mold, gore from Ethan’s bitten hand.

Read On AO3 { X }

Things are going according to plan…

Heisenberg held onto Ethan Winters forearm, the weight of his own body keeping the younger blonde man from falling through the open grate on the floor, to his doom below. Heisenberg had given Ethan a choice, to work alongside him in defeating Miranda. Ethan had spat back at him in anger at the mere mention of using his own baby girl, Rose, against the tyrannical prophetess. Heisenberg could see the rage seething off of him in the dim warm light of his factory. Heisenberg had taken a step back to recollect himself, trying to not burst out at the man. Ethan had been going through a day in hell - getting a taste of what it was like in his life. He had to stay calm, he had to keep his thoughts in order.

So he gave him a different deal. Heisenberg held out his hand to Ethan, promising that Rose as a weapon was off the table. They didn’t necessarily need her to finish this off - he had another secret that had yet to be revealed to Ethan any way, one that would soon come to light. His words seemed to calm the raging storm of anger that was rising within Ethan, but Heisenberg could still see the hints of distrust within the lines of his face, heavily evident within his hazel eyes.

“Ethan, I promise that no harm will come to the girl, not if I can help it.” He said.

Heisenberg looked down at Ethan’s mauled hand, seeing the soiled rags covered in dirt and darkened by blood.

“Before we go any further with this plan, let me help you out with that.” Heisenberg offered

Ethan was caught off guard by it, the anger now morphed into surprise, but the distrust still stayed as Heisenberg pulled him away from the open grate that was close behind.

“How?” He asked

“I have some tools to make a prosthetic upstairs. Just let me get it all put together and adjusted, and the damned thing is all yours.” Heisenberg replied

The distrust had now faded from Ethan, his shoulders dropping a bit as he grew to trust the older man. This was good, this is exactly what he needed. Heisenberg let go of his arms and began to move toward the set of metal double doors that had burst open at the mere flick of his wrist, waving for Ethan to follow him.

“Come on. I don’t want you getting lost in this place.”

Heisenberg walked up the old metal stairs, hearing them ring out, creaking underneath the weight of each step. When he finally reached the top step he moved down a long and darkened hallway, straight to a dark wooden door on his right. He placed his hand on the door knob, slowly opening the door to an even darker room, turning on the lamp with his power, allowing the warm dim glow to illuminate a place he hardly visited anymore.

The light didn’t go very far in the room, the way Heisenberg used to like - the dimness of it all made it easier on his eyes to see without squinting. But what it did touch was the wooden desk stationed underneath the light, to his left, leaning up against the west wall and unmade bed to the right of it. The entire room had gone untouched for a long, long time and it was odd coming back to it after all of these years.

Especially without you.

But he had to do it anyway. Heisenberg walked through the door frame, pulling out the wooden chair and motioning for Ethan to sit as he began to rummage through the drawers, finding an old first-aid kit, the pieces of a prosthetic that he had once worked on long ago, and the few tools he needed. Heisenberg sat on the edge of the bed and took hold of Ethan’s hand in his. He slowly unwrapped Ethan’s hand, inspecting the damage that the Lycan had done to him.

“The mother fucker sure took a chunk out of you.” Heisenberg commented, “My apologies for not stopping them sooner.”

“Those were your assholes?” Ethan asked

“Not technically ‘mine’, but enough to command them.” Heisenberg explained, “Mother Miranda’s doing there.”

“She turned them all, didn’t she?”

Heisenberg nodded, taking a clean gauze with the first aid medicine and proceeding to clean the wound.

“All a part of her big plan - a sacrifice to the damn mold for its power to bring her daughter back to life. They’ve all been infected for quite some time now. They were damned from the beginning sadly.”

“Yeah, I know.” He said, his tone downtrodden as the memories of when he first stepped foot into the cursed village came flooding into his mind.

Ethan looked away from the old man, his eyes catching glimpses of the tools by his side, catching glimpses of the room under the dim light. He could see the dust floating through the air, coating the bed frame, the armoire, even the desk. His eyes continued to follow the dust particles until he noticed something else in the corners of the room, something that glimmered with the subtle touch of the light.

It was a wooden cane. The handle on top resembled that of a fox, and the cane itself was made of beech, decorated with an intricate metal inlay, and a dark brown stain.

“Did you used to make this stuff for the villagers?” Ethan asked

Heisenberg chuckled at his response. If only the young man knew how much the villagers feared him.

“No, I did not.” He replied, “Most of them were scared shitless of me, save for one.”

“So I guess these belonged to them?” Ethan asked, motioning his head towards the cane.

Ethan noticed that Heisenberg grew still before the old man finally responded.

“Only the cane does.”

Ethan cocked his brow, the curiosity evident on his face.

“You say that like they’re still alive.” He commented

Heisenberg stared straight past Ethan, seeing the ghostly visage of you standing behind the young man, hand placed on his shoulder. This was why he hated coming into this fucking room. You always appeared in some way to him here, never saying a word due the mold that was wrapped around your neck like a noose, the roots trailing all along your body like the day he was forced to leave you to your demise.

He hated to see your eyes devoid of the life that once was there, your face twisted in anguish as your mouth hung open mid scream. He hated that he couldn’t hear your voice, your laugh, couldn’t fucking touch you.

You were there, he could see you, but he knew the truth.

It was just a phantom of you, one that would always haunt him.

Heisenebrg finally pulled his attention away from your ghost and back to Ethan. His entire demeanor had changed, growing darker. His voice dropping lower in tone as the seriousness of the situation at hand took over.

“Listen Ethan, our reasons for wanting to get rid of Miranda are similar in more ways than you would think. Not only does she have your daughter, but she has someone that I care about - well, the damn mold does.” He explained, “It’s a bit of a long story.”

Ethan looked down at his hand momentarily, feeling the effects of the first aid medication taking its effects on him. He hadn’t realized that there might be more at stake here for the older man other than just what he already knew.

“Well, we’ve got time right now.” Ethan replied, “Why don’t you tell it to me?”

Heisenberg sat back on the edge of the bed, surprised at his request. The hint of a smile appeared on his face as he heard your words in his mind, saying a phrase he was so used to hearing in his younger years.

‘God help you dumb boy.’

“Alright, fine.” Heisenberg said, going back to work on Ethan’s hand.

“You see, it all started with that goddamn snow…”

Chapter One: Fish in a Birdcage

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hermits-that-craft · 1 year

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Never Go Marching Home

A/N As promised, here is a finished WIP thats been sitting in my drafts! This will also be posted on AO3, and a link will be in the reblogs.

Grian’s world ends when he’s three years old.

Maybe the statement isn’t entirely true. The first six months are nothing but pleasant, according to his father. Nothing but smiles and revelry as his baby sister is brought into the world and introduced to the family.

But then his mother got ill.

Her condition worsened over the year. Truly, his world does not end until a few months after he turns four. His mothers last breath within moment of his sisters first steps, toddling over to a mother who hasn’t had the strength to hold her since she was barely a few months old.

She dies surrounded by family, a proud smile on her face.

The next few years pass in a blur. Grian and Pearl are watched by a rotating roster of neighbours, friends and family as their father works long hours in dirty businesses.

First the mines, to pay off their debts to doctors who didn’t bother to treat their mother but were kept around anyways. Then the factory, when the mines were shut to build residentials on. Father would come home covered in soot and with little more than loose change, having been harangued by the funeral home for their mothers casket and grave costs on the way home. The paycheck never went far.

On Pearl’s 5th birthday, she is taken by Mother’s sister to live on the other continent. Grian is also grabbed, his bags packed while he was at school, but he runs back home before they can force him to board the blimp travelling to Canberra-Town.

Grian spends the next five years in a daze. Going from job to job as his father plunges further into debt to One Eye’d Jack, the only mobster rich enough to have more runners than sense, who runs the outer sectors of London-town. He’s barely old enough to attend a high school when his hands become stained red, stabbing someone to death in a rage he didn’t know he had.

The police ignore him, their pockets lined with Jack’s dirty cash. No crimes are committed in the outer slums, not officially anyways. Glorified runners and guns for hire, that's all the cops could be called, and a 13 year old with harrowed eyes and hollow cheeks is nothing to look twice at, even when another child lies dying beneath him. To arrest him is to go against Jack’s orders.

The runners bring Grian in for the kill.

He doesn’t remember much of what they said. Sam was a snotty nosed rich kid who told Grian he was his friend, but only enjoyed watching his pain, especially after Taurtis died of a treatable infection just days before. Honestly, Jack didn’t mind the killing. If Sam had any sense about him, he wouldn’t have taunted Grian with the vaccine for the infection, nor would he have boasted about owning the vaccine for months while Taurtis had withered away.

Grian got off lightly, beaten only to a pulp and not within an inch of his life. He doesn’t know if it’s because his father was favoured by Jack, or if there was some kind of sympathy in the heartless bastard anyways.

It was more likely that he knew Grian would do jobs for him if he was given some sort of favour. Grian didn’t want to think about what sort of jobs he would be given after killing some rich kid in warm blooded rage, but he knew it wouldn’t be long before they started to grab him off the streets to do them.

Three years passed in more of a daze, barely making eye contact with anyone and actively avoiding his father where possible. It’s not as though he doesn’t love the man, but seeing his father come home black and blue after loosing favour with Jack isn’t something he’d find particularly comforting, and Grian knows it wont be long before he looses him too.

It’s in this daze that he meets a few new friends.

Mumbo and Iskall are an odd folk. Between the way Iskall’s prosthetic eye glows even when the sun is brighter than it really ought to be, and the way the Mumbo seems to rust when it rains for more than three days in a row. He’d hesitate to call them the strangest of their bunch, as he’s seen the people they surround themselves with, but their nice enough and keep to their own trouble, and often times get him out of his.

He’s caught them with blood on their hands, hidden between broken street lights and maze like alleyways. Grian watches with curiosity as the duo kill people at random, with no clear rhyme of reason and never get questioned by anyone.

He almost convinces himself that they aren’t even real, but his father pales at the mention of them on one of the rare occasions that they actually speak to each other. That’s all the warning he needs to know these men are bad news, dangerous even. He doesn’t even have to pay attention to his father as hes told that the pair are worse than an oil fire, that they and their group will destroy everything.

Personally, Grian wouldn’t mind to see the old timbers of outer London go up in smoke. Fire and brimstone smell of something more than he could experience here. Of danger and excitement. His mother claimed he had an adventurous soul, and Jack calls him a devil in the making. He doesn’t know if proving Jack right would make his mother proud per se, but he sticks to Mumbo and Iskall like glue afterwards.

And when his father flees the city soon after Grian turns 18, leaving him an apartment on his own? Well, he just invites his new friends to live with him. Mumbo and Iskall come and go as they please, never using the front door if they can avoid it, and Grian’s family falls quickly from his mind as he surrounds himself with new friends and a life of relative ease, stealing from whomever he dared.

And when Iskall and Mumbo bring in the body of someone Grian had briefly met through them, asking him if he can watch the body for a few days while they dealt with the problem - Well, he agrees without too much hesitation.

And after a week of not seeing hide nor hair of Mumbo and Iskall as smoke covers the other side of the city and violence reigns in the hallowed halls of the ministers cabinets, the man awakes.

Grian wasn’t expecting the man who had a gaping hole in his chest to stand up and start walking after little less than a week, and all the bumbling man can do to make Grian stop shrieking is to slap a hand over Grian’s mouth until he looses his voice.

The man wears a gas mask of rusted brass and adorned with golden spikes, his eyes a hauntingly bright purple as he stares at Grian. Iskall and Mumbo enter through a window that Grian could just about reach and-

He does.

He races across the rooftops of the outer city, his mad dash closer to flying than it is to running as the pair who protected him now follow him, glowing purple eyes haunting his every step.

He doesn’t mean to kill Iskall.

He truly doesn’t.

But between the adrenaline wearing off and the slow horror that he fucked up severely, he lets Mumbo lead him back to his apartment, Iskall’s body thrown over the tall mans shoulder as though the corpse weighed nothing.

Grian can almost believe that the man is dead. Permanently.

But even though the man has a slit throat and a strange, green fluid leaking out of him in place of blood, the man winks at him. No one else on the street seem to notice. People close their curtains, usher kids inside already cramped apartments. Someone gives a frightened shout. Another screams a curse at Mumbo. A prayer is muttered just loud enough for Grian to hear. None of these people know Grian.

All of them hate Mumbo and Iskall.

Grian is pushed into his apartment by Mumbo, and Xisuma sits at the head of his table. Iskall’s body disappears into a different room. Mumbo does not leave it. Xisuma watches him, a mug of something steaming in his hands. He gestures for Grian to sit. Grian complies, knowing when things have to come to an end.

Words are exchanged. A deal is brokered. Xisuma leaves the apartment, an ice cold drink that was never so much as sipped being the only thing that even indicates that the man was ever there. Mumbo presses something cold and metal into his hands, Iskall still slung over his shoulder. The corpse grins wickedly at Grian, and winks before settling down.

Grian hides in his apartment for a few days, getting used to the feeling of a gun in his hands. Somehow, it’s not as heavy as he expected it to be.

He lets himself get taken by One Eye’d Jack’s runners.

Jack talks to him, weaves a tale of unpaid debt and never completing deals. Grian knows who Jack wants him to kill. He knows what he has to do. He can’t leave this world with someone who will look for him still yet left behind, after all. Xisuma is a good man - relatively speaking of course, as good as anyone can be in the slums and outskirts - but he will not have crew who have people who could follow them.

And Grian’s seen what the mechanisation process can do to a man. He wants to fly.

So when the bullet lands square in his fathers chest, he bites back the guilt. HIs fathers forgiveness is nothing on his mothers disappointment, but she's dead, of course. And he has a new life to lead.

The ships doctor has given him a prescription to give to Jack. And when the half ounce of lead was injected directly into Jack’s brain, well. It was only natural that the rest of the bar get caught alight by the mad bastards cigar. It was only natural that the outskirts of the city catch soon afterwards, for damp timber may smolder but gasoline goes up well even while wet.

And if Grian dies in his exit?

Well, its all well and good that there were new wings made just in time for him to resurrect. The mechanisation process is painful, even while unconscious. All the drugs in the universe couldn’t dope you up enough to experience the molten metal seeping into your bones and blood. Best to be dead and hope the process actually works for a change.

After all, no one is missing him back in London-town, all those who remember him there are dead or dying, burnt beyond recognition.

Save for a younger sister, waiting for him on the opposite side of the planet, still feeling mighty betrayed that he did not save her when he fled off that blimp.

#hermechanisms au #hermitcraft #hermitcraft au #mechanisms au #my writing #hermitcraft fanfic #grian #pearlescentmoon #iskall85 #mumbo jumbo #xisumavoid #one eyed jack #tw death #tw murder #idk ask to tag #long post i think?#one shot

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screechthemighty · 26 days

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Fair warning, this chapter is a bit of a doozy. That seems to happen with poor Wolfwood. Also, it sprung into my head fully-formed while writing the LAST Wolfwood chapter, so that was fun. Anyways, AO3 link in a reblog, enjoy the full chapter below, happy Wolfwood Wednesday!

the unknowable tomorrow | a tristamp fanfic

part thirteen: wolfwood

content warnings: religious trauma, psychological abuse, physical abuse/torture, mass murder, gore, displayed corpses, dissociation, guilt/self-loathing, and references to human trafficking

citations: this chapter is based on events described in trigun maximum vol. 12 ch. 6. it also uses a quote from 1x3 of trigun: stampede.

Wolfwood stepped from darkness into darkness of a different kind.

As his eyes adjusted, he could see he was in some kind of storage room, packed full of odds and ends. He’d think he was in the back room of a general store, but something about it was off. A second look confirmed that none of the clothes had duplicates, none of the bags matched, and the boxes were haphazardly packed with odds and ends. It was either a thieves’ hoard or a scavenger’s hoard, maybe both, all prepped to be sorted and resold to people who didn’t care where their purchases came from. If a portal had taken him here...

Wolfwood started rummaging through the clothes. His fingers glanced over a familiar material. It was hard to see color in the low light, but he knew that coat.

Damn it, Vash.

It took some feeling around the pockets, but eventually, Wolfwood was able to find his lighter. He took the rifle off his back long enough to throw on the coat. It felt perverse to wear it, but he needed to keep his arms free. He grabbed the rifle, clicked the lighter on, and used the dim light to start looking for more of Vash’s things. Vash’s bag, a pair of pants and a shirt that looked like his, a pair of boots that were roughly the same size and look. Various survival supplies that probably didn’t belong to Vash, but weren’t going back to their original owners any time soon anyway. No sign of the pistol, but weapons might be stored in a different place, or taken by the thieves instead of being resold. He'd worry about it later. Wolfwood clicked the lighter off, readied his rifle, and carefully opened the door to the storeroom.

There was a storefront on the other side. It looked like every general store he’d ever been in, but with a strangely abandoned feeling to it. All the shelves were empty, and the roof was partially collapsed, but he could hear voices coming from outside. Wolfwood crept across the room, trying to stay low. The voices grew clearer as he got closer to the door. “…can mock them all you want,” said an immediately familiar one. He sounded hoarse, weak, but it was definitely Vash. “But they’re not the monsters you think they are.”

“Is that so?”

Wolfwood froze. His mouth went dry.

No, no, no.

Wolfwood kept moving, even though his legs felt like they were turning to sludge. The moons were full outside, giving him a clear view of what was happening. He saw Vash, chained up by his flesh and blood arm in the middle of a town square. He was in rough shape: stripped down to his underwear, practically dangling from the handcuffs, prosthetic gone, body covered in bruises. And standing over him, glinting in the moonlight…

Millions Knives, in the flesh.

“These men beat you and left you out here to suffer,” Millions Knives continued. He sounded amused, as if he were talking to a toddler who was doubling down on a really obvious lie. “They intend to sell you into slavery. What is that, if not monstrous behavior? How can you defend this?”

“I’m not defending it,” Vash said. “It’s wrong. But they’re not malicious. Didn’t you see their faces? The Plant building? There was an explosion. She flooded the place with radiation when she died. The town and everyone in it was abandoned. They can’t go anywhere and they don’t have any other way to survive. They have people depending on them, people they need to protect…” Vash glared up at his brother. “…and they wouldn’t be in this situation if you hadn’t crashed those ships.”

Knives’ head tilted. “So, you’re blaming me for this?” he asked. The amusement was gone from his voice. In its place was a deliberate blankness. The sort of calm that never led to anything good. “Is that what you’re saying?”

“I’m saying you have no right to judge them. No right at all.”

Stop it. Stop talking. You’re just going to make this worse. Wolfwood’s grip on the rifle was so tight that his hands ached. Vash, please, for once, shut up…

Suddenly, he had a terrible thought.

I could end this all right now.

Knives didn’t know he was here. He had the element of surprise. In the back of his mind, Wolfwood remembered that he didn’t believe that Knives was anything close to an angel, that if Vash could bleed so could Knives, that if Vash could be killed, so could Knives. He remembered all the harm that he’d cause so many people, all the lives lost, Vash and the kids and even Wolfwood himself…

I could stop it.

One bullet was all it would take.

He raised the rifle.

Knives didn’t turn around. He had no way of knowing Wolfwood was there. But the second Wolfwood got a clear look at him, he froze. It wasn’t just the sight of a being more powerful than him that did it, wasn’t just the Eye of Michael’s bullshit spreading through his mind and freezing him in place. It was the look in Knives’ eyes as he stared down at Vash. Wolfwood knew that look. Even when it was directed at someone else, it made him want to run and hide.

But still, Vash met Knives’ eyes. Stared up at him in defiance, not fear.

How? How can he do that?

After what felt like an eternity, Millions Knives sighed. “If that’s how you feel, perhaps you haven’t learned.” He turned away. “Rot with these humans, if you’re so convinced they’re not malicious. See how you enjoy their hospitality. We can talk again when I come back for them.”

Those were the words that made Vash’s eyes light up with fear. “Come back for…no. No, Nai, don’t…” He scrambled after Knives until he hit the limits of his restraints. “Please, no!”

“Don’t worry. I won’t let them sell you.”

“That’s not what I mean, Nai, please! You don’t have to do this!”

“Don’t have to keep you safe?” Knives stopped, glanced over his shoulder. “Of course I do. You’re my little brother, after all.”

He kept walking.

“Nai, no! Please…don’t! Don’t!” Vash strained against his restraints. “I don’t want you to do this!”

But it was too late. Millions Knives was gone, disappearing into the shadows of the night. Wolfwood lowered the rifle with a sharp gasp. It felt like a vice had suddenly been removed from his chest.

Stupid, stupid, you should have taken the shot, you should’ve taken the damn shot!

But Wolfwood didn’t have time to berate himself. He had other things to worry about, like the people suddenly running out of nearby buildings to see what Vash was screaming about. “Will you shut the hell up?!” someone snapped.

“Please, you have to run!” Vash begged. “You have to get out of here while you can, he…he’s coming back, he’ll kill everyone here, please!”

Someone scoffed. “He’s lost it already…should we bring him in?”

“After the fight he put up? Nah, let him stay a bit longer. We don’t want any trouble when the merchants come over.”

“You’re not listening to me! You have to think of the kids, you’ve got to…”

“Shut up!” A well-aimed kick made Vash double over with a pained sob. “Quit yelling or we’ll put the gag on!”

“Please,” Vash begged. “Please, you have to go…I don’t want you to die…”

“Right, because the boogeyman’s coming for us.” Another kick. Another sob. “Shut the hell up. Trying to sleep here.”

The figures departed, but Wolfwood stayed rooted in place. Other people were probably awake. Other eyes were probably on Vash. If he wanted to grab him and run, he’d have to wait a bit longer, make sure that the town was quiet again before he made his move.

It hurt, sitting there and listening to Vash’s hoarse sobs instead of helping. But it at least gave Wolfwood time to plan.

He wasn’t sure where they were, but he could make some guesses. If the community had survived this long cut off from most other people, they had to have a water supply nearby. Probably one of the planet’s rare springs or aquifers, since their Plant had died, and one close enough that outsiders wouldn’t risk the residual radiation of the Plant explosion to harvest from it. If he made a break for the water supply, figured out a safe place to stash Vash…that’d be a start. He could improvise from there. He busied himself with sneaking around the store and grabbing a few more empty bottles. They’d need as much water as they could get if they had to keep running.

Assuming Vash could run. Leaving your captives tied up and letting the elements weaken them was a tried-and-true method of pre-breaking people for slavers. Depending on how long he’d been exposed…

You’ll figure it out. You don’t have any choice.

The moons marched across the sky. Eventually, the town felt still again. Even Vash’s weeping had quieted. Wolfwood was still cautious as he made his way out of the building. Vash was slumped against the pole, curled up tightly, his body shaking in the cold night air. He’d been out there a while, if the peeling on his shoulders and his dry lips were anything to go by. Wolfwood carefully brushed his fingers against Vash’s cheeks. Despite his previous sobs, they were completely dry, caked in sand that hadn’t been disturbed by tears any time recently.

Shit. Not good.

Vash shuddered at the touch, flinching away. His eyes took a second to focus. “Nico…?”

“Shh.” Wolfwood looked around. “Hold still, okay? I’m getting you out, but you have to be quiet.” Vash did as he was told, which almost worried Wolfwood as much as how dry he was. Wolfwood picked the handcuff lock in record time, letting Vash slump to the ground. “Can you walk?”

Vash struggled to stand, but quickly slipped. Shit, okay. Plan B. Wolfwood made sure the pack and rifle were secure on his back before scooping Vash up. Vash curled up against him immediately. Wolfwood examined their surroundings. Buildings in various states of disrepair. Rough road cutting up the middle of town. In front of him, a gate leading out into a vast expanse of sands. Behind him, further off, another gate leading out of town, this time to a nearby cliffside.

And if there’s a road leading there, that’s probably where the water is.

Wolfwood adjusted his grip on Vash and started jogging.

No one tried to stop him as they left, so they hadn’t left any guards posted. Probably figured Vash was too broken-down to run or smart enough to realize that running without any supplies was suicide. Fine by Wolfwood; trying to shoot his way out with all this extra cargo would’ve been a pain in the ass. He paced himself best he could, stopping only long enough to re-adjust his hold on Vash or straighten out the pack and the rifle. Vash whined quietly every time Wolfwood had to put him down, and clung desperately to him once he was back up. Whatever fire had driven him to backtalk his brother had bled out of him with his screams, or been kicked out of him by the townsfolk.

And yet he’d still begged Knives not to kill them.

And Knives still left him, Wolfwood thought, suddenly furious. That bastard left his own brother with these people…to what? Teach him a lesson? Because it sure felt like that was what he was doing. Let him suffer a few days, then make him watch as Knives massacred the place. Wolfwood might not have agreed with Vash about whether or not these people were monsters, might not have agreed with him about killing, but what Knives was doing here…

This isn’t about protecting Vash. It’s about sending him a message. He almost growled in frustration. Son of a bitch…

But he had to abandon that line of thinking for now. They were getting close to the cliffs. He had to focus on following the trail up. It was wide enough, well-maintained to allow for water to be moved up and down it, but tripping and falling down it would be embarrassing at best.

Wolfwood kept following the path up the cliffside and into the caves within. The walls were marked with some kind of glowing substance—cultivated fungi, maybe, another sure sign there was water somewhere—that lead them deeper and deeper inside. Eventually, they emerged into a large room, marked by more glowing fungi, a sleeping worm colony, and below all of that…

Water, thank God. An entire spring coming right up from the ground, trickling down into a river leading deeper into the caves. Wolfwood carefully set Vash down and pulled the first water bottle he could get access to out of his pack. In an ideal world, he’d boil it first, but he decided to cross his fingers and hope that it was fresh enough from the source to be clean. Vash needed water now, and he didn’t have anything to burn anyway. He filled up the bottle and brought it back to Vash. “Here…”

He had to help Vash sit up. For a moment, Wolfwood was worried the kid had fallen unconscious, but Vash’s eyes sprung back open the second water touched his lips. Wolfwood went from being worried he wouldn’t be able to get the guy to drink to angling the bottle so he wasn’t drinking so much. “Slowly, slowly…kid, you really can’t be throwing up right now…”

Vash’s hand jerked up, tilting the bottle back down and splashing water over his face and neck. That was fair; some of the burns looked like they stung. Wolfwood moved him closer to the spring and grabbed the first piece of cloth he could find out of the bag. He soaked it in water and draped it over Vash’s shoulders. “There, that better?”

“Mm.” Vash relaxed almost instantly. His next few sips of water weren’t so frantic, and his eyes looked a little clearer when they met Wolfwood’s. “Nico.”

“Yeah, I’m here.”

“You came back.”

“’Course I did. Had to get my lighter, didn’t I?” Wolfwood smiled gently, resting his hand against Vash’s forehead. He felt hot. Even with how cold the night was, he felt hot. “How long did they have you out there?”

“Couple days…sun’s…bright…is that my…?”

“Yeah, I know, it looks like shit on me.” Wolfwood shrugged off the jacket and lay it down next to Vash. “But I couldn’t just leave it there. Do you know where they took your arm?”

Vash shook his head. “Brad’s gonna kill me,” he mumbled.

“If Brad’s an even halfway decent man, he’ll just be happy you’re alive. Maybe wait a week to kill you.”

Vash nodded. His eyes suddenly grew frantic and scared again. “My brother…Nai, he…”

“I know. I saw him.” His skin still crawled at the memory. “Don’t worry, we’ll be long gone before he gets back.”

“But he’ll kill them. I know he will. He can do it. I’ve…heard stories, and after the Fall, I…” Vash struggled to sit on his own. “I have to warn them…”

“You already tried. Vash…” Wolfwood caught his shoulder. “You can barely walk. I had to carry you up here.”

“I…” Vash tried again, but had to lie back down just as quickly. His face crumpled, but he still didn’t have enough water in him to shed actual tears. “I can’t let them die. I can’t…”

“You’re not letting them die. Hey, look at me.” Wolfwood carefully tilted Vash’s face towards him. “You tried. If they don’t want to listen, that’s on them.” Wolfwood didn’t point out the obvious: that Vash shouldn’t care so much about people who hurt him so badly, that maybe this would teach them that if you fucked around, you’d find out one day. He knew what Vash’s response would be, and he didn’t especially want to go through that whole conversation again. “And whatever Nai’s going to do, it’s not your fault.”

A pained noise tore out of Vash, almost like the noise he’d made when he’d been kicked. He curled up towards Wolfwood. Wolfwood was worried if he hugged him, he’d just drive his body temperature back up, so instead he rested his forehead against Vash’s.

It was still too warm.

“We’ve gotta get you cooled off,” Wolfwood said. “Here…”

He pumped as much water into Vash as he could, carefully doused his head, re-wet the cloth around his neck. He examined Vash’s injuries while he was at it. Bruises, scrapes, sunburn. Nothing too deep, nothing that would kill him any time soon, and Vash claimed that none of his bones felt broken. Could be worse.

But he already had some scars hiding among the bruises. The bullet wound Wolfwood had treated last time had left a thin white line along his leg. Wolfwood felt his throat close up at the sight, but he tried not to get too visibly angry. Vash needed to rest. Them having the same old debate wasn’t resting.

Slowly, Vash’s skin cooled. The feverish look faded from his eyes.

The pain didn’t.

“We should get out of here,” Wolfwood said quietly. “They’ll notice you’re gone eventually and this is probably gonna be one of the first places they look.” There were other branching tunnels moving off from this area; all he had to do was make them hard enough to find that it wasn’t worth looking. “Can you walk, or do you need me to carry you?”

“I’ll…I’ll try…” Vash sat up slowly. He was able to make it upright on his own power, though Wolfwood had to help him stand and support him as he walked. They moved slowly through the first random tunnel they could find. Wolfwood carefully tracked the twists and turns until they hit a dead end. The space was larger, with a crevice that overlooked the space leading back to the town. Technically, they were cornered, but it was a convenient sniper post. Wolfwood decided to take the risk and helped Vash sit back down. “You sleep,” he said. “I’ll keep watch.”

Vash hummed quietly and leaned against Wolfwood. His hand tightly gripped Wolfwood’s sleeve. That would slow Wolfwood down if it came to a firefight, but Wolfwood couldn’t bring himself to make Vash let go.

Afte the night he’d had, he deserved some comfort.

By sunrise, he had a plan, or at least a workable half-plan.

Step One: grill Vash about the town once he was awake. Did they have any working transport, any thoma, food or ammo stashes. Did he know where his pistol and arm might be. The answers would help him shape his mental shopping list.

Step Two: Lay low for the day. Let Vash get his strength up. Catch some worms, fill up the water bottles.

Step Three: Once it got dark, make their way into town, grab what they could for supplies.

Step Four: Run and don’t look back.

There were a lot of holes, a lot of places things could go wrong, but it would have to do for now. Unfortunately, once the plan was squared away, he didn’t have much else to think about except what he’d seen that night. The conversation between Vash and Knives specifically.

It infuriated him, pissed him off in a way that made him want to get violent. He didn’t agree with Vash about a lot, he’d argue with the man until he was blue in the face, but he could never imagine just leaving Vash so casually. If he ever treated any of the littles that way…if he ever treated Livio that way…

I’d deserve worse than a bullet. Worse than any kind of death.

Wolfwood knew how messed up people could be. This was the first time he couldn’t fully grasp the level of cruelty he was faced with.

He’s your brother. How could you? Wolfwood glanced down aft Vash, still sound asleep. Still clinging to Wolfwood’s sleeve. He loves you more than you deserve. Isn’t that enough? What’s the end goal, here?

To break him, probably. And the sick part was, Wolfwood knew it wouldn’t work, at least not the way Knives wanted it to. It didn’t matter how many times Knives left Vash to humanity’s cruelty; Vash would never give up on them. He’d never give up on Knives, either, no matter how incompatible those two things were.

Something had to give. Vash would have to pick a side, eventually. Wolfwood just wasn’t sure which side was worse.

The rising sun sent rays of light in through the crack in the wall. Vash whined quietly and buried his face in Wolfwood’s shoulder. “Morning, Blondie,” Wolfwood said.

There was a pause before Vash leaned back. He looked genuinely shocked to see Wolfwood there. “Am I dreaming?” he asked.

Wolfwood smiled and poked Vash between the eyes—gently, though, just enough pressure to make his point. “100% real,” he said. “Sorry about that.”

Vash broke into a wide, relieved grin. “Oh, that’s…” He leaned forward until he was resting against Wolfwood. “That’s good. That’s really good.”

“I dunno about good.” Wolfwood checked Vash’s forehead again. He was cooler than he had been the night before, but still warmer than the usual. “Thirsty?”

Vash nodded eagerly. Wolfwood passed him one of the water bottles. He waited until Vash had taken a few good chugs before asking, “How do you feel?”

“Sore. Really sore. Head hurts.” Vash winced as he tried to straighten up. “Tired.”

“Do you think if you took the day to rest, you’d be able to walk out of here?”

“I could…try.”

That’s a “no,” then. “Do you know if they have any transportation down there? Cars, bikes, thomas? Did you have anything when they grabbed you?”

“I had a thomas, but she got away when they grabbed me. Probably kept running to the meetup point, so…” Vash trailed off, then shook his head. “Sorry. Ship Three will know something is wrong when she shows up without me, but without any way for me to…”

Another pause. This time, Vash seemed to hold on to whatever thought he’d had, and grabbed his jacket. He reached into a hidden pocket even Wolfwood hadn’t been able to find, and pulled out some kind of thin contraption with an earpiece attached. “Okay. Okay, good. We can call for help.”

Perfect. Wolfwood would have to dodge seeing anyone from the ship, but at least Vash would be somewhere safe. “How close can they get?”

“We’d have to move away from any population centers…” Vash froze. “Nico, was Nai really there last night?”

Damn it. Should he lie? Vash would be furious if he caught Wolfwood in a lie, but if Wolfwood told him the truth, he’d probably do something stupid. Try to fist fight Knives on his own or get himself recaptured while trying to warn the town, or something like that. Unfortunately, Wolfwood took too long to decide one way or another, and the silence was all the answer Vash needed. He tried to get on his feet; his expression was furious, not terrified like it had been the night before. “That asshole...”

“Steady on!” Wolfwood was glad to see Vash getting visibly pissed for a change, not just mopey and depressed, but he did not like the thought of where that anger might lead them. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

“I have to stop him.”

“How? You going to give him an ass-whooping with no gun? Bite him into submission or something?”

“I’m thinking about it.”

Heaven help me, he’s serious about this. Wolfwood dragged Vash back down as best he could without hurting him. “You are not going to fight your brother. We are staying put until you can walk, and then we are getting you home.”

“But…”

“But nothing.” Wolfwood tightened his grip on Vash’s arm. “You want to see Ship Three again? Because I can promise you that you won’t if you go after him.”

“He wouldn’t hurt me – “

“He left! You were baked to a crisp when I got to you, and he wasn’t planning on coming back until you were completely burned up! All that to prove a point. How is that not hurting you?”

Vash’s lips parted. His eyes slowly widened as a dozen retorts formed and died. Wolfwood could see something in there was close to breaking, so he grabbed his chance, even though he knew it would hurt.

“Don’t you think killing those people is more about getting to you than it is keeping you safe?”

Cruel to be kind.

Wolfwood couldn’t tell if the question was enough to sever Vash’s loyalty to Knives entirely—in fact, he was pretty sure it wouldn’t. But from the way Vash’s face crumpled, it had fractured something. “Oh,” Vash said quietly.

A few tears slipped down his cheeks; the sight only compounded the guilt Wolfwood felt. This is the right call. You didn’t tell him anything that wasn’t true. You’ve seen where that stupid loyalty to Knives gets him. He has to face what his brother is. Still… “Hey, c’mon.” Wolfwood pressed the bottle of water back into Vash’s hands. “Vash, I…”

Voices suddenly started carrying up the tunnel. Wolfwood and Vash froze at almost the same time, their eyes locking onto each other. After a pause, Vash leaned over and whispered, “It’s not Nai. I’d know.”

So, it was just people from town. Probably entered the caves while Wolfwood was arguing with Vash. So much for my sniper position.

Wolfwood put on his sternest face and pressed a finger against his lips. Vash nodded.

It was hard to get a read on where the speakers were. Too many tunnels, too much echoing. Wolfwood caught snippets of conversation—can’t have gone far, maze in here, probably come crawling out—but the voices grew quieter from there until it was silent again. This time, Wolfwood made sure to keep his eyes glued on the valley below. A small group crossed back into town eventually, hauling a water wagon behind them.

As Wolfwood had suspected, they’d assumed a fleeing Vash would come here. Probably figured he’d either wander the tunnels until he died (in which case, there was no reason to potentially lose men looking for him), or wander out on his own when he couldn’t find a way through (in which case, they could just kidnap him again). Maybe they’d left a guard, but considering the haul of stolen goods they already had, they probably didn’t need Vash to get by.

Good. That works out in our –

“I have to warn them,” Vash said.

Wolfwood closed his eyes and counted backwards from ten. “No,” he replied with gritted teeth, “you do not. And spare me the victims-of-circumstance speech. I heard it all last night and I don’t care.”

“I care, though.”

“Well, we’ve already established that you’re insane, and way too forgiving, so…”

“Do you really think they deserve to die? All of them?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think. This is called consequence. They messed with the wrong person and pissed off someone stronger than them. It was gonna happen someday, even if they never met you. And the consequence of us showing our faces is them capturing or killing us, so if you don’t mind, I’d rather stay…”

“They have kids down there.”

Damn it.

Damn it, Vash knew that was a tactical missile of a statement. And he kept going, too: “At least one that I’ve seen, but they’ve talked about more. Kids who weren’t affected by the blast. They don’t have anyone to defend them. If the town goes, they’ll die.”

Wolfwood tried to think of a rebuttal. Almost all of them left him feeling like a raging hypocrite. How was he supposed to point out the brutality of their caretakers when he had the same damn log in his eye? How could he argue without Vash sensing that hypocrisy?

“Do you see why I have to try, now?” Vash said.

Wolfwood did. He hated it. He hated what he knew he had to do even more.

“Not you,” Wolfwood said. “I’ll go.” He glanced Vash’s way, then looked away again at the startled look on his face. “Listen, you can barely stand, and I was gonna see if I could grab some transportation anyway. If you’re serious about this, I’d rather it be me.” He started checking the rifle. Not many bullets left; he’d have to be careful, however he handled this. “Do you know where these kids are kept?”

“Uh…not in town. I saw people going towards the cliffs with supplies, sort of southeast, so I think over there.”

“Right. Might start there.” He wanted to confirm that he was dealing with actual helpless kids before he put his safety on the line. “I need you to promise me you’ll stay put. Don’t come out for anything, understand?”

“I promise.” Vash sighed heavily when Wolfwood gave him a scrutinizing glare. “I really do. Look.” He held out his pinkie. “Please be careful.”

Wolfwood rolled his eyes, but relented enough to link his pinkie with Vash’s. “I’ll be more careful than you are,” he grumbled. He shoved the water bottle back towards Vash again. “Drink up. I’ll refill when I get back.”

If I get back, he couldn’t help thinking, though he had no intention of letting these people get the best of him. Didn’t matter if he was out of vials and down to a handful of bullets. He was Nicholas the Punisher. He’d figure it out.

Wolfwood crept back through the tunnels to the spring room. No guard there. No guard anywhere else along the passage out, or down the cliffside. The sun beat down on his head as he reached the bottom and scanned the valley. The path up into the cliffs forked off, leading to a cluster of buildings he hadn’t paid much attention to the night before. Didn’t necessarily look like residential buildings, but they weren’t falling over, so they were probably suitable enough shelter. He jogged towards the building, his head on a swivel. Everyone must have been inside to avoid the heat of the rising sun, because he didn’t hear any shouts of alarm and he wasn’t shot at.

So far, so good.

He arrived at the buildings. It looked like a storage building, probably for keeping surplus water. He could hear movement inside, voices. Wolfwood peered in through a window.

His stomach sank.

Vash was right; there were kids. The youngest looked maybe ten or twelve, the oldest pushing adulthood (sixteen, maybe?). They had a weary maturity to their eyes that said they hadn’t really been kids in a long time. He knew that look. He’d seen so many kids come in with it—kids even younger than these ones. Their clothes were patched up, but clean, their skin unmarred by the Plant explosion or excess sun exposure. They may have been alone out there, but they hadn’t been shoved outside the nest by necessity just yet.

Because they had people providing for them.

He watched two of the middle-looking kids play cards. Another one had his nose in a book. It was quiet, aside from the humming of the oldest girl as she folded laundry, but the space still felt comfortable. A bit sad, but…safe.

Is it far enough away from the town that Knives will spare it?

Wolfwood knew it wasn’t. That Knives wouldn’t see any innocence here. That even if he did spare them, not all of them would survive being thrust into the world on their own. Maybe none of them would

Damn it…

Wolfwood’s head snapped away from the window at the sound of creaking wood. Someone was coming up the path, dragging a cart behind him. Wolfwood ducked to cover behind the corner. Just one guy, from the look of things, all wrapped up to keep the sun away from their skin as much as possible. And as they got closer…

Bingo. There was one item on Wolfwood’s mental list crossed off. Vash’s gun was pretty distinctive, even when it was strapped to a stranger’s waist. And since it was just one guy…

I can take him. I can definitely take him.

But still, Wolfwood waited. He waited until the cart had been pulled up alongside the house and unloaded, until the person had knocked on the doorway and stepped back. The oldest girl was the one who answered and hauled in the supplies. She chatted with the stranger from the village, asked how things were going. Wolfwood noticed the way the stranger skated past their escaped captive, instead saying that they’d had some issues with supplies but everything would work out. They also issued a stern reminder that everyone needed to stay inside tomorrow until the convoy left.

Yeah, because if the slavers see a group of healthy young people, they’ll take them by force. They were fine with selling other people, but not with their own people being taken. Wolfwood would be bothered by the hypocrisy if it weren’t so common. Even people who weren’t active participants tended to turn a blind eye to No Man’s Land’s human trafficking. The various gangs who engaged it in were too powerful, especially the Roderick gang. All your average person could do was lay low and hope they weren’t singled out as especially valuable.

Still, his frustration with the situation made the next steps a lot easier.

He waited until the door was shut, until the stranger from town had turned around and was headed back. He moved from behind the corner, first at a slow crouch, then at a careful sprint. It was a lot easier to move quietly without the weight of his old weapon on his back; he was still a little surprised that he wasn’t noticed until he was within range and had the rifle aimed at the stranger’s head.

“Don’t move.”

The stranger froze and glanced over their shoulder. Their face was obscured by scarves and goggles, but Wolfwood could see the shock in their body language. “Not a sound. Hands where I can see them.” The stranger obeyed. Wolfwood could see their hands were shaking. That worked for him; if they were scared, if they wanted to live, that made it easier to control them. “Slide the pistol over here.”

The stranger hesitated before removing the pistol and sliding it towards Wolfwood. Wolfwood stepped forward carefully to kick it behind him. “What do you want?” asked the stranger shakily. Their mouth was so muffled it was hard to tell if he was dealing with a man or woman, but it didn’t matter. Either one could trounce him if given the opportunity. “We don’t have much…”

“Yeah, I know that’s not true. I want to talk to whoever’s in charge.”

“I’m vice-foreman. You can talk to me.”

Wolfwood narrowed his eyes. He couldn’t tell if the stranger was lying or not, but he decided to take the gamble. Rolling up into town, even with a hostage, was probably asking for more trouble than he could handle. “Can I see your face while we’re talking?”

The stranger hesitated again before pulling off the goggles and lowering the scarf covering the lower half of their face. As expected, Wolfwood saw a face laced with scar tissue, white and shiny and definitely more sensitive to the sun. One eye looked blinded. The whole effect made it hard to tell if he was speaking to a man or a woman, young or old. They were just a human person worn down to grim survival instincts. “What do you want?”

The voice was female, though. It reminded him of Miss Melanie a bit, a thought that Wolfwood shoved aside as quickly as possible. He didn’t need to be thinking about her right now. “I don’t know how else to say this, so I’m gonna cut to the chase,” Wolfwood said. “You fucked up big time. That guy you were holding last night? His brother’s coming and he’s going to be pissed.”

The vice-foreman rolled her eyes. “Yeah, we all heard him screaming last night. Unless his brother’s bringing an army…”

He wasn’t. He wouldn’t need one. But Wolfwood had no way of explaining that without it sounding impossible, so he tried a different angle. “What year is it?” Wolfwood asked.

“…what?”

“What year?”

“Thirty-Four, abouts? What, you want me to try and figure out what Earth Year it is? No one knows that anymore, pal.”

Planetary Year Thirty-Four. That gave him something to work with. Wolfwood pulled out his lighter and held it up so the design etched into it caught the light. ��Does this look familiar?”

It was a gamble that paid off. The vice-foreman’s eyes widened at the emblem. Must’ve had a run-in with the Eye before, so this half-formed plan of his would probably work. On paper, Wolfwood was one of their pastors. He’d been taught to do the whole fire and brimstone bit, shock and awe before the bullets started, but he never did. They wanted him to kill, so he killed. No sense in dressing it up as something other than a slaughter. That was why he preferred to refer to himself as an undertaker. Fit the job description better.

But all of it was still there. Wolfwood dug into the deep recesses of his brain, drawing out all the details that had been drilled in there.

“In the past, God rained fire from the sky, destroying the city of depraved fools. We seek to fix the world once and for all…”

He barely recognized his own voice then. It was flat, dull, the voice of a kid who was barely hanging on, who ignored the pain and the smell of blood and thought only of home. Of everyone who would be safe as long as he kept his head down, said everything correctly, did as he was told.

“…to bring everything back to even.”

He never thought he’d say those words willingly, but here he was.

The vice-foreman took a step back. “They sent you?”

“Not they. The man you kidnapped. He doesn’t want you to die.” Wolfwood pocketed the lighter again. “Shit if I know why, but his brother…he won’t listen. You really picked the wrong guy to try and sell.”

“But he escaped. We don’t have him anymore, I swear.”

“Doesn’t matter. You did what you did, and now you pay the price.”

“We have children…”

“Don’t.” Wolfwood shook his head. “I’m just the messenger. I’m not here for your excuses or your explanations. I’m just here to tell you to run. Get as many people as you can and get out before he comes back. Far as you can.”

“We’re in the middle of nowhere. How…how do I know you’re not lying to me?”

Wolfwood lowered his glasses. “Look me in the eyes and tell me I’m not dead serious about this.”

He held eye contact with the vice-foreman. Watched as her expression changed from defensive to quiet dread. “Why warn us?” she asked. “If you’re with them…”

Wolfwood shrugged. He could’ve corrected her, but he wasn’t not with them. If letting her think he was currently made the warning more credible, he’d take it. “I owe that man a few. Frankly, I don’t care if you live or die, but…he does. He’s terrified for you, even after everything you did. Think about that.” He tilted his head back. “And think about them.”

And with that, he backed away, keeping his eyes on the vice-foreman as he backed up to scoop up Vash’s pistol. Holding it felt wrong. This thing was as close to a weapon of peace that a gun could be; he wasn’t worthy of touching it. But it wasn’t going to grow legs and walk back to Vash, so he did what he had to. “What time is the convoy coming in?”

“Tomorrow morning. Sunrise.”

“Then I suggest you get out of here before then. Assuming you’ve got transport…”

The vice-foreman laughed sharply. “Do you think we’d still be here if we did?”

Good point. Guess we’re walking after all. And he’d wasted time he could’ve spent stealing having this little chat, so…

I hope you like eating worm for the foreseeable future, Vash, Wolfwood thought as he kept backing away. I really hope this is worth it to you.

Once there was enough distance between them, the vice-foreman picked back up the cart and started walking away. Wolfwood still didn’t turn his back until she was far, far down the road. It was only then that he made his way back to the cliffside path, running as fast as he could.

No one chased him down on the way in. Vash was exactly where Wolfwood had left him, more or less. He’d moved a little up the tunnel to get out of the sun and was curled up under his jacket, eyes closed, breathing slow. Wolfwood had to step over him to check the crack in the wall. No sign of any pitchfork-bearing groups coming to storm the cliffs so far.

“Did you tell them?” Vash asked quietly.

Wolfwood glanced Vash’s way. “I told the second in command. She’ll pass it along. Think I left an impression. And I got your gun back.” He stepped back to lay it on the ground near Vash. “That’s all, though. We’re on spring water and worm meat rations until Ship Three picks you up.”

Vash carefully picked up the pistol and rolled over onto his back to examine it. There was something sad in his eyes as he did. “I know,” he said. “But…thank you for trying.”

Wolfwood looked down into the valley and didn’t reply.

He couldn’t sleep again that night.

It wasn’t that he was worried about their upcoming travels. Vash was on the mend after a lot of water and rest; they probably would’ve run for it that night, if it hadn’t been for the threat of crossing paths with Millions Knives. Right now, it was a waiting game. See if he followed through on his threat. If the town would still be standing come sunrise.

Vash took ages to doze off. Wolfwood stayed glued to his spot near the crack in the cliff wall and watched.

He tried to tell himself at first that he was just keeping an eye out, to see if anyone came up looking again or if anyone ever left. But as the night wore on, as his eyes kept scanning the valley for flashes of silver…

“So, what did the Ninevites do? Did they listen?”

It was one of Miss Melanie’s secret stories, the ones he carried deep in his heart but would never repeat to a soul. The one about a prophet who decided he would rather run away than preach to a people he hated. God had a whale (like a grand worm, apparently, but not a worm) swallow him up, then spit him out at the right port when the prophet repented for his disobedience. The name had come up in the Eye’s teachings, he remembered, something about the disobedient nature of man, but only Miss Melanie had ever told him the whole story.

“They did listen. They wore ash and sackcloth and prayed for forgiveness. And God heard them. He spared them.” That was the part the Eye would have objected to. Sinners didn’t get reprieve in their teachings. “But that wasn’t enough for Jonah. He wanted to see them suffer for what they had done to his own people. God rebuked him for that. It’s not right, to hate others so much that you would…” She’d trailed off, up to her wrists in soapy water. “It’s not right.”

He remembered the smell of laundry soap, the dampness of his palms as he hung up small shirts to dry. The distressed look on her face as she contemplated the cruelty of denying others forgiveness. He’d been upset for her, changed the subject so she wouldn’t look so sad, but now…

Shit. I’m the guy she was talking about, aren’t I?

Because he wouldn’t lie: there was a part of him, deep down, that wanted to see that place torn down. There was so much cruelty in the world, cruelty that those people had undeniably contributed to. Wolfwood couldn’t stop any of it. Sometimes it felt like no one could. He hadn’t been lying when he told the vice-foreman that he didn’t care what happened to them. If they lived, whatever. If they died, they’d brought it on themselves, and at least they wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone else.

But then he remembered the look in the vice-foreman’s eyes, the flat sound of his voice, how monstrous he must have looked to her…

I had let go. I don’t like who I was back then.

Wolfwood shut his eyes tightly.

I don’t want you to do that for me. Please don’t do that for me.

Just an extension of Millions Knives’ hatred.

When other people change your destination for you…it’s one of the worst things you can do to a person.

He dug his thumb into his bruise until Vash’s voice stopped echoing in his head. Until the pain was so bad that he couldn’t help jerking his hand away, hissing sharply as he did. The sun was starting to peek over the horizon. Dawn was coming.

Vash was awake.

“Sorry,” Wolfwood said. “Go back to sleep, it’s…”

But it wasn’t nothing.

Vash wasn’t looking at him; he was looking past Wolfwood, towards the crack. His eyes were wide, afraid, and he clutched the jacket around him as tightly as possible. “Vash?”

Whatever Vash might have said was cut off by the sound of an approaching truck. Wolfwood turned around in time to see one pulling up to the outskirts of town. Just the one, which felt weird since they were expecting a convoy. Unless…

Of course, Vash took off running. Wolfwood raced after him. “Vash, Vash…” He knew what was coming. They both did. “Vash, don’t…”

For a man who’d only just stepped back from death’s door, Vash was quick. He was out of the side tunnel, darting past the spring, and heading towards the entrance before Wolfwood could stop him. Wolfwood was terrified he was going to have to wrestle the guy back inside, but Vash collapsed at the entrance, gasping for breath, staring down over the town.

It was already burning.

Wolfwood was briefly transfixed by the carnage below. He could hear the flames, the slashing of blades, the sound of gunfire being abruptly cut off. If he listened very closely, he could hear screaming. “…come on,” Wolfwood whispered. He grabbed Vash’s arm, ready to haul him back to his feet, to carry him if he had to. “Vash, you don’t have to…”

Vash jerked his arm away and stayed where he was. His body shook and tears streaked his face as he stared down into the valley, watching carnage Wolfwood had been so quick to dismiss as consequence. Seeing it now, seeing the horror in Vash’s eyes…

Wolfwood looked away. His own hands started shaking, but for different reasons. He waited for one of those blades to come streaking up the cliffs and cut his throat.

It never did

The sun rose. The screaming stopped. For a while, it was quiet.

Vash’s voice felt like a sudden slap in the face.

“Help me up.”

Wolfwood blinked. He wasn’t expecting it to be so bright. How long had he been standing there? Long enough that his legs ached as he turned around. Vash looked terrible again—the mad sprint to the entrance must’ve taken a lot out of him. Wolfwood did as he was told, walking to Vash’s side to help him to his feet. Vash wobbled, took a deep breath, then pulled away to start hobbling down the path. “Where are you going?” Wolfwood asked.

“Some of them might have…” Vash had to stop not too far away. “…some of them might have gotten out. I need…I need to find survivors.”

Wolfwood tried to remember if he’d seen anyone leave. There had been some activity around the town that night, but he couldn’t grasp any details. His mind was still someplace else, still bracing itself to be struck down for being such a miserable piece of shit. That guilt was what shut his mouth. Objectively, he knew they should be focused on getting out of there, that Knives might still be there, but those thoughts stayed stuck in his head. He just jogged to catch up to Vash and helped him down the path.

The walk seemed to take ages. They took a detour to check the kid’s building. It was completely empty, door wide open, no sign of carnage. Didn’t mean there were any survivors. Each step closer to town from there brought out new details. Most of the buildings had been leveled. Wolfwood thought he could see the truck peeking above the ruins. There was blood on the sand—people had tried to run, hadn’t gotten far, but no sign of the bodies. Just rubble, bullet casings, blood, and the unoccupied truck that had started it all.

Then they reached what had been the town center.

The post Vash had been tied to was the tallest thing left standing. The bodies were laid out in a neat spiral around it, their scarred faces turned to the sky. Throats cut. All missing their left arm.

Vash’s prosthetic was hanging from the post by its wrist.

Wolfwood couldn’t help it: the sight of the arm yanked a disbelieving, strangled yelp of a laugh from him. What kind of sick joke is this? Was Bluesummers here already? Or had he learned how to be such a monster from Knives? Vash stared over the tableau with a dull expression before walking to the truck. It was unoccupied, but the driver’s seat was stained with blood. “Guess he found the slavers, too,” Vash said quietly. “What would you have done?”

Wolfwood tore his eyes away from the bodies. “…huh?”

“You told me that you don’t go out of your way to be nonlethal. That you choose the people you care about. If you were in Nai’s position…”

The question jarred Wolfwood out of the nightmarish fog clinging to his mind. “If I were in Nai’s position, we would’ve been long gone by now,” he said. “I wouldn’t have let anyone stop me, but…Vash, I wouldn’t have…”

He wouldn’t, right? He may have been a monster, but he wasn’t this.

No, you’re just fine with seeing it happen. Is that much better?

“You wouldn’t have done this,” Vash finished, unaware of Wolfwood’s crisis of conscience. “Because this isn’t…normal. This isn’t…” He looked over the wreckage. “This isn’t how people act.”

Wolfwood suddenly understood what Vash was really getting at. The realization that was slowly sinking in. He’d wanted Vash to understand what his brother was, to pick a damn side already, but…

Not like this.

Vash’s hair was slicked back and sticking up from restless sleep and the repeated soaks he’d taken to cool off. Getting the golden mop out of his eyes made him look older. Wolfwood wasn’t sure he liked it. “…we should get moving,” Wolfwood said finally. He stopped to tousle Vash’s hair as he walked to examine the truck, trying to push it back into place. “Do you think this thing still has juice?”

Someone started screaming.

Wolfwood’s first thought was that someone was still alive in there, somehow, half-bled out or trapped under rubble. What he saw when he turned around was almost worse. There was a handful of people nearby, all wrapped up in clothes and scarves and goggles, save for one. It was the eldest girl from the depot. She collapsed on the ground in front of Knives’ bloody display, sobbing hysterically. The others standing nearby were frozen in place, staring at the carnage. “Don’t let the kids come over here…no, stay over there!” one called.

The vice-foreman. Her and maybe four other adults, and from the sound of it more someplace on the edge of town with the other kids. Some of them had run.

They had survived.

“You’re alive,” Vash breathed.

The vice-foreman’s gaze jerked over to them. Wolfwood didn’t need to see her face to tell how terrified she was at the sight of them. “Please,” she said. “Please, you made your point…”

“You’re alive,” Vash repeated, seemingly not hearing her pleas. “You…” He cupped his hands over his mouth, tears suddenly flooding his eyes. “Oh, thank God…”

Wolfwood had never heard Vash invoke a higher power of any kind in the future. It sounded genuine here and now. As if he had been struck by lightning and suddenly believed that maybe God could exist. Something had finally worked out. Even something small.

Wolfwood had stopped getting that feeling a long time ago.

He wondered if the same thing would happen to Vash.

The vice-foreman looked confused, even pulled off her goggles to get a better look at Vash’s relieved face. “I’m sorry,” Vash said, his voice muffled by his hands and his tears. “I tried to stop him, I did…what can I do? We have this, there has to be someplace we can go…”

“The truck might not be charged.” Wolfwood wasn’t sure why he said that. He was pretty sure he was still in shock. Vash’s bittersweet joy at seeing survivors didn’t help.

I don’t understand him.

“We’ll figure it out. We’ll…” Vash’s voice cracked as a tears started slipping down his face. “We’ll figure it out.”

The vice-foreman kept staring. So did the other adults. Wolfwood wondered if any of them had been the ones to strap Vash to that pole, if they’d been the ones to kick him when they tried to warn him or if they’d just turned a blind eye when it happened.

He wondered if the guilt choked them as much as it did Wolfwood.

“We need to bury them,” said the eldest girl. “We can’t just leave them like this.”

Vash hobbled over to kneel next to her. “We will,” he said. “I’ll help.”

“No,” Wolfwood said. “You’ll rest. I’ll help.” He sighed quietly. “Undertaker, remember?”

It was going to take hours, especially if they insisted on individual graves. He wasn’t even sure if he’d be able to find a shovel in this wreckage. But it was his job.

Maybe digging a few graves would make up for his inaction.

In the end, they made burial mounds out of the town’s rubble.

Wolfwood tried not to think too hard about the fact that they couldn’t find the missing arms. He tried not to think too hard about any of it. He just kept moving rocks, stacking them carefully over body after body after body.

“Nico?”

Wolfwood looked up from the latest stack. The sun had moved across the sky. Vash was standing near him with a water bottle. “Here,” he said quietly. “Are you hungry?”

He wasn’t. He was barely even thirsty, but he forced himself to down some and dump some more over his head and neck. “How long have I been working?” he asked hoarsely.

“It’s been a few hours. I think I got the truck working.” Vash took the water bottle back. “It has a built-in solar recharger, so the battery’s topped up. We just have to figure out where we’re going.”

“Anywhere that isn’t here sounds good.” Wolfwood looked down at his hands. They were coated in dust, and the rough edges of the stones were starting to bite into his skin. He’d tear right through if he wasn’t careful. It wasn’t until Vash gently took his hand that Wolfwood noticed he’d popped his arm back on. “Good thing they didn’t break that.”

“Yeah.” The smooth surface of his prosthetic fingers slid over Wolfwood’s palm, as if testing the integrity of his skin. “You should wrap these. Come on.”

Wolfwood let himself be led to the truck. Details about Vash filtered in as his mind started settling back into his body. He’d put on some clothes and shoes along with his coat. His hair was starting to flop back down into his face. His eyes were tired, tired, tired, but focused as he cleaned off Wolfwood’s hands. The water evaporated almost instantly in the heat. “Are you okay?” Vash asked.

“Are you?” Wolfwood retorted.

“I’m not the one who’s been on autopilot for hours.”

“I’m not the one whose brother…” Wolfwood took a deep breath. “Sorry.”

“…no. No, you’re right.” Vash dug one of the random shirts Wolfwood had grabbed out of his back. “Honestly, I’m…not great.” He grabbed the hem and tore fiercely, tearing a long strip off starting from the bottom. “I’m not doing great.”

He kept tearing. The destruction seemed to do him some good, because when he’d gathered enough cloth to wrap around Wolfwood’s hands, his next words came easily.

“I don’t like being angry. I don’t like how it makes me feel. But I’m so angry at him right now, and I don’t know what to do with it. Has that ever happened to you? You get angry and it just…” He tied off the makeshift wrap. “…sits there? Right here.” He tapped his chest, right on his sternum. “I feel like I’m going to explode.”

“Think that might be heartburn,” Wolfwood said. The joke was instinctive, but he knew it wasn’t what Vash needed right now. He forced himself to be serious: “I get what you mean. I do.”

“How do you deal with it?”

Wolfwood snorted. “You don’t want my advice on that. Did Brad never tell you I broke his nose?”

“Fractured his orbital bone,” Vash corrected. “But yeah, he told me. And that you broke a tablet.” He didn’t sound disappointed or shocked at all. “Usually, when I’m mad about something, I can figure out a way to fix things instead. That’s part of why I come out here. But I don’t know what to do about this.” Vash met Wolfwood’s eyes. “I’m not that crazy, am I?”

That felt like a trick question. “I’m gonna need some more context for that one, kid.”

“I mean…I’ve tried to talk to him about things before, but it feels like he doesn’t hear me. Ever. So, either I’m crazy and I’m not making sense, which I can fix, or he doesn’t want to listen, which I can’t fix. And that would also mean that a guy who’s been falling through portals scattered around my life cares more about me than my own twin.” Vash let out a strangled laugh and tore another strip of fabric. “Which, as much as I appreciate everything you’ve done for me, is kind of messed up.”

“I think the word you’re looking for is fucked.”

“There’s kids around, you know.”

“They’ve heard worse by now.” Or at least, he had by that age. “Listen, you probably don’t want to hear this, but your brother isn’t a good person.”

“Like your uncle. How did you…?”

Wolfwood grimaced. “I…shot him, actually. In my defense, he shot me first, so I figure that made us even.” His free hand strayed to his side, to the place where there had once been a scar. “Don’t ask me if it was fatal. I didn’t stick around to check. But I shot him, and I ran, and I found someplace safe. Have you called Ship Three yet?” Vash shook his head. “Maybe you should.”

It was the last thing Wolfwood ever thought he would say, but the way Vash had described the place made it sound better than out here. He just hoped Brad and Luida had actually put in some effort.

“Okay,” Vash said. “Okay, I’ll call. Thanks, Nico.”

“For what?”

“Listening.”

Vash walked a safe distance away to start speaking into that device of his. Wolfwood stared after him, suddenly too tired to stand back up.

He wished it could be that simple for Vash, that all he’d have to do was break things off with Knives and run back to Ship Three. He knew better, though. Wolfwood’s uncle had never bothered looking for him, assuming the son of a bitch had survived, because he didn’t care. He’d never wanted Wolfwood anyway. But Knives did want Vash for whatever crazy scheme he was cooking up. He wanted Vash shattered to pieces, malleable. And he’d never stop until he got that.

I should have taken the shot.

But he hadn’t. All he could do now was keep driving a wedge between Vash and Knives. Make it so a few decades from now, going back to July was unthinkable. Or at least, going back to negotiate was unthinkable.

Sorry, me, Wolfwood thought as he pulled out a cigarette. If this goes well, our job is gonna be a lot harder.

Future him would just have to deal with that.

Vash walked back over as Wolfwood lit his cigarette. He had a few new tear tracks on his face, but he looked relieved. “Someone can pick me up,” he said. “I know where to go. I don’t know what it will mean for the others, but it’s better than here.”

“Sounds good to me.” Wolfwood took a long drag from the cigarette. “So? Where to, co-captain?”

Vash smiled, and Wolfwood was relieved to see it looked genuine. “East,” he said. “We’re going east.”

East it was. Hopefully, no trouble would follow them that way. Especially if that trouble’s name was Millions Knives.

They buried the last of the bodies, gathered what supplies they could find, and drove east. It was almost two straight days of near-continuous driving, and they were two of the most awkward days of Wolfwood’s life.

No one really knew what to do with each other. The survivors were wrapped up in their grief. Vash was still in pain, and napped to escape it. Wolfwood still felt the haze of his guilt trying to drag him under, along with all the aches and pains he’d accumulated since this whole mess started.

(His ankle still looked fine. Wolfwood was still afraid to ask Vash what he might have done to it.)

Vash, on the rare occasion he did talk, didn’t bring up Knives again. He tried to talk to the kids (they just stared at him), then the adults (who gave short, terse answers and sounded like they were scared he’d go full Knives on them), then Wolfwood (the ensuing debate about the merits of mechanical versus animal transport killed a few hours, even if that came at the cost of Wolfwood having to admit he had no clue how to ride and had eaten dirt every time he tried to learn). At least most of the adults knew how to drive well. He didn’t have to deal with Meryl Stryfe’s ability to find every pot hole in her path.

Scratch that. He would’ve preferred it if Meryl were there. Her driving may have been bad enough to put the fear of God in the staunchest atheist, but she’d probably do a better job helping Vash find answers than Wolfwood.

The relief Wolfwood felt when he saw signs of civilization felt like having a glass of ice water dumped on his head. “This the place?” he asked.

Vash discretely checked one of the many gizmos he had tucked in his coat’s seemingly endless pockets. “This is it,” he confirmed. “Hopefully, they won’t think we’re here to cause trouble.”

Wolfwood kept one hand on his rifle as they got out of the truck, just in case. They got a few odd glances, but no one tried to talk to them, which was fine by Wolfwood. “Right, we’re off,” he said as he tossed the keys to the vice-foreman. “You can keep driving…sell the thing…whatever you want, I don’t really care.”

She caught the keys and stared at the two of them. “That’s all? Really?”

“What, you want a kiss or something?”

Vash rested a hand on Wolfwood’s shoulder and shot the vice-foreman a reassuring smile. “That’s all. No bad blood from me, I promise.” The vice-foreman looked immediately confused. Vash kept on smiling. “Just be safe. You can do something better now. Look after each other…” He turned and started walking away. “Look after other people, too.”

The vice-foreman’s baffled eyes locked onto Wolfwood. He shrugged. “You heard the man,” he said as he turned to follow Vash. “Ash and sackcloth.”

And that was that. They walked into town and no one tried to stop them. It felt anticlimactic, but Wolfwood wasn’t going to complain. He’d had enough craziness to last him two lifetimes.

“Do we need to get a hotel?” Wolfwood asked.

“I don’t know,” Vash said. “They said our people were about two days out, too, so I might just have to – “

“Vash!”

Wolfwood recognized that voice. It took him a second to spot its owner, though. Brad was out of his Ship Three uniform, wearing a battered brown jacket and jeans, but it was definitely him.

Wolfwood still wasn’t sure how he felt about the man. The look on Vash’s face nudged him towards a more positive opinion: joy, then relief, then crumpling under the weight of everything he’d been through. When he dodged his way through the crowd and reached Brad, the man didn’t hesitate to give Vash a tight hug. Vash sank into the embrace with shaking shoulders. Safe to cry.

He's okay now.

As if on cue, Wolfwood felt that familiar, someone-hovering-over-him feeling again. A portal had formed at the end of a nearby alley. When he looked back, Brad had his back to him and was examining Vash’s visible bruises like a mother thomas fussing over her chick. Vash glanced over Brad’s shoulder and caught Wolfwood’s eye. Wolfwood tilted his head towards the alley, then pointed to Vash and gave him a questioning thumb’s up. You good?

Vash smiled and nodded.

He was safe. He’d be back on the ship soon. Wolfwood had done as much as he could. It was time for him to go. Still, he lingered by the alley entrance until Vash and Brad vanished into the crowd.

The eldest of the depot kids had wandered into town with the adults. They looked overwhelmed by all the people, but determined. Maybe this would be a good place for them. Maybe they’d get a second chance here.

He just hoped they used it for something good.

Wolfwood slipped his hand into his pocket as he stepped towards the portal. He still had his lighter. He hadn’t had the chance to give it to Vash.

Next time, he thought as he stepped through.

I’ll give it to him next time.

#three guesses who shows up in this chapter first two don't count #trigun #trigun stampede #fic: the unknowable tomorrow

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