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kiradragonwriter · 4 years

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Loss and Control

Day 1 Semblance

Grimm were everywhere Clover looked, but so too were there thousands of hunters and huntresses. This was what everyone hoped was the final battle, the one that would stop Salem’s reign of terror. On this day warriors from all over the world were here in this battle. Atlas had been the last to arrive seeing as the kingdom had to stabilize even just a little before leaving to fight on the front lines of this war. They owed it to those kids for pushing Salem back and saving Atlas and Mantle.

“Squadrons spread out and get our ground forces into the fray. Air support, stay in the skies as long as you can to take out the flying grimm. Support everyone, not just our fellow countrymen, we are fighting to save all who live on Remnant,” General Schnee spoke in a strong and determined tone her eyes blazing before cutting off the scroll and turning to their pilots. “Get us as close to the main forces as you can.”

Clover moved to the door of the air ship with the other teams, about to flick his pin when he remembered that it had been lost in the tundra. He instead patted the lucky rabbit’s foot and placed his hand on the wall.

Winter caught his action and whispered, “Should you using your semblance Clover? You only just got out medical and PT.”

He caught the look of concern at his chest, then light blue eyes meeting teal green. Ducking his head and whispering back, “This is a tactical and selfish use. With my semblance we can make it closer to main forces to provide support, giving the main teams a better shot at defeating Salem.”

“And the selfish reason?” she asked under the noise of the teams checking that they were ready for when the signal was given.

“So we can get to the people who matter most to us. Your sister.”

“And you’re worried about Qrow.”

He closes his eyes, he can still hear the cry ringing in his ears, but is snapped out of the memory by Robyn shifting over to them as the turbulence gets worse.

“It looks like we will get half-way through the main forces and use landing strategies to get down. Your Ace Ops and my Huntresses are ready to go General Schnee.”

Winter nodded, took one last glance at Clover and pushed the controls to open the doors. It was time to fight.

…

Clover cursed under his breath as he dodged another beowolf and stabbed it through the head before racing with team JRN in the direction that Qrow had gone in to fight Tyrian. The second Qrow had seen the Faunus, he had engaged him and been pushing their fight away from team RWBY. That had not been the plan according to the kids, after they had gotten over the shock of seeing him alive. The plan seemed to have gone right out the window with the amount of grimm that were around all of them and Tyrian taunting Qrow about Clovers death. Qrow was supposed to fight Tyrian alone, while the kids assisted with keeping the serial killer within his range.

Suddenly to their left in the distance a dark reddish black light dome formed, making the kids call out to move that way.

“What is that?” shouted Clover as Ren and him took out an ursa together.

“It’s Qrow’s semblance,” shouted Nora, smashing the head of the ursa Jaune had knocked back with his shield.

“What?” Clover gasped, dodging a griffon and using Kingfisher to ensnare its wings throw it towards Jaune, who slices the beast in half.

“After Atlas, Qrow’s semblance either fully activated or changed to being a visible field of light. Anything inside the field has anything from annoying mishaps to the worst case of misfortune ever experienced. Also depending on the state of Qrow’s emotions, determines how big the field is and how effective it is.” Jaune shouted as he took out a creep and jumped back over to their group, blocking a boarbatusk from rolling into Nora and shoved it back.

Ren kicked the small grimm into the air and stabbed the underside before joining them back on the task. All of them, running as best they can toward the dome while he caught their attention.

“Judging by the size and how the light is fluctuating, …,” Ren said, looking to his team leader.

Jaune nodded his head and Ren put his hands out to the group, enshrouding them in tranquility as they ran by the grimm. None of the grimm noticed as they raced by, already turning into dust by the time the kids and Clover passed. The second they could see into the field of light; they heard the clash of weapons and watched the two enemies push each other away.

…

Qrow knew what Tyrian was doing the second he was half way through his first taunt. He knew Tyrian was trying to make him fall into despair and rage, so he could pull him away from the others. So he let him.

For his own plan to work, their allies couldn’t be around to get caught in the field of his semblance. So he launched himself at the scorpion Faunus, forcing all of his attention on himself. He kept chasing and retreating, drawing Tyrian onto the grimm heavy side of the battle field. Though none of the grimm paying full attention to them, that could change with the flip of a coin. It was a risk Qrow was willing to take.

“My, the mighty Qrow Branwen seems to have fallen quite far from his prestige. You are alone with no hope of support coming to your aid this time Birdy,” mocked Tyrian in a snide and condescending tone as he approached closer to Qrow.

“You should not get ahead of yourself Callows. You think just because I don’t have any allies nearby that I won’t go all out. I am going to do whatever it takes to kill you.” Qrow stated as he began to back further away from Tyrian and the divide.

“Aw yes the “Harbinger of Misfortune” that is huntsman Branwen. A man who is burdened with the curse of bringing bad luck and even death to his allies. Are you going to use the misfortune that lead to Clovers death, kill me in revenge? You whose own weapon pierced the man’s body after you broke his aura. You should turn your blade on yourself in that case.”

“Shut up! You have no right to say his name! You will pay for your part in his death and I will kill you!” Qrow shouted before sweeping his arms in an arch in front of him and closing his eyes. Bursting forth, with Qrow as the epicenter, raced a reddish black crackling circular dome of light. It stretched to a twenty-yard radius and height, the energy within it feeling oppressive and cloying.

“What is this?” questioned the faunus with a maniacal grin, as he watched the light settle. “Some surprise bit of last resort magic that wizard gave you? It won’t help you; you will die here Birdy.”

“For Clover, I will kill you,” spoke the scythe wielder, clenching his fist over the pin feeling all of his anger, despair, and pain. Qrow opened his eyes glowing pale red, reflecting all these emotions, the light of the dome making his pale skin glow dark red. “This is all me Tyrian. Welcome to my “Field of Misfortune”.”

Tyrian and Qrow both charged at each other, the epicenter of the dome following Qrow, and clashed weapons. Pushing away from one another, they began to swing their blades hoping to strike the other. They leapt and dodged, Tyrian moving with agility and Qrow with speed and strength. Neither noticed Clover and team JNR getting to the edge of the field, but they noticed some of the grimm turn in the direction of the field.

“The grimm are going to try to attack Qrow!” Nora exclaimed to the group.

“What? Why?”

“The field, the way it is acting and how big it is. The look on his face, Qrow is letting negative emotions power it. That is going to attract grimm, and right now that will be more than he can handle while fighting Tyrian,” Ren gasped out after killing another creep.

“Damn it Qrow,” Clover cursed again as he took out the centennial that popped up in front of him. Neither in the field were paying attention to their surroundings, both moving almost to keep track of. Clover caught the look on Qrow’s face when he locked the tonfa with Tyrian’s blades once more. He felt his heart clench and knew the kids were not far off, the expressions were the same as that night. The hurt, frustration, anger, and despair. The one expression that had Clover attempting to enter the field, self-contempt, the one thing Clover had been hoping to help Qrow fight against the most.

Jaune grabbed his arm holding him back from entering, “Don’t, when the field is powered by negative emotions, he has no control of what the misfortune targets. We just have to keep as many grimm out as possible and Tyrian in. It is the best we can do for him now.”

The tranquility would fade over them soon enough. So, they began to move around cutting down as many of the grimm as was feasibly possible. The entire time Clover was constantly looking into the field, watching the bad luck affect both of the fighters inside and the grimm who decided that going after the source that was attracting them.

Often, either Tyrian or Qrow would slip on stone or dirt, making them mist their intended target. At one-point Tyrian kicked the tonfa out of Qrow’s hand across the field. Qrow in retaliation kicked and punched the scorpion before he was swiped away by the mechanical tail. This pushed Qrow to Harbinger, he swiped it up changing it to its sword mode and blocked the bullets being fired at him. One of The Queen’s Servant gun became jammed allowing Qrow to dodge right and tries to strike him on his side, but blocked by the tail.

Grimm that entered the field were also affected. They either took each other out by accident, were struck by Tyrians’ stray bullets hitting them, or Qrow killing them when he had the leeway to take them out.

Suddenly Clover noticed that the field had shrunk by about ten yards, and called out to Jaune. The knight cursed and said this was a side effect of the negative emotions as the driving force of the field, some were not as long lasting as positive emotions. He looked back to the fight, the two still had not noticed them, still focused on killing each other. His eyes widen as he finally caught a clear view of Qrow, tears were streaming down his cheeks, show emotions of only despair and self-contempt.

He clenched his teeth in frustration, while Qrow has carried those emotions with him for years, he had been getting better. Clover knew that he and everyone knew worked with had made a mistake of some kind that night. His mistake that night was staying too focus on one order and not trusting Qrow. Qrow may have knocked out and sense into Ironwood, before he escaped back to the girls, but the man would still have Tyrian and his own guilt to deal with.

He glanced to check on the corvid to see him getting kicked into a rocky cliff face, not too far from himself, his field shrinking another ten yards. Callows laughed manically as he slowly approached Qrow, the tip of his metal stinger dripping the purple venom. Qrow pushed away from the cliff face, teetering on his feet and his aura flickering weakly, close to breaking. It was then that he caught sight of his pin on Qrow before the man fell to his knees.

Clover’s eyes widen, his main luck charm was with Qrow the entire time, the one he has put all of his luck into.

“Jaune I need you to amplify my aura to support my semblance. Ren, Nora, guard our backs. I am going to try something and hope to the Brothers that luck is on our side.”

Without even questioning him they fell into position. Clover knelt on the ground facing towards Qrow, Jaune stood behind him placing his hands on his shoulders, Ren and Nora took up their places on either side of the two nocking back and killing the grimm who thought they were an easier target than Qrow.

He felt his aura begin to grow in strength, surrounding them in a turquoise glow. His eyes glowing as they focused on Qrow and his pin. Luck, he though, I need my luck and my voice to reach Qrow.

…

Qrow was struggling, he knew it was because of the negative emotions he was harboring inside himself. He and the kids had tested his field, his positive emotions and willingness to fully embrace his misfortune were what made his field controllable and last as long as he had the aura. Negative emotions towards himself while fully embracing his semblance though, it only lasted as long as he held onto those emotions and he had no control. He just could not help it though, Tyrian just brought up the worst emotions and reminded him that he was indeed part of the equation that lead to Clover dying that night.

“I thought you were going to kill me Branwen? Is this really all you can do?” the scorpion questioned condescendingly as he entered the field. His eyes glowing purple and venom dripped from the tip and blood-thirsty grin on his face. “What a shame you won’t get to avenge the weed. You will die.”

Qrow closed his eyes trying to find his strength, to lift his weapon, himself, any part of himself; trying to be what Clover saw in him. Suddenly he felt a warmth come over him.

“QROW! DON’T GIVE UP! DON’T LET DESPAIR TAKE YOU!”

Qrow’s eyes shot open and Tyrian spun to the left to see the small group not too far away. All of them glowing with a turquoise light as the grimm around them took each other out. Qrow’s pale red glowing eyes found Clover’s glowing teal-green ones, shock and unimaginable hope.

“DON’T LET THAT BASTARD WIN! I AM ALIVE! I AM RIGHT HERE! I KNOW YOU CAN FEEL IT! I AM HERE WITH YOU AND YOU HAVE ALL THE LUCK STORED IN MY PIN WITH YOU! FIND EVERY OUNCE OF HOPE, JOY, PRIDE, AND LOVE IN YOUR HEART AND USE YOUR SEMBLANCE TO BRING HIM HELL!”

Qrow placed his hand over the pin, and looked down; he was glowing turquoise as well. It was true, Clover is alive. Clover is alive! He felt a nudge inside his mind, lifted his sword and braced it with his other arm, blocking Callow’s blades and stinger. Locking eyes with his opponent, which began to glow an even brighter red, before pushing him to the right and rolling to his left and standing. Together they were flanking the scorpion.

Qrow took a deep breath and tried to remember.

Hope: was the kids and their determination to finish this war.

Joy: was seeing the kids get their hunters licenses and feel safe.

Pride: is seeing Ruby being a strong leader and himself giving up alcohol.

Love… Love: is from everyone in his life, and for Clover.

This time when Qrow spread the “Field of Misfortune” it was pale red and had a radius of fifty yards. He saw the kids and Clover spread out around the Faunus, all of them still glowing turquoise. The bad luck wasn’t going to touch them, not even by accident.

Tyrian was growling in frustration, not understand how that special operative was still alive. This was not part of the plan!

Clover looked briefly to Qrow before flicking Kingfishers hook towards the serial killers head. The Faunus dodged out the way only to be smacked in the back by one of Nora’s grenades and shot at by Ren. He tried to shoot at Ren only for Jaune to jump in front with his shield up and covering them. With Tyrian distracted Qrow and Clover sprinted forward, both their weapons aimed at opposite ends of the man. He jumped crouched in the air to avoid the two attacks but left himself open for both hunters to kick him a short distance away.

Standing side by side they shoulders brushed against one another, both letting out sighs upon feeling how solid each was.

“How long can you have this field up?” asked Clover as they both dodged back from Tyrians bullets. Qrow spun his sword in front of them to block the bullets when the aim was adjusted to where they landed.

“Positive emotions equal less aura usage and longer time period. What about you?” Qrow asked in return as he stomped his on the field causing a grimm to glow and crash into the serial killer while Clover stabbed another that got too close to them.

“Honestly, no clue. This was a something I had wanted to test for years, but there was never anytime. The only reason I even thought it could, is because of your field and wearing my lucky pin,” stated Clover as he swung his partner away from Tyrian dive attacking them and Nora hit a grimm into him.

Qrow gave a rough laugh at the irony of Clover’s using his untested luck in the final battle. It seemed to be pulling through for them though. “Then we’ll finish this quickly, before your “Cloak of Fortune” wears off.”

“ARRRGG, NIETHER OF YOU ARE LEAVING HERE ALIVE!” Tyrian shouted in rage and frustration, activating his semblance to break their auras in the opening they left open. Every one though was blocked by their partner. Even his stinger was blocked by both men.

Clover finally saw their opportunity when they both bent their upper body’s to dodge the stinger. He quickly flicked the hook of Kingfisher around the stinger and looping the rest around his arms. Qrow used his scythe to trip and Clover, with all his strength, flung the faunus over his head and into the ground with a sickening sound of many different things breaking.

There Tyrian lay flattened out his side, the shining dust of his broken aura disappearing into thin air. His writs looked to possibly be dislocated and his tail looked pretty mangled from the impact.

Qrow breathed deeply, staring down at the downed man who had killed many people for fun and in the name of his goddess. The kids came over, his field still causing the grimm to take each other out, and let out whoops of elation. Clover was keeping the line of Kingfisher taunt while looking at Qrow.

“Let’s be done with this and go help your nieces.”

“You don’t want to arrest him and wait till this is all done?” Qrow asked a little shocked while Jaune came over to check Clover’s aura levels.

“Nope. No longer an Ace Op, so I can’t technically arrest him. Not to mention the last time he was arrested didn’t end well,” the luck bearer said with a weary smile towards him.

Qrow glanced back at the scorpion with a sad look on his face as the memory of last time came to mind. He watched Clover motion for the kids move to the edge of the field, before motioning him to finish their adversary off. He stepped forward, transforming Harbinger into its sword, raising it to stab Tyrian through the chest. He stopped and thought about it, then stabbed him in both his legs, making the Faunus cry out in pain.

“Qorw?”

“He’s not going anywhere like that. If he dies it is what he deserves. If he survives, then he’ll answer for everything he has done. I’m not a murderer or an assassin and I refuse to turn into one now,” he stated simply as Clover unwound and freed Kingfisher. Clover watched him move away a couple yards before he finished and caught up.

Clover gasped as Qrow suddenly spun around, cupped the back of his head, and brought their mouths together in a kiss. Their semblances and auras brushing one another in a way that should have been uncomfortable, but was heaven to them. They were opposites in many ways, but they were the same in others. It was a balance that was them.

Pulling back Qrow looked deep into Clover’s eyes, ignoring Nora’s cheer of excitement at them kissing. “I love you and when this is over, I want us to talk and figure this out.”

“I love you too, and we will Qrow. We will.”

#fair game #fairgameweek2020 #qrow x clover #semblance

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weareallfallengods · 4 years

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Chapter 1, continued

This thing tossed us like a couple of rag dolls thrown from a child’s stroller being kicked by a football player. Or at least it started to go that way. Somehow, as the bike ground across the pavement, with just my left hand managing to keep any kind of hold on the bike, I managed to swing myself around it like a gymnast on a gold-medal winning vault-horse routine, snagged Grace’s bar apron with my free hand, and with sheer desperate strength, yank all three back together, right as the beast’s slavering maw snapped shut on empty air where Grace’s head had been just milliseconds before. Through pure accident of positioning, my toes raked across it’s eyes as my leg swung around and I slammed them back down on the pegs, jammed the throttle all the way open, even as Grace somehow managed to complete the circle I’d pulled her in, ending by straddling my hips, arms and hair akimbo while we slid sideways, fortunately tires first.

Grace’s eyes were wider than a kid who opened their eyes to Disneyland on a Christmas morning as she slammed into me, and I used our momentum to get the bike fully upright, only barely escaping a second snap from the beast as it lunged again, trying to tear us apart.

That near miss, and the sigh of relief I almost let happen, didn’t get a chance to last long.

Her damn hair was in my face, which at any other time, wouldn’t have been a problem, really, but just at that second, was incredibly, blindingly, distracting. And it might have saved our lives.

Something hot burned into my shoulder and face as the sound of crashing metal and people yelling slammed into me. Hm, spicy.

“Shit! Watch out! Sorry!” Grace called to the one lady who wasn’t running for the hills as we smashed through her food cart. Can you get third-degree barbecue sauce burns? Food trays, sauces and meat all went flying as we dervished our way right through the middle of her street-side restaurant, sweet and spicy and sticky all at once, all over the ground, and all over me and Grace as well. I couldn’t think of anything more than just keeping everything together and moving forward. Run. The only thought occupying my mind. Just run.

“Hey.”

The softness of her voice is what brought me back to the girl squished up against me and out of the rabbit-instinct flight mode I was in.

I don’t know why but for some reason, my brain decided that was the perfect moment to notice that I’d never realized how captivating the color brown could be. Grace’s eyes were less than inches from mine, and I froze for a second. Again.

“I think it’s stopped.”

I glanced back. The beast had been right on top of us when we hit the food cart, but now it was standing there in the middle of the sidewalk, sniffing around for all the world like the biggest, dumbest, glowiest dog you’ve ever seen. OK, a dog that could tear a truck apart like a box of tissues, but still.

“What the hell is it doing?”

“Maybe it’s hungry.”

I didn’t realize I’d said that out loud. I’d never seen one of these things just...stop like that. It didn't make sense.

No time to think of that right now, just enough time to dart down another alley, blocking the beast from view as it sat down to lap up all the spilled barbecued beef at its feet.

As we weaved and darted through alleys and parking lots, squeezing through sidewalks and darting across small streets, I started to recognize where we were now, and had the barest inkling of a plan besides ‘get away without dying.’

“Whatever that thing is, I think it likes barbecue.”

Grace’s whispered comment snapped me back to what was right in front of me, the whole reason I was in this kind of mess again in the first place. .

“Hunh?”

“I think it stopped to eat at the barbecue stand we knocked over. It’s not chasing us anymore- look.”

I tried to check the mirror again, only to find they’d both been ripped off by now, so switched to glancing over my shoulder quickly, and saw no ominous glow behind us, other than the few street lamps on the small boulevard we were going down.

“Barbecue?” I was still pretty confused. Probably drunk too. But definitely confused.

Grace’s laugh was carried away on the night like fireworks swept away in a light breeze. “Well, I dunno what the hell that thing was, but I haven’t met anyone yet who wouldn’t drop everything for good barbecue, honey.”

Raising an eyebrow, I laughed, “Well it’s good to see I’m not the only one here who can make wildly ridiculous comments with horrible timing!”

“Funny the things you think about when you should be focusing on other stuff that’s a little more important, hunh? Like right now, all I can think about is a nice rack of ribs.” Grace grew quieter as her head sank back down on to my shoulder. “Where we headed, sugar?”

“Somewhere close. Safe. I think.”

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The old loft was just as dank and dirty and run down on the inside as it looked on the outside. Probably worse. No diamonds in the rough here, that’s for sure. Broken glass scattered on the beat up industrial floor scattered the glow of the streetlight through the mist that filled the space. Definitely not up to my usual standard, but hey, we couldn’t really complain too much.

Throwing an old, discarded, and probably moldy, but definitely more disgusting than I wanted to ever touch again, mover’s blanket over the plate window helped to at least hide a little bit of how gross this place looked. Plus, privacy. A quick scan around and I found a pile of old tarps and a couple skeezy mattresses that I definitely wasn’t going to think about where they’d been or who’d done what on them for how long. It’d have to do. A dirty mattress was a small price to pay for still being alive.

"It's not the Four Seasons, but it'll do for now. It's kinda cold- I don't think the building even has heat, but I think we can keep warm enough to make it through the rest of tonight at least."

Grace flopped down heavily on the mattress, exhausted, shoulders slumped, staring vacantly at the floor.

"That was...was that...I don't even know where to start. My brain's been turned to oatmeal. What…? What happened? What in the name of all fucks just happened?"

“Yeah, there’s kind of a lot to unpack here isn’t there?” I just crumpled down into one of the old blankets like a sock puppet being dropped into its nest. “I’m not even sure where to begin.”

“Ya think? Like one minute, I’m trying to mind my business, working my shift at the bar, wondering whether I’m going to have to give another statement to the cops after another bar fight breaks out, and the next I’m getting tossed around like a hot sweet-potato, almost get eaten by a glowing, walking catfish that got beaten a little too hard with the ugly stick, get covered in barbecue sauce, do-si-doed by a goddamn motorcycle ninja, only to wind up in some place that looks like it was lifted straight out of Zillow for Crackheads!”

A snort of wry, tired amusement escaped me. “Yeah, I guess it really does look that bad here. I mean, I’m surprised this place is even still standing after all this time, but you’re right, it definitely looks a bit sketchy.”

“Way to avoid the point, hun.”

“Yeah, I know.” Not sure why, but she kept making me nervous, and the way she was sort of frowning while pinning me down with those sparkling coffee eyes definitely wasn’t helping. Probably just wasn’t used to people making eye contact. Which was the whole reason I was in this mess to begin with. Another sigh.

“Alright. I’ll explain as much as I can. You deserve that much.”

Grace flopped down on the edge of the mattress, chin propped in her hands for all the world like a kid during goddamn story time. How the hell was I supposed to concentrate when she’s doing things like that? Look away! Only way to save myself for now.

“OK, here goes. So the thing you saw? Well, it’s a…” I scowled. “It’s a...sunuvabitch, I don’t really know what it’s called. Alright, further back then. The basics. Got it.

“Supernatural things exist. Like you believe that humans are the highest species on this planet and that you’re all alone in the universe, and no one can quite agree on whether there was anything before or after this life or what happens when you die, right? Well, a lot of what most people believe to be myth or religious superstition is actually, um, real.”

So she hasn’t tried to run away just yet. That’s a good sign, right?

“From what I’ve been able to piece together, from the bits I can remember, what you would call ‘heaven’ and ‘hell’ are real places- they’re just not really visible to mortals. Most of the time. ‘Angels’ and ‘demons’ are real things too, but they’re a little bit different than most people tend to think of them from what I’ve seen.

“I don’t know how many there are, but there’s angels and demons walking around, living just like you and me, every day. The thing is, that mortals like you can’t see them. And that’s where the problem is.”

“Like me?” It wasn’t really a question. Her tone made that clear enough.

“Oh boy. OK, here’s the big one- because with the heaven and hell stuff, most people can be like ‘meh, it’s all superstitious nonsense anyway’ and brush it off. This? Not so much.

“I’m not human. Or mortal. I can see angels and demons walking around plain as day, just like the ones I’ve met can see me. Mortals...see something else.”

“Like the creep at the bar earlier? Did he see...something else? In you?”

“Yeah. On the outside, at first glance, I look like any other girl. But look closer? Well, you saw what happened. People just aren’t ready to see my real nature.”

“But that didn’t happen to me.” Now Grace was looking a little bit confused- but the kind of confused you get when a teacher is explaining something that you know should make sense, even if you were having a hard time getting it.

“No, it didn’t. And it took me way too long to pick up on that. I should’ve realized right away. If I had, maybe I could have gotten you out of there faster and that whole ‘sweet potato’ thing wouldn’t have happened.”

“So what should I be seeing? When I look into your eyes I mean?”

“Probably something along the lines of falling through an eternally expanding universe, a sense that you’re tinier than a piece of sand in the scope of the cosmos, that sort of thing. At least, that’s what I’ve heard from a couple of the ones who were able to be slightly coherent afterwards. There haven’t been many of those over the years.”

“Wow. I definitely don’t see that.”

“And that’s the problem, really. I’ve never heard of something like that happening before. I don’t know what it means, or why you can, or anything! All I know is that something is very, very different, and very, very wrong, otherwise that thing wouldn’t have been after us. And right now, I don’t know if what’s wrong is you, or me, or both of us. But we need to find out if we’re going to not be looking over our shoulders for...what did you call it again?”

Grace laughed. A genuine laugh, not weighed down by worry or terror. “A glowing, walking catfish?”

“Ha ha, yeah, that got beaten too many times with the ugly stick!”

Grace sat up suddenly, nodding sharply to herself. “Alright, well, you’re either batshit crazy, or I owe my gran an apology.” Grace was still half chuckling, but looking very intent.

“Your gran?”

“Yeah, she was super religious, always prayin’, talkin’ and singin’ about god. She must’ve gone to church three times a week! Boy, would she have loved to hear all this.”

“I’ll bet!”

“So, I just wanna make sure I’ve got all the stuff you said- angels are real, and something’s wrong with the fact that I can see your real eyes, and not like, the fires of the Big Bang or something, but you don’t know why that’s a problem or what caused it.. Right?”

“I’d say that about covers it for now, yeah.”

“Alright, I can live with that much for now. I’m clean tuckered out, and you look like you’re about to just fall over any second now. Whaddya say we call it a night?”

“Yeah.” I really could barely keep my eyes open at this point. I guess pretending my motorbike was a juggling pin kind of took it out of me.

Grace popped up, suddenly all business.

“So doesn’t look like this place has a big ol’ tub to dump you in, so we’ll have to settle for a couple of wet wipes. Here, help me get these blankets on to the mattress here. They’re gross, but it’s better than freezing to death.”

“You’re the boss!” Those wet wipes were a pocket-sized blessing, wrapped in foil paper. I’m more of a Chanel and gunpowder type, not so big on the earthy, barbecue scents.

I was starting to stumble a bit as we plopped the discarded blankets down as well as we could in the relative darkness of the loft.

“Probably better to stay dressed with how dirty these blankets are.” Grace frowned as she watched me struggle to pick up one of the heavier blankets a couple of times.

That didn’t even register until much later.

“OK, you, lay down. No more for you tonight. Sleep.”

I couldn’t even argue with her. I just curled up in a ball on the bed, barely aware of Grace pulling a couple of the blankets over me, but I thought I could just make out her arm resting on mine as we both drifted off into the heavy, dreamless sleep that comes when you’ve been pushed to your limits. At least, I kind of hope it was.

#flight from grace #angelic fiction #demonic fiction #chapter 1

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1stunseeliefaelass · 4 years

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Darksiders Arthurian Tales Revisited

Chapter 7: Shadows of Paranoia

Death then suddenly remembered Ale and quickly rushes over to her. She opens her eyes and sweetly says, "Guess my spell was taking too long?"

Death only hugged her, "Next time you travel, you're getting teleported. Especially if you're meeting me. And no going alone next time."

"Of course Atan, I'm sorry for worrying you so. I promise you I'm fine. Aside from my cheek stinging I'm ok." Ale assures him whilst gently stroking his head.

Death groaned in embarrassment, "I would ask why you didn't see the warning signs, but given your circumstances it's understandable."

"Well the vines were warning me that something was off, but I wasn't sure about it. I should've listened to them." Ale explains softly.

"You think?" Death questioned a bit sarcastically before continuing, "Anyway, who are you two, how are you doing, and why were you helping?"

Gregory then gave his introductions, "Name's Brewheim, Gregory Brewheim. I own a tavern in a town several kilometers that way.", he then gestured to the road behind him.

"And you?" Death inquired of C.

"C. Gregory's my adoptive Dad. I work at his tavern, but occasionally go on contracts." C explains simply.

Death gave a strange look, "C? Strange name is that short for anything?"

"Maybe, I dunno. It's the only name I've ever known."

"Where you heading off too?"

"To Lord Vortigern's home. He's my Dad's patron and often buys various alcohols from Gregory." C explains.

"I'm also a micro brewer, C's also helped to deal with some of the pests out here." Gregory says.

"Hilarious, I just came from there." Death states chuckling.

"Talk about a coincidence huh? Although our wagon is currently closed off..." C tells him.

"What seems to be the problem?"

C and Gregory then both pointed at the massive trees in front and behind their wagon. Well tree and tree half.

"Ah right....uhmm...." Death attempts to say before thinking on what he can do whilst looking around him. He then turns Harvester into a massive crowbar without the hook, making it essentially a rod with a flat end. From there he lodges it under the tree half and begins trying to move tree. Lifting and shifting it to get it out of the way. Course War and Strife came on by just in time to see his attempt.

"What are you doing?" Strife questioned.

"Moving a tree."

"I thought we were fighting something." War stated a slight bit disappointed.

"If you two COULD HELP ME OUT HERE." Death growled at them.

"Uh right." War nodded before helping out.

Strife only helped out after he was sure he could do so without breaking his back. Being the leanest of the brothers. He then notices the full tree behind the wagon,

"Ok what the hell happened here?"

"Wendigo. One sent by Uther." Death stated simply.

"A Wendigo? I thought those things were in North America? Wait a minute you're pulling something aren't you? Please tell me you're joking." Strife pled with him.

Death sighed, "Believe me I wish I was, but just ask our unfortunate Mother. Who had the misfortune of having walked alongside this thing."

Strife then ran over to Ale, "You alright Ma, what happened?"

"I just traveled with him but didn't realize what he was until it nearly ate me. I'd hate to know what would've happened if Death hadn't come sooner." Ale explained whilst still shivering a tiny bit.

"Why the hell was it calling for Death? Why was it using you?"

"It was asking about him at first. And the way it asked set me off. I tried being vague, but it wasn't enough to stop him from grabbing me. I was just supposed to be a meal, simple as that. But then I tried calling your brother, and it noticed that I did. That's when Death learned of what happened from the beast." Ale explains softly.

Death sighed as Strife looked his way, "Why the hell was it after you?"

"Like I said, Uther. Sent it to...kill me. Chose one hell of a way of doing it."

Ale looked a bit ashamed but Strife reassured her, "Hey Ma, it's ok. Just doing what you naturally do, which is good. He just was able to manipulate that."

"Do you think he was lying when thanking me for the food I'd given him? Or was he just manipulating me more?" Ale inquired.

"Was the food warm?"

"I always carry warm food in my crystal Atan." Ale informed him.

"Then his reactions were genuine. He did enjoy them. Next time, listen to your vines."

"Believe me I shall after this. Thank you Atan." Ale stated softly.

"Why the hell you even out this far anyway?"

Death piped up, "I called her, and she asked if she should come. I agreed, but I wouldn't have done it if I had known what would happen."

"Speaking of that Atan, do you still want to talk?"

Death looked her way and thought for a moment before sighing, "When we get to Vortigern's, which is far safer than out here. Now if you don't mind, help us out Strife!"

"Indeed, if you'd be so inclined as to help us out it'd be GREATLY appreciated brother." War added.

"Yeah yeah yeah. War I have an idea..."

"Aw crap." Death muttered his breath.

"...I need you to ignite Chaoseater into it's lightning mode."

War did so with Death shaking his head, realizing what Strife was doing, "Everybody behind the other trees!"

Gregory then books it and shouts to Strife, "Ye better not blow up my damn cart!"

"Don't worry, if everything goes according to plan, it'll all go in that direction." Strife explains pointing off to south end of the road. "Now stab the tree."

"Oh crap, now I see where this is going." War says backing away.

Strife in turn asked Death to put his scythes on either side of the tree whilst in lightning mode, then prepared a lightning shot and fired, hitting Chaoseater. Through that act, a chain reaction is caused, that blows up the tree. Sending pieces flying everywhere. One barely misses Death, Strife also narrowly avoided one, War blocked most of the big ones, the tiny ones tink off his armor. The cart, somehow was not hit by any of that. But does tiny tree pieces on it now. Gregory actually surprised everyone by grabbing a piece that flew at his head like it was nothing.

Gregory looks at everyone's slacked jaws and shrugs, "What?" He then chucks the wood aside, "At least my cart's still alright."

War and Death then looked at Strife, who's hair was now standing on end. Both shared a halted laugh and Strife looked their way in return, "What you going on about?"

"Has your hair always been standing up like that? Or is just me?" Death asked stifling laughter.

Strife then checked his hair, "Wait what the....you assholes!"

Both brothers began dying at that. Causing Strife to get more angry. Course Ale came up and smacked him upside the head, "First off, language.", then upon giving Death and War the same treatment, "Secondly that's for picking on your brother."

"Sorry Ma."

Death meanwhile said, "I'm a grown adult. Was that really necessary?"

"You weren't acting like it." Ale says.

Death grumbled a bit but apologized all the same, "Sorry Ceise."

Ale then looked at War, "And you?"

"Sorry, Ale."

She nodded at that and the group all hopped into the wagon to leave. Death however paused and looked around, feeling uneasy all of a sudden. As if he were being watched by someone.

"Yo, you good?" Strife questioned him.

"Yeah just...worried. Not entirely sure if it's dead or not."

"Mmhmm, well whatever the case will be, let's head back to safety ok?"

"Yes."

The group then finally headed away with Gregory happy to see his engineering wasn't messed up either. As the cart still purred like a kitten. "Good, now let's everybody going without being attacked."

Before long they all arrived and Death had the sudden urge to hurry inside. He wasn't sure why, but something was really freaking him out. Ale picked up on that and came in as Death started checking every window and began to see a shadow moving in the forest. Constantly keeping up with him as he moved around the house. Ale noted the vines' explanation of things and quickly came up to him, placing a hand on his arm, "Atan?"

Jolting he told her, "Hhaagh! Don't sneak on me like that please."

"Sorry Atan, are you alright? The vines say you look as though you've seen a ghost. If not something worse."

"I think it followed us." Death stated softly.

"The Wendigo?"

"Yeah."

Ale looks but as always sees nothing. But trusts Death's judgment either way. She begins stroking his back gently as his breathing ever so quietly begins picking up. Suddenly Death saw the shadow recede and sighs with relief.

"I hope that thing is just going away for now. I don't like being watched."

Ale continued to stroke him, "I know Atan, perhaps we could talk now? In a room you feel safest in?"

"The attic, it doesn't have a window so..."

"Ah. Then that's where we'll go." Ale stated following him there.

Upon reaching the attic, Death shut the door and sighed deeply, "This has been a little intense hasn't it?"

"Quite." Ale said calmly.

"How's the cheek doing?"

"It doesn't sting anymore Atan, no worries." Ale assured him.

He then begins to make small chat that slowly turns into a more serious conversation. He began discussing why he was so worried about his dreams again, with Ale grasping his hand for this part, "I'm afraid of what it'll do to me. All of that, coming crashing in. That it'd leave me a wreck, just like I was when I came home that night."

"Atan, you'll always have your family at your side. You also have that new friend of yours correct? The girl you shared this painful secret with?"

"Uh yeah...I wonder where she is right now."

Morgen was in her room playing with Fuzzball by her window whilst reading. Suddenly a moving shadow caught her eye. She looks out and sees it staring directly at her. Getting creeped out she takes Fuzzball and hurries from the room in a brisk walk. Course when reaching the next window, she sees it's also there, still staring hungrily. Morgen picked up her pace the more she saw it, squeezing Fuzzball by accident in her panic as she fled around the house. Finally reaching the attic and attempting to open the door. Only to find it locked. She then banged on the door and in a panic yelled, ",Please whoever's in there open the door! Please!"

"Uh ok." Death quickly replied before doing so. He was thus met with Morgen barreling into him, shaking with terror.

"There's something out there, it's following my every move. I can't shake the feeling that it's after me." Morgen quickly says in rapid succession.

"A, ease your tension on Fuzzball. B, tell me what you saw?"

Morgen quickly loosened her grip on the poor rodent before saying just as fast, "A shadow, with hungry eyes staring at me. It's in the woods."

"Did it have antlers?"

"Yes it did!" Morgen shouted in her panic.

Death then cautiously placed his arms around her, figuring maybe that would work. As he'd seen men doing it to women to calm them before, "Relax relax relax, we're fine it's not going to enter. Uther's probably going to keep that thing away from Vortigern's home for now. We're all safe, you're safe."

"Forgive me Death, but....oh this is going to sound so strange I'm sure, but might you...continue holding me like this? Just, perhaps a bit closer as well?" Morgen requested of him.

"Uhm....ok." Death told her before obliging.

Meanwhile the Wendigo was pissed at not being able to enter the grounds. It sent a mental attack in the form of Lilith's voice behind him, "Hello sweet boy."

Death quickly turned around in pure fear, breathing fast and heavy. Then Morgen hears something next, her Mother's voice in her ear, "Come to me. I'm just outside, come to me."

"No no that can't be, you're dead! I saw you buried! No!" Ale shouted before Death grabbed her wrists as she thrashed about.

"Ceise! Ceise!" Death shouted before hearing his brother Absalom's voice next, "I'm just outside brother, come to me." Death the growled, beginning to see what was happening. He walked outside the attic, intent on facing the creature. Finding a balcony he opened it's doors and shouted out, "REVEAL YOURSELF COWARD! ENOUGH OF YOUR MIND GAMES!"

Suddenly he saw a body walking into the grounds. A dead corpse walking around as if it hadn't been decaying for years, possibly eons.

"What the? Wendigos aren't able to do that, what the hell are you?"

Death then hears Crom's voice, "Something that used to be better, but now extremely hostile, feral." Death froze at hearing that voice, and it continued, "I used to be......nevermind that....why don't we have a chat? Shall we?"

Death growled, "Stop using that voice."

It taunted him, "Have a problem with it, Horseman?"

Death then heard the true Crom, "Well then, I guess I did leave an impression from our last few times. You do realize I can end this with ease right? It doesn't me take me long to kill such a creature. Just let me take control, I'll handle the rest."

"No."

"Don't be so stubborn about it. You need me in order to finish this." Crom insisted.

"No I don't."

"Do you wish to be haunted? Do you wish to be continuously attacked?"

"Anything is better than you right now." Death growled at him.

"Well then, if you want to have it like that, go on ahead. Be stubborn about it. But if you need help, I'll be in your mirror."

With that Crom stopped talking, leaving Death alone to deal with this new threat. Death after a moment of quiet, noticed the undead being felt off.

"Is that Abyssal energy?"

Merlin then spoke up behind him, "Not exactly. That's uh...Dream energy actually. If you use it properly you can technically put a mind into a body, and a spirit into a vessel."

Death then looked at him weird, "Wait what? Dream energy?"

"Yeah."

"From the Dream Realm?" Death inquired further.

"Yeah. This Wendigo's something else isn't he?" Merlin questioned.

"Yeah he is. How do we fight something like this? The same way you would fight any Wendigo? Or something else entirely?"

"I can always check my archives. But for now, we'll just have to keep everyone from falling for it's traps." Merlin explained.

Death only nodded, "I'll try my best."

Merlin then teleported to his archives, leaving Death to deal with the undead freaks. He does so slowly, but doesn't leave the grounds as he makes his way to them. They immediately turn hostile upon seeing Death, and begin to fight tactically. Some fight like expert swordsman, some like various spearmen, they were using anything a soldier may use aside from guns. He begins to pick each one off, even summoning ghouls to try and ease his current workload. Luckily despite their higher intelligence, these undead beasts for all their energies, weren't very effective fighters. Death's strength in this case was enough to dispell this crowd, and his magic helped to control it all the better. He then looked around for the Wendigo, finding a shadow. Only for it dispell when he gets closer. Death then realizes it was another taunt, and a mind game on top of that. Growling he went back inside to warn everyone, "The Wendigo can summon undead!"

This gets everyone's attention and they all gather around to hear what he knows now. Death explains his most recent discovery and fight whilst also telling them that Merlin was trying to find more information. He then warned everyone to disregard any voices inside their heads that either beg for help, try and order them outside, or ask them to do anything until further notice. After this speech was done, Vortigern sighed, "Great. I'll make sure to keep an eye on my girls. Morgen, you gonna be alright? Do you need anything?"

"I think I'll be fine for now, but thank you Uncle. Let's try and work on dinner to keep us busy. We can let the girls help as well, and I'll make sure little Arthur remains with me for now. Everyone can help pitch in for dinner tonight, that way we're all occupied and can see each other."

"Right. And if anymore of the undead come out, me and Strife will be out picking them off. Unless you want to go out there Fury?" Death stated.

"Eh I'm a better fighter than a cook, you know this." Fury reminded him.

"Yeah, I do." Death expressed while nodding.

Fury then follows her older brothers and watches out the nearest window with them. Meanwhile everyone else begins to work on dinner. War isn't entirely sure what to do at first, but Ale gives him guidance where she can. Happy to give help in anyway. Morgen observed her a moment and could start to see why Death viewed her as a Mother. Even if her small size was a bit comical when compared to her adoptive family. Barrcus and Mina managed most of the cooking but made sure nothing went wrong alongside Ale. Ale couldn't catch every mistake after all. Vortigern meanwhile used this time to bond with his daughters and teach them some valuable things. Especially while some may view cooking as a 'woman's job', in truth anyone can do it with enough patience and dedication. Showing the girls this by making a perfect dumpling. They then mimicked it whilst he watched them with pride. Course he did have to help them a teensie bit, but they were happy nonetheless. Morgen in the meantime kept an eye on Arthur, only helping with the occasional thing so that Arthur couldn't get hurt by accident.

Finally after a couple of hours, that felt like an entire day, the zombies suddenly ceased coming. The Wendigo finally stopped summoning them as his master was unconvinced of their effectiveness. Death could still sense it, and scanned the woods for any sign of it. Strife and Fury however could smell the food and let him know.

"Ah, I'm starting to starve. And these things ain't coming anymore. So might as well go get something to eat." Strife remarked.

"Yeah, I doubt we'll see them return. At least for now. Let's try and rest up a tad before getting back to this tedious folly hmm?" Fury added.

Death shook his head, "Are you sure you wanna do that? I can still sense it out there. There's no idea of knowing what this thing will do next."

"You can think on an empty stomach, now come on. Or do I need get Ma in order to pull you in?"

Death laughs, "Whatever.", but does finally follow whilst muttering under his breath, "Whistle-blower."

"Oh as if you're not a snitch either?" Strife asked sarcastically.

Both brothers then chuckled a bit at each other before Fury hollered, "Hey get your asses moving before War and I beat you to it!"

They both then hurried in, not about to be outdone by their younger siblings. Luckily Ale was able to keep War waiting for his three elder siblings before he started eating anything. The food was all brought from the kitchen to the dining hall, with Mina shouting to Death, Strife, and Fury that they'd gone there. With that everyone was finally seated and ready to eat up.

"So Morgen, have you found any proper suitors for yourself?" Vortigern asked her curiously.

Morgen nearly chocked on her drink but after a short coughing fit it sorted itself out, "Uncle...don't you think it's a bit early to be thinking about suitors and marriage for me? Given how things have been for me?"

"What do you mean by that?"

"Wait....no one....explained?" Morgen inquired cautiously."

"Explained what exactly?" Vortigern wondered whilst looking at Barrcus.

Barrcus held his head in his hand, "Aw crap. Maybe we shouldn't discuss this with your daughters in the room."

Mina sees him motion for her to take the girls outside the room, but not to leave them alone either. Once she leaves with Anna and Elaine, Barrcus begins the explanation. He goes into as much detail as he's comfortable with, which is ultimately not much. However it does paint a good enough picture. Vortigern's confusion slowly becomes horror, then turns to anger at the end of it all. He eyed Barrcus for a bit, almost blaming him. Barrcus meanwhile held his head a bit more shamefully, despite having been unable to do anything to prevent the horrors. As Uther made sure of that in some way or another. Morgen noticed her Uncle looking angry and in a moment of pent up rage escaping she shouted to Vortigern, "I won't have you blaming him for this! He did all he could for me and you know it! Uther prevented his every attempt to help me!"

Vortigern actually looks at her surprised, as normally she was rather docile. Even as a knight she was more of a peacekeeper than a fighter. Cautiously he questioned her, "Where was this all this time? When did you get your bark?"

Morgen jolted a slight bit and actually looked a bit hurt by that, "What are you....what are you saying? Was I always just....a meek girl to you?"

Sighing Vortigern told her, "After your Mother died, you went silent. You wouldn't talk that much, about anything. If you had told me then what Barrcus here has just told me, I may have been able to do something about it. It hurts me, that you didn't tell me. That you didn't let me know at all, at any time. It wounds me almost, it breaks my heart."

Death then retorted, "Funny how an abuser can keep their victim silent. He could've threatened Barrcus or Mina, to make sure she stayed silent. Hell could've possibly threatened your life."

Vortigern shook his head, "I doubt he would've threatened to harm me, he's still my brother."

"My older brother beat me on several occasions." Death fired back.

"Yeah, and he tried to kill me on several others. I was a toddler during his first attempt." Strife adds.

Meanwhile Mina hears Igraine in her ear, and the girls hear their Momma. Mina instantly knows what's wrong and quickly hugs the girls close to her. "Don't listen girls! That's not yrr Mother! Don't listen!"

Anna and Elaine however continued to beg Mina to let them go so that Daddy wouldn't be so sad anymore. That he wouldn't have to be lonely anymore. In a last ditch effort to keep the girls safe when they suddenly escape her grasp, Mina begins singing. The girls actually stop dead in their tracks, turning back towards Mina. Her eyes began to glow, her voice gained an echo, her body grew taller, and from under her skirt came a fox's tail. She also had a pair of spindly wings with small membranes on their ends that looked like autumn leaves. Her song captivated the girls long enough for her to coax them away. She began backing away slowly, and making sure the girls followed her with each step. However, she didn't realize where she was backing up. And Mina soon ended up in full view of everyone else, shocking them as she slowly walked backwards before hitting a pillar that finally stopped her.

Barrcus rushed over to stop her, "Mina! Look at yourself!"

Death meanwhile then noticed the Wendigo's shadow's eyes were glowing too, "Shit. Barrcus get her to stop! It's listening!"

Barrcus looked back to see the Wendigo's head cocked up and to the side for once, as if listening to Mina, "Continue singing Mina."

The Wendigo began swaying a bit, as did its shadow. The shadow the began to partially dissipate, the onslaught from the creature ending for now. Once the shadow receded, Barrcus finally told Mina, "Good work, now rest my love." With that he cast a sleep spell on her for the moment. Barrcus then attempted to carry her, doing his best. He doesn't care if it throws his back out, he's damn well doing it. Meanwhile Anna and Elaine are a bit dazed and scared. They quickly run to their Papa and hug him. Morgen takes the time to walk away, feeling truly worthless after hearing such things from her Uncle. Death noticed she'd barely touched her food and decided to bring it to her. But really it was just an excuse to go check on her, one Strife called him out on,

"Bro, what you doing?"

"Bringing her dinner, she didn't finish."

"Right?" Strife remarked sarcastically.

"It's the truth isn't it?"

"Not the whole truth man, I can see it just by the way you walk."

Death grumbled before walking away, annoyed at Strife for doing that. Upon reaching Morgen's door he gently rapped his knuckles on it, "You forgot to finish your meal."

"I find my appetite to be.....lessened suddenly." Morgen replied trying not to let any voice cracks slip.

"Well I haven't exactly finished mine either. Mind letting me in?"

Morgen sighed before opening the door slightly, "Why are you here? And don't say it's to make sure I finish dinner."

Death in turn sighed as well, "I think you need someone to talk to, and that's usually better done with food in your system."

Morgen let a silent chuckle out before finally letting him in, "At least you understand, and thank you for defending me like that. Lesser men wouldn't have in that moment I dare say."

"Your Uncle is worried, but unfortunately doesn't know what to say. Or rather the right things to say."

"You've got that right. Such nerve honestly. He just doesn't get it, how easy it was for Uther to do what he did. How much it destroyed me bit by bit each time. How many times I 'complied' and stayed quiet because fear of someone I loved dying stayed my tongue. To be told that....I should've said something if I wanted help from him sooner? It makes me feel so....so...." Morgen ranted before suddenly kicking a chest in her frustration.

"Kicking furniture isn't going to help anything, but however trying to explain your side of things might help him understand. Barrcus didn't exactly paint the best picture either so...", Death expressed to her.

"Oh don't even get me STARTED, with what he was doing in regards to Barrcus. His eyes said it all, he blames Barrcus for what happened even though it WASN'T HIS FAULT AT ALL!" Morgen shouted as the aura of serenity around her suddenly began to drop.

Death quickly informed her, "You're may want to try calming down. You may cause a bit of a.....your aura's dropping. It's becoming a bit more chaotic."

"I AM CALM." Morgen insisted with gritted teeth as she began wincing. Clearly she was holding something back, and having trouble doing it.

"What else happened, for all those years? What else did he do?" Death asked hoping it might calm her down and give her extra catharsis.

Morgen began explaining more of what happened to her. From the occasional hidden slaps behind the scenes, to even him actively preventing her from having a love life. The botched attempts at trying to get her breastfeed her own baby brother. And then some. All of it she laid bare to Death in her anger and frustration. However as time went on her anger subsided and instead she fell into a chair sobbing towards the end. Overwhelmed by her emotions and feelings of worthlessness. Death then sat beside Morgen and tenderly began to stroke her back,

"Wish I had the proper words to say right now. This is definitely...rivaling Lilith on so many levels."

"I can....think of something better, if you don't mind...." Morgen said between sobs.

"You do realize that you will have to Vortigern right? About what Uther was doing. It'll break his heart but, he does need to hear it. It will help him, as well as helping you. You felt better after telling Barrcus and Mina, after telling me, right?"

"Of course....." Morgen replied softly.

"Then you're going to have to tell him. Whether it's tonight or some other time."

Morgen sighed before finally wiping at her eyes, "You know....you truly have good wisdom. Behind all that brooding sarcasm that is, hmhm...."

Death cocks his head, "Seriously?"

Morgen then snickers a bit at that, and surprises Death with a hug, "Thank you, for all you've been doing for me. You're truly a good man, and don't you forget it either."

Death sighed, "If Ale has anything to do with it, I won't."

The two then began eating together and chatting for the most part. Doing all they could to better each other's moods. Morgen at one point even inquired if Death had any particular animals he wasn't fond of for one reason or another.

"Small dog breeds for one. Sure they're....'cute' and all, but they're so annoying. And tropical birds, their colors often make me dizzy and they're incredibly LOUD. And Irukandji, tiny little insignificant creatures that become really annoying when they touch you. Doesn't help that they're see through."

"So what is an Irukandji exactly? Aside from how you've creatively described it." Morgen questioned him.

"It's the smallest of species of jellyfish, and it's a type of box jellyfish. They also have.....uhm ahem sorry....." Death expresses a bit embarrassed at geeking out.

Morgen snickered, "I don't mind you know. It just goes to show how well traveled you are. I'm sure you probably have many locations you enjoy."

"There are few worlds that aren't annoying, to say the least." Death stated simply whilst reclining in his seat.

"What would you say your favorites were?" Morgen asks curiously.

Death gave her a look, "That's a bit of a difficult question isn't it?"

"Well just tell me of a few that you liked. I enjoy learning about other places, if only I could actually visit them." Morgen tells him.

"The realm of the Makers is a start. Beautiful, it's lush, and the buildings all look like works of art. And the Makers are themselves not that bad of company."

"I've heard a few stories, but they're usually brief at best. What stories do you have of their realm?" Morgen pressed.

Death from there explains his occasional visits there. Whether it was a council mission, for armor, or for plain fun. He even tells her of how it's one the better realms for riding a horse for the hell of it, "The breeze is pleasant, the fields wipe and open, has plenty of good game."

"Sounds marvelous, though I imagine your views of Heaven are a bit, mixed at best." Morgen remarks.

"Everybody there is a judgemental, hypocritical asshole. There's a reason why Angels get the nickname 'Pigeon'. They talk a lot of crap, they shit on everything and everyone, and they act all high and mighty about everything. They've even called me a 'Heathen' on multiple occasions." Death expresses with rising annoyance.

#Darksiders Fandom #Darksiders Fanfics #Darksiders OCs #Darksiders Arthurian Tales Revisited #Death #Strife #Fury #War

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sunnylildragun · 5 years

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The Lion- doesn't- Sleep Tonight

Day 4 of the Bumbleby Week- AU Day.

No one truly knew how Yang Xiao Long had lost her right arm. There were rumors, speculations, and a lot of gossip. Some said she did it by protecting her house from Grimm. Others said it was in a motorcycle accident. Some speculated that it had been fighting a bunch of bandits. None of those were accurate, and the blonde always just brushed it off. She didn't pay much mind to what people said about her arm, as long as they didn't ask her awkward questions. Like, it was funny when it started, but why were people so interested in knowing if it had a vibration function? Geez, chill, people.

There was also a discussion over what she hid under her cowgirl hat. Team CRDL once tried stealing it from her head, which resulted in broken noses and bruised ribs for them. After that, no one explicitly talked about it. The subject was buried in the same grave as Cardin Winchester's ego. And Yang was glad for that. What she had under her hat was nobody's business, and whoever she wanted to know, would know. And for now, it was no one but her sister, her father and her uncle.

Blake Belladonna couldn't help but wonder, too, what it was that the taller girl hid. Every time purple eyes fell upon her own yellow ones, she knew there was more to Yang than anyone could tell. Blake had, throughout her life, learned to read people very well. Her parents were influential activists in the Faunus Rights cause, although being humans. They found it very important to treat everyone as equals, so that's what they taught her since a very young age. It gave the raven haired girl the opportunity to make many friends, and to interact with all sorts of people.

Her partner was still a mystery to her. As curious as she was, though, Blake couldn't bring herself to ask Yang about it. She was afraid of hurting their growing friendship, or worse: permanently harming their partnership. The two of them had a duty not only with each other, but also with their team. Blake just couldn't risk losing both her relationship with Yang, and the functionality of the team.

So she held herself back, only talking out her frustrations when she was with her friends from outside the team. And those were Sun Wukong, a monkey faunus who she had befriended in the early months at Beacon, and Ilia Amitola, a chameleon faunus girl whose family was supported by the Belladonna family, and who was her childhood friend. They were in a cafe in Vale, Blake and Sun drinking tea, while Ilia enjoyed a capuchino.

"It's just..." Blake started. "I really wanna know more about her. She's always cheerful, and nice, and sweet. But I can see a longing in her eyes... as if she's hiding something. Something that hurts her deep inside."

"Blake... maybe you're just reading the wrong signs." Ilia said, after sipping from her cup. "From what I could see, she's a very open person. Perhaps she just likes the hat."

"Yeah!" Sun agreed. "And Yang trusts you a big deal. I mean, I've seen y'all do that combo... what was it again? Something bee related..."

"Bumblebee?" Blake raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, that thing! You literally throw her at the enemy. No offense to Neptune, but I would never do something like that with him."

"Sun, Yang and I are partners. We're different people in combat than what we are in our casual, day to day life." The human girl sipped from her tea.

"I think she likes you." Ilia smirked at Blake as she said it, and it grew to a grin when the taller choked.

"What?!"

"And you like her back." Sun joined the teasing.

"No, I don't?" Blake's voice was indignant. "And how would you two know that she likes me? Has she told you anything?!"

"No, she hasn't. But Ilia and I both crushed on you."

"Yeah, we know what it looks like." The chameleon faunus added. "She eyes you whenever you have your head buried in those books of yours. And that means all the damn time."

"That's true. Not to mention how she watches you train."

"How she lets you win most of your wrestling games after you two spar, even though she's physically stronger."

"How she puts herself in harm's way whenever the White Fang is near, because she knows your parents are a threat to their violent ways."

"How she shamelessly flirts with you and you flirt back."

"I get it!" Blake finally broke. "I just... never thought of it that way. Yang is just-" she sighed, not knowing how to explain her thoughts. It wouldn't work anyway. "Has anyone else ever mentioned any of that?"

"Weiss complains about it all the time." Ilia drank a bit more. "She says you two should get a room already."

"Schnee..." Blake said through gritted teeth, just before an idea popped in her head. A devilish smirk took over her features. "So... you and Weiss have been talking a lot?"

"Yeah, yeah. She's coming around. I think living in the same room as you had an influence on her." Ilia answered dismissively.

"Ilia." Sun called, knowing where Blake wanted to get with her teasing. These two had been his friends for a while, and he loved their shenanigans. "We all know that's not what Blake is talking about. You and the Ice Queen... you're seeing each other, aren't ya?"

Immediately, the darker spots on the faunus girl's cheeks turned a bright pink. "I-I... w-we... uh, we're kinda..." she sighed, trying to control how flustered she was. "We've gone on a few dates. She's actually... a pretty decent person when you get to know her."

"I think you look cute together." Sun smiled, supporting.

"I think so, too." Blake smiled too, and she saw Ilia relax and lighten up. The ravenette's mind was far from there, though, all the way to Beacon. She couldn't help but think of Yang, and of everything her friends just said.

Maybe se did have feelings for her partner...

-+-

Some weeks later, Blake and Yang were sent in a training mission. They were alone, as it was a project in which they should develop their partnership, and their field skills. It was supposed to test their abilities far from the comfort zone that was being under one of the professors' wings. As huntresses in training who were in the beginning of their second year, they appreciated this opportunity of experiencing actual independence. It was nice.

And Blake lowkey wanted to have some alone time with her partner. She had decided that she would confront Yang about... whatever it was. She kept it in mind to not make any assumptions, and to not go too fast with her questions. Blake didn't want to scare Yang off, she wanted to be let in.

The two of them didn't have time for that right now, though. Exploring the forest in the outskirts of Mountain Glenn had given them a bit of trouble, as they were intercepted by a bunch of creatures of Grimm. They had cleaned most of them, but three remained, giving them a bit more of a fight. Out of the corner of her eyes, Blake saw Yang duck an Ursa paw, and then punch the beast in the gut, sending it into a tree. The black haired girl herself was facing two Beowolves- an Alpha and a regular one. She jumped back as one tried to take a bite at her.

'Shit,' she thought. 'I can't let myself get distracted like that.'

Blake put her katana in pistol mode, shooting at the exhausted, weaker one's head. It was soon gone in a fuzz of smoke. The only one remaining was the Alpha, which got it all fours, ready to lunge at her. The girl readied herself too, grabbing the sheath of Gambol Shroud. The monster attacked, and she slid under it. Then, she got her weapon back into a sword, and attacked it several times.

Yang was not doing all that bad, either. The Ursa she had chosen to unleash her fire upon was not far from becoming ashes. She kicked its face, then punched it repeatedly in the stomach. The sound of her gauntlet and of the gun in her prosthetic firing filled the clearing, and it was all she could hear. She did capture, though, the moment Blake grunted in pain as the Alpha she was fighting pawed her, throwing her a few feet backwards, her back and her head hitting a tree. Her purple aura shone as the impact shattered it, since she had received many blows earlier that night.

The blonde turned to see what happened, her eyes widening and turning red. "Blake!" Came the almost feral cry. The growl behind her got her back to her own risky situation. She had to act fast.

Yang blocked the Ursa's claws with her right arm, and with the other she punched its head. The monster finally vanished, and the girl could finally focus on helping her partner. She fired her guns, jumping in the direction of the Beowolf. It was jumping at Blake, who was supporting herself against the tree. Her hand was on her forehead, eyes closed as her head started aching. When they opened, they immediately went wide. Just as she thought it was done for her, a mess of fire and blond hair changed the beast's trajectory, both going into the forest.

Blake got herself up, still dizzy from the impact. She heard a few gunshots and walked slowly there, trying to ignore low ringing in her ears. In the way, she found Yang's hat, which apparently was taken out of her head by a tree branch. She grabbed it, and followed the track of destruction left by the blonde and the Grimm. When she found them, Blake's shock was written all over her face.

"You. Ain't. Ever. Touching. My. Partner. Again!" Yang shouted between punches, her voice almost a roar. The girl's rage wasn't what shocked Blake the most, though.

On top of Yang's head was a pair of lion ears, that were back and low as she striked the creature multiple times. Even in the dark, Blake could see the lines of the faunus trait very clearly. When it was finally over, the faunus was sweaty and gasping for air. Her dark brownish-gold ears were up, as the danger had vanished and her anger was slowly coming to an end. Blake accidentally stumbled back, the shock from the sight in front of her and the hit to her head affecting her body. She stepped on a stick, and Yang's left ear turned to her, followed by her head.

As red eyes became violet once again as they stared softly into Blake's own. Then, when she realized where the yellow orbs were, she panicked. She noticed the hat in Blake's hand, and her eyes widened even more, almost taking her whole face.

"Blake, I-" she wasn't able to finish the sentence, as the other girl tried walking to her, only to lose her balance and almost fall. She supported herself on a tree, and tried to stand still. "Blake!" Yang ran to her, trying to think of what to do. She put a hand on the girl's shoulder, worry all over her features. "Hey, what's going on?"

"I... I'm not feeling all that well." Blake closed her eyes, as the pain in her head got even more intense, her ears ringing with even more intensity. "My head..."

"L-Let's get you back... to the camp." Yang gulped. "Do you... can you walk there?"

"I... don't think so." Blake answered, groaning in pain.

"Would you like me to, you know... um... carry you there?"

Blake was silent for a few seconds, but then nodded. She whined in pain, as it made her head hurt more. Yang just nodded back, putting one of the other's arms over her shoulder, and one of her own arms went to the girl's back for support. The other went under her knees, and soon she was walking back to their camp. It was in another clearing, a bit to the north of the one where they battled the Grimm. Blake still had the hat in the hand that wasn't holding on to Yang's shoulder. Her head was against her partner's chest, and she listened to her heartbeat as she gave in to sleep.

-+-

Blake woke up a few hours after that. She was inside the tent, in her sleeping bag. The headache had dulled a bit, and she guessed it was because her aura was full again. The young woman sat up, rubbing her eyes with her left hand. She then sighed, deciding to get out of the tent and see how Yang was holding up. It turned out the sky was already gaining the colors of dawn, and she had to cover her eyes as they tried to adjust to the light.

When she was finally able to see again, she spotted Yang sitting on a tree trunk they found to use as a bench. She was staring at Blake with a sweet smile, and her ears were free from the prison of the hat. Her whole being looked amazing in the light, and showing her faunus trait like that made her look... whole. It was like the hat covered the missing piece of a puzzle, and the entirety of Yang's beauty was unlocked by having them out.

It was not that Blake thought her partner didn't look good with the hat. She actually looked awesome with it, too. Yang looked beautiful all the time. It's just that this part of the faunus girl made her look natural, and like the greatest masterpiece ever created. The most beautiful being ever born. Yang looked exactly how Blake thought her heart would look if it were a person.

"Um... you can come sit with me. If you want." Yang finally said, her eyes going down and her pale cheeks turning red. Blake gave a nervous chuckle, and walked to the bench. She sat beside the blonde, "accidentally" bumping her shoulder against Yang's own. The taller girl didn't move away, brushing her hand against the ravenette's own instead. Her pinky was over Blake's own, and the smaller girl blushed.

They were silent for a few moments, until Yang spoke again.

"So..."

"So." Blake said, looking at her partner, and Yang looked back at her. The violet eyes held an emotion that Blake had not seen there yet. The blonde's metallic fingers came in contact with the other's cheek.

"I was so worried. So scared that..." Yang sighed, her eyes closing and her head low. Blake's hands shot up, taking the other woman's cheeks in them.

"Hey." She called softly. "Yang, look at me." Violet eyes opened to show unshed tears. "I'm sorry I put you through that."

"Just... be more careful, please. I don't want anything happening to you. I know we're being trained to that kind of fight, but..." the girl trailed off, looking at her yellow, mechanical fingers. Blake noticed the change, and put her left handover the one in her cheek.

"Is there... do you wanna talk about it?"

"No." Yang said, pulling away. Blake's heart dropped to her stomach and a lump formed in her throat. She had done exactly what she didn't want to do. She had made her partner push her away. She- "I never want to talk about it. But... I guess I have to. Now that you know about them," golden ears twitched in emphasis, "you may as well know the story behind it all."

"Yang... you don't have to. Not if you're not ready. I'd never want to push you into talking about it, not if it makes you uncomfortable."

"You aren't pushing me. I've... actually been meaning to talk to you for some time now. I know what your parents do for people like me. For the faunus. I was gonna ask for your help to... encourage myself to get out of hiding my heritage."

"Oh..." Blake let out in awe. Yang wanted her help with something like that? It made her chest feel warm, and butterflies fly all over her stomach. "I'll do anything my power. Just tell me how I can help, and I will do it."

"Well, I think we can start with what happened. As you know, from that time you went White Fang crazy and I told you about my obsession, my mother left and I went after answers for her whereabouts. The story I told you is not exactly all that happened, though."

Blake felt her body temperature drop a few degrees, knowing what she was about to hear would not be a happy story at all. "And... what happened?"

"It was almost night...

Ruby and I had entered a small diner by the woods. We were just kids, so I guessed no one would mess with us. Dad always taught us to not talk to strangers, so I thought only doing that would work. In my head, it was all pretty simple. Walk in. Ask the bartender- who, to me, seemed to be someone we could trust- for the information I wanted. Walk out with what I needed, and find that damned house.

The part of going in went alright, but the adults in there looked... scary. Shady. And they stared at me and at my ears like I was some kind of abomination. They seemed to want to take Ruby from me, so I held her close. I didn't know why they were acting like that, since to me a faunus and a human being sisters wasn't something weird. Besides, as you know, Ruby only looks human. Those claws of hers are killers. I've always loved and protected her with my whole being, I didn't get why anyone would ever assume I would do something bad to her.

"Sis... I'm scared..." I remember Ruby's small voice saying as she clinged to my arm.

"We'll be out soon. I promise." I answered, and kept walking to the balcony. "Sir," I called the bartender, who was cleaning some glasses, and he looked down at me.

"What is it?" His voice was rough, and rude.

"Um... do you know this woman?" I showed him a picture of Raven, and he leaned down to look at it.

"Never seen 'er around." He shrugged. "Now get out, before you get me in trouble."

My eyebrows furrowed, and I wondered what kind of trouble a little girl and a toddler could cause. "I'm already going. Just one more question-"

"Didn't ya hear the man, little beast?!" A tall, black haired man punched the balcony, his green eyes shining with anger, spite and violence. He was smoking, and he smelled like alcohol. Everything about him was scary, but the worst part was... that he was a huntsman. "Can't you read a sign to save your life? Huh? Right by the door, it says 'no faunus allowed'. I don't come to this bar to find your scum of a race!"

"S-sorry, sir..." my whole body was shaking, and my ears were glued to my skull, seeming to want to vanish. "I-I just wanted s-some information. I-It's very importan-"

"I don't care what you want!" He started walking in our direction, and I put myself in front of Ruby as we walked backwards. "Just get the fuck out of here, you small, filthy abomination! Go, and never fucking come back!" His voice filled the whole building, and I grabbed Ruby's hand and ran out of that terrible place.

Once she was in the wagon, I started running the way I'd never run before. I ran for what felt like hours, until I was exhausted, and most likely lost. Ruby was sleeping in the wagon, and I was glad she wasn't hurt. My mind was filled with thoughts, though. Why did he treat me like that? Why do people hate faunus? Did I do something wrong?

As I let these demons roam my mind freely, I kept walking and didn't notice the monsters outside. Beowolves were watching us, waiting for the right time to strike. They were probably attracted by the negativityof my thoughts. But all I could see was the path in front of me, the trail leading somewhere. That darned abandoned house from that photograph I had seen. The building that got me into that mess. For a moment, I forgot all the hardships of the day, and felt fulfilled as my goal was apparently achieved.

The nightmare wasn't over, though.

I took one more step, and hell broke loose. The pack of Beowolves jumped out of the dark trees. I was too tired to react. Ruby was basically passed out in the wagon, so shouting at her to run would do little to nothing. So I stood there in horror and shock, as death stared at me with shining, hungry orange and red eyes. One of them- the Alpha- was the first to jump at us, and it was going for Ruby, specifically.

"No!" Came the cry from my dry throat. Out of impulse, despair, and the desire to protect my little sister, I put my right arm in front of her. The Grimm took it, the bite sending pain through my whole body. It shook me around a few times and my yells woke Ruby up. Everything was a bit messy after that, but I still remember her silver eyes looking at me in shock and in fear. I remember her shouting for help. I remember when it threw me into a tree, and I remember Uncle Qrow calling my name and telling me to hold on.

After that, I never went out showing my ears again. I felt like my heritage was the responsible for all that happened after I set foot in that bar. To me, everything went wrong after that. And I... I blamed myself for that man's prejudice. I blamed myself for the fact that I was so terrified I didn't notice my surroundings. I blamed myself for putting Ruby's life in danger. I thought it was my fault I was born a faunus and I never wanted to go through what I went through that day again."

Blake felt her heart clench as she looked at Yang, who had her eyes on the yellow prosthetic. Her ears were a bit dropped, and the purple eyes had sadness, pain and some anger in them. From what she just heard, the black haired girl assumed the anger wasn't towards the man who'd been so ruthless to her when she was just a child. Yang was angry at herself.

Blake couldn't watch that any longer, and put a hand on her friend's shoulder. "Hey," her voice was soft, caring. "It's not your fault that people like that exist. Your heritage isn't a crime either, and you shouldn't feel the need to blame yourself for having it." Yang looked at her, a small smile forming. Her eyes started shedding the tears she had been holding back, and Blake reached out to whip them with her unoccupied hand. "I actually think they're gorgeous. Your ears." Her voice was just a bit above whisper.

Yang let herself relax, exhaling slowly and nuzzling against Blake's palm. Her lion ears captured how fast the other girl's heart was beating, and it was just as fast as her own. She then closed her eyes again, leaning in to rest her forehead against Blake's own. A low chuckle echoed from her throat, and Blake could hear the relief in it.

She decided to pull Yang into a hug, holding the girl close, arms around her shoulders. Yang hugged her back after the shock wore down. Blake didn't start contact very often, so she wanted to make the most of it. The blonde nuzzled against the shorter's shoulder, sighing in relief to find comfort in somebody's arms. As Blake's hands descended to her back, rubbing up and down, the blonde could feel all the tension leaving her.

"Did you get any sleep?" The raven haired girl asked softly. "You seem so tired..."

"I kept on watch all night. I thought you needed some rest after everything that happened."

Blake's heart beat a bit faster with that. Yang was always so thoughtful, and it made her chest go warm. "Well... I'm awake now. You should get some rest, too."

"Are you alright, though? I mean, you hit your head and back really hard." Yang pulled away, and looked at Blake with a smirk. Her hands were in the human girl's waist, thumbs rubbing her sides, and Blake's hands were in Yang's shoulders. "Wouldn't want princess here to faint."

"Princess?" Blake raised and eyebrow, looking around. "Did we bring Weiss to the trip?"

Yang laughed out loud at that, and it was music to Blake's ears. "You're a jerk. But don't worry, I won't tell Weiss. My ears kill me when she throws her tantrums when we call her princess."

"Thank you. And if I had feline ears, I wouldn't want to have someone yelling near me, either."

"That makes me wonder what would be your heritage if you were a faunus."

"Panther ears, maybe?"

"More like cat ears."

"Why cat ears?"

"You would look even feistier with cat ears on your head when you're upset."

"Panther ears would make me look intimidating. Wouldn't that be better?"

"Nah, your death glares are scary enough."

Blake slapped Yang's shoulder lightly. "Jerk." Both giggled, touching foreheads again. They knew exactly what they were doing, the lines they were crossing. They knew they would have to talk about it later, and they knew it would bring some changes to the way they act around each other. In that moment, though, they didn't pay much mind to that and just enjoyed themselves.

They stayed in a comfortable silence for a few minutes, until Yang yawned. Blake didn't say anything, just putting her hand on the back of the blonde's head. The faunus let her head be lightly pushed to Blake's shoulder, and her eyes slowly closed. Her breathing was soon steady, and her partner could tell she was sleeping.

Blake kept caressing the blond locks, some times brushing lightly against Yang's ears. She still couldn't believe that such a sweet, caring person as the woman in her arms could have a past this tragic. She wasn't sure if she would be able to remain uncorrupted if she had experienced anything anywhere near what Yang went through. It made Blake love the blonde even more, knowing her soul was kind to the point she didn't hate the world, even after being forced to hide. Even after losing a part of herself. And she knew there was still much work to do on getting Yang's confidence to let her ears free more often back. She wouldn't give up, though.

She would help Yang. She would fight beside her. They would win against the chains of discrimination.

And Blake made a promise to always do everything in her power to not let anything ever harm Yang like that. She would protect her partner to hell and back, and she knew the faunus would do the same for her.

Because no matter the circumstances, no matter the hardships. No matter the world, or the universe they were in. They would always be there for each other.

#bumbleby #yang xiao long #blake belladonna #rwby #bmblbweek #bumblebyweek #bumbleby week

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trinity-blood-translations · 6 years

Text

Radio Head - Chapter IV. (Trinity Blood RAM 5)

Radio Head - Prologue Radio Head - Chapter I Radio Head - Chapter II Radio Head - Chapter III Radio Head - Chapter IV Radio Head - Epilogue

* * *

Chapter IV

Page 228

At first sight it looked like a steel spider crawling up clumsy from the gaping wide hole on the floor. However it was impossible that such a being in nature would exist. The colossus which revealed himself on the deck with a giant body close to 4 meters in diameter, shedding a dim light from the steel body and with a weird rotating gatling gun tower ---- was XAM. Additionally from the head of the spider were rotating cameras to see. An external speaker occasionally spat scratching noises mixed with a voice.

〈CAN……CAN NOT die……〉

It sounded as if a dead person were sobbing while crouching at the entrance of the netherworld. At the beginning it was so quiet, that it was hard to understand. Lament with interruptions, but it tended to become gradually stronger till it reached a level of a shrill scream.

〈CAN NOT die, CAN NOT die, CAN NOT die, CAN NOT die, CAN NOT die, CAN NOT die, CAN NOT die, CAN NOT dieeeeeeeee!!!〉

“Huhh?!”

The screech of the woman and the scream of the sergeant overlapped each other. Giving a roar similar to the operating noise of the machine saw the gatling gun threw gunfire. The 12,75 millimeter machine gun bullet is enough to transform an armored vehicle easely into a honeycomb. As the detonation blast sounded on the surface of the deck, the above mentioned giant sergeant who was about to lift the muzzle, and the soldiers were turned in an instant into a bloodstained lump of meat. The salty sea breeze was mixed with terrible blood smell.

Page 229

“G…..gyaaaaaaa!!!”

The next scream came from all the passengers who stood a bit away from the place of the tragedy and saw everything with their own eyes. The iron monster that suddenly appeared and the death he has scattered seemingly made the people lose their mind. Although the soldiers tried to control the situation with warnings, but even so, everybody tried to escape by running as if they didn’t hear---- but nevertheless, the multi-legged tank turret rotated faster. Deep holes drilled into the deck, one by one, and severed the escaping people right in the middle like a devilish sword. Moreover the gunfire stretched out upwards without a pause and skewered the airship that noticed the incident and was trying to change the course straight from the front.

“Th…this voice is Francoise?! Idiot, she is…..”

The airship with the smashed gasbag turned into a gigantic fireball accompanied by a load explosion. Claude muttered dumbfounded while he was watching the explosion lights and the blaster above his head. The soldier just like he were watching a daydream wandered his gaze around, but suddenly came to his senses and raised his gaze, besides he drew closer to Puppeteer who was holding his chin with a self-satisfied look.

“Ex…explain it, you bastard! What on earth is that?!”

“Hmm, there is a theory of mine…”

Page 230

The young man answered in a serious and disappointed tone while on his beautiful face appeared sorrow indeed, but in fact he was desperately trying to resist to the urge not to roll around on the floor laughing. He pointed his sharp chin toward the iron spider, which was going berserk among the passengers and the soldiers who were running for their life, and took its victims en masse with its fireline and gigantic body, one after another.

“The brain of your beloved suffered by the accident an irreparable damage, isn’t that so? At the time Dr. Dupree made his wife resurrect, I guess, he gave up to restore the brain in its original state. And finally, instead, he was searching for an exterior replacement……at any rate, at that time this thing was obviously just around the corner with its high-powered electric intelligence, the computer that could be used for that purpose.” “The control system of XAM! Really? That’s why Lois was walking around the whole time with this monster. Because Francoise was in there…”

“Something like that. However, to be exact, most likely it’s only a part of her soul copied into the machine, because only the memory field was substituted.”

The evil speech of the young man did not seem to have reached the ears of Claude. No, even if he heard it, he probably would have ignored it. He dropped his gun and sauntered off empty handed on the shaken deck. The iron monster screaming with the voice of a woman was there still producing blood, flesh and death en masse. The man walked in front of the monster without a sign of fear.

“Francoise…….are you suffering, aren’t you……?”

The voice of Claude was soft and sounded for an insensate military person quite strange. Putting up both hands frankly as if he was about to hug his love he kept walking toward the multi-legged tank.

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Page 232

“Francoise, poor……”

〈CAN NOT die,…… CAN NOT die〉

The front camera similar to the head of a spider turned toward the approaching man. Accompanied by inorganic machine sounds the foot actuator began to operate and the colossus turned to Claude. But the man showed no sign of fear at all while he was standing in front of the approaching woman, tearfully in front of his former lover, whom he had stolen her life. He gently whispered with a solemn expression on his face as he looked up to the multi-legged tank which was moving his legs ominously smooth toward him. At this moment----- The foot of XAM stopped. Literally, the forefoot hung up in the air.

If the he would have stopped about 2 minutes later the body of Claude would have been squashed with the weight of more than 10 tons. The gigantic foot with the metal tube and the actuator implemented in it, touched even his hair but stopped in the air.

Was it because a god felt pity about the unfortunate soul or maybe an angel was emotionally touched by the love which had overcome even the fear, that it caused a miracle to happen ---- but it was such a beautiful sight completely reminiscent of a religious painting.

Page 233

In this sacred tranquility Claude reached out his hand to touch the tank and whispered to his beloved.

“No matter what shape you have become, you are still you..... I love you. Let us go together. Somewhere at a quite place, just the two of us, let us stay together, Francoise……”

The love of the man was sincere without and if nobody interrupts this confession may last until eternity ---- if that steel foot overhead wouldn’t simply crush down onto him and smash his brain.

“…….oops, that’s what I call instant death”

From the man whose head was easily trampled only his body was twitching on the foot of the multi-legged tank. On the other hand the tank gained again mobility. It didn't care about the man who just became a lump of meat. It lifted its leg and pulled up blood and cerebral fluid like a thread and returned to battle mode again.

“Oh, what a heartbreaking scene…. however it was the doctor who gave her this shape but the original cause were you, Lieutenant. Being told by such guys, 'I love you!', usually makes one just angry.”

〈kill,....me kill....kill, kiLL, kILL, KILL, KILL〉

While Puppeteer was immersed in deep emotion the multi-legged tank continued its death march. Over the armed group that have lost their will to fight and the surviving frightened passenger swirled the sword of massacre once again.

“Oh my, ……..is it totally out of control?”

Puppeteer lamented in front of the tank, which trampled the people trying to escape or continued to mow them down with the machine-gun fire.

Page 234

But meanwhile he moved his fingers, reminiscent of a pianist, with fine movements in order to implant his “threads” into the corpses lying around. No matter how many people died, he wouldn’t care but if the ship sinks he will be in a big trouble. It’s really cold. And he really didn’t want to swim in the middle of winter.

“I’m not supposed to have such a fight scene[1] as my hobby, ……..besides, this sort of trouble should be dealt with by “Magician”.

The young man grumbled while the “puppets” began to move.

Just a few minutes ago those lumps of meat lived, laughed, were talking about love. Now the heads were blown off by bullets, the internal organs were entirely squashed by the steel foot. But still, the muscles which were about to torn and the bones which were about to break have began to obey according to the pseudo-signal transmitted by the “threads”

and they started to deal with the requested tasks -------- the dead silently standing in the way of the multi-legged tank began to bury their claws into the monster. They used their already torn muscles to crawl up on the frame of the machine.

Of course the self-defense program of XAM bombed the opponents getting closer with a storm of bullets but as you know the dead have no fear. With half of the bodies blown off, though the strange insect-like crowd was still stuck to the frame and were trying to hook their fingernails into the tiny crevices of the armoring an tear it off. It seemed that the iron beast would be helplessly a prey of the crowd of the dead…..

“Wow!”

Suddenly Puppeteer who was looking bored by the sight of the awful scene turned his eyes away,

Page 235

because a flickering light exploded around the XAM. The field of vision which had dyed pure white for a moment, normalized again after a few seconds. In his sight which began to regain colors again emerged shadows of the “puppets” clinging on the multi-legged tank and now they began to fall down one by one. All of them carbonized beyond all recognition.

„Wow! That’s amazing! Was it an electromagnetic net? It was just killing more birds with one stone!”

The young man frowned by the stench of burned flesh rubbed his still unclear eyes. However as he saw that the multi-legged tank which burnt his “puppets” to ashes turned toward another direction, he couldn’t help but ducked.

“Oops, no time to admire. Well then, should I do…?”

For implanting his “threads” into the corpses in the surroundings and make a shield of them wasn’t enough time left. Moreover all the corpses have suffered heavy damages so that they aren’t suitable for manipulation. Nevertheless he still tried hard to launch his “threads” some of the bodies, but…..

„O-oh….don’t say it’s too late?”

The “puppets” just stood up with many trouble were trampled down easily again and the iron monster rushed over to “Puppeteer’s” direction ------- at this moment he showed an unusual serious expression.

MPH-ARSL-GAIOL[2]、By the name and the sign of the mighty and petty Nothingness, I summon the seal of the sacrificial blood.....

This voice sounded like it wouldn’t come from here but from another world. Maybe as if it was coming from across the distance of the stars or from the deep bottom of the sea.

Page 236

Tell me, you angel, even if you has fallen. By the water of life of the innocent, I will set the seal of the contract on this pontoon. Therefore the nameless one who has many names – according to old oath – brings the extermination of our enemy ---- seal of Baphomet, come!

At this moment the huge body of XAM fleshed with red lights.

No, it wasn’t that. At the feet of the multi-legged tank which was closing in on “Puppeteer” appeared suddenly a dazzling light. The source of that glow was a strange circle which unnoticed pierced the deck. It was painted with the fresh blood of the dead who have just died in devastating death. It was as if a crimson snake wriggled drawing a complicated and mysterious magic circle ---- just like as it were a trap to catch the prey.

〈”Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”〉

A dull scream from came from the speaker of XAM. Despite the fact that no blood was flowing in the steel body, it sounded like there were blood blister mixed in the scream.

However a further abnormal phenomenon appeared on the car body: as the magic circle emerged from the floor as if it were the deep-seated grudge of the dead and covered the body of the multi-legged tank from the feets ---- Wait, no! If you look closely, where the body of the multi-legged tank touched the deck, it looked like as if red rust would gradually devour it quickly from the soles on. Although it’s unthinkable that ordinary steel rusts that rapid like this. Not to mention for such an armour-plate made of special steel is absolutely impossible. But actually, in a matter of seconds was the huge body of XAM completely painted with the color of blood.

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As the distinctive stench of iron rust occasionally tickled the nose of “Puppeteer”, the giant completely eaten up by the red rust crushed down to the ground with a thunderous noise.

〈”Ah, ah, die, I …..!”〉

The speaker partially buried by rust vomited the cracked noise with interruptions.

〈”Yes…. I can die with this…..with this…..With….Th….”〉

Perhaps it was just a mere coincidence that at the same time as the voice that used up all his strength stopped like a large animal breathes his last ---- the neck of the external camera broke off. However “Puppeteer” looked at this scene with eyes as he would see something very disgusting, he gave a deep sigh of relief in his heart.

“This method gives evidence of bad taste….was that you, “Magician”?”

〈” …..you always say that I have bad taste, don’t you?”〉

The sarcastic laugh resounded from under the feet’s of the young man.

As the reddish brown eyes looked down, his shadow strangely began to bent and then emerged like a thread of dripping darkness while as if somebody would pull it up.

“My “Seal of Baphomet” is an electrolytic corrosion ---- this is surely an extremely sophisticated “magic” using the potential difference between dissimilar metals and discharge of ions. Calling it as bad taste or something like this….besides that, by all means it saved your life. Apart from what you really think, how about to show a little gratitude at least on the surface, “Puppeteer”?

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“If you intend to make someone feel grateful take a bit better timing into consideration.”

The young man tried a meager protest against the completely black dressed gentleman who just literally gushed out from the darkness. He pointed at the bloodstain on his coat and pressed accusingly his lips together.

“You know, this coat was pretty much my favorite one….so if you can use your magic trick to get rid of the stain, I will thank you with all my heart.”

“Please don’t force me to something irrational like this. It bears repeating: my “Shadow”…… the wormhole isn’t available indefinitely. In the first place the wormhole is a micro-Black Hole of ultra small size. In the second place the world of quantum physics is dominated by far more troublesome principals than the macro-world…..”

“Oh, how nice of you to say that![3] You saw me being bullied[4] and you were engrossed in your typical immoral pleasure, weren’t you? I sense a faint perversion and scent of conspiracy in your current timing.”

Puppeteer looked at his colleague who was keen at trying to justify himself and made a roguish sound with his throat. Then his gaze randomly shifted to the rusty iron lump lying on the ground.

“Still, she was happy at the end to die, isn't that right?....Well, with this, I wonder if this story has a Happy Ending?”

“Honestly, it sounds like you're dissatisfied that the story ended happily, isn’t that so Puppeteer”?”

There was nothing but everywhere miserable corpses of people who had enjoyed their lives without worrying until a few minutes ago:

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bodies turned into mincemeat by the bullets, burnt internal organs, besides, by the influence of the “fibers” still struggling severed arms and legs ------ The black haired gentleman pulled out somewhere a cigarillo while walking towards XAM trying not to step on the human remains scattered in the bloody mud. While he relaxed lit a fire, declared whit a deep voice:

『Da der Tod (genau zu nehmen) der wahre Endzweck unseres Lebens ist”』[5] ----Mozart. Well, although many things happened, with this she got a rest, and even if we are bored, we will have from now on a calm journey. We all got what we were looking for. Isn’t that great? That’s right, if you like we could return to the lounge and get a drink to celebrate……..Huch ?

The sight of the “Magician” who was exhaling deep purple smoke fell unexpectedly at his feet. The eyes resembling of those of a dead fish were observing the crimson rotten scrapheap. A little while later he turned back to his travelling companion at ease.

“Oh, this is bad, “Puppeteer”………it seems like I have to take back what I said before.”

“He, what’s wrong?”

“Mmh, our wish for a calm journey is seemingly fallen through. It’s because of this…..”

〈The body damage has exceeded 90%〉

In the machine voice which interrupted the mellow voice of the “Magician”, there was no change at all since it was running wild just a while ago. However, it was neither the dead bride nor that ghost or something like this.

Page 240

The camera which should have stopped to operate rotated weakly and the lens captured the black-haired gentleman stood there very disappointed and the young man with the pretty face who was approaching from behind.

〈From now on in order to maintain the confidentiality of the prototype this machine will switch into self-destruction mode. Persons within a radius of one hundred meters please leave this machine as soon as possible and get into guard position. I repeat: this machine…..〉

“…..Hey Isaak, what does this mean?”

“Oh, it seems like the body has returned to sanity ---- presumably as the pseudo-ego in the operation system disappeared, I guess the normal program started to running.”

“No, that’s not I wanted to ask…… can you stop it? If it explodes in such a place this won’t this ship possibly sink?”

“I quite agree with you…..unfortunately, it seems it’s a bit too late.”

Raising one eyebrow expressively “Magician” slightly stepped aside in order to let his companion see the running counter from before on the digital display of the lower part the multi legged tank. Right after that all the numbers on the liquid crystal display changed to zero ---- an then there was a violent explosion.

(End of Part IV)

[1]荒事 - Kabuki genre with brave warriors and grim deities and demons

[2] In Enochian (occult language recorded by John Dee and Edward Kelley in 1582), Mph Arsl Gaiol is the Holy name of the element Water.

[3] そんなこと言って – used if somebody gets angry or mad

[4] I guess he means by it that he was in trouble.

[5] As death, when we come to consider it closely, is the true goal of our existence. - This sentence is in the original Japanese novel written in German with katakana.

#tb never forget #trinity blood #Sunao Yoshida #Thores Shibamoto #Isaak Fernand von Kämpfer #Dietrich von Lohengrin #rosencreutz orden #light novel #Rage Against the Moons #radio head #rco

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mighty-loki-and-accomplices · 7 years

Text

I took a break from my monster Thorki fic to write something completely different. I ended up with racer!Thor hijacking Loki’s car... Why?? I mean that’s not what I wanted to write.... WHY?

Anyway, here, have that weird ficlet...

5 pm.

It’s about time.

He’s been stuck in that tiny cubicle for the whole day, doing the same thing over and over again. Take a new sheet of paper, copy up the codes and wait for the machine to tell him when to start over. He feels like if he hears the computer beep one more time he’s going to hurl the thing against the wall.

He is tired, he is hungry, his back hurt from sitting too long on the uncomfortable chair and it’s so damn hot in there. When are they planning to fix the AC?

He just wants to go home. Have a shower, order some food and read, sprawled on his couch, until it’s time to go to bed.

Yes.

That seems like a good plan. He hastily shove his belongings in his briefcase with a concentrated expression, checking twice to make sure he didn’t forget anything. Why does he even bother to take all that? He could just as well bring his sandwich in a cool bag and leave the rest of his papers there, it’s not as if he actually planned to work from home.

“Hey, Loki! Ready to go?”

He rolls his eyes and promptly ignores the man that just slouched over the wall of his cubicle and interrupted his departure’s routine. He checks the inside of his bag and his desk one last time before finally standing.

“Fancy to go for a drink? Everybody’s going.”

“No. Thank you, Tony.” Loki mumbles as he look for his car keys in his jacket’s pockets. “Maybe next time.”

“You always say that!” Tony accuses “Come on! It’s Friday! You’ve got to relax Lo.”

But Loki is already half way to the elevator and has absolutely no intention of turning back. The day is done, the week is over, now nobody gets to tell him what he has to do. He doesn’t care what’s his colleagues thinks about him, as long as they don’t bother him, it’s fine. He knows he has quite a reputation, he doesn’t talk to anyone unless spoken to, he never partake in any kind of social events and usually just stay as far as possible from other people. Mostly they see him as a cold hearted bastard with a stick up his ass. Probably with OCD too. He doesn’t mind. Their view of him doesn’t affect him in the slightest, so why should he bother to refute it?

It’s only when he is finally in his car that he breathe a little more easily. It’s made for the city, small but not overly so with a build in computer and GPS and everything a modern car should have. It is immaculate except for the driver’s carpet; he been planning to clean it for ages but always forget. He press the start button and sigh with contentment. The car is nearly silent, it doesn’t even look like it’s turned on. Once more he congratulate himself for buying a hybrid. Saving the planet is good, but getting to drive home in a safe and quiet environment beats it without contest. He gets out of the garage when he spot two other people get into their car and join the traffic.

At last he is on his way home.

Silence and peace for two whole days before another hellish week starts.

Loki always drives slowly. This has nothing to do with security, he just likes to make sure that he stay on the electric mode as much as possible. That way he wouldn’t have to refuel it nearly as often as he should; and more importantly the car is nearly soundless when he does so. He is used to people honking, cursing at him, and overtaking his car in dangerous ways. He doesn’t care.

But what he’s not used to is people zig-zagging in between cars at an impressive speed, motor roaring like some kind of wild beasts, tyres burning on the asphalt; and crashing just in front of him.

Loki slams on the brakes as he watches the showy red car roll over several times before eventually stopping on its back. His eyes are wide open and his mind is wiped clean.

What just happened?

What should he do?

His first reflex is to go out and check on the driver but he can hear other motors far behind and he has absolutely no desire to be rolled over. Before him nothing moves. He can see some other cars stop as well behind him and several other driving around the red car as if nothing. He so loves that country, it’s so heart-warming to see people care for each other.

Just as he regain his senses and fetch his phone out of his pocket to call 911 he sees movements in the red car. Behind him the other fast cars are approaching, he can almost see them in the rear-view. Looming at the horizon, motor deafeningly loud.

There is someone crawling out of the red car. Loki can’t see very well but it looks like a man, blond and definitely big. He gets on his feet a bit disoriented and certainly a bit hurt; and around them Loki can see people start to drive off again. In less than a minute he is the only one left immobile.

An orange car makes it way in the traffic and pass them in a flash, honking mockingly when it passed the red car. Suddenly the blond is stumbling toward his car and Loki panics. What should he do? The closer he gets, the bigger he looks. Loki can’t do anything but sit there and watch him open the driver door.

Oh god, is that blood on his face?

Loki stares at him in horror unable to think, let alone move.

“I need to borrow your car.” The blond says sheepishly.

He gives Loki a long look and makes to shove him out the way but Loki bats his hand away and glare at him.

“Why?”

The blond seems surprised by the question for a second, then grin; headless of the cuts on his cheeks.

“I got a race to win.”

It’s terrifying. The fire in the man’s eyes as he says these words along with his bloody face and his grin, it’s simply terrifying.

He should go. Press start and drive away, call 911 when he gets home and forget about the whole thing. One look at the man’s biceps and he knows that he wouldn’t succeed. He should stumble out of the car and let the man take it; with some luck he’d be able to get it back later.

Instead Loki finds himself sliding in the passenger’s seat to make room for the blond. They both look extremely surprised by that.

Someone honks behind them and Loki spots another car going crazy in the traffic, the blond curses loudly and shove himself in the car with more colourful curses. It takes about thirty seconds for him to adjust the seat and mirrors before he turns to Loki expectantly.

“The key” he demands hand stretched toward Loki.

“No need. Press here.” As usual the car does not make any sound and the blond arch an eyebrow “Hybrid” Loki says as way of explanation “it’s on.”

“Great” the man hisses rolling his eyes. “Where is the clutch?” he asks feeling the empty place where it should be “Where is the clutch?” he nearly yell as he watches the grey car getting nearer and nearer.

“HYBRID!” Loki repeats loudly “She’s automatic!”

“Fan-fucking-tastic” the blond grumbles.

He reverses gear, just enough to go around the red car still smoking in the middle of the road, and starts to drive.

Loki has never heard his car make that much noises.

The man is driving fast and getting faster. He’s slaloming in between cars, one hand on the wheel and the other on the gear, ready to change it. Loki stops him as soon as he sees the thick fingers curl around the pole.

“Automatic” he repeats

The blond glances at him before nodding and putting both hands on the wheel. Cars are honking, angry drivers are shouting at them but Loki can’t hear anything over the roaring of his car.

He should have accepted Tony’s invitation. He really should have. Next time he’ll say ‘yes’, he swear to himself.

He holds on his belt for dear life, eyes huge and mouth open on a silent scream as he his pressed tight against the door as the blond makes a sharp turn. There is smoke at their back and Loki is pretty sure his tyres are not going to survive that ride. He grimaces at the thought.

“Why?” the man asks as he once again made a turn.

Loki’s blood pumps viciously in his ears, the roaring of the motor so loud that he doesn’t hear the question at all. Loki can see the back of the orange car far ahead of them, he isn’t sure if that’s such a good thing. He doesn’t dare to look at the speed, certain that heart wouldn’t be able to take it. He’s already seen an accident that day, he has no wish in being in one. Loki yelps when the blond suddenly turn right and he all but collapses against the man. The blond chuckles as Loki hastily try to straighten himself.

“So? Why didn’t you get out?”

“And let a stranger take my car away? How am I supposed to go home?” Loki glares at him before continuing. “I’m warning you, if there is as much as a scratch on her you’re getting me a new one. And a good one!”

The man turns his head to study him, surprised, then grins widely. He speeds up, still looking at Loki, and still with that terrifying grin in place. They hit a speed bump and both of their heads hit the roof of the car. The blond is still looking at him. Another half minute of that and Loki screams.

“EYES ON THE ROAD!”

Surprisingly the blond chuckles but obeys; after a moment he extends his hand for a handshake.

“I’m Thor.”

“Keep your hands on the wheel you stupid!”

Thor laughs frankly and seems to accelerate a bit more. Soon they are close enough to the orange car from earlier that Loki can read the licence plate and Thor grins manically. It is still very far from them though.

“So?” Thor asks after a few seconds.

“So what?”

“What’s your name?”

“Loki.”

“Well, Loki, don’t worry. Should anything happen to her-” Thor’s hand slide lovingly on the leather wheel “I know just the right car for you.”

#loki #thor #thorki #G rating #fanfic #I don't know what happened #I hate writing in present #I just want to finish my monster fic #but it's taking so long #my stuff

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ladystylestores · 4 years

Text

Review: fierce and fun Warrior Nun is a perfect Fourth of July binge-watch

Ava (Alba Baptista) finds herself resurrected by an angelic halo in her back, and is recruited by a group of nuns in the Order of the Cruciform Sword.

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The nuns have just suffered a devastating loss of one of their own.

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Ava just wants to live a little with her new hip friends.

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Sparks fly between Ava and JC (Emilio Sakraya)

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JC’s friends don’t know quite what to make of Ava.

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Father Vincent (Tristan Ulloa) tries to win Ava over to the cause.

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Mother Superion (Sylvia De Fanti) has her doubts about Ava’s potential.

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Sister Lilith (Lorena Andrea) and Sister Beatrice (Kristina Tonteri-Young)

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Sister Camila (Olivia Declan)

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Cardinal Duretti (Joaquim de Almeida) questions the stability of the order.

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A romantic interlude.

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Shotgun Mary (Toya Turner) and Sister Lilith are both on the hunt for the missing Ava.

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Shotgun Mary finds Ava

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Jillian Salvius (Thekla Reuten) is a wealthy scientist and entrepreneur whose work might be a threat to the Catholic Church

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Sister Beatrice in fight mode is fierce.

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A young woman gains extraordinary powers when a divine artifact is accidentally embedded in her back, and finds herself reluctantly battling demons on Earth in Warrior Nun, a new Netflix series based on the comic books by Ben Dunn. It sounds like a cheesy premise, but this adaptation is anything but. It’s a fiercely fun, entertaining, occasionally thought-provoking series that will have you hooked and eager for a second season.

(Mild spoilers below, but no major reveals.)

As we previously reported, the first issue in Dunn’s manga-style comic book series, “Warrior Nun Areala,” debuted in 1994. The series largely features Sister Shannon Masters, a modern-day crusader for the Catholic Church’s (fictional) Order of the Cruciform Sword. In the series mythology, the Order dates back to 1066, when a young Valkyrie woman named Auria converted to Christianity. Renamed Areala, she selects a new avatar every generation to carry on her mission of battling the agents of hell. Sister Shannon is the Chosen One. It’s like Buffy the Vampire Slayer got religion.

Dunn has said he was inspired to create the series after learning, via a New York Times article, about the Fraternity of Our Lady, which established a chapter in Harlem in 1991 to run a soup kitchen. One of the nuns (the fraternity has both nuns and priests), Sister Marie Chantel, trained in the martial arts (judo and Tae Kwon Do), and many of her fellow nuns also practiced self-defense, albeit mostly for sport. Dunn envisioned a world with nuns as superheroes, where heaven and hell are real dimensions.

Sister Shannon isn’t dominant in the Netflix adaptation—she only appears in a couple of episodes, played by Melina Matthews. Instead, the show focuses on a young woman named Ava (Alba Baptista). Per the official premise:

Caught in the middle of an ancient war between good and evil, a young girl wakes up in a morgue with inexplicable powers. Her search for answers brings her to The Order of the Cruciform Sword, a secret society of warrior nuns sworn to protect the world from evil. While juggling her responsibilities as the chosen one with the normal obstacles of a teenage girl, this mysterious fantasy drama is full of mystery, action, adventure, and teenage romance, proving our main character might fight in the name of good, but she’s no angel.

We meet Ava after she has just died in a Catholic hospital, having been there since she was crippled (a paraplegic) in a car accident at the age of seven. Her body is laid out in the church morgue by Father Vincent (Tristan Ulloa), when his crew of warrior nuns returns from what should have been a routine mission. Sister Shannon has been mortally wounded and they must remove the angelic halo from her back that grants special powers, and insert it into the next “Halo Bearer.”

But they are interrupted by a supernatural beast intent on retrieving said halo for itself. As the sisters scatter, one of them slips the halo into Ava’s body. The halo’s power brings her back to life, and also restores her mobility. But Ava is not a nun, nor is she particularly devout, and honestly, after a lifetime paralyzed in a hospital bed, the 18-year-old just wants to live a little. This rankles Cardinal Duretti (Joaquim de Almeida): “How did our greatest weapon against evil end up in an unbeliever?”

The whole armor of god

Ava and Shotgun Mary take refuge in a village that has seen more than its share of demons.

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Ava comes to terms with her calling.

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There could be another personal motive behind Jillian’s research.

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Warrior nuns suited up for a mission.

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Tending to a wounded warrior.

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Shotgun Mary stands firm in the face of evil.

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There is tension in the nuns’ ranks

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Lilith returns to her sisters.

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Ava has a vision.

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Ava decides upon a course of action.

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The team marches out to infiltrate the Vatican.

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Nah, not suspicious behavior at all.

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Sister Camila’s mad hacker skills come in handy.

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Sister Lilith ready to do her part.

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Warrior nuns, assemble!

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Father Vincent argues that Ava must have been chosen for a reason, and tries to convince her to take the role of Halo Bearer seriously. Mother Superion (Sylvia De Fanti) doesn’t think Ava has what it takes, while Sister Lilith (Lorena Andrea) was supposed to be next in line for the honor and resents being passed over in favor of Ava. Sister Beatrice (Kristina Tonteri-Young) and Sister Camila (Olivia Declan) are a bit more welcoming, while Shotgun Mary (Toya Turner) is grieving the loss of her BFF Sister Shannon and intent on revenge upon whoever betrayed the Order that fateful day.

There are also greater machinations afoot, starting with scientist and tech entrepreneur Jillian Salvius (Thekla Reuten), who has been using a mysterious material known as “divinium,” found on certain holy relics stolen from the Vatican, to create a prototype inter dimensional portal. She thinks this will usher in a new Age of Enlightenment: “Heaven exists, and I discovered a gateway to it.” This puts her at odds with the Cardinal and the Church—she has desecrated holy relics, after all. And the Cardinal himself seems to be intent on remaking the Order to serve his own ambitions within the Church. Ava clearly needs time to process and come to terms with her new situation—but that might be a luxury the Order can’t afford, as the beast is still hunting for the halo, leaving carnage in its wake.

The entire cast give stellar performances, but Baptista is luminous as Ava. The character could easily have come across as a spoiled brat in the early episodes, given that her learned defense mechanisms involve flippant irreverence and keeping people at a distance. Instead, you genuinely feel for this young woman who has suddenly been granted a second chance at life, able to feel sensations, to walk and run and feed herself, for the first time in 11 years. But the gift comes with a price: she is thrust into a spiritual war she doesn’t understand, with people she has no reason to trust after years of abuse at the Catholic hospital. There’s also her raging teen hormones and a super-cute boy (Emilio Sakraya) drawing her away from the Order.

The series is expertly plotted, with twists and turns that will keep you guessing until the final reveal.

We naturally expect there to be heroes and villains, but Warrior Nun takes a much more nuanced, less black-and-white approach to this than the original comics. In the comics, for instance, Julius Salvius is a Satanist and arms dealer whose minions regularly battle the Order. But his gender-swapped counterpart in the TV series, Jillian, is a more complicated figure—someone who seeks to rise above the longstanding the tension between science and religion for motives that might just be more personal (and less overtly evil) than one might otherwise expect.

Likewise, the heroic figures have all-too-human flaws that lead to ill-advised decisions at times: entitlement and resentment (Sister Lilith), jealousy (Mother Superion), anger management issues (Shotgun Mary), and being a bit too naively trusting (Sister Camila) and overly obedient to Church authority (Sister Beatrice). Another welcome departure from the comics: the nuns actually dress modestly, like nuns, rather than the silly cleavage-centric habits and loin cloths worn by the nuns in Dunn’s earlier comics.

The series is expertly plotted, with twists and turns that will keep you guessing until the final reveal. There is a rich historical mythology, and plenty of action and killer “Nun-Fu” moves, especially when Sister Beatrice lets out her inner ninja. (Watching her effortlessly take out a crew of Jillian’s security forces who assumed she was too small and weak to pose any threat is glorious.) And there are welcome moments of sly comic relief and contemplative reflection to break up the action now and then. Ava and her sister Warrior Nuns are definitely worthy to join the ranks of Buffy, Wynonna Earp, and Witchblade‘s Sarah Pezzini as flawed-but-fierce women who fight against evil, in all its forms, for the greater good.

Warrior Nun is now streaming on Netflix, and makes for an excellent holiday weekend binge.

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smoothshift · 5 years

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I've become a BMW fan after experiencing some of their cars via the BMW Town Tour via /r/cars

I've become a BMW fan after experiencing some of their cars via the BMW Town Tour

On Tuesday, June 3rd, 2019, I went to a BMW event called "Town Tour." Someone posted about it on /r/Cars a couple months ago, and I can't remember who you are, so though I can't thank you via tagging you here, if you see this, please know I greatly appreciate you posting the link to the site.

One thing that all the participants suffered through during this event was lack of actual drive time. In Murrieta, CA, where this event was hosted, there was a major accident on the freeway, so the roads were jam-packed with commuters who had to exit the freeway. The BMW Town Tour staff limited us to basically just driving in a circle around the BMW dealership. At most, I took an M5 up to 65 mph, but goddamn did it get there quickly!

The first car I drove was this BMW M4 Competition (+ bonus M4 CS pics from the dealership's showroom floor). I immediately became a fan. It felt like this car was just urging me to continue accelerating. The interior oozed a level of luxury I had never before experienced, but I think it mostly stood out just because it was a brown/tan color instead of the all-black interiors I'm so used to in friends' Infintis and Benz cars. This car's sheer acceleration had me wondering wtf it must feel like driving an exotic. The fastest car I drove before these BMW M-cars was a tuned Nissan GT-R, but I only drove it for a mile in a straight line before bringing it back to the owner. I actually got to mildly corner with this car when coming around turns that followed the road layout the Town Tour staff set for us. Obviously, I wasn't all out cornering or anything like one would do on a track, but I could really feel the effort BMW put into the suspension. I strictly drove the car in Sport Plus mode, so I don't know what the Comfort or regular Sport modes entail. Overall, with enough funds, I thought I could see myself driving one of these in a heartbeat until I drove the next car.

The BMW M2 Competition! I think this was my favorite car. Maybe it was just my brain tricking me because I loved this car so much, but it felt like it was faster than the M4. Then again, I had gotten more comfortable driving the cars, so I suppose I was willing to go a bit deeper into the RPM range before upshifting. I swear I'd do dirty things to get this car in my garage. The power, the fact the car seemed to go in any direction I even gently turned the steering wheel toward, and just the overall appearance really cemented it as the 'Ultimate Driving Machine.' Save for the Nissan Maxima I bought my wife, every car I've ever owned has been under 3000 lbs curb weight. I see that the M2 Competition comes in a bit over 3400 lbs, but I couldn't tell. It really felt like the car was lighter.

Up next was the BMW M850i Convertible. This car seemed cool and all, but unlike the other cars in the lineup, the BMW Town Tour staff wouldn't allow anyone to drive it solo. We had to have a guide with us, and the person who went with me seemed to be selling me on the car (as if I could afford a car with a $109k MSRP 😂) by just mentioning features that went in one ear and out the other. Unfortunately, she didn't tell me we were going on an actual test drive. What happened was I signed up for the M5 first, but someone took it for a spin and went off the road layout we were supposed to follow. That jack ass got stuck in the traffic I mentioned earlier. The tour staff asked if I was interested in driving the M850i earlier than my slotted time, but they made it sound like the tour guide was coming with me just to check out the road conditions. We literally just took one low-speed spin around the streets and came back to the dealership. When I realized that was my test drive, I was very disappointed. I didn't even get to open the car up at all. And to add insult to injury, the person who drove it after me actually got to experience the car with the top down, but they had two tour guides accompany him for some reason.

Lastly, I drove this BMW M5. As you can probably tell, I got lazier with taking pictures as the morning went on. One thing I can say about this M5 that will surprise everyone here? It's insanely fast! (Shocking, right? Who woulda thunk it?) The M5's power can be felt as soon as you gently step on the gas pedal. I thought the M4 and M2 were quick, but this thing blew me away with its acceleration. I only got to take it to 65 mph, but it got there so fast that I didn't even realize I was 20 over the speed limit at first. I giggled like a schoolgirl every time I hit the gas pedal. The upshifts were ridiculously quick, too. Obviously, I can't differentiate the milliseconds of difference between one car's upshifts over the other's, but I could just sense the M5's upshifts were blindingly quick. I am a traditional manual transmission enthusiast, but I can see why people love paddle-shifters now. The quickness in the upshifts is unmatched by any manual car I've ever driven. My test drive of this car lasted fewer than 10 minutes. The guy who drove it before me ruined the event for everyone by taking the M5 out for an over 1-hour test drive with his wife. It seemed like the staff got more strict on how far we could go and how long we could drive.

Inside the dealership, they had this BMW that apparently has won a lot of races. The interior was completely stripped besides having a driver's seat.

I also saw this BMW Supra. It was the 4-cylinder with 255 hp. The dealership was asking $59k for this! I was flabbergasted. I can't imagine how much they'll charge for the 6-cylinder when they get one at the dealership.

FINAL THOUGHTS

I always thought BMWs seemed cool af, but I never drove any before this event. Now that I've officially driven a few of their cars, I have to admit I'm a fan.

Would I ever buy one? Probably never a new one. And if I did buy a used one, I'd probably go through CarMax just for their extended warranty. It feels like these cars have too much technology. With the click of a button, you can change the suspension dynamics. That seems like it's a recipe for financial disaster once the suspension needs any kind of maintenance.

I drive this beautiful Toyota 86 as my daily. Her name is Tiana. She's my "forever car," meaning I intend to keep her for the rest of my life. I initially thought I was going to feel disappointed jumping from these 400+ hp BMWs back into my 205 hp 86, but I honestly felt at home. The BMWs were nice; however, I can't help but think they just have too much power for the road. Anybody who can afford the payments on one, and even idiots who lack the funds yet are financially incompetent enough to finance one anyway, can drive these beasts down the same roads as people putting along in Corollas and Cruzes. That's scary.

Just imagine as these cars insanely depreciate and are priced under $20k in 10-15 years. High schoolers driving around in 400+ hp performance cars? Yikes!

#reddit #autonews #auto #cars

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cheerstoyourmustaches · 9 months

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@koopzilla cont.

To emerge from an egg without a mother waiting up above is a cruel fate. So, upon discovering the egg nestled deep in one of Darkland's many trenches, he had waited. The king would see this creature born safely. Much as Kamek had for him. Someone has to do it. His efforts are rewarded. Bowser smiled contently as his kin emerged from the egg. The dragon erupts like a volcano at birth! It gets a laugh from its audience. An eggshell flung towards the crater shatters. He granted the youngen a moment to analyze its surroundings. The wretched heats and cold dark skies of the land deserve a moment of processing. Eventually, the king approached carefully. His claws are raised, opened in peace, one containing a large silver jug. He steps softly and keep his grating tones hushed. "Easy. Easy, Champ. You're safe." Bowser has outgrown baby language, but the mood is obvious. The critter is tense. Confused. Possibly upset. He stopped a short distance, looking the dragon up and down.

"Heh! Look at you! You're something special. I don't know who left you here... but they're missing out! Ya hungry?" Sure enough, the practiced parent had come prepared. His metallic offering is a thermos filled to the brim with milk for the newborn. "Ah?"

To transform into a scaley beast so hideously unbeany is one nightmare in itself, but to also find himself trapped in another egg-prison is quite another! Perhaps it was part of the curse to start from square one in the life of a miserable lizard? Though he wasn't sure there was a curse out there dedicated to teaching one biology, so it was probably just a cherry on top of the misery cake he'd been served.

Contrary to the Koopa King's views, Peasley would have preferred an audience of zero upon gathering enough energy through a nap spent baking among the hot rocks the egg had appeared among and quite frankly looked no different from. After all, he was not exactly looking his best as a beasty - and on top of that, his beasty self was also a mess - mottled with egg slime that gave his scales a temporary sleekness, but smelled exactly what you would think an egg left out in the heat for too long would smell of.

Upon spotting the tyrant, Peasley wants to bury his head in the sand. His only saving grace is a mistaken identity so at least this won't reflect poorly on Mother and the Beanbean kingdom. Still, he can't help but wonder where that blast of magic had come from in the Darklands that had done this to him. He should take no chances , especially not with Bowser-...was that milk?

A reptilian gaze set into permanent fury thanks to bushy brows squints at the offering. "...rohhh-...HO!? [Do I look like a CHILD to you?!]" The prince is quick to find a temporary balance on back claws to reach up with a claw and swat the thermos out of the other's hand! Milk pools around the dirt and cool the pads of his toes briefly, but it's not enough to stop a tantrum which consists of throwing his head back to screech, drool flying free and fangs flashing! By the time his voice hits a dry note, he's choking slightly. It's hard to wet one's whistle in such dry air...oh bother!

Choking all the way to the dirt, he indignantly laps at the ground milk as a low bellow rumbles somewhere in his chest.

#//dirt milk sounds tasty tho #koopzilla #beast mode;// i suppose you could call it a bit of an accident ✧*:･ﾟ

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bornfromscarletcords · 6 years

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A Wolf’s Compassion

Hello I am Shane Daniels, I have wolf’s blood. I don’t really come from a pack, so I’m not really sure what or why I am the way I am, but my family said I could be something called a Vaugre. They aren’t wolves so their knowledge on the subject is limited, but they said it’s something like a werewolf or one of those native american shifters. Every once in awhile I get a little more wolfish than the average kid, but mostly I’m just like everyone else, or maybe I’d like to be. I don’t have many friends, but the ones I do have are pretty awesome. I’m thirteen, my hair gets pretty wild sometimes but mostly I keep it short...ish. My skins pretty dark so although I don’t really remember them I’m guessing my bio-parents were too...maybe. I guess I’m of average height for my age, whatever that means, and though I don’t mean to my eyes are typically gold in color, though if I concentrate I can sort of make them look honey colored or something. Most people don’t pay attention to them for too long, partly because something in me sort of forces their attention away but I also read somewhere that if people find something that’s too traumatic or causes too much stress, even if mundane, they’ll sort of just edit it out of their brains or something. I mean I know the eyes are disconcerting, but if anyone actually told me they could see a little too much of an inner animal in them I might wear glasses or something. So far, the number of complaints were few in number, which unfortunately was likely to do with fear, but there is a type of hierarchy to these things, rabbits eat the leaves larger rabbits with sharper teeth and better ability to hide eat the littler rabbits, then hawks or something eat them and so on and so forth until god eats everyone or something and poops out paradise.

My adopted mother, is an Enchantress, which means that even by conventional human standards she’d be pretty, but with the veil of her aura unsuppressed she’s more or less gorgeous. I’d say super model pretty but that’d be slightly misleading, you’d have to embrace somewhat murky or occasionally frowned upon ideas about pheromones, bestial adaptation around belief, sexy math, and something like hypnosis. From what she told me her people aren’t unlike the Sirens, or mermaids of old, though they typically don’t attract waywards sailors to their doom, not that they couldn’t. Enchanters draw a lot of power from their voices, and besides having an unusual capacity to comprehend languages, they are great singers and can more or less work miracles simply by speaking strongly or powerfully. With this said, you should sort of understand why saying they’re simply really pretty is a dangerous underestimation, most people would probably see them as something close, but just variant enough to the ideal of the perfect sexual or love companion. Someone that would in a manner of speaking improve their legacy and their present by impossible strides. Almost like those pictures of angels or roman gods, who don’t always match contemporary ideals of what is attractive but who meld seamlessly into the style of the picture. Oh the first cavemen who chanced on their pleasing curves and soft flesh must of died, gone to heaven, and clawed his way back to earth because they were that much better.

My adopted mother’s name is Esme, Esmeralda Daniels if you want the whole thing. She has red hair a bit on the short side, it sort of stops around her ears, most people say its charming. She’s a bio-engineer, and works at one of the most prestiges facilities in the city, but more relevantly, in the country at least that’s what other people tell me. She has freckles and green eyes which are nearly as startling as my own, though most people are attracted by hers rather than repelled.

My mom is busy more often than she’d like to be though I will say even a couple of hours with her is pretty worthwhile, she always has the best stories and games. Still I suppose you could say she has cash to burn, so she spares not expenses when it comes to the safety of those she cares about. So our household has something like a bodyguard, or kill-maid, or something. Her name is Rachel, and she has dark skin, and hair of a similar coloring. She looks like she could pass for native american or south american or something, but mom said something about her being from one of the pacific islands or something. Rachel is one of The Hunters, a race or order or band or whatever of supernaturally skilled trackers and enders of quarry both mundane and otherworldly. Generally speaking their excellent martial artists, but their true extraordinary-ness lies in their miraculous capacity for tracking, trap making, and manipulation of people and circumstances to end their targets. They rarely settle and are seldom far from others of their kind unless on a pilgrimage or responding to some natural, or unnatural disaster. With this said, it was strange that Rachel had agreed to settle for babysitting on an Enchantresses payroll, but when I pressed Esme about it, she said that Rachel owed her. It’s weird that Rachel owed her but she was the one getting paid, but the supernatural rarely makes conventional sense.

I’ve only really seen Rachel’s hunter, gene, aura, magic, call it what you want, activate a couple of times, but it was always pretty dazzling and vaguely terrifying. She sort of ignites and these markings sort of flash around her and the space near her like some type of armor, except the markings look alive, like souls or something. Rachels always very fast, very strong, and very smart, but something about her hunter’s, or huntress’s activation just pushes that from the interesting into the almost impossible. You know how when you’re playing skeeball at an arcade or something, and you keep almost hitting the hundred pointer but it just keeps rolling away. Well it’s that extra nudge of biomechanical harmony that is the difference between you going home with a measly tail of tickets and a whole damn roll of them. Rachel’s activation was sort of like that, maybe she was just a tad stronger, a tad faster, a tad smarter, but it was that extra push, paired with an ability to shut out all the nonsense of the world to really harmonize those abilities as if they were more important than breathing which sort of accelerated her into almost unstoppable goddess of the hunt mode. To really bring it home, it’s like her critical chance and critical damage modifiers were maxed temporarily but effectively maxxed out.

I’ll admit, being what many might call a pseudo animal, I was a little on edge when my mother explained that my babysitter was actually an otherworldly beast killer. She explained that although some hunters killed supernatural creatures indiscriminately there were also those who only culled the evil or too dangerous or too stupid to be allowed to live. Rachel was of the latter variety, mostly. The important part of that conversation was that she avoided the harm of children whenever possible. There was some tension between us at first, with Rachel being, rigid, generally abrasive, and vaguely condescending, and me being, a little more often than usual I might add, a wolf. Eventually, after both of our non human internal defense systems found a means to communicate without threat of death, we became pretty good friends; as things were, hunter’s need to burn off energy nearly as much as vaugre do, and Rachel and I love going for runs. Rachel’s pretty attractive, I mean not your conventional knockout, but she was fit, and capable, and it was hard not to find a certain appeal after watching those tender almost perfect loping strides of hers. Seeing all that muscle and dark flesh gyrating at inhuman harmonies, ay dios mio.

I have a sorta sister, sorta because she’s Esme’s daughter which makes her my adopted sister, but also because she’s a major bitch. I mean I like her, enough to preserve her existence, and I know that if I kill her I should make it look like an accident, so that others don’t have to suffer more, she’d appreciate that in her twilight years of the afterlife. Diana, is an enchantress like Esme, but although they share the same powers and skills, my sorta sister does not have the savy or experience her mother to know how or why to utilize them to their fullest potential. So mostly she just wastes them on getting compliments from boys or making them give her stuff. She’s attractive, as in otherworldly did we just stumble on eve herself attractive, but that’s sort of par for the course for enchantresses who were coming into their abilities. Diana is fifteen but I’m pretty sure she could convince most of the men in the city to abandoned their wives or at least forget them for a while. She wouldn’t even need her voice to do it, her presence was typically enough to give most people pause. She wasn’t a couch potato, but she didn’t exactly enjoy Rachel and I’s somewhat extreme regimen for outdoor jogging, she preferred hiking, which required a little more vigilance and caution, but most importantly slow and steady trekking. She wears glasses but I have no idea if she actually needs them or just think they make her look cute or something. She has electric blue eyes, long dark hair which is more straight than not, and a viking woman’s disposition about nearly everything. Her and Esme don’t always get along, well rarely if ever get along, but it wasn’t always like that. In wolf packs as the pups come of age there is sort of a natural bio-social event which takes place; the more mature wolves sort of have to rearrange the structure slightly to make room for the pups without coddling them or ignoring their superiority if the latter is the case. What was happening with Esme and Diana did not seem entirely different, though I suppose you could say it was just all about growing up or mothers and daughters or some other less awesome example. Diana had a bad habit of blaming me for the growing schism between her and her mother, and I used to argue with her about it, but she’s pretty good at avoiding responsibility and hurting a person with the conventional or invisible things. So now I just go quiet, and a break or rearrange her stuff when she’s not looking.

Diana and I used to go to the same school but now she goes to high-school. I suppose Esme will send me with her after I graduate from middle school, which will happen at the end of the year, but to be honest, I’m not entirely chipper about having to deal with older, grosser, more emotionally unstable versions of the kids I already know. I don’t mind my current classmates but there’s definitely a distance between most of us. Humans always seem to tune into the least helpful frequencies when around an other-wordly creature even if they don’t know they’re around one. Either they put themselves in unnecessary danger, or the ones who would most likely help them in vaguely compromising positions. In short most have very weak or non existent defenses. My inner wolf has trouble tolerating inefficient use of energy, and general stupidity, to dangerous “I might start clawing people in the face” levels of intensity. So not surprisingly I have to be careful about the type of people I surround myself with.

As things are my core friend group consists of Chris, Bethany, and Edward. Chris and Bethany are twins and though people say boy and girl twins aren’t supposed to look the same these two look pretty similar, which was probably why Chris always cuts his hair short and Bethany tends to keep hers long. They have brown hair which occasionally looks like autumn leaves, and startling blue eyes like a glacier glowing in the moonlight, or arctic fires. They both wore glasses, Bethany’s were squared but Chris’s typically were circular, and their fashion sense was almost perversely similar. They said they didn’t mean to, and at first you started to doubt it, but then they’d reach for a door at the same time, or start finishing eachother’s sentences, or start juggling objects with one another without out speaking or looking at one another. It makes me less surprised at the suspicion people regarded twins with during the early stages of man’s civilization; they were some creepy bastards. Chris and Bethany are wizards, which means they do spells and stuff. The difference from witches, in general, being that most of their spells do not require the life energy of other creatures. They tried to explain it to me before but I’ll admit it’s hard to keep track of, their magic is more phantom like than a witch. Put another way “Wizards are more like dead people” they explained to me. It was a little wierd but that made it make a little more sense, wolves’ from what I could feel and had been told, weren’t unlike dead people themselves.

Edward is a Champion, and no that doesn’t mean people give him medals for being a unique snowflake. Champions as I’ve come to understand them, are sort of like knights but with more magical origins. Like with enchantresses and beauty Champions radiate competence, strength, inspiration to their friends, and fear to their enemies. Remember how I said hunters have this wierd activation armor thing, well I’ve seen something similar on Edward, except it’s almost always there, he just hides it a little. It’s like this golden cloak or suit of mail. If you touch him the wrong way it sort of zaps you, and even if it doesn’t down right repel you it makes his skin feel about as hard as stone, not unlike my skin when my wolf is raging or the moon is full. Edward has wild red hair which runs on the shaggy side down to his shoulders. His eyes are blue but more like the morning sky than the twins’. He hides how much he likes to really cut loose and play, his parents are all about discipline and nobility, but whenever there's a good game of kickball or a playground brawl brewing he’s all but bounding towards it.

My friends’ parents are otherworldly like them but that doesn’t mean they’re best buds with Esme or each other. They all sort of know one another but the bridging of boundaries isn’t always so easy for adults, too much learned hate and survivalist’s reservation. Oh well, if we were all exactly like the ones who raised us, things probably wouldn’t change.

Speaking of change we got a new classmate, her name is Hannah. She’s wolf blooded like me. I knew something was off about her when she walked into the classroom I just couldn’t tell what it was. Then I sniffed her, and I knew almost instantaneously.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Hannah said to me.

“I do too, you smell like wolf, like me but different, girly and like you-ish or something.” I told her.

“Look I came here to stay away from trouble, my aunt doesn’t want me hanging out with dangerous people and other wolves are dangerous.” Hannah said.

“So you admit it. Well, you won’t have to worry about that too much, not too many wolves around here, so far I was the only one as far as I know, until you showed up.” I said.

“Well fine, leave me alone then.” Hannah said.

“What, no that’s dumb, there’s safety in numbers.” I said

“Didn’t you just here me, i’m not supposed to be around other wolves.” Hannah said.

“Yeah but I’ve never been in a pack or seen another...well my mom calls them Vaugre. So I’m sort of just like a really wierd special person. Your aunt didn’t say anything about hanging out with them right?” I said.

“Vaugre? If heard aunty use that term before, umm… I guess you have a point. We should spit on it.” Hannah said. She spit into her hand and held it out for him.

“Mom says witches use spit and stuff for magic.” I said.

“I’m not a witch and neither is my aunty. We could arm wrestle instead, I’ll use my other hand.” Hannah said. I thought about it for a second and spit into my hand, clasping her’s tight.

“Nah, this is fine. Want to hang out with us at recess.” I said nodding to my friends.

“Yeah that sounds fun.” Hannah said.

Hannah is blonde, with long curly hair like a horses mane or something. She is shrewd and inquisitive though not in a bad way, just in like a very thorough pointed way. She must get that from her aunt, who is a new detective in the city. She has freckles and blue eyes that get even brighter and bluer the closer her wolf is to the surface. Her body always seems to be hot like mine, something about our metabolism or how our blood boils or something. We aren’t as bad as Chris and Bethany but for one reason or another we’re pretty in tune with each other’s feelings and actions. She said it had something to do with our wolves and the need for pack, and that makes sense. In short sometimes we’re like two peas in a pod, a great team, and other times we’re nearly about to kill each other, more or less arguing about who came up with an Idea first, or who did more work than the other. Still that’s pretty fun too, she really knows how to wrestle. I try not to be too rough with Chris because his body’s not as durable as mine, Edward is interesting to fight, but something’s off about how my wolf gets when our jostling too and fro gets a little too deadly. Wrestling with Hannah seems just right, our wolves know just how to bite or scratch or pin the other, they get to run freely as beasts. I’m not sure if other kids find her pretty, but to me she always seems too wolfish to limit to more human definitions of appeal. Sometimes she looks like a scion of wildness, or temptation in the form of divine art; my attraction almost magnetic. Other times she looked like a hell beast coming for my soul, though even then I felt a certain heated stirring in my stomach which made me kind of want to lick her face or something.

Having another wolf around made me a bit bold, and so I decided to convince her into going to talk to a vampire. Alysha Shabazz, was one of the local baddies in the neighborhood. Most people of the otherworld were questionable to say the least when it came to their inhuman activities, but many adhered to certain ideas of heroism, lesser badness, or some type of grey straddling. Alysha Shabazz was more or less an evil woman. I rarely saw her as most people tried to stay out of her way, lest they become her next meal, and she didn’t seem to have much interest in the city folk. She seemed to be of indian descent, eastern hemisphere, and most of her beautiful cinnamon skin and luscious curves were wrapped up in scarves and fabrics. Her hair was supposedly very long and pleasing to the eye but I’d only seen it once, tied in a braid down her back. She’d been stalking some human couple that night. Most people wouldn’t have noticed her, but my inner wolf had a way of spotting other predators. We didn’t see her make the kill, or if she fed on them at all, but we also didn’t get in her way. Law of the jungle, stay smart, stay strong, and you survive long enough to change what you need to. Getting in the way of a blood lusting vampire was not smart. She did give me cookies once, and like pet me around the ears, once as a human the other time when I was more wolfish. Most people mistake me for a dog or like a savage looking boy when the inner beast is a little more outer but Alysha seemed to have no trouble spotting the difference. She even called me by name though it was low enough to escape human detection. She seemed sweet, and dangerous. Most people left her alone because, one, she kept worser baddies at bay, and two fighting a powerful vampire tended to be a quick path to a painful slow death.

Anyway Hannah was slow to get on board, but I could see her wolf having trouble letting me go on my own, and her slippery slide into rebelliousness seemed to be igniting into a very endearing set of habits. Long story short, we sort of broke into Alysha’s house. We were pretty careful about it, Hannah’s very good at picking locks and I made sure no one saw us go in. We snooped around, well sniffed and listened around. It was simple but cozy as far as houses go, and there was a lot of carpet which does wonders for our paws, not that we wolfed out their, it was just interesting to note. We did spend a couple of moments rolling around on the rugs though, it was just so comfortable and it scratched all the right places, but our arrogance got the better of us, because that was when the despicable Alysha descended upon us. Well it was more like she opened the door, groceries in hand to two neighborhood delinquents. That was it, I thought to myself, this...is the end. Then she made us dinner and soup and told us stories and jokes and stuff, she’s a very nice lady and I’m not just saying that because the upper folds of her dress kept sliding apart so certain lucious rounded fleshy parts became more visible...or because her food was gourmet status. Hannah told me she was worried Alysha might have put her blood in it or something, but I didn’t care it would have been the most delicious blood i’d ever tasted. Apparently Alysha had been a member of the local clan of Enchantresses, but like way way back in the day, like a couple of centuries ago. Which means she like knew Esme’s ancestors or something. She like fell in love with some weird dude, or needed to save her sister or something and so she became a vampire to be with him...or to be powerful enough to like help someone or something. It was all very riveting when she told us, I just can’t remember word for word, some tales are like that. Anyway her Enchantress abilities didn’t leave her like some people in her clan said they would, though they were altered slightly. She gave me a kiss on the head before rubbing my hair and giving me a hug. She gave Hannah a strong handshake and a salute and sent us both on our way. It was awesome.

#Wolves Construction Magic Hopes Happiness

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