#but he wasnt as actively loathing himself until after the life games started

[definitelynotshouting]

i literally can't stop rotating hunger au worldbuilding and lore in my head. forgive me if you've ever touched on this in an ask before, but... re: the existential horror of being a parasite that has the sense of self of the host it ate. if one of grian's friends ever did get taken and used as a watcher larva host. how do you think he would feel about the watcher that came out the other side? would he want to see them as still the same person as his friend, or...?

Ive been staring at this ask since i got it with like. I need you to picture the most comically heartbroken expression right now okay. like this is me reading that and thinking about it in great and terrible detail:

Gods he would be devastated if this ever happened. He knows what thats like. He knows just how much it hurts-- and that its not a hurt that can be quantified, because its just that intense, that scalding, that encompassing of an experience to go through. I think, genuinely, Grian would be so utterly horrified and grief-stricken for whichever friend went through the Watcherification process that it would trump every other potential feeling on the list

But i think, ultimately, he would still view them as his friend, and treat them in the same way. There's a little bit of hypocrisy in Grian's character that i enjoy engaging with while writing him, and a good part of that in hunger au is centered around how he's firmly designated himself as the monster, and everybody else is the victim, and theres no room for nuance because he sucks and theyre the only people who are valid. When in reality, yes he hurt them, yes he did terrible and invasive things, but he did them out of pure survival rather than maliciousness, and that does make a subtle difference. And... hes not the only one who has fucked up, either!! The entire point of hunger au is how everyone has fumbled the bag in various ways and now they're all trying to clean it up together. Its just, yknow, Grian is so wrapped up in his own pain that he cant see those grey areas yet

And the thing is, if one of his friends got Watchered™, so to speak, and was standing in front of him, i think he would treat them with SO much compassion. Theyve been through possibly the worst thing anyone can experience and come out the other side-- at his core, Grian is i think a character who wants to do good, and do good by other people, and in this hypothetical that would translate into a lot of kindness he doesnt usually afford for himself. Honestly i think he'd spend the time trying to show them the ropes, get them set up in a better position than he found himself in, and provide his own fumbling emotional support as best he could, just out of sheer solidarity. Like, he gets it. He's been there. He may as well help out.

And i think he wouldnt even realize how hypocritical he's being until someone else pointed it out to him, about how he treats this friend with so much care but is simultaneously cruel to himself. I dont think he'd know how to handle that-- he's sort of dug himself a rut in the road with the way he thinks about and treats himself, and the cognitive dissonance would be really uncomfortable for him. Ultimately a good thing!!! Growth is often very uncomfortable. But imo Grian has a tendency to run from things like feelings of discomfort, so i think it'd take him a while to reconcile his previous ways of thinking with whats being presented in front of him essentially in the form of a mirror.

So uh. tl;dr: he'd be a little hypocrite about it and would feel a lot more compassionately inclined towards the friend than he does himself, and would try to help them out as best he could. Thank you for the incredible question that has given me the opportunity to rotate this worm at even higher speeds than usual inside my brainpan DKNFEKNDSKDJKDKD

#shouting speaks #asks #hunger au #compliments #theres also like. the factor that a lot of grian's self-hate stems from the games #he was always a bit unstable about his self-perception after he became a Watcher #but he wasnt as actively loathing himself until after the life games started #like he took GREAT pains to ''eat ethically'' and try to manufactor joy more than fear #which is why he starved. its harder to wrangle those emotions out of people than it is to shove them in a box; scare them; & eat the buffet #idk i have so many feelings about him as a character. oh hunger!grian my blorbo of blorbos. we're really in it now #txt

[minidog]

Hi i hate writing this is on ao3 too

they were kids once.

there were summers spent without a care in the world. hazy memories of when they were simply boys, dirtying their church clothes in spite of their mothers warnings from playing in the dirt. it kicked up in clouds in the air as they screamed and squealed with delight, bonding in the way only children can. no one knew one anothers names, or their parents, their favorite colors, their fears, their hopes, and somehow sparring with sticks fashioned into swords was enough to feel like theyd known each other for thousands of years.

it was a time before girls were talked about only in relation to the size of their breasts or the length of their dresses, before adults built walls with talk of sanctity and virginity. somehow, they all seemed to look happier when it wasnt dictated what constituted as a 'girl game' or a 'boy game'. theyd play pretend with the other children until the sun started to make its way down the sky and their parents called them home for dinner.

thea never liked how he played. it was a hot day, and even though the suns rays beat down relentlessly on them, she insisted they leave for the creek where the others were surely splashing about. "god forbid we become hermits, hanschen," shed said. she was the sort of young girl to have no qualms with using the lords name in vain, and the sort of young girl who enjoyed throwing words like 'hermits' to make her brother feel stupid. they were at the creek, and hanschen watched from underneath the branches of the old oak as his sister, dirt and sand caked on her chubby face, chased martha and otto into the water. she was pretending to be a great white shark, which neither of the kids wouldve known since she only referred to it by the latin name she found in an encyclopedia a week before, while the other town kids watched with mild interest before deciding to incorporate her odd shtick into their own fantasy worlds.

she spun around when martha and ottos feet hit the water, followed by heavy splashing as they sprinted through the shallows, sun-bleached blonde hair whipping across her shoulder. she stomped over to him, brown eyes the coldest glare a six year old could possibly muster. he looked up, unimpressed, crossing his arms across his chest. "what?"

"what?" she mimicked him. "do you intend to be so insipid?"

he decided against asking her what insipid meant and where on earth shed ever heard it before, instead looking up at the young girl with a thoroughly unimpressed stare. "only if it makes you mad," he told her. it was his duty as her twin.

suddenly, she hauled hanschen up to his feet with superhuman strength and pushed him so hard he stumbled into the creek. the cold water shocked his entire body as he fell backwards, soaking his clothes quickly. hed have screamed if his head didnt go under for a brief few seconds, instead coughing water hed inhaled on accident. all to the amusement of thea and the others, of course.

his arm stung from abrasions courtesy of the rocks under the water, and when he held it up for inspection, spots of bright red blood had already began to run down his forearm. even as a child, he was more annoyed than anything else.

he drew his eyes away from his scraped arm to give thea a pointed glare, but she was no where to be found, evidently disappeared once her game with martha and otto picked up again. instead he met the eyes of another boy, one hed seen around often. hed been writing something with a branch broken from a tree as hanschen could see from the dipping lines in the earth. usually he was spotted with another young boy, tugging him by the hand and always yapping a lot of variations of "moritz" and "stiefel" at the poor kid, but today hanschen noted he was alone.

his eyes sparkled green in the sunlight, narrowed as he looked at him. his coarse wavy hair was parted neatly on the left but otherwise seemed to stick up everywhere, sticking to his forehead and shaped by the wind. he wore sunday clothes, even though it was a thursday, either because he was stuck up or because he owned nothing else, hanschen couldnt tell.

hanschens arm dropped back into the water, his cuts stinging from the cold. he raised a brow. the boy on the shore waved back.

after that, they werent best friends. they didnt build forts out of sticks and mud or skip down the road hand in hand. in fact, they seemed to be at constant odds, even when their opinions were limited to the small world they knew as children. hanschen and melchior were electromagnetic. it took him a long time to realize it was attraction, not repellent, that had them clashing.

has them clashing. they continue to find their way to each other no matter how hard they try to stop it.

"youre thinking?" melchior asks.

"mm. reminiscing." he tries to avoid looking at the boy - man is a more accurate descriptor, its been a decade since he had been a kid writing words at the creek - but ultimately fails, distracted by the way the stray strands of hair shimmer in the moonlight, like silver thread.

he thinks the first time he realized he was different was in his earlier years of school. his childhood summers had ended and hed been introduced to the world of education, an unsavory thing that had him confined to a single room for hours on end, watching an adult wear chalk thin on a dusty blackboard. it was not only his first introduction to academics like math and science, but his first introduction to gym.

gym was hell in hanschens opinion. there was no studying to help him, and to be graded solely on his skill frustrated him to no end. hed spend hours out throwing around a ball, muscles screaming in agony, before being released to the locker rooms to shower in a room full of sweaty boys like himself.

the water was always hard and cold, striking his back like a whip. he thought all the other boys looked, too. he thought all the other boys dropped their eyes from faces to bodies, not to compare themselves mentally, but just to look. when he said something of that account, he quickly realized that assumption was wrong. then he told himself he was simply observant, because in order to survive he had to be sharper, didnt he?

he gathered information like this. for example, georg was the first to sprout dark, coarse hairs in a line from his navel. moritz looked at his feet and remained silent, and his awkwardness only grew when his body followed suit, and like the click of a light, hanschen started seeing the effects the regular physical activity had on his body; his stomach was no longer soft, his arms and legs no longer sticks awkwardly tacked on to his lanky body. his masculine v stirred something like envy in hanschens stomach. and ernst had the nicest cock; it was prettier than any of the other boys. he caught him staring once and hanschens face felt so hot he thought he might be burning from the inside out. he was just jealous was all. he wasnt the ideal and they were.

self-loathing and attraction always seemed to blend together for hanschen. he truly did feel insecure in his own skin surrounded by boys hed known since childhood whod suddenly become sculpted by the gods. he also definitely wanted them to pound him so hard he forgot his own name. so that made things confusing.

"when did you first realize you liked boys?" hanschen asks.

"i dont. i didnt," melchior says, shutting him up quickly. hanschens gaze darts away from the other boys face and he swallows hard. hes not a stupid boy, but somehow he allowed melchior gabor to weasel his way into his life.

he knew this is what would happen, and yet he still let melchior get to him. he still felt butterflies swarming in his stomach around him, especially whenever they were doing anything domestic. then he could pretend they were married or something, like they were a couple, a real couple, and it reduced him to an eager little boy again, curious and happy and excited, all the sorts of emotions that dulled through the years. hes allowed himself to be vulnerable in front of melchior gabor and he hates himself for it.

he feels melchiors soft hands on his face, forcing him to look at him again. his chest still rises and falls heavily, though now at regular intervals, and the post-orgasmic daze makes him look like an angel sent from heaven. he kisses him, hard, lips soft and firm against his own. hands move to the back of his head, grasping at his tousled hair, soon becoming tangled in the locks of blond. he wonders if melchior thinks about how their lips fit like pieces in a puzzle. wonders if he can taste the cum as his tongue passes over his parted lips, if he minds. wonders if he even thinks at all.

melchior pulls away first, running his hands through hanschens hair a few times before bringing his right hand and using his thumb to wipe cum from his chin, then the stray saliva on his bottom lip. "you missed a spot," he says instead of acknowledging the intimacy at all. its not surprising because its what he always does. hanschen rolls his eyes.

"ive been thinking," melchior says.

"youve been thinking..." hanschen repeats.

"about wendla. wendla bergmann. from when we were kids. from church."

"wendla bergmann. thea says she has the best hair. whatever that means."

"i think ill grow to fancy her," melchior continues, ignoring the anecdote entirely. "i think she could be something. wed definitely be something. perfect, really."

"im glad you decided on a wife while you were busy fucking me," hanschen snaps. the very real annoyance and hurt is lost on melchior, who simply laughs at him.

"shes kind. and pretty. and i think intelligent, too," he goes on.

"why are you telling me this, again?"

he gives him an odd look. "were friends, arent we? dont friends talk?"

"you have stiefel for talking, dont you?"

"do i only have to have one friend?"

"i cant imagine you could manage to score more than one." hes only half-joking.

"i like talking to you," melchior points out.

except, he doesnt. hanschen knows he doesnt, because it wouldnt hurt this much if he did. he was lonely, and melchior was there, melchior who was only horny and bored. who is still only horny and bored. hanschen swallows the poison in his mouth hard, bites his tongue because he knows he asked for it. he asked to be used. melchior is the first boy hanschen loved, and the first boy that destroys him, too. sometimes its how things are. it surely beats being alone.

"i know." hanschen kisses him again, only to make him stop talking, only to feel his skin on his before he disappears completely.

#andyfic #spring awakening #melchior gabor #hanschen rilow #helchior