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seraphiism · 4 months

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𓆩 ♡ 𓆪 ┊ 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐇 , 𝐒𝐄𝐄𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆

( AT THE END OF THIS STORY, I WALK INTO THE SEA & IT CHOOSES NOT TO DROWN ME. )

chara : scaramouche/wanderer fandom : genshin impact quote cr : jihyun yun a/n : contains scenes of drowning. reader is an angel. not meant to portray a romantic relationship.

ACT I :

A FUNERAL PROCESSION DOESN'T MEAN ANYTHING WHEN IT'S YOURS. THE LOWERING OF THE CASKET / THE DIRT AND DECAY THAT COVERS THE ROOT OF BEING. IT IS VOID IN EXISTENCE, & IN PLACE OF WHERE A HEART RESIDES, THERE IS AN ECHO OF WHAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN HUMAN AND WHAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN HAPPY.

there is supposed to be a grief that accompanies acknowledgement of loss and death, but in the open wounds of mortality, flesh torn asunder in the killing of a body, a puppet feels nothing.

he stares at the funeral, desolate. it is his, yet he does not mourn. the sight before him is somber, but it is filled with deception, he thinks, and so he reminds himself over and over that he is the one that lies in that casket, dead.

it's easy to forget it's your funeral when everyone there is someone you don't know or someone who pretended to care until it was too late. he cannot recognize half of these faces.

if he opened the casket, would he recognize himself?

"you have experienced both life and death, dearest kabukimono. which do you find to be more beautiful?"

his train of thought is disrupted, gaze shifting to the figure beside him. you have always remained at his side for reasons unknown, denied the existence of guardian angels, but he cannot find any other explanation for the everlasting presence of some supposed divinity watching over him. he could laugh, really. even if you were a guardian angel, you were far too cynical, far too perfect a companion for someone like him.

"i have no heart." the words are filled with spite and hatred and devoured by anger, but beneath it, there is a loneliness, and the ache of it all almost makes you feel something. "you can't experience both if you were made to be a vessel of nothing."

you smile, amused. you study the crowd, its mess of black umbrellas and murmurs and cries. you hear the sobs, but you are certain that there are no tears shed.

"are they mourning for you?"

he laughs, bitter.

"no. not with that pathetic acting."

"they must be very selfish, then." you hum, words spoken more to yourself than anything. "it must be tragic, knowing that your funeral is not full of love and grief. i wonder what would have been more painful for you," you glance at him, but he does not dare look at you, "the absence of the mournful or the false pretenses of sorrow from those who never cared."

you stand next to each other, watch as the crowd disperses, until all that's left is a tombstone with a name he will soon rid of.

"desolate wanderer," your voice is soft, somber, "i am sorry for you. would you like me to say a prayer?"

he does not answer.

ACT I , REVERSED :

the scene changes. the black umbrellas blur into nothing. a coldness washes over him, envelops him entirely in something known as terror. suddenly, it is still. the wretched air is quiet, profound. frightening.

he stands in a body of water, the tides calm, the shore distant. he recognizes this feeling. it is not one he can forget, even when he tries. three times he has known this sensation, the creeping dread, the breaking of something deep inside the void in his chest.

you stand before him, watch as the water drips from your fingertips. your gaze is absent, unreadable, but maybe he sees something so incredibly sorrowful in it. he watches your reflections, notes the feathers that were once part of you. how they float on the surface, lonely and listless, and in the muddled waters, the pure white twists into something black.

"do not be afraid." you tell him, and he watches the droplets trail down your skin, descend into the water from which they came, one by one, slowly.

he could laugh at the words. he wants to say it's human nature to be afraid, but he stops himself-- he is not human, after all, so why does he succumb to fear?

"i'm not."

brash words. liar, you think. but that's okay. you tilt your head ever so slightly, lips curved in a subtle smile.

"are you ready?"

he nods. the water is cold, cruel, invades his senses. there's a numbness that sinks into his skin, but maybe that's an absolution, the cleansing, the awakening. you close the little distance between your bodies, hands cupping his face, tender. there is something in your eyes-- pride, maybe, but he denies himself the possibility. who would be proud of a failed creation?

he closes his eyes. the water grows colder, but there's something warm in his chest, and he does not know whether it is fear or hope he feels the most.

"good night, kabukimono." you press a kiss to his forehead. "may you find something greater on the other side."

your hands slide down, delicate in the way they wrap around his throat, fragile, and in meaning of divinity and reincarnations and sacrifice for something better, you pull him into the waves, further and further and further down until his body loses all sensation, until he can no longer hear the violent sea, until his breath is gone and he is no more.

ACT II :

"balladeer. scaramouche. kunikuzushi. harbinger." you mumble the names to yourself, keep track of them by counting with your fingers. "have i missed any? shall i grant you another warm, endearing title?"

the balladeer scowls at you, though you find it amusing. perhaps in a previous life, you would have surely teased him, pushed it a little further. but in this life, there is a different kind of danger in his eyes, a deeper misery. you do not think you care enough to provoke him-- he could not hurt you, after all, even if he dared.

you contemplate the possibility. he could not hurt you-- not because he'd care too much about you to do so, but simply because you carry the blood of a higher being. he would most certainly try if he knew he could harm you, should you push him to the brink.

what a bitter feeling. you smile faintly at the realization and he does not like it.

"why are you here?"

"i am always here. you've just been given the impression that i'm a thorn in your side."

"are you not?"

"in your search for power and vengeance, have i failed you? was this my fault, the twists and turns in your path to greatness? i can only guide you so much, and all this time, i have watched you walk down the road to destruction." you pause, watch his expression darken with a kind of fury, some kind of hurt. "every name you are known as holds your past. you change it, try to cleanse yourself, but the truth is that you'll always carry it, unforgotten."

"so what did the sea do for me, angel? did you kill my spirit for the sake of your enjoyment?"

you tilt your head once more, smile so exhausted and worn.

"i did not kill your spirit, lonely wanderer. you already killed it long ago." your words hold a dreadful venom, bitterness on the tip of your tongue, rust lining your throat. "the sea could not save you, just as i could not."

he does not know how to respond. he hates that faint apathy you always manage to have, even when he knows it's only a facade at times. he hates that not even a higher power can help him -- but it's always been that way, hasn't it? just like everyone else, you've failed him too. that's what he'll tell himself because that's all he knows.

he turns on his heel, feels the razor edges of your brutality sink into his flesh. he walks, and he does not stop.

"we will try again." he states, command deep in his voice. "neither you or the sea are meant to save me."

you close your eyes, bow your head. somewhere in the silence, you say a prayer. you have never been a savior.

he is not meant for the saving.

ACT II , REVERSED :

the scene changes once more. it's the sea again, that familiar coldness that fails to abate. it's that strange fear again, that uncertainty. and then there's you, there's always you, he thinks. he stares at the reflections once more, distorted by the ripples of motion. your feathers look darker, the harbinger notes, and there are far more than before. he rests his hand in the water, watches as one floats into his palm. his grasp is gentle as he examines it, and there's a flicker of white, then black once more. he wonders if he imagined it.

"you didn't crush it." you comment.

"you thought i would?"

"i don't know." you reply. "you are not always made of carnage." and that familiar curve of the lips. "it wouldn't have hurt in the end, but thank you for your kindness."

his eye twitches, and you laugh. he doesn't know if you're being genuine, and he's going to dwell on this moment for a bit too long, he realizes.

the air becomes heavy once more. you wonder if he is certain in this decision. it is the second time, but the fear remains stagnant, unchanging.

"do not be afraid."

there is something you cannot quite decipher in his gaze-- determination? wrath? you are unsure. you don't bother to question it. you do it all over again, this familiarity-- the ripples in the water as you move closer, hands cupping his face once more. you press your forehead against his, close your eyes just as he does.

"good night, kunikuzushi. may you find something greater on the other side."

you open your eyes. your hands trail down, fingers wrapping around his throat in yet another means of reawakening. his hands rests over yours, eyes still shut, and you feel how they tremble ever so slightly.

the sea is cold, unwelcoming. the plunge is gentle, but the sensation still frightens him nonetheless. you are merciful even for an angel, comes the bittersweet thought, and maybe he isn't worth such benevolence. he's always wondered why you chose to stay by his side, anyway.

he feels the fight leave his body, feels the way your grip tightens to end this suffering just a little faster. your hands are warm, the balladeer thinks, and it is the last thing he remembers before it all goes void.

ACT III :

maybe you truly are not a guardian angel. you have not been at his side for a long while. he thought perhaps it was just that he had forgotten, that maybe you were nearby all along. but your absence has been all too noticed, and he does not like it.

it is... lonely, here. to be forgotten by all, to carry the weight of what was.

sumeru is vast. it is beautiful, bright, radiant. all the things he is not accustomed to. he stands on the highest of heights, watches the endless landscape below him. somewhere, he hears familiar footsteps : light, graceful.

"do you remember me?"

he stills. he's not sure if he wants to see your face, see that perplexed expression, see the way you tell him that you do not. no one else does.

you hum, deep in thought, and the sound is beautiful. how he misses it so. it sends an ache in the hollows of his chest, some kind of longing.

"won't you turn around? it's been a long while since i've seen that grumpy face."

you can practically hear him roll his eyes. it is a moment or two of gathering composure and courage before the vagabond finally turns, and of course, you have that same stupid smile on your face. this time, it is more genuine, and he's not sure how to quite process that.

"i remember you." you answer. "you're far too stubborn and annoying to forget."

he almost feels something beat wildly in his chest, but he does not understand the sensation. there is nothing there, no heart, yet some kind of heartache. you speak again.

"what do you call yourself now?"

he has taken many names, few of them significant. he has not granted one to himself-- no need, he thinks, though he knows that he would not rid of it if he had one. he thinks back to the sea, recalls your many conversations.

"wanderer."

you pause, and he notes that small flicker of recognition in your eyes.

"familiar and fitting." you muse. you close the distance just as you always have in the past, but this time, there is no water, no vicious wave to overtake him. "do you wish to see the sea?"

the words are heavy in meaning, but it is different this time. in your voice there is the quiet pondering of are you happy this time? have you found the right path? did you find it, that greatness? and he understands it.

he freezes. inhale, exhale. he stares at the sight before him, recalls when you once stood with him at his funeral. things have changed now. he is the same yet different, a harbor for sorrow and anger, but a home for something virtuous. his gaze shifts to you once more. this is not the outcome he intended, desired, nor expected. but there's forgiveness somewhere out there, and maybe he'll grant it to himself one day.

"no," he answers, and in his visage, there is just the faintest trace of kindness you once remembered from memories past, "i've had enough of you drowning me."

you laugh softly, see his lips curve just the smallest bit.

"i am glad, dearest wanderer."

#genshin impact #genshin impact x reader #favoniuslibrary #scaramouche x reader #wanderer x reader #this was so fun to write idc if it is abstract and doesn't make much sense ' o ' it's been awhile since i've enjoyed writing smth so much #.: writing

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happyk44 · 8 months

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The air was quiet for once. No monsters, no boulders hurtling their way. No vicious winds. Nothing. Smooth sailing.

Frank knew it wouldn't last but he drank it in as much as he could. The temperature this high was was low, not yet freezing, but like the fresh burst of cold signalling the end of fall and the onslaught of winter. Everyone had taken to wearing jackets when they were on deck, especially at night, when the sun wasn't there to give them some faint reprieve of warmth.

Well, everyone except Frank. And Jason.

Nobody bothered them about it. But sometimes, when they moved higher up, where the air waa too thin and freezing, they would side-eye him. Hazel's look was always curious behind her scarf. The others though... they looked confused, concerned. Staring like something was wrong with him.

He tried to shrug it off the way Jason did. But Jason didn't get that look as much as Frank did. Jason was a child for the sky. Of course, thin breathless air wouldn't bother him as much. Of course, freezing winds did nothing to him. He could probably survive at the edge of the atmosphere, where sky and space meet. Floating there like an untethered astronaut, yet happy nonetheless. Perfectly fine.

It didn't work on Frank the same way. Mars was orderly bloodlust and head-on battles. Sturdy feet pounding sturdier ground.

What wars were fought in the air back in the ancient days? Even now, fighter pilots wore oxygen masks to beat the thinness, had shielding to keep them safe from the enemy and the cold. Nico even wore an old leather jacket - the same one they wore in their jets back in the day. Because who wanted to emergency eject into the frozen clouds without one?

Frank was still made of war. But he also had the lungs of a bird, and the heated blood of grizzly. He didn't freeze. And he breathed easy.

It was a bittersweet thing. He hadn't even considered it until Hazel came out on deck one night with a jacket for him to wear and he had realized he wasn't cold. When her voice had gone heavy with the effort to speak and he realized he wasn't struggling with the altitude the way he was supposed to.

His abilities just kicked in naturally. The same way they did when he went to sleep and woke up curled into a wolfish ball.

Some days he dreamed about walking with Hazel in a meadow of flowers and horses and he'd look up at her, paws muddy, drool escaping down his teeth and she'd teasingly chastise him for wanting to chase the horses around. Some days he dreamed about blood dripping from his maw and down his claws. And he'd wake up, animal in form, and worry about why he was losing his humanity in his dreams.

Because you're losing it in reality, he thought.

He tightens his fists and hopes for a fight to come soon. He couldn't be here alone in silence with his thoughts, with the knowledge that he was becoming something other. He wasn't unfamiliar with being othered by the world - Chinese to the white kids in school, Canadian to the Americans at Camp Jupiter. Fatherless. Raised by his grandmother. Fat, awkward, shy. He didn't have ADHD or dyslexia - not like every other demigod. He was othered a lot through pure existence.

That didn't mean he wanted to add inhuman to the list.

"Don't let it get to you."

Frank startled.

Jason sat on the railing, staring up at the stars. His legs swung off into the dark. He was wearing a black tank top, and cargo shorts, without socks or shoes. He relaxed, soaking in the frozen air. It puffed white with every exhale.

"What are you talking about?" Frank asked with an instinctual cock of his head. Like a dog. He righted his head up and straight, gritting his teeth. His nails cut into his palm.

Jason snorted and swung around. There was a strange delicacy in Jason when he was in the air. Leo called him Superman, but that wasn't it. Yeah, he was bulky like the hero, and flew like the hero. But any delicacy in Superman came from Clark Kent. Not from his powers.

Jason was like a dancer. Weightless, and gentle. Even harsh and forceful movements looked graceful on him. It was when he was on the ground he became a pounding unnatural force. Like a tank.

In the air, he was a ballerina, swift and full of motion, captivating. On the ground, he was a war machine, destructive and explosive.

It made sense in a way. Lightning cut the air with nothing more than a burning sizzle. But it exploded the earth when it hits. Shattered trees and destroyed houses. A storm was nothing when it bustled around in the empty air. Speeding wind and flooding rains. They meant nothing to the sky. But when it hit the ocean, hit the earth - everything broke.

Jason hopped off the railing. He landed without sound. "I see you, Frank. Sometimes you look at yourself in the mirror or the glass of a window, and you look confused. Like you don't know what you're looking at."

He approached, slow. Like a human nearing a stray cat. Frank felt almost feral. It was under his skin, prickling. Raw. He didn't like that Jason could see him.

But he didn't like that he thought human and not person. That he was comparing himself to the feral cats he used to help capture with the SPCA for the volunteer hours.

That Jason was right.

It scared him. He couldn't see his face. He knew it was his. Nothing had changed. But when he looked in the mirror, he felt like he was looking at a stranger.

He knew what it is. Once, when his mother came home from deployment, he caught her staring empty at her reflection. When she spotted him, she'd asked him, offhand but knowing, what he saw when he looked at her.

My mom, he said.

She'd grinned, just a bit too small. So I still look like myself then?

Of course, he'd said with a frown. Why wouldn't you?

She explained it to him later, gently, over cookies and tea. Depersonalization. A subsect of dissociation. She had explained it away, like it was just the result of seeing herself covered in mud so much she couldn't remember what she looked like clean. Acting like it wasn't the result of trauma, depression, PTSD.

It doesn't hurt, she'd assured him. And I know it's still me. I just can't tell.

You should go to a doctor, Frank has said, tucked under her arm even though he was too big for that anymore.

She had laughed and kissed the top of his head. I will, she promised. When I'm finished with this one.

And then she left, again, and then she died.

It wasn't until now that he wondered if it was really the trauma of war that made her unable to see herself in the mirror. Or if it was a combination of that and her own shapeshifting ability. Did she turn a lot? To save her fellow soldiers? To protect herself?

He knew she did it in her final moments. That she was brave. But did she do it a lot before then? Did she lose herself the way he was?

He didn't look in the mirror and wonder why his eyes were brown or his teeth were flat. Didn't look at his hands and wonder why his nails weren't claws or why his skin was so hairless. Didn't think he needed to be on all fours, or find speech difficult. But he did feel that otherness in his reflection. A sense of that isn't me when he stared back at himself.

He knew it was. That his brain was lying to him.

But he still couldn't see himself.

Sometimes his skin felt wrong. The world seemed a little warped. Like he was looking at it from the wrong angle. But no matter how much he moved around, it wouldn't go back to normal.

He felt satiated by Hazel's presence. The sensation of "everything is wrong" fell mostly to the background with her.

But he couldn't cling to her like a koala with separation anxiety. That wasn't fair to her. She wasn't required to fix his problems. And she was already holding onto his lifeline, keeping it safe, just for him.

He couldn't ask more of her. To help him reangle a world that had never changed.

Jason crossed his arms. His smile looked like Frank's mom's that night - just a bit too small. Then he glanced away. "I can't see myself either."

Breath caught in Frank's throat.

"I don't think it's a fixable thing for me," Jason went on. "And it might not be for you either. I was raised by wolves. I don't..." He laughed quietly and ducked his head. "I don't think of myself as human. Not consciously anyway. My mother was a wolf, my siblings were wolves. I feel more like a puppy plucked out of the bin and handed off than a human person."

Frank exhaled shakily. "So what do you do about it?"

Jason was quiet. His eyes were focused on the ground, brows furrowed. Then, "Nothing." He looked up to Frank. Blue eyes bore back at him. "There's nothing I can do. I am a wild child." He shrugged. "You can't scrub it out of me."

"So... I'm just gonna be stuck like this?" His nails bore deeper into his skin. Conscious effort rang out to keep them from becoming claws. "Feeling like the world is wrong because my brain can't decide if I'm a human or an animal?"

"I don't know what I am either," Jason said. "Even with the wolves, I knew I wasn't one of them. Not really. I didn't have fur. I didn't have claws or full rows of fangs. I knew how to be a wolf, but no one is ever going to look and think I'm one." His arms dropped to sides. He drew in closer. "But I just don't let it get to me."

He leaned against one of the mast poles and tilted his head up to the stars.

"That's kind of the nice thing about being part-animal." He grinned ruefully. "Well, animal animal, anyway."

"What do you mean?"

Jason looked back at Frank, for just a second before his eyes scanted away. He'd never noticed it before. He didn't get to Camp Jupiter until after Jason disappeared and they hadn't hung out enough once he camp back until just now. But Jason never really met someone's eyes. Only in battle, when the goal was dominance.

He looked all over, but eyes were a fraction of a second. Never landing purposely.

"Animals don't really care what you are. Wolves will adopt a human child and raise him. Ducks adopt chicks. Cats will take in kittens from another litter." He closed his eyes. "Because it doesn't matter in the end. We live, we hunt, we eat, we die. Who cares if your child is hairless and stands on two legs? Do they follow you? Do they represent what it means to be a wolf? To be a duck, or a cat, or a monkey? Do they accept your nature as much as their own?" He gestured upwards to the sky. "Do they understand nature as it is?"

Frank tilted his head back to stare up at the stars. They glistened and glittered in the black. It was a cloudless night. Everything was so clear. He felt almost as though he could reach out and touch one.

"People say there's no evolutionary benefit to animal adoption. Adopting a newborn, especially when you haven't lost any of your own, expends more energy." Jason sank down to a sit. His eyes were still closed. "Adopting a newborn outside your species doesn't carry on your genes. Doesn't keep your species running."

Frank thought of his bird lungs and grizzly blood. Sitting down next to Jason, he said, "It's symbiotic."

"Sometimes," Jason agreed. "Sometimes it's beneficial on both ends. Sometimes mothers are just nurturing. And sometimes it's just help." He spread his legs. "I brought the elder wolves their food when they could no longer hunt. My sister nursed our nieces because her mother died. Lupa brought me and they cared because I needed it. Can you help? Would it hurt you or the pack to help? Sometimes those are the only questions that matter."

He gestured loosely. "Animals aren't perfect. Brood parasitism for one thing. Fish and insects and rabbits eat their young. Some animals attack others for fun. But humans aren't perfect either, so what does it matter why animals adopt?"

A gentle breeze slid through their hair. Jason looked utterly at ease. Frank felt... Not serene. No. But. Calmer, almost. It sank inside him like a heavy fog. Foreign and strange, but ultimately fine. The fog wasn't too dense. Visibility was decent. Right now, it was okay.

He looked down to his hairless clawless hands. "No one ever asks why humans adopt."

Jason grinned, flashed all his teeth. "No. They don't." He looked away. "No one ever says so, but when I came to camp..." He shook his head. "People think the wolves took care of me because of Juno and my father. But they took care of me because I was their pup. If I wasn't, I would've been trained like everyone else. Not immersed in what it means to be a wolf." He gave a soft smile. "I used to call Lupa 'Mom'. She made me stop a couple months before I had to leave, but.."

His smile dipped and he looked up to the stars. His bright blue eyes seemed to glow.

"The wolves were my family. I didn't know anything else."

Frank pressed a hand to his chest. "I'm not like you. You're... mixed." He snorted. "Human-passing, but raised in an all wolf household. That's your... culture. Your world. Even if people don't believe it when you say so. But I'm..."

"The opposite." He nodded. Jason nudged him with his shoulder. "That doesn't mean you can't learn. Wolf. Bird. Bear. You can find what it means to be them."

The wind whistled. Far below the deck, he could hear the faint sounds of snoring. He rubbed at his ear, wishing away whatever animal hearing chose to ignite itself. "What if I forget how to be human?"

Jason sighed. "Frank. The only way you could stay fully human is to give up being an animal. You'd have to stop shapeshifting."

Stop being himself.

Frank never considered himself a mixed child. He didn't even know what his father looked like until recently. And that was ambiguous at best. Gods could look however they chose. Who was to say he didn't look Chinese when he met his mom?

But the parallels remained. He knew other kids who were mixed. Kids who were out of touch with their Chinese side. Kids who were jealous he could speak Cantonese, even if limited, because their family wouldn't teach them. Or their Chinese parent didn't know it at all.

His grandmother was strict about maintaining their culture even so far away from where they came from. But he knew other immigrants weren't the same way. That they did away with it all to assimilate. Not just Chinese families, but all kinds of ethnicities and cultures. Even some white families. Dropping away their heritage so they could mask in with the Canadians. So they could pick up the new customs and social order faster. So their kids wouldn't get bullied. So life could be easier.

And now, in the modern hustle and bustle of cultural appreciation, there were people who knew nothing about the place their families came from. They could walk into those countries and blend in physically, but never verbally, never emotionally, never culturally.

Did Frank want that for himself? To match with the other birds on the branch but never have a clue about how to act other than to fly and tweet? To blend in with the wolves, but know that Jason, with his furless skin and flat teeth, was more wolf than him?

Did it matter? He wasn't really part-animal. Not like Jason. Shapeshifting was a power. But it wasn't separate from him. When he held too long in a form, he could feel himself start to sink in. He was still Frank, but more Frank the bear, angered that someone threatened his cub, than Frank the human, angered that someone threatened Hazel.

And shapeshifting...

It was culture, wasn't it? His mom used it. His grandmother used it. All the great, great, greats used it if they had it. It was part of his family. Like a tradition passed down.

So if he stopped, wouldn't he be abandoning part of his culture?

Animals believed in survival - for their species or one they plucked from the whorls of loneliness. They nurtured the young, cared for the old, visited graves. Died and let their descendants consume the grass they grew. They fought to protect, to live.

His grizzly blood quickened in veins. Hotter. Warmer, against the cold. Shapeshifting was Frank's survival, as bitter lightning was Jason's, as deadly gold was Hazel's, and a sudden hurricane was Percy's.

He couldn't throw it away.

"I'm never going to recognize myself in the mirror, am I?"

Jason sighed. It was a quiet sad thing and it made Frank's bird lungs stutter.

"No," Jason said. "You won't. You won't feel wholly human either. Or wholly like an animal. Whichever one you choose. Bear, bird, wolf. Or everything, all of them." He turned and caught Frank's eyes. "But you'll know who you are." He looked away. "I've found that's the thing that really matters."

They weren't mixed kids. Finding solace in both worlds - human and animal - was never going to put the world right again. And Frank doubted that every child of an immigrant and every mixed kid who discovered and immersed themselves in forgotten traditions and customs would suddenly feel 100% in place either.

But they would know who they were. Who all the people who came before them were. How life was lived before migration.

Maybe he wasn't part animal, the way Jason was, or the way other feral children were, raised by wolves and monkeys and bears. Any animal that came across a miserable child and decided to help.

But grizzly bear warmth coursed through his skin and kept him hot despite the cold. Bird lungs kept him breathing easy in the thin air. Wolf teeth protected his friends. Ram horns shoved back monsters. Goldfish gills and scales kept him alive in the water. Dragonfly wings let him buzz quickly through the air.

His mother fed stray cats and dogs. She encouraged Frank to be kind to animals that passed by. His grandmother put out bird feed and spoke loudly to them when they came to eat. Cats brought birds to their owners. Crows came back with shiny things for people who helped them.

No, he wasn't part-animal. But animals kept him alive. Who was he to not show respect to the ones that helped him? Even if it made him unrecognizable to himself.

Was that why his grandmother was so strict about their culture? Did she lose her humanity too? Unable to see herself in the mirror and deciding she wasn't going to lose her ancestry along with it?

"Nice teeth," Jason murmured.

Frank ran his tongue along sharp fangs. Even his tongue felt different - wider, longer. His mouth hadn't changed, not externally anyway. But he could feel his tongue start farther in his throat to accommodate the new length. His uvula wasn't where it should've been. Of course it wasn't. It was probably further down, somewhere in throat. Or just gone. If it stayed where it was in a normal human, the thickness of his tongue and its new starting place would've immediately gagged him.

"It just happens sometimes," Frank said, focusing mentally on flat teeth, a human tongue, his uvula at the top of his mouth. "I don't know why."

"Let it." Jason stretched his arms up over his head. "Animals don't deny their instincts, why should you? We have them for a reason."

Frank considered that. Thought of his grandmother, sick, frail, and a bird flying out of the house before it came crumbling down. Thought of her speaking loudly to the birds that came to eat. How similar the two looked.

He let his wolven fangs rest where they formed, but kept his human tongue. The other felt too strange to have in a human head.

Jason reached out and traced his nail over one. Then pulled back and turned back to the stars. "I can teach you what it means to be a wolf, if you want," he said.

Frank traced his fangs once more. Then smiled. "I'd like that."

#this was supposed to be about depersonalization and i accidentally turned it into a mixed kid metaphor 😑#am i mad about it? no. but am i kinda annoyed it deviated from the intended plan? yeah #frank zhang #wolf!jason #jason grace #my writing #my fanfic #happy talks pjo #anyway idc if this doesn't make sense i havent eaten all day so im gonna go do that now okay bye 👍

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