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melohax · 3 years

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I’ve seen some people who finished Omori talking about how they don’t understand the game’s plot, what happens in the good ending or why the protagonist even decided to change his ways. So then, here’s my thoughts on Omori’s story.

Warning: SPOILERS AHOY. Only read this if you’ve already finished the game and seen the good or true ending. Or if you don’t plan on playing the game at all but still want to know the whole story.

I’ve seen some people around the internet talk about how Sunny’s character isn’t clear to them or how they feel Sunny doesn’t deserve a good ending. Here’s some thoughts I have on why I think Sunny’s growth was well depicted.

There’s two main routes you can go through in the game: the “Reality” route and the “Hikikomori” route.

In the “Hikikomori” route, Sunny stays in Headspace forever and we get to learn many additional details about him. Sunny’s parents are implied to have known what Sunny did to Mari all along. It’s also implied that Sunny’s mother covered the whole thing up and chose to present it as a suicide as well cus, in her own words, she can’t bear the thought of losing both of her kids.

Sunny’s mother insinuates her son isn’t a “good boy” even though she begs him to be good but she still sees him as her little boy (as seen by the overly-sweet and positive messages she leaves around the house and her voice mails) and needs him alive so she can survive her own grief. Sunny’s father is shown cutting down the hanging tree and telling Sunny he isn’t his son, presumably disowning Sunny. The father keeps being absent forever afterwards.

Fast forward to the present and the “Reality” route, Sunny’s moving in 3 days. He knows his time is up in the real world and the biggest catalyst for his personal growth is that he’s finally seeing his old friends in the REAL world after 4 years of only seeing their loving, idealized child version in dreams. For the first time, he gets to witness the collateral consequences of what he did to Mari in his now teenaged friends: Aubrey spirals into delinquency after feeling like she was thrown aside by everyone she loved. Hero is guilt ridden, can’t even go near Mari’s grave and gives up on his dreams of being a chef. Kel wants to make things better but feels powerless, useless and like a screwup. Basil lives in a miserable state of almost constant fear and psychosis.

Sunny finally gets to see the huge toll his lie took on his friends’ entire lives as they keep blaming themselves for not knowing about Mari’s supposed suicidal ideations. He’s finally forced to face reality and he still tries to hide in dreamworld but he can’t. The inhabitants of Headspace are all people or fictional characters he knows or likes in real life (that he changed in his dreams, like how Kim’s brother is a sweet gentle giant and Sweetheart looks just like the candy shop owner at the supermarket) and their quests end up leading him to events where he’s reminded over and over again his dreams will end soon (the end of the underwater highway, the tree near the whale, the shadows of Mari and Basil) and that he needs to delve into Blackspace.

This shows how his own subconscious mind knows well what needs to be done; he’s putting the mental and emotional effort of making himself face what he’s done, shown through the contrast between the whimsical nature of Headspace and the dark surrealism of Blackspace.

As this happens in Sunny’s psyche, in the real world he can try to “atone” a bit by doing good things for his little community like completing requests people around him have. He still has a lot of trouble being near Basil in the real world but considering his entire subconscious mainly revolves around finding and rescuing Basil, he wants and needs to face Basil sincerely before he runs out of time.

We’re shown through memories that Sunny’s personality was always quiet, wary, a bit distant and very bad at dealing with pressure. Some people even describe him as cowardly or mediocre but he was just a small kid who’s entire world ended when he was 12. Since then, he never left his house, spending most of his days asleep rather than awake. It’s no wonder his personality isn’t as developed as his friends. His friends, although they were also in immense pain, at least still continued to live beyond Mari’s death. Sunny didn’t. He only lived through sleep.

Subconsciously, it’s shown Sunny both loves and hates Basil. This is seen in Blackspace with the dialogue he has with the “strangers” walking in the void. They talk about how Sunny (as Omori) does horrible things to Basil in the darkness of Blackspace because he struggles with facing the truth of his own actions. It’s also revealed through datamine of Blackspace’s metaphorical photo album that Basil, in his attempts to save Sunny from the judgement of others and to get him to come out of catatonia, was the one who come up with the plan to hang Mari.

Sunny describes Mari as looking as if calmly asleep when he drags her up the stairs. Her eyes remained peacefully closed until Sunny and Basil hung her. Then, Sunny turned back to look at Mari’s corpse, her previously closed eyes were wide open. She might have even been still alive, might have opened her eyes during or after the noose was tied to her neck. Or the belief he saw her eyes open could have been a manifestation of Sunny’s guilt, instead.

Either way, the horrifying possibilities surrounding Mari’s death lead to Sunny handling his emotional pain by subconsciously taking it out on Basil. It’s why Basil in Blackspace is shown constantly suffering and dying in many different ways. It’s the only way Sunny has been able to deal with himself; by forcing Basil into the darkest corners of his mind, his perfect colorful dreamworld can’t be ruined by the ugly reality Basil’s mere presence represents. It’s less painful to try to forget Basil and to forever blame him for both of their sins.

Still, even with all these conflicted feelings, Sunny’s tried to come to terms with love he still feels for Basil many times before. The shadows point out how this isn’t the first time he’s tried to save the Flower Boy; how all the previous times before ended in Sunny failing to find redemption and so his mind turns back to torturing the Basil of his dreams instead.

However, one of the Blackspace shadows also mentions a very important detail that changes almost everything this time around: his time is almost up in the real world. Whether this means he’ll commit suicide or move away, it’s almost time for him to leave the friends he’s always loved so much behind.

Sunny is forced to do a lot of internal work and self-reflection in what little time he has left. It’s shown through his dream actions, the surreal imagery surrounding him and the characters with all the sub plots his subconscious makes up.

In the route to the good ending, he traverses Blackspace and manages to listen to every harsh truth Basil’s shadow has to tell him. His attempts to save Basil mean he’s fighting his own mind, forcing himself to accept the truth.

To achieve redemption for his greatest mistake, Sunny needs to start with accepting Basil entirely; he has to stop making Basil take the brunt of their combined regrets. It means being willing to finally face the REAL Basil instead of permanently burying him in the most painful place within Sunny’s mind.

So basically, it’s obvious to me that Sunny is forced out of his “comfortable” hikikomori misery the moment he opens the door to meet the REAL Kel.

Sunny and Basil have a confrontation in the real world. When Sunny entera Basil’s room, we see poor Basil suicidal and at his limit. He’s clearly in the throes of a psychotic episode and at the mercy of hallucinations and delusions he can’t escape from (“There’s no way out of this is there, Sunny?”). Basil attacks you in an attempt to save you by killing the “thing behind you” but as we know, there isn’t actually something behind you.

There was never any monster to take the blame for Basil’s regrets, nor yours. It’s always been just you.

Meanwhile, Sunny is trying his best not to completely lose his shit so he can save Basil and stop him from potentially killing the both of them. Sunny likely loses an eye in the fight, shown by the blood coming from your socket and the bandage over it in the hospital.

Incidentally, the eye you lose is on the same side as the eye that can be seen peeking through the hair of Mari’s face as she’s hanging from the tree.

In the good ending, the song at the end talks about how even after confessing the truth, Sunny is alone once again, so it’s not actually clear if Aubrey, Kel and Hero actually forgave him. I feel like this is deliberately left up to interpretation by the writers. The lyrics then continue on to say Sunny still finds it hard to wake up, still finds himself plagued some days with lingering regret, but that he still tries to take it all one step at a time to carry on living.

With the song’s lyrics in mind, the end scene that shows Basil and Sunny smiling at each other while Mari’s shadow leaves them doesn’t mean they’re completely fine all of a sudden. Whether their friends forgave them or not, they at least finally have the relief of honesty. The burden of their unbearable shared secret is now off their shoulders. It’s finally out in the open, which means they both can now start healing and working to find the redemption Sunny was looking for in Blackspace. It also means they can go back to loving each other again without the crushing pain they both felt in each other’s presence.

I agree that Aubrey and the gang get pretty left out in the good ending, though. I wish there was more of them and their reactions to the truth BUT I think it’s sadly a deliberate choice by the writers to leave their reaction up to the player’s interpretation. This can feel extremely unfulfilling to many people (me included, I hate when authors do that tbh) but also to many others that’s a good thing cus they get to apply their own personal meaning and feelings.

I personally feel like the friends forgiving Sunny and Basil right off the bat would be incredibly unrealistic. I think they would need a lot of time (especially Aubrey) for them to forgive the lie that wrecked their lives for years. Forgiveness isn’t impossible but it would probably come in the form of a slow, difficult, heartbreaking process. Bittersweet.

Redemption isn’t just about forgiveness, anyway.

Even if a person is never forgiven by the people they’ve hurt, they can still find redemption for their actions through doing good for the people around them and the world at large. An example of this is shown through what Sunny can do on his last days in his neighborhood. The gratitude and additional flowers he receives in the hospital from each person he’s helped are proof he can still do good for others even after something as horrible and unforgivable as accidental murder. In a way, it’s proof that his life is still worth living.

But ultimately that’s just my own interpretation of the ending and I understand other people would interpret it all differently. Some see forgiveness as a given in the story while there’s also others who think Sunny doesn’t deserve forgiveness or those who think Sunny is a sociopath/psychopath or that Basil is the true villain of the game. I think this is why the ending was left so open, to favor all the different interpretations people have of it.

ETA: Here’s a different take on Sunny’s parents. This post argues that, despite the initial implications, they actually didn’t know about the attempted coverup. It’s a really good writeup explaining the whys and hows and has me reconsidering that part of the story!

https://www.reddit.com/r/OMORI/comments/kr9nvx/major_spoilers_regarding_sunny_his_parents_and/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf

#omori #omori game #omori sunny #omori basil #omori spoilers #spoilers #i said id wait before doing a post like this lol #but here i am #omori meta

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ladyfawkes · 3 years

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FINALLY!!! AN UPDATE!!! Lol. Nice long one, too. Post-Cassandra's Revenge AU. Grievous injuries occur to more than one character during Cassandra's fight for magical dominance. These afflictions won’t become manifest until after they’ve left the Tower, however.

In the aftermath from Cassandra's Revenge at Black Rock Tower, Eugene is trying to use his rare alone time to process all that had happened. Thankfully, he has Lance to keep him grounded with his own irksome ways.

One enormous weight had been lifted and Eugene's psyche was flying because he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that Rapunzel reciprocated all of his feelings for her. He also witnessed exactly to what lengths Rapunzel would move heaven and earth to fight for him.

Amongst his euphoria for Rapunzel, however, he must also figure out how to forgive Cassandra for all that she’s done.

Chapter 3 Summary:

Although Eugene had originally explained that he wasn't otherwise affected by his experiences from yesterday at Black Rock Tower, today was proving out much differently.

Eugene had tried valiantly to keep things from Rapunzel in order to save her more grief. Yet he had to quickly make the determination to tell her everything instead, due in large part to Lance’s prodding. Nobody had known it at the time, but Eugene’s affliction symptoms would soon send him spiraling too quickly. Unfortunately for Eugene, he would be caught up within the throes of the fight's aftermath before he could ever tell Rapunzel anything else. Or even confess privately to Lance. He was no longer capable of giving an explanation about anything to anyone.

What, exactly, had happened to him and who was to blame?

CHAPTER THREE MEA CULPA, TUA CULPA, NOSTRA CULPA

Approximately 40 minutes later, Lance, Rapunzel, Varian, and Eugene had sat down for tea. And although Eugene had originally told Rapunzel that the new scars didn’t hurt, the skin around them had definitely become more sensitized overnight. It’s why earlier he had practically jumped out of his skin even at Rapunzel’s lightest of touches. But he didn’t want Rapunzel to worry needlessly and he wasn’t entirely sure if the sensation was real or if he was just in a state of hyper-awareness and imagining things that weren’t there. However, since their confrontation in Eugene’s room, the presumed-healed wounds were even stinging and smarting somewhat, quite unlike before. Again, Eugene wrestled internally with the idea of telling her about what was happening or not. He finally decided that after tea, he should take Rapunzel aside and tell her about this latest development.

During the past several minutes, Eugene had barely touched even a morsel of his hors d'oeuvres, much less anything more substantial. That was not at all characteristic of his notoriously healthy appetite. At the present, he preferred instead to sip absently from the same cup of tea. Before long everyone at the table kept giving him surreptitious double-takes. Certain he must’ve been imagining it, Eugene turned away from the group and laid down his head, pillowing it against his elbow on the table…..and he was still barely touching that teacup.

Moderately taken aback by Eugene’s abrupt change in mood, the rest of them simply let him alone for the time being. Although still a sensitive person, Eugene wasn’t usually quite so moody anymore. In fact, Lance quite liked to tease Eugene about how his once formerly nihilistic professional thief friend had instead become a rather insufferable eternal optimist. The rest of the group wordlessly seemed to agree that whatever was happening would perhaps blow over soon and Eugene would be back to his normal self in no time.

Little did his friends know that at this very moment, Eugene had been additionally and shockingly swept up in the personal hell of biting back against rather sudden and excruciating pain emanating from his core. Red hot burning sensations now simultaneously emanated from and rippled outward from the new impalement scars; they had quickly forged a web of blazing pain over the entire surface of his skin. So rapidly tuned out was he that Eugene became practically oblivious to the world around him. As each corresponding wave of burning sensations caused him more pain, he subsequently had to fight mounting nausea, overheating, and dizziness. What was being fought from within him was now manifesting outwardly upon Eugene’s face, deepening his complexion to an alarming shade of crimson. Something Eugene’s friends hadn’t yet witnessed was him taking on the shocking appearance of one who had been stricken with extreme sunburn -- over the entire surface of his body. After all, Eugene had turned his back and covered his head with his jacket.

Some mysterious internal source of heat had arisen within Eugene, almost as if his body were trying to fight off something particularly nasty and virulent. And although earlier he’d promised to tell Lance and Rapunzel the story behind why he thought he’d received his newest scars, Eugene was currently in no shape to tell them anything, especially now, as he’d fallen silent with the rapid spiking of his internal temperature.

The young man had become so light-headed, overheated, and overburdened with pain that he could hardly think, much less speak intelligibly. Oh lord, it’s so hot, was one of Eugene’s only lucid thoughts.

At this point in time, he was finding it impossible to merely sit at the table without needing to fall sideways off the chair or slump bodily over the table. He was additionally getting so annoyed with all the racket surrounding him...the bits that penetrated his thickened consciousness and brain fog, anyway….why couldn’t the people around the table just stop yelling, already?? Eugene wished they all would just shut the hell up, and stop clanking their silverware on the dishes so loudly. That way, his ears would stop ringing and he’d have a better chance of getting his head to stop pounding a little. Although his back was toward his companions, they noted his non-verbal mounting signs of distress nonetheless. Rapunzel had stood up out of her seat and walked around the table to check on him. She lightly touched his shoulder from behind.

Without any outward indication he’d noticed her, Eugene greatly startled Rapunzel and everyone at the table as he clapped his hands over the ringing in his ears and shot up unsteadily out of his seat. He attempted an announcement to the entire table his intention to leave and take refuge in his bedroom until he felt better. Yet before he could complete any of the words coming out of his mouth, Eugene’s eyes rolled back in his head and he suddenly collapsed like a sack of potatoes. Everyone in the dining hall simultaneously expressed alarm and dismay upon seeing Eugene’s current condition.

‘--Gene!’” was the only panic-stricken syllable that Rapunzel managed to utter in that moment. Before the princess could even fully comprehend what was happening, Eugene’s chin slammed into the edge of the hard wooden table in front of him. The princess sprang into action and managed to catch Eugene before he could cause himself any further injury. Everyone at the table began chattering worriedly at once, wondering how it was that Eugene could go from looking perfectly healthy just minutes ago to outright fainting and turning red as a sunburn victim.

“Lance!” called Rapunzel. Lance made it to Eugene instantly, saying, “On it, dear Princess,” as he took up his friend Eugene’s side opposite Rapunzel and the pair laid the distressed young man on the cool marble floor of the dining hall. Varian had dutifully sprinted from the large hall, having volunteered to go summon the palace surgeon. They needed to see what, if anything, could be done for Eugene. And hopefully even get some insight as to his current condition.

Right now, blood was gushing from a superficial wound in Eugene’s chin where his skin had split open upon making contact with the unyielding table. Rapunzel had ordered one of the kitchen servants to bring her a bowl of cold water and several clean serviettes. This, of course, was done immediately. The princess took one serviette, folded over a corner, dipped it in the clean water, and pressed it against Eugene’s chin wound. It was only then he began to stir a little. He had turned his head enough to dislodge the cloth, which in turn caused Rapunzel to shift and firmly press the cloth back upon the wound.

“That huuuurts,” Eugene whimpered semi-consciously, feebly attempting to push away Rapunzel’s ministering hands with one of his own.

“I’m sure it does,” soothed Rapunzel, running her hand across his fevered brow. She looked up at Lance with deep concern, “He is positively burning up. Could you soak another cloth for me and press it against his forehead, please?”

“Sure thing, Princess,” answered Lance, and did what Rapunzel requested.

That much cold moisture coming into contact with Eugene’s reddened overheated face, however, nearly succeeded in fully rousing the unconscious young man. Their charge soon settled down, however, as Lance restrained one of Eugene’s flailing arms and Rapunzel restrained the other.

“Lance,” Rapunzel queried worriedly, “do you have any idea about what might be causing this curious overheating within him? And do you know anything about those new scars that he hasn’t yet told me?”

“The only thing I know for certain, Princess, is that he received these marks yesterday during the time, ah….Cassandra…..was squeezing him with rocks? -- whatever that meant.” Rapunzel’s eyes grew larger than saucers and Lance couldn’t hold her gaze. “But he did say he….” even Lance was having difficulty finishing the explanation in the same place where Eugene had, though Lance had originally been the one goading his friend into telling the Princess, “....he did say he had literally felt himself get run through in four places whilst being held onto by those rocks.” Rapunzel’s complexion noticeably paled, even in the bright afternoon sunlight of the dining hall.

“No…..please….no…..” she whispered, wilting before Lance’s eyes in spite of her obvious desire to remain strong for Eugene.

“But -- but he also was positively adamant and was almost certain that Cassandra wasn’t the one responsible,” Lance fibbed, not wanting to see Rapunzel’s confidence falter. “And that’s all I know,” he said in a rush, before he could descend any deeper. This little white lie of Eugene being sure it wasn’t Cass felt practically necessary right now.

“Really?” asked Rapunzel hopefully. Suddenly Lance understood why Eugene would do anything to keep Rapunzel from being disappointed or feeling betrayed, especially when it comes to Cassandra. “I wonder why Eugene wanted to keep this from me, though….” she mused to herself.

“The only reason he didn’t tell you is because Eugene knew how worried you would become if you had even one inkling that Cass had actively tried to kill him. His sincerest wish was to keep you from experiencing even more distress.”

Rapunzel looked down at her intended and ran her free hand lovingly through his hair. “And to think, I was upset with him for keeping it secret….I should've known he was merely trying to shield me. Dearest Eugene….what’s happening to you right now? If only I could’ve asked you sooner….” her eyes grew moist and she said to Lance, "he’s forever the protector, even when he’s the one in worse danger, or the one who’s truly suffered --”

“Princess Rapunzel?” An authoritative yet kind voice interrupted her speech as more quickened footsteps echoed across the hall. True to his word, Varian had brought the palace surgeon to assist with Eugene.

“Dr. Eden,” acknowledged Rapunzel, nodding with some relief, “thank you for coming so quickly. While we’re not exactly certain what’s affecting Eugene, we can tell you that the visual symptoms you can see weren’t affecting him as little as an hour ago.”

Lance stood up from his place by Eugene, volunteering the empty spot for Dr. Eden. The doctor quickly knelt down and began examining her patient. “So he’s not sunburned, then?” queried the doctor. “Not at all,” Rapunzel answered.

“And his fever?” continued Eden.

“He showed no signs of it at all until approximately 30 minutes ago, when he laid down his head upon the table during tea.”

“Hmmm,” Dr. Eden’s brows knitted together as she mused to herself. “Does anyone here happen to have a spyglass or other magnifier?”

“I do!” Varian chirped, clearly pleased to be of further assistance. The young teen stepped closer and volunteered his ever-present prism goggles. After Varian showed the doctor how to work the goggles, she asked the nearby servants if the castle had any ice stores in the palace cellars. Unfortunately, they did not and had used up the last of the stores the week prior and had yet to replenish them. It was then that Varian again volunteered. “Uhm, actually, I have an alchemical compound that creates ice from regular water almost instantly,” he said helpfully.

“Can the ice safely touch human skin?”, asked Dr. Eden. Varian answered in the affirmative. “Can you make enough ice to fill an entire washtub with it too?” Dr. Eden continued multi-tasking by asking Varian questions and closely examining the surface of Eugene’s skin up close with the goggles.

Varian made some brief calculations in his head and affirmed that he did indeed have enough ice-making compound for the task at hand.

“All right, then -- retrieve your supplies, Alchemist, and I shall meet up with you again in the bath chamber. My patient is in need of your services too,” said Dr. Eden.

“Yes, ma’am!!” said Varian excitedly, very nearly saluting the doctor as he rushed out of the hall, nearly ploughing into one of the palace servants in his haste. "Whoops! Sorry!!" the teen exclaimed in a hurry.

Then the doctor turned toward the princess and said, “We’ve simply got to bring down Eugene’s temperature as rapidly as possible. Now tell me -- has he perhaps recently been struck by lightning?”

“No!!” Rapunzel answered immediately. But then thought better of it.

“Wait….actually....” The power and energies that she and Cassandra had been wielding yesterday had certainly resembled nothing if not so much as awesome lightning…. And poor Eugene and Varian had been haplessly trapped and caught up right in the center of it all. Oh, how foolish she had been to assume they had all somehow escaped her goddess-like fight with Cassandra completely unscathed…..therefore she nodded despondently toward Dr. Eden.

“Y-yesterday,” Rapunzel’s throat constricted on the word, and a hand flew to her mouth. The princess could no longer speak. That instantaneous tsunami of guilt which built within her over the mere possibility that her actions from yesterday might’ve led to Eugene’s current state of suffering today threatened to overwhelm her.

Lance had just explained to her that Eugene was all but certain that Cassandra wasn’t the one responsible for his newest gnarly scars. Was it possible that’s because Eugene knew that Rapunzel was the one who had given them to him instead, however unwittingly?

#rta #tts #fanfiction AU #tangled fanfiction #cassandras revenge rewrite #eugene fitzherbert #lance strongbow #rapunzel #varian #cassandra #whump #eugene whump

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pandora15 · 4 years

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Betrayal

The Temple was burning.

As Obi-Wan approached one of the side entrances, he felt death ringing into the Force, the Temple’s usually soothing presence a rictus of agony and loss.

Obi-Wan kept himself pressed into the shadows, carefully eyeing the blue-and-white clone troopers stalking about the Temple’s perimeter, scanning for intruders.

This was his home, and these were Anakin’s men walking blankly around.

The fact that this was Anakin’s men made worry claw up his chest into his throat. Obi-Wan did not know where Anakin was, let alone if he survived. He knew that Anakin was supposed to be on Coruscant, and if his men were now in the Temple, that could only mean one thing.

The 501st had somehow infiltrated the Temple to murder their General, and they succeeded.

Anakin was dead.

Closing his eyes, Obi-Wan forced himself to take a few deep breaths to control himself. There would be time to mourn later, once he completes his mission and reunites with Master Yoda, who was probably still in hyperspace.

The original plan was to wait for Master Yoda to arrive, but upon realizing that Jedi were dying and dying by the second on Coruscant, Obi-Wan decided that he needed to act, before it was too late.

He would find Master Yoda afterwards, he was sure of it.

Obi-Wan opened his eyes and looked towards the entrance, studying the troopers who paced nearby, scanning for unwanted intruders.

A few robed bodies littered their feet, likely Jedi who were outside the Temple, trying to come home, as the security beacon was set to recall any Jedi to Coruscant.

It was clear that it was a trap set by the Sith, and Obi-Wan would have to go into the Temple and reconfigure the beacon to call the Jedi away from the Temple. Otherwise, everyone would try to come home, only to be immediately massacred by the very men they trusted.

With cold hands, Obi-Wan pulled his hood over his face and waited, deciding it was better to enter the Temple undetected than to be spotted and forced to fight.

The troopers could easily call reinforcements, after all, and Obi-Wan was sure he could not fight against too many of them at once.

Not like this.

A simple distraction with the Force set the troopers turning towards the opposite direction, and Obi-Wan moved quietly past them, slipping into the Temple through the entrance and taking a deep breath as its massive door closed behind him.

The Temple’s corridors were cold.

Shuddering, Obi-Wan pulled his robe around himself, tentatively reaching out into the Force.

A swirl of coiling darkness met his touch, and he retreated, gritting his teeth at the sensation.

There was so much death, enough to make him want to stop in his tracks and fall, letting the darkness overwhelm him. He was only a flickering light in a sea of oppressive darkness, after all.

It would be so easy to give up, to allow the Sith to reign free.

Shaking his head, Obi-Wan turned towards the Northwest Tower and walked quietly. Running would generate sound, and sound would mean discovery—he could not afford discovery.

As he traversed the corridors of his destroyed home, he spotted the bodies of younglings and Padawans, along with the occasional Knight or Master, laying on the ground, as though discarded. He ached to kneel down and mourn all of them, but he pressed onwards, raw grief gathering deep in his chest.

Obi-Wan debated taking a roundabout route to the central security station, but then he decided that the less he wandered around the Temple, the better. If he covered more ground, there was a higher chance that he would be spotted.

Every so often, he would overhear the murmuring of troopers as they walked about the Temple’s corridors, kicking bodies to the side, as though they never cared about the Jedi at all.

Obi-Wan’s heart leapt to his chest, aching from the sight of the men who betrayed all of them so brutally. He reeled from Cody’s betrayal, from the death and loss of everyone he ever cared about.

Anakin was dead. For all Obi-Wan knew, he and Yoda were the only ones who survived. Mandalore was gripped in the throes of war, and Ahsoka was there with her own men. He’d tried to contact her after he left Utapau, but he was met with terrible silence.

For all he knew, he had just failed Ahsoka again, in an even worse way than before. She felt a sort of duty to fight Maul because of him.

And now, it was likely that Ahsoka’s men shot her down, just like the clones shot down Jedi all over the galaxy. Sure, Ahsoka was no longer in the Order, but would that be enough to protect her from the attack?

As the troopers turned away, Obi-Wan slipped past them, turning into the corridor. As he walked past the Archives, however, he saw a tall, dark figure inside. The figure wore Jedi robes, dark ones, familiar ones.

“Anakin?” he breathed, and without a moment’s thought, he was walking into the Archives, heart pounding in his chest.

Anakin spun around, and his eyes widened.

“You survived?” Anakin asked, voice low and hoarse. There appeared to be an unsettled sort of emotion shining in his eyes, but Obi-Wan dismissed that for the shock he was sure Anakin felt in the Force. He was sure Anakin felt the betrayal more keenly than anyone else.

“I escaped,” Obi-Wan replied. “I was shot down, but I escaped.”

Anakin held his unignited lightsaber in a death grip, his mech hand squeezed so tightly that the protective leather was tearing slightly at the seams.

“I see.” Anakin nodded slowly.

For all that Obi-Wan wanted to reach into the Force and reassure himself with the brightness of Anakin’s Force presence, Obi-Wan knew he would also easily feel the coldness of death, of the dark, pressing all around him, and…

It would be too much.

It would be better if he kept himself contained within his own Force presence—at least, until he and Anakin were away from the Temple, safe.

Or rather, away from the betrayal.

“Your men are here,” Obi-Wan said, gesturing around them. “I assumed they—”

He cut himself off, voice catching in his throat.

“No, they haven’t.” Anakin’s voice echoed oddly in the chamber, eyes glinting in the dim light.

“We need to get out of here before they do find you,” Obi-Wan said, glancing back at the entrance through which he just walked. “There is a beacon in the communications center that’s recalling all the Jedi here to the Temple. We must reconfigure it to tell them to stay away.”

Anakin tilted his head and frowned. “In the central security station?”

Obi-Wan nodded in relief. “Yes, you know what I’m talking about, then? It’s not safe here, Anakin; we must reconfigure it before anyone other Jedi get here and are shot down.”

A slow nod from Anakin sent relief coursing through his veins.

“Well, let’s go, then,” Obi-Wan said, and he turned around to walk to the Archives’ exit, trusting Anakin to follow him.

As expected, he heard Anakin’s heavy footsteps approaching him, following him, but then he felt a hand reach for his left shoulder, gripping it tightly.

Frowning at the sudden, strange movement, Obi-Wan made to turn around, but before he could, pain exploded into his chest as a blue shaft of light erupted from the center of his chest. He looked down, seeing the blue lightsaber stabbed in his chest.

A cry tore itself from his lips as he realized exactly what had happened.

“Ana—” He let out a gasp, unable to speak around the lightsaber embedded in his chest.

Just as quickly as the light appeared, it disappeared. His knees buckled as his vision blurred, but he felt hands gripping his shoulders, lowering him slowly to the ground as he gasped, feeling blood dripping out of his mouth.

Obi-Wan blinked, seeing Anakin staring down at him, eyes cold.

“You—” he gasped, struggling to breathe, to form his thoughts into words.

“You would stand in the way, Obi-Wan,” Anakin said, voice shaking. “I…I must save Padmé, no matter the cost.”

A cough ripped through Obi-Wan’s mouth, blood spraying the air. “You—cost?”

“The Sith have offered me a way to save her,” Anakin explained, and he knelt down to meet Obi-Wan’s eyes.

It was in that moment, in the dim light of the Archives, that Obi-Wan saw the Sith yellow flickering in Anakin’s eyes.

Renewed pain coursed through him—betrayal, the wound in his chest, the loss in the Force: it all crashed down on him.

Obi-Wan’s vision blurred, and he shivered, feeling everything begin to fade away—the Temple, the Archives, even Anakin.

The Force barreled its way past his carefully constructed shields, and darkness crashed into him.

There was no hope left, not unless Master Yoda found a way to do what Obi-Wan could not, and to search for any other survivors.

Hope was gone, and all that remained was betrayal.

Blinking heavily, Obi-Wan sought Anakin’s eyes. He took a shuddering breath, followed by another.

“You—brother,” he rasped, feeling the coldness creep up through his body and mind, robbing him of his last moments.

Anakin’s eyes widened slightly in a mixture of confusion and turbulence, but Obi-Wan barely noticed it as his vision began to fade into darkness.

“Loved…you…”

And then there was just the nothingness.

#pandora writes #obi wan kenobi #anakin skywalker #tw character death #tw major character death #this one's dark and sad oof #this is the idea i was mentioning earlier btw #i thought of this in the middle of the night and it wouldn't leave me alone so #here we are #rots #sw fanfiction

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spookygondolier · 4 years

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So I have this group of superhero characters and I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell their story for years, but instead of figuring that out, I instead decided to reimagine them as characters in the ATLA universe. It was convenient that several of them already had elemental-ish superpowers. This actually ended up dominating my weekend and several evenings and I wrote like 4400 words of story about it, which I’m putting under the cut.

The basics: from left to right we have Onartok (nonbender, adoptive dad extraordinaire), Katluq (waterbender, moody teen), Ikkuma (firebender, not a fan of polar winters), Tarou (firebender, wants to travel the world), Fen (nonbender, trying to save her family’s farm), and Ming (nonbender, stubbornly friendly florist). They start off in the Southern Water Tribe and travel the world trying to avoid the war, picking up strays along the way, and eventually settle in Omashu.

In the bottom set of pictures, there’s a snapshot of the group a couple years later, where they open a Water Tribe themed restaurant in Omashu, Fen joins the Earth Kingdom army to try to find her brother, and Ikkuma moves to the colony town of Yu Dao. In the Legend of Korra universe, Ming joins the Air Acolytes, Fen becomes an airbender, Ikkuma and Tarou bond over their shared love of pro-bending, and Onartok helps Katluq get away from Triad life by getting him a job in a restaurant.

If you want to read the whole story, which I’ve titled “Children of War”, click below!

Fire Navy soldiers come once more to the Southern Water Tribe. This time, it takes the tribe a little less time to rally the warriors and waterbenders for a defense.

While the men are defending the village, some of the Fire soldiers sneak away from the fighting and start exploring houses. In some of them, they find a woman left alone.

Nine months later, two women bear strange children.

Makaana's child, at first, seems perfectly normal. She cries immediately, loud and healthy, and reaches for her mother. When she opens her eyes, they are an unsettling shade of gold. Her husband leaves the room as Makaana's joy turns to ice in her veins. She coldly hands the child off to the healers to be cleaned and names the little girl Ikkuma.

Atuut, still grieving her husband lost in the fight, gives birth to a frighteningly pale little boy. At first, they are worried that something is wrong with the child, that perhaps he will not survive. After tense moments of silence he finally cries out and Atuut realizes what has happened. She breaks down in tears and cannot be consoled. She refuses to hold the boy, refuses to care for what shouldn't be hers. The baby is taken in by a childless neighbor, Onartok, who pledges to raise the child as his own. He lost his wife during the fighting, too, and his home feels too empty these days. He calls the boy Katluq.

Rumors spread behind closed doors. Makaana keeps her child hidden away at home, away from curious eyes, and gives glares in exchange for glances of pity when she passes her neighbors. Atuut throws herself into the arms of the first man who will have her, still weeping, and disappears from the public eye for several months. Onartok is distracted from his own grief by the pressing demands of a newborn.

One year later, Atuut gives birth to another baby boy, with skin in a reassuringly familiar shade of brown. Two years later, Ikkuma accidentally sets fire to the furs of her bed in the throes of a tantrum. Her parents are horrified. Onartok gains another child.

The children grow under Onartok's care. He makes sure that Katluq finds chances to play with his brother. He learns to keep a bucket of water near at hand at all times, and reaches for it promptly when Ikkuma's lip starts to wobble or her brows furrow in frustration. The children learn and play with the rest of the village children, though they are sometimes treated with a certain measure of caution or curiosity.

Katluq demonstrates an aptitude for waterbending and is promptly taken in for training by one of the (increasingly fewer) village waterbenders. Ikkuma spends hours watching the hearth fire, or hikes far out away from the village where she is alone and surrounded by nothing but snow, and tries to see how long she can sustain a flame in her hands. When the Fire Navy comes back, she peers through a crack in the ice blocks of her house and carefully observes the way they move, marvels at what they can do and how much control they seem to have even as she is horrified at the destruction they bring to her village. She wonders if one of them might be her father, if he might understand her better than her birth mother.

They enter their teen years. Katluq grows quiet and draws into himself as he comes to understand what sets him apart from the other boys of the tribe. Ikkuma's moods grow stormy and unpredictable, especially during the long dark winter. She spits sparks during an argument with one of her friends. Her peers greet her with fear, after that. Neither of them have many friends anymore.

The raids keep coming. They are down to only a handful of adult waterbenders and Onartok fears for Katluq's safety. So far, the boy has been safely kept inside with the excuse that he is too young for fighting, but now he is old enough to chafe at the restriction and proud enough to demand that he be able to prove himself by using his abilities to help defend the village. Onartok refuses to hear it. He tells the pair of them that he's going to be taking them on a long fishing trip, to work on honing their skills to ready them for the responsibilities of adulthood. He does not tell them that he has no plans to return. The village is slightly relieved to see them go. They didn't like the visible reminders of what the Fire Nation has taken from them.

They sail for days and weather a frightening storm. After a week, Katluq and Ikkuma start to ask when they will set the course to return home. Onartok deftly dodges their questions, instead assigning them endless ship chores to distract them. After a time, they learn to stop asking. At night, they whisper stories of home to each other and wonder if they will see it again.

Eventually, they come upon a small island and stop to replenish their supplies. As they approach shore, they are met by a boy in a little fishing boat, about the same age as Katluq and Ikkuma. When they see his red clothing, they immediately prepare to defend themselves, but the boy reacts with nothing but curiosity to the sight of their ship and their appearances. He introduces himself as Tarou and asks if he can get a look inside their ship because he has never seen one so big before. At first they refuse, but he tells them that he can help guide them safely through the shallow waters to land safely, as long as they let him explore a little first. Reluctantly, he is allowed on board with the three of them dogging his every step and ready to act if he tries anything suspicious. He clambers between decks, chatting endlessly the whole time, telling stories about life in his tiny fishing village. When he casually calls a flame to his hand to light his way in the darkness of the lower deck, they are ready. He turns around to find Katluq with hands wreathed in water, Ikkuma readying a wobbly ball of fire to throw his way, and Onartok armed with a wickedly sharp bone-handled knife. After Tarou's flames flicker out in shock and fear, a broad smile slowly crosses his face and he asks if they have fun stories to share, too.

They treat him to a meal, to try to bribe him into keeping their secrets, and share the bare bones of their story- that they come from the Southern Water Tribe and they are trying to find somewhere to escape the war. Tarou explains that, so far, the war has scarcely touched his small island. What interest could the army possibly have in a bunch of poor, uneducated fishermen? Anyway, everyone on the island is too busy trying to survive to worry about political matters. He promises to keep what he knows to himself and offers to find them some clothes to borrow if they want to stay a little while. After all, Katluq should blend in easily as long as he doesn't waterbend, and Ikkuma's firebending will answer any questions before they can be raised. Even Onartok should be able to go unnoticed if he changes his hair and clothes and tries to keep his blue eyes mostly to himself. And since Tarou is being so helpful, he really wouldn't mind a sailing lesson or two on their beautiful ship. It's his dream to sail away from his boring home, to find a proper adventure somewhere out there, and learning how to manage a seaworthy ship is the first step.

They tentatively agree to the arrangement, but keep their ship ready to go at a moment's notice. Tarou is carefully supervised whenever he is on the ship and Onartok refrains from teaching him what he would need to do to unmoor the ship. On land, Tarou introduces them to the village as new arrivals from a neighboring island. Any suspicions the villagers hold are set aside as the newcomers prove themselves exceptionally capable at fishing, even if their methods are unorthodox. Tarou teaches Ikkuma to meditate and his mother takes her on as a firebending student. She feels more at peace than she can remember, breathing slowly in front of a candle at sunrise, far away from the dismal polar winter. Once she is able to master the basics, she is surprised to see that she can control her flames even better than Tarou, who she is beginning to realize is not an especially talented bender. Katluq finds his peace by sneaking out at night to practice waterbending alone on the beach under the bright light of the moon. Onartok cautiously bonds with Tarou's parents over the shared fear of the war reaching their children, who are nearing the right age to be of interest to the military. Over the next few months, they all start to relax by increments.

One day, the first tendrils of war start to wrap around the island. Naval recruiters set up a camp near the village and start making their faces known. Ikkuma stays up late into the night trying to convince Tarou that joining them won't bring him the adventure he thinks it will. She's seen what they do, she knows. Katluq lies silently in the dark, listening to them, too tense to sleep. Onartok tries to comfort Tarou's mother as she is up all night pacing back and forth in his borrowed hut, the flames of his cooking fire flickering unevenly in time with her panic as she explains her fear that Tarou won't last long in the military. He's too undisciplined, too ready to question orders, he lacks control. Onartok knows they will have to leave. He can't risk the recruiters uncovering the truth about Katluq and he knows Ikkuma would fare just as badly in the Fire Nation Navy as Tarou would, if they tried to take her. He offers to bring Tarou along, away from the military, until it is safe for him to come back. Tarou's mother tearfully agrees, but begs Onartok not to tell the boy's father, who would never approve of an attempt to avoid contributing to the war effort. They set sail before sunrise.

It is tricky at first, sailing past the Fire Navy ships quick enough to be gone before they can rouse sufficient suspicion to warrant an investigation. Once they make it out to the open sea, they see less and less of the iron ships. Tarou spends the first couple days quiet, confused and homesick, but he quickly adjusts to the routine of sea travel and his usual cheer returns a little more each day. He makes up for his lack of sailing skills with pure enthusiasm and Onartok finds that the boy is really growing on him. Tarou, Ikkuma, and Katluq grow inseparable.

After a few weeks, they reach land in the Earth Kingdom. They change back into their Water Tribe attire and Tarou borrows some of Katluq's clothes, which will draw less negative attention than Fire Nation red. Onartok reaches an arrangement with a dockmaster in a coastal town, so their boat will be held safe until they return. If a year passes with no sign of them, the dockmaster has permission to sell the ship. They sell most of their perishable fish in exchange for enough money to buy a few ostrich horses for easier travel and they head inland.

They pass blackened fields and scorched, empty villages and wonder if there is anywhere they can go that has not been touched by the war. One night, they take refuge in a barn near an overgrown and apparently abandoned farm with only a few skinny animals wandering about. They are woken in the middle of the night by the sound of footfalls through hay and open their eyes to find themselves face to face with an arrow aimed their way by a steely-faced teenage girl.

They come to discover that the farm is not, in fact, abandoned and the girl, Fen, is trying her best to care for it after her father and brother left for the army. She does not mention a mother. She doesn't seem especially concerned with where they come from or what their story is, only whether or not they intend to harm her animals or crops. Once she can be convinced to lower her weapon, she tensely admits that she is finding it difficult to manage the farm alone. Tarou and his quick tongue convince her to leave them unharmed and maybe even give them a spare room or two, in exchange for their help to save the farm from complete disrepair.

None of them has done a farm chore in their life but they are willing workers and Fen proves to be a competent teacher. The first week is quiet, at first. Fen only speaks when spoken to or when she is giving instructions, but Tarou talks enough for all of them and Ikkuma often joins in with commentary. Fen shows them some Earth Kingdom cooking techniques and Katluq is surprised to find that he takes a liking to cooking, even if it is usually women's work. Onartok makes sure everyone is together at meal times and they get to know each other better over food.

Fen tries to teach them archery, though none of them are particularly interested apart from Onartok. She befriends their ostrich horses. Ikkuma is the first one who actually manages to get Fen to laugh, to the dismay of Tarou, who has been trying since the first day. They manage to save some of the overgrown crops and sell them in the nearest village. They buy new traveling clothes and some ingredients they don't have on the farm.

A month and a half into their stay, they wake in the night to the smell of smoke. The local village is under attack and a wildfire is rapidly consuming the countryside, heading straight for the farm. They pack hastily and Ikkuma and Tarou try to fend off the blaze for as long as possible. Fen is surprised but too distraught at the inevitable loss of her home to be afraid or angry that they didn't tell her they were firebenders. They flee in the opposite direction of the fire.

They keep moving until they are too exhausted to keep going and, hoping they have traveled far enough away, they set up camp and sleep through half the day. The next day, as they try to figure out their travel plans mid-journey, Fen tells them that she's heard stories that the best place to avoid the war is in Ba Sing Se. Nowhere could be safer. However, she also explains the rigorous entry process for getting into the city and Onartok knows there is no way he can convincingly forge papers for all of them. But the King of Omashu is said to be mad, and Omashu is probably one of the next safest places. Perhaps a mad king wouldn't have such a problem with their motley group.

After a hard week of travel, they reach the great stone gates of the mountainous city. All of them stop in their tracks to marvel at its size and grandeur. It is the biggest city they have ever seen and they crane their necks to look up and take it all in. The guards who greet them are as intimidating as the city. Fen takes the lead, surprising everyone, and tells the story of the loss of her home, weaving in bits and pieces about the way her fellow refugees were so kind and helpful with the upkeep of the farm before it burned down. As it turns out, her father is somewhat highly-ranked in the army and one of the guards had fought beside him a couple years ago. After only a little argument, the guards agree to let them in. The guard who knows Fen's father gives them a recommendation for a neighborhood in the city where they will likely be able to find a place to stay.

They move into a small but cozy apartment in a mostly quiet neighborhood. Their new neighbor, a cheerful girl named Ming, greets them on their first day with a bouquet of fresh flowers from the florist shop where she works. Onartok and Tarou find work with a fishmonger, while Katluq gets a job in the kitchen of a small restaurant. Ikkuma can only find work in a laundry, which she hates, but consoles herself by subtly keeping her water warm as she washes the clothes. Fen joins Ming at the florist shop. Ming, through stubborn friendliness, finds a way into their tight-knit group.

It takes several months before any of them trust her enough to reveal their bending, and only Katluq shares with her at first. Knowing, at this point, that most of them are originally from the Water Tribe, she is delighted and not terribly surprised, though she can't help but feel a little hurt that it took him this long to open up to her. When Tarou and Ikkuma light lanterns for the night in front of her with intentional casualness, she backs right up to the door and is a breath away from calling the guards before Fen and Katluq are able to talk her down. After a few minutes of explanation, she realizes that they have never had anything to do with the Fire Nation military. Once she can be convinced that, yes, Ikkuma really is from the Water Tribe and had never even seen the Fire Nation before this year, she starts to get a little teary-eyed as she hears the rest of the story. She holds herself a little distant from the firebenders for a couple days, but is back to her usual bubbly self within the week. She does not share their secret.

After a couple years, Onartok and Katluq save up enough money to open up their own restaurant, which claims to serve authentic Water Tribe cuisine. If the dishes are not quite perfect, being cobbled together from their scattered memories of watching the women cook back home, they are still more authentic than anything else being sold in the stone city. There is a standing agreement that, when they need a job, any of the rest of the group will have a spot as a server.

Ming adopts as many stray animals as she can find and the rest of them grumble as they find fur over everything they own. Tarou and Ikkuma find a small house together in a livelier part of the city. Some nights, they close the shutters to prying eyes and practice what they remember of firebending katas together in the dim light of their stone home. Katluq and Ming move into an apartment with an entire spare room for their pets. Ming decorates with copious amounts of flowers. Fen learns that her father was killed in battle and half the city's guards show up at her door to pay their respects. Ikkuma falls in love and then has a dramatic breakup with a beautiful potter. They all grow up and the war does not reach Omashu.

After nearly a decade, as the war still shows no signs of ending soon, Tarou starts to wonder if it would be worth it to try to go visit his family. He and his mother kept up a lively correspondence for years, but he hasn't heard much from her recently. Surely, by now, the military will have run out of suitable young people to recruit from his home village and it might be safe to go back. If nothing else, this might be just the chance to go on that grand adventure he's always dreamed of. Katluq and Ikkuma decide to join him for the journey. They take the long way, sightseeing and traveling all over the Earth Kingdom. Eventually they make it to the Fire Nation colonies. Tarou can't shake the unnerving sense that he is coming home after all these years, surrounded by red and eating his childhood favorite foods. He hunts for news of his home island and finds little. Ikkuma, who has for years felt like someone torn between nations, feels like she might have found a place she could belong in Yu Dao, where the Earth Kingdom and Fire Nation seem to coexist in peace and the sharp borders of the nations feel blurred. She chooses to stay while Katluq and Tarou set sail for the Fire Nation.

The closer they get, the more frequently they find themselves trying to avoid the notice of Fire Navy vessels. Once, they are flagged down and Tarou manages to put together a convincing enough story that the two of them are brothers from the colonies en route to pay a visit to the homeland (while Katluq stands as far away as possible and sweats bullets the whole time). After weeks at sea, they finally reach Tarou's home island. The village is half-empty, mostly elders and children, and there is a massive new factory looming in the distance, puffing up ominous black smoke. Tarou's childhood home is empty, clearly unoccupied for several years. He is able to find his aunt a few huts away, who tells him that both his parents left for the military two years ago, as did most of the able men and women of the village who wanted to do their part to help their country. Tarou turns around and walks away as she starts to question him about what he has been doing to honor the Fire Lord.

As the shores of the island shrink in the distance over the railing of their ship, Tarou doesn't say a word. Katluq suggests they pay a visit to Kyoshi Island, hoping it will be a fun detour. They catch a glimpse of the Unagi just before they're ready to leave the island and Tarou finally cracks a smile. They return to Omashu and both throw themselves into work at the restaurant as if they have to make up for their time away. After a suggestion from Tarou (phrased as a joke but meant with a hesitant earnestness), they start introducing some weekly special dishes inspired by Fire Nation cuisine. They learn quickly to adjust the spice level to suit Earth Kingdom tastes, but the dishes gain something of a small cult fanbase.

In Yu Dao, Ikkuma puts the rest of her saved-up travel funds to use in securing a tiny apartment. It is the first time she has ever lived completely alone. If anyone asks, which surprisingly few people do, she names Tarou's island as her birthplace. She finds a job in a factory and nearly loses her job a couple weeks in when her supervisors tire of hearing her continual suggestions for improvements to the machinery. When they realize that she's right, she instead finds herself promoted up through the ranks until she is helping to design and build new machines. She signs herself up for lessons at a firebending school with the explanation that her home village was too small and she never had the chance to pursue formal training. She is at least a decade older than most of the other students, but she relishes in the feeling of being able to practice and refine her bending skills without fear for the first time since her brief stay on Tarou's island years earlier.

A few years after Fen is old enough to join the Earth Kingdom army, she tries to volunteer in hopes of tracking down her brother. She is laughed out of the recruiting tent on the basis of her gender. She shoots the helmet off the recruiting officer's head on her way out. A few days later, she is back with a different hairstyle, a fake name, and some of Katluq's old clothes. This time, they let her in. It takes her a year of training and ten months of combat, but eventually she finds her brother. She fights beside him for another six months before she can work out an arrangement for the pair of them to be discharged, so they can go home again. She writes to Ming, who agrees to travel to the site of the former farm and do what she can to help restore it. The three of them slowly rebuild it. Fen's brother enjoys the peace, after so many years of war. He marries a girl from the village. Ming turns part of the land into a sanctuary for injured wildlife. Fen fills a stable with friendly and well-trained ostrich horses.

By the time the war does come to Omashu, they are well into adulthood. Onartok is no longer with them. Ming, Fen, her brother and his wife are still living happily on the farm with two children. Ikkuma is living in Yu Dao and has made a home with an earthbending schoolmistress. Tarou and Katluq have built the restaurant into a very successful local favorite. They don't quite believe it when they hear that the Avatar is in town. It is a slow process to come around to the idea that he might actually be back in the world after all these years.

When Fire Nation forces show up prepared to attack the city, word spreads quickly. Tarou and Katluq help their more vulnerable neighbors hide and then take to the streets, ready to do whatever they can to help protect their neighborhood. Everyone is shocked when King Bumi immediately surrenders. Hoping to do as much as possible to keep the war out of their city, Tarou and Katluq join the resistance movement, which grows quickly. They are frustrated when the Avatar shows up again and tries to stop their plans to assassinate the new governor, though Katluq is quietly pleased to see that he has such clever and brave Southern Water Tribe siblings to help him. Tarou thinks the Pentapox plague idea is stupid, but Katluq quickly convinces him that getting out of the city is bound to be better than sticking around to see what will happen if the occupying soldiers discover a rogue firebender on the side of the resistance. After they escape the city, they go to stay with Ming and Fen on the farm. When they hear that the king has taken back Omashu during the Day of Black Sun, they decide to make their way back and see what has become of it.

When the war ends, they can't shake the feeling that it's a dream. It can't be over, just like that. War is what made them. Literally, in some cases. It's what has kept them up at night and guided the direction of their lives. The war is what brought them together. They all travel back to Omashu and meet in the restaurant, sitting around a table swapping stories with each other like when they were young. Tarou wonders if it might be easier to travel now, if he might be able to visit the poles now that his nation is no longer at war with the Water Tribes. Katluq and Ikkuma wonder if they might be able to see their childhood home again, whether or not they would be welcome. Ikkuma's wife is concerned about what will become of the colonies now that the balance of power has been overthrown in the Fire Nation.

But all the wonders and worries seem far away as they huddle together around the table, hot tea and good food and each other. It feels like home. It feels like peace.

In another lifetime, Ikkuma is born to an upper-class couple of nonbenders in Republic City. They aren't quite sure what to do with their spitfire of a daughter, who excels in her firebending training but can barely hold a civil conversation over the dinner table, who spends as much of her free time as possible in the seats of the pro-bending arena. Tarou, from a less wealthy district of Republic City, meets her in the audience one night and they become fast friends as they bond over their favorite teams and agree to meet up to spar with each other in the hopes that they can practice enough to make it big, themselves, even if they have to be on opposing teams. They practice together for years and eventually they both make it onto pro teams. When they fight each other, they move with the smoothness of a long-practiced dance, predicting and dodging each other's attacks almost before they happen. Their friendly rivalry becomes the stuff of gossip as many fans debate whether or not they're secretly dating. They're not, but they take any opportunity to fan the flames of the debate through joking flirtations or casual cuddling in public.

Katluq's mother is in deep with the Triads. He never figures out who his father is. His mother is killed by her boyfriend when he is five years old and he and his younger half-brother are taken in by the Red Monsoons, who have them doing jobs and dodging cops before they learn how to read. As he grows up, Katluq starts dreaming of a more peaceful life, where he does not have to constantly fear for his safety. When Mako and Bolin make it onto the pro-bending scene, Katluq and his brother idolize them. Katluq starts to wonder if maybe he, too, can make it out of the triad's clutches someday. One day, he is caught stealing food from Narook's Seaweed Noodlery. The chef who caught him, Onartok, takes one look at the skinny, scared teenager and sits right down in the back alley with him to have a long talk about his life choices. In the end, he offers to let Katluq work off the crime by helping in the kitchen, and says he can try to see about getting him a full-time job if he's interested. Katluq accepts and, for the first time in his life, finds himself doing a job he can be proud of. He is not able to convince his brother to leave the Red Monsoons before he winds up in prison.

Ming joins the Air Acolytes. She loves the beauty of Air Temple Island and the lifestyle suits her perfectly. Fen grows up as a farm girl in the rural Earth Kingdom. She meets Ming when she unexpectedly finds herself in possession of airbending abilities after Harmonic Convergence. Ming shows her around when she first comes to Air Temple Island to train and they grow to become close friends. Ming is one of the few people who understands Fen's understated humor and who doesn't make her feel pressured when she doesn't feel like talking or when she needs to take a break from the bustle of the island to sit quietly in a dark room for a little while. As they move through young adulthood together, their friendship slowly grows into something more and they find happiness with each other.

They are all shaped by peace, this time, not war. They don’t all meet each other until they are older and their bonds grow more slowly, at the pace of a casually developing friendship rather than being forged in the intensity of life on the run. It takes them less time to find peace, happiness, home.

#atla oc #lok oc #my art #my writing #btw i'm also working on more dnd subclass quizzes #i just had to finish this first

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liathgray · 4 years

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Anyways, here’s that essay

Please keep in kind this was not written to be consumed by people familiar with the source material, it was for a class. It’s focused on weird stuff and was meant to compare and contrast the Judas Contact storyline and season two of Titans.

Okay, here we go.

In 1984, a four-part story was published as an arc in Tales of the Teen Titans titled as The Judas Contract. Since, it has become one of the most influential and well-known stories to come out of the DC publishing company for its bold story choices and permanently changing characters who had been around for decades, as well as introducing death as something that can occur in the present, not just in the mechanics of a backstory. It garnered four separate adaptations, the most recent of which being the second season of Titans, a loose live-action version of the titular team. Between the two, there are many small plot and character details that do not line up, so for the sake of simplicity, pedantic plot elements will be removed from the comparison, instead focusing on individual motivation, the importance of the setting, and how characters are impacted and changed by the actions in the narrative.

The Judas Contract proper follows a team of pre-established young heroes being unknowingly spied on by their newest superpowered member, Tara Markov. She works alongside Slade Wilson, a mercenary and personal rogue of the Teen Titans, feeding him important information in order to fulfill his contract to kidnap them, hence the title of the arc; there is a Judas among them. The contract is almost completed until Slade’s son, Joey, enters the picture, determined to prevent any more death at hands of his father, emotionally conflicting Slade enough for Tara to feel betrayed and collapse the cavern they had been in, killing herself in the process. In the end, it is her story alongside the former Robin, Dick Grayson, who is inspired to take up a new vigilante identity as a result. Titans, has the same basic idea of there being a mole in the group and the evolution of Dick from Robin to Nightwing, but the surrounding plot and progression are entirely different. The Titans had existed previously, but broke up due to a series of events involving Slade, starting with the murder of a teammate, and ending in the death of Joey. There’s much grief and trauma surrounding this, so when years later Dick decides to reopen the team’s old headquarters to house and train new young heroes he stumbled across, his old friends are a mix of angry, re-traumatized, and reluctant, especially with the re-emergence of their aforementioned enemy. In the place of Tara, there is Rose. Daughter of Slade and, again, the spy on the team who, unlike Tara, has a change of heart and reveals her betrayal in an attempt to warn her newfound friends.

The most striking element of both is the use of character, and in what direction the agents go in, especially in light of the overarching themes that they share; that of redemption, recovery, guilt, and betrayal. In the comic, the focal point for all of this is Tara. She is continually treated well by her teammates whom remain compassionate to her, despite her brashness and tendency to get violent. They know little of her, yet still welcome her into their home and personal lives. It is revealed to the audience early on that Tara is working for Slade, which makes each interaction she has with those she is deceiving all the more upsetting, even distressing to watch. Tara’s particular flavor of trauma deals with abandonment, something she acquired after being forced out of her home country, which later developed into malignant narcissism. She becomes very attached to the idea of being in a position of power and finds comfort in the presence of Slade, as he was the first person to justify her being alive. Tara, in the end, fails to redeem herself, instead the illusion she had built of stability and power came crumbling down after she spends ally after ally until there is no one, and she has no power left. Though it’s somewhat cynical, the idea here is that these cycles of betrayal and neglect cannot always be broken, that’s the point of this character; sometimes people are just too dysfunctional and if they are not willing to put in the work to get better and heal, they just won’t.

Rose, Tara’s counterpart, goes through a very different metamorphosis, despite the setup being similar. Her initial motivation was revenge for the brother she never knew, having been told it was the Titans who killed him when in fact it had been Slade, though it wasn’t intentional. Slade, however, blamed the Titans, specifically Dick, thus Rose believed him and was willing to participate as a double agent. When she encounters them for the first time, she is met with sympathy and understanding, people who didn’t value her as a weapon, creating incongruity with the story she was fed of elite fighters and master manipulators. Upon learning the truth about the circumstances under which her brother died, and who exactly killed him, she backs out. Rose realized she was lied to and manipulated, almost immediately grasping the gravity of the situation and seeing how hard she was pushing people whose greatest crime was daring to care about the very person she thought she was avenging. Later, she tells her newly acquired love interest the truth, following it up by saying, “I’d take it all back if I could. But I can’t.” (Zhang). Where Tara failed, Rose succeeded; she got rid of the poison in her life and recognized that she was the bad guy, alongside seeing the humanity of those she attempted to sabotage.

The theme of redemption and recovery doesn’t stop with Rose. It is furthered by all the other existing characters, young and old. On the basis of new beginnings for the second generation, and moving past the collective trauma and fear associated with teamwork for the first. More so than anyone else, this idea is present in the journey of Dick Grayson. In the original story, he is motivated to save his friends from an ugly fate while in the throes of a very real identity crisis involving the title of Robin, which he had recently discarded, believing that it was time for him to grow past the role and create a legacy entirely his own. Which he does do; he rebrands himself as Nightwing, rising to the occasion and overcoming the difficulties of abandoning a role that represented his culminative childhood and heritage to do save the people he loves. It is very much about the conquering of his external obstacles.

This is not the case in Titans, it is largely about his spectacular fall from grace and the struggle of building himself back up from rock bottom. He had kept a secret from all his closest friends about the death of Joey; he told them Joey was murdered before he found him, when in fact, he wasn’t. Joey died trying to protect Dick from Slade, and Dick felt so much guilt and shame in having been partially responsible that he lied about it for years. When his teammates find out, his worst nightmare comes true: they leave him. He is with next to no support, devoid of the family he fought tooth and nail to keep together, and is left in the tomb of his last chance to remain stable. While Rose and Tara had to redeem themselves to other people, Dick’s story is a redemption to himself, not anyone else. He stops doing things for other people and imagines himself of deserving the loneliness of, in essence, being re-orphaned. In a desperate attempt to find forgiveness, he seeks out Slade who, instead of offering the sought after peace of mind, says, “I sentence you to live alone (…) Forever knowing that your Titans family lives and breathes somewhere out there in the world, but you can never be with them.” (Morales). His lowest point is monumentally more devastating than his comic counterpart; he isolates himself entirely, going as far as to get himself jailed to carry out the self-imposed punishment, expecting to be abused and killed alone in a prison, the prospect of death barely startling him. In moments like this, the tragedy of the character hurts so much more because the audience knows that if he gets knocked down, he may not get back up, he has every reason not to. Which is why it is so earnest and exhilarating when he does. Dick was broken down to his factory parts, every mistake and bad trait not only was put on display, but magnified. He was made to confront those things before being able to piece himself back together, only then could he take on a new identity as Nightwing. Seeing him fall again is tangibly damaging to the character, so seeing him climb his way back up, scratching, clawing, slipping up, and struggling all the way, it’s all the more satisfying when he reaches the top.

A large part of this fall and rise, or in the case of The Judas Contract, the lack off a fall, is to do with the setting. The comic has all their main characters living in relative harmony or with their own spaces. When they are not off stopping cults from destroying political landscapes or battling supervillains, they are at home, going about their daily lives as somewhat normal people with jobs and relationships. It exemplifies that they all have a decent grasp on who they are, and even if they don’t, they have a bed to go back to and a support system to rely on. This is an established team with a running headquarters, lovingly named Titans Tower, the scene is only a part of the narrative as the backdrop, as a story punching bag that ultimately doesn’t matter, and that is all it needs to be. The story is much more interested in the series of events taking place, otherwise known as the act. Everything that goes down becomes a spoiler because there are so many plot points to cover and twists to reveal, thus the scene becomes story fuel, which in turn fuels the act, fueling the actors. There is less of a fall because they all have a home to turn to; it is built around the idea that the primary agents are at least somewhat realized people, with lives of their own. They react to the world around them as it throws obstacles, and the idea is re-enforced by the irrelevance of where the action takes place, wholly opposing the priorities of its live-action adaptation.

Not to say that Titans doesn’t jump from place to place, in fact it shifts its characters around quite a lot, but those moves are reactions to and influenced by the primary setting. The Titans operate out of, again, Titans Tower, but instead of a home and safe place, it is a monument to their old team’s sins. A ghost town that continues to haunt them, bringing back their darkest times and motivating nearly every move they make. When they first arrive, it’s tense, they’re subconsciously expecting the worst and prepare to bail at the first signs of trouble, which they eventually do. It is their return that sparks the entire story moving forward, and the presence of a looming shadow built from mistakes colours their reactions and triggers a sort of trauma response. Conversely, it is a beacon of hope and rebirth for the younger members. It is the first place wherein they have been allowed to be themselves, even at their worst, then collectively learn to get better as a group, a family even. The motif of past and present, trauma and recovery, informs the presentation of Titans Tower, making the growth visible in ways it previously hadn’t been. Using the setting as story plays into how Titans is structured; it drip-feeds the audience information, allowing the plot to meander so each development can happen and be processed before the next major plot point kicks in, and if they lose the setting, their home, there’s nothing else, thus the consequences are much steeper.

Throughout its two seasons run, Titans has been unapologetically divisive; deeply flawed characters with a universe quite different from that of the comics. It was not designed to make audiences comfortable, often forcing them to look at the worst parts of characters they might have previously idolized and showing the amount of hard work that has to be put into self-betterment. It is highly character-driven, mostly following interpersonal relationships and intimate growth. Barely anyone feels self-assured, often scrambling for any sense of identity. Though everyone goes through their fair share of change, this is ultimately Dick’s redemption story to himself. It departs from the source material, which often showed readers the best parts of people, that the downfall of heroes comes from outside sources while overall making a cynical statement about the cycle of abuse regarding Tara. These are heroes who know who they are and have no problem in the actions they make, whereas in the adaptation, almost every conflict is generated internally by lies and secrecy. The adaptation removes the halo from these supposed heroes and allows the emotions to be a bit dirty and muddled, creating an equally satisfying but very different take on a classic comic story.

#titans #DC Universe #DC comics #tara markov #rose wilson #joey wilson #jericho wilson #slade wilson #deathstroke #robin #nightwing #dick grayson #titans dcu #ceces lengthy excretes

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jwoodhouse08-blog · 5 years

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I’m starting to write books, when dogs aren’t laying on my keyboard, so I thought I would share some of my creative writing pieces.

I’m quite obsessed with the dark ages and have written the beginnings/bits & pieces of some journaling of noble women whose lives I invented through a game.

- 1 -

I was so close to being someone that mattered in her eyes, at least it seemed that way, but truly I do doubt that my mother could ever be pleased. She was sick when I was sent off to be the handmaiden to Baroness Ophelia, but I was certain then she would get better. Apparently her fever overcame her within the night, and just like that, I am without a mother. Why is it I think of her bitterness in the wake of her death? The viper of her tongue, the storm of her temper? She was so often in a huff, but not always. And gods, Lillith isn’t even going to know what it’s like to have a mother at all. I asked father if he would remarry and he said it wasn’t any of my business but if I must know he thought he’d done his bit in having children, and expected his daughters might give him a grandson to inherit. “You mean to marry me off just after mother’s in the ground?” I asked bitterly.

“Why dally? She’s not getting any warmer,” father said, unmoved.

On the eighteenth of August during a gnarly heat wave, I met my husband.

He was superior in form, which wasn’t hard to be with I fair and maidenly. I hadn’t know him but I would soon and often and intimately, such thoughts made me squirm with great insecurity. I had scrutinized my body in the mirror the night before, flickering between pale freckles, examining the curls in my pale pubic hair. I did not expect my husband would inspect me soon, a somewhat foolish smile plastering his face. He tipped a long hat at me, greeting hollowly, “My Lady.”

We were married within a fortnight and I was greatly disappointed and invaded, shortly after a sobbing disappointing mess wishing so badly to write my mother. I settled for drafting a letter to my old nanny in the wood closet, ignoring my husband’s tepid apologetic knocking on the door, I wanted so badly for him to go away.

We did not recover well from such despair, I couldn’t look to him without wrinkling my nose with disgust, but still I did my wifely duty and no more. I should have not been surprised to find he was finding comfort in a Mistress, Miss Eleana Finch, a butcher’s somewhat portly wife who fondled his genitals and put up with the tickle of his mustache hairs for far longer than I could ever endure. Bless her, I thought, hating my husband and then they had some sort of falling out. Suddenly there were letters, to me, his sisters, his aunts, one to his grandmother, accusing my husband of immoral and disquieting things. He has sullied our family name so quickly and so deeply.

Somewhere amid the throes of disappointing me, my husband has made me pregnant. My bones ache and I am weary and fat, and there are far too many opinions, and swarming hands. Then the labor pains come and they are unlike anything I have ever heard of, threatening to take me early in the most immoral of way, fonts of blood spilling from between my legs. Somewhere along the way the bleeding stops, and I have a daughter they swaddle in white and rub liquid from the face of. She looks very inhuman to me, much like an angel might and in this hazy post blood loss world, I find her strangely beautiful, and decide to call her Angela.

Lady Angela was only six months along when Ophelia invited me back to her attendance at court. I was dying of boredom and glad for the escape, promising to visit in only a weekend, sure Angela would forget me entirely. Between carriage rides to the court and home, I received word of my grandmother’s passing. Shortly after I happened upon a divine opportunity, a position for Indra under Ophelia, as one of her handmaiden’s had passed away. My husband proved not entirely useless when he inherited an estate from an elderly Uncle, a wondrous place called Portmouth. I thought perhaps the tides had changed and took up with our second baby, just to lose her at birth, my heart as hollow as my womb, as empty as my arms.

Sweet Angela turned three, a proper Lady, far blonder than me, then my sisters Indra and Karlai were married to respective husbands in turn. When I became pregnant again the fear visited me anew, I spent nine months in great anxiety, only to have a healthy boy who we called Taylor. The long awaited grandson, my father sent me a letter expressing his great pleasure and intentions to visit soon. It wasn’t until Mona was married a year later he took the opportunity to meet his grandson, apologizing and saying he had little interest in babies but was happy to slap the family name on it. My husband called him uncouth, but I am used to father. Mona seemed so young to be getting married, like a child herself. I hope she does not find her nuptials so uncomfortable as I did, I was sure to warn all my sisters – it was my obligation, really.

Karlai had a baby, following in my footsteps of new husband, new baby, another grandson for my father at that. I’m sure Stuart and Taylor are going to get along swimmingly when they’re older boys. We vacationed shortly after, on my return I received a parcel from my father, a birthday gift – a beautiful necklace that I will treasure always, I will be sure to pass it on to Angela.

My other sister, Mona, had a boy and then another, my own daughter Angela turning nine, and Taylor almost a proper man at six. My grandfather fell ill but bore through it, giving me great prospects of death as a corpsely old woman.

After much discussion it has been all but decided that Taylor will be pursuing the path of religion. It isn’t that I disagree, I think it is a great field for my son, and just as honorable as taking to the battlefield – but to be told, rather than asked? I am, after all, only his mother. My husband says it isn’t like that, he knows only I am maidenly and my heart will weep for him and I may miss him too much to do what is best for him! He is such a stupid man. It was terribly painful seeing Taylor off with his father for the Monastery, he seemed so young and round faced, it is a small mercy he didn’t beg me not to go. He promised he would write. Angela was terse, she went to be alone after.

1613

Great gods, I was written by father and Lillith has turned up in the family way! She isn’t married – no, not in any way. Father is besides himself with grief, hasn’t said anything about the father which leads me to believe he is either married, or worse, destitute. I wrote Lillith a letter but she has not written me back at all, I suppose I shouldn’t have scolded her so, it cannot be easy to carry a baby in secret just to turn it out. Still, to be so selfish. She has hurt our family so,

1614

The world has it out for my sisters it does seem. Indra had been writing through the aid of another, complaining of nearsightedness causing her headaches but it seems things have progressed. She is completely without her vision now. Her poor husband did not sign on to be married to a disabled woman…I worry for poor Indra. There is little protection for women like her in our world.

Shortly after the plague on Lillith and Indra, misfortune visited my bedside too, I delivered a stillborn son. It was an ugly exhausting labor and he was a violent shade of purple. I dare speak no further on it, it is horrible and I think of it far too often. Still I seem big, like he is inside, worse still at times I swear I feel him kicking. I will pray.

1615

Angela is becoming a most reformed young lady, she’s made me proud in her studies and showed great prowess with music in particular.

I knew the chances were I would not be so lucky as to outlive all of my sisters, but to lose Karlai in only her twenties, while she’s having a daughter? Elaine won’t even have a mother now. I wrote her father offering guidance – no reply.

I wouldn’t even talk about my pregnancy, didn’t tell the husband, not until he said I’d gone and gotten fat and I told him he’s a dim-wit and there’s a baby coming. “Well no one told me,” he said in such a storm. I haven’t ever been fat, the loser. “You really having a baby, Mama?” Angela asked, I confirmed as much and no more was said on it. Ellen came in a rush, my labor nightmarish but quick, she was born in hours, really, though I’d been bedbound for months with various ailments. It is good to have a baby again.

My husband was called to arms and all but slaughtered like a pig brought in by the ring of the dinner bell. He had no business in combat but things grew, they grew so ugly. There was a draft and – and now I am without a husband.

#creative writing #writing #dark ages #medieval #17th century #dark age journal series

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traditional-with-a-twist · 5 years

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Beauty and Her Beast

masterpost || AO3 || Next>>

A/N: After a lot of fussing and fidgeting, I decided to publish the first draft of this story as it was originally conceived. For a revised version of this scene, check out The Weeping Princess from the main arc of The Beast with the Beautiful Face.

Shirayuki buries her face against Obi’s chest, shoulders shaking.

She’s dressed all in white, a thick heavy dress of mourning. The clothes are appropriate for her new status as a stillborn princess, but they don’t suit Shirayuki.

The stiff, glossy folds confine her, make her look small and plain. The color is too cold and dull for the blossoming brightness of her complexion. She is subdued by the relentless white, lost among the elegant corners.

It’s as if the widow’s garb, the physical representation of her mourning, is suffocating her. She clings to Obi like he’s a lifeline, the only thing keeping her head above the water.

His eyes are dull as he looks down at her, his arms hanging at his sides. Nothing could have been further from his expectations than finding himself here, like this, with her.

When he had decided to sneak back into the castle for the ceremony, he had been entertaining hopes of glimpsing her from afar.

He thought he might see her resplendent among the royal entourage, decked out as a princess, hair like a beacon, perhaps scattering meaningful flowers or even herbs with a special significance over the shroud.

Instead she was swathed in veils, as if she were the one wearing grave clothes. He had found her here, alone, tucked away in some forgotten corner of the castle.

She was crying, and there was no one to comfort her.

Obi knows he’s not qualified for the job. Even now, his mind is slipping, losing track of the barriers that exist between them.

Social status, family obligations, the rawness of grief -- all stretch thin and transparent, wavering like mirages in the heat of her palms against his shirt, the soft puff of her breath, the curve of her hair.

Next to that, what are the obstacles that kept him at bay, held him at a distance from her?

Only the memory of his master stays his hands at his sides.

As long as he has known the miss, his respect for Zen, his desire to honor him and his dreams for the future, has circumscribed the boundary line of his relationship with her.

At times, the line has been hair thin: when she tripped at Laxdo, borne back by a heavy box...at Wistal, it was Garrack and her sly tricks with the roka juice...in the Tanbarun library, the little princess was his downfall.

Each time, he had been there to catch her, to take her in his arms and support her slender frame against his long, lean strength--but all of those incidents were accident, chance, no more, no further.

Once or twice he had thought of crossing the line--when her hand swung, free and empty, calling out for comfort, just inches away--but each time, Zen’s presence held him back from the brink.

He needed those reminders, missed his master when the distance prevented Zen’s timely intrusions, as Obi had confessed obliquely to Shirayuki on the balcony in Tanbarun.

Zen had been real, present, turning red in the face when Obi outraged him, haranguing him when Obi transgressed on Zen’s notions of sacred propriety, knocking the breath out of Obi like a knee to the stomach when he caught him at unguarded moments with his ridiculously disproportionate magnanimity and unsettling conviction about family ties and future togetherness.

As long as those moments continued, the power of Obi’s allegiance to Zen had grown in proportion with the force of his attraction to Shirayuki.

Maybe Zen had known that--maybe that was why he continued to trust Obi with her, despite repeated provocations, joking or otherwise.

In any case, Obi had been glad for the restraint.

The pair of them, the miss and his master, had acted like poles of a magnetic field: drawing him in opposite directions, yet somehow multiplying each other’s strength by their very contradiction to each other.

The more he served his master, the more he loved the miss. The more he loved her, the more he wished to serve his master.

The tension had kept him balanced, poised on a wire that stretched from one to the other.

When his feet were tempted to wander, it snapped him back into Zen’s service like the recoil of an elastic band. When his thoughts were tempted to wander, it slapped him in the face, reminding him to keep his distance.

When he guarded Shirayuki, it guarded his heart.

It protected her from him.

That was how Obi had wanted it. It kept the sun shining and the wheels turning in the little world he had come to inhabit; it promised better things for the people who had come to inhabit his affections.

Now it was gone.

He had known as soon as the messenger had arrived to deliver tidings under an ebony standard: Trade the wedding wreaths for black velvet drapes--the prince was dead.

Shirayuki had already left her position in the pharmacy in expectations of assuming her place at Zen’s side, but their future together was cut short before she ever had a chance to prove herself in her new role as second princess of Clarines.

In a way, she and Obi were both out of a job. Maybe Izana would have kept him on the payroll, overlooked his essential extraneousness now that his brother’s patronage had ended, but it didn’t matter.

Obi was no courtier. He knew little of noble intrigues when they operated within the sphere of legality. He could not predict the politicking of aristocrats.

He was not equipped to confront the vague of possibilities of threats that might arise in the absence of Zen’s influence.

Obi was equal to combating only one danger to his newly bereaved miss, and that was himself.

Rather, it was the irresistible urge within him that propelled him towards her, compelled him to intrude on her notice, interrupt her grieving, and demand her attention. Whatever guise his caring assumed--solid comfort, faithful labor, teasing companionship--he knew the throbbing pulse, the bone-deep longing underlying it all.

He knew his friendship with her was a poisoned apple: pleasant on the surface, but fatal at its core.

Obi would sacrifice anything to spare her pain, defend her from harm. So he had taken the necessary steps and acted accordingly to remove the threat.

In the tumult of the first throes of mourning, when she was hemmed in and pressed on all sides by the people of the castle and her family-to-have-been, he had made himself disappear.

He still carried his identification tag, tucked away and secured in a secret pocket in his belt, but he had known better than to present it at the gate.

Even in a state of mourning, even on the very day of the funeral, he doubted whether the relentless bureaucracy of Wistal Castle would falter enough to let a deserter pass unnoticed.

Donning his messenger uniform had also seemed risky, when none of the other castle employees answered to the description of long, wild, and dark. He had clothed himself in stealth and shadows instead.

What a contrast they must make: she, weighted with planes of white silk, and he, insubstantial as a leaf passing between the earth and the sun.

The thread stretched between them had come unmoored. One end of it waved free, and he was off-balance, trying to slip away from her, let gravity pull them apart, but--

She was holding onto to him, clinging to him, and there was no one else there.

#Akagami no Shirayukihime #obiyuki #major character death #PurePassion #Beauty and Her Beast #less focus on story mechanics #more on the feels #hence the funky verb tenses

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whimsicalworldofme · 6 years

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Tumbling Down

Poe taps Ava to join him as he interrogates the captured pilot of the crashed ship and her ability to use the Force gives them information that seems almost impossible.

Word Count: 2879

Content Warnings: Mentions of death, murder, and violence, though none graphic.

The wide, tiled, echoing halls of the command center bustled with people darting too and from various scrambling tasks, the whole base still on alert. Officers nodded politely or even greeted Ava with a quick “ma’am” before darting off to tend to their duties. She could hear talk of ships being fueled, the scope of their radar being expanded beyond their planet’s system, all the sort of things that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end and her mouth go dry as the sands of Jakku. Though Rey had insisted they were safe, command was clearly still on high alert. She couldn’t do anything about that though, so she kept her head up and made her way to the room Rey said Poe would be in.

She knocked on the heavy door, the echo of it reverberating through the air. No one answered but the mechanical door lifted open with the whir and hiss of its type and Ava stepped through, finding Poe and a few lower ranking officers on the other side, Isaacs, Atmon, and Tuth. They huddled in a clump on one side of the room, hands clasped behind their backs or folded over their chests as the muttered amongst themselves. None of them were watching the girl on the other side of the room, cuffed down to a chair. She was humanoid with a complexion that reminded Ava of the reddish, sand worn cliffs of Tatooine like she had seen once or twice only in pictures. Her hair, deep green in color hung long on one side and was buzzed short on the other. But those were the most noticeable things about her. What caught and held Ava’s attention was the high collared, deep grey uniform jacket she wore bearing the insignia and rank badges of the First Order.

“You sent for me?” Ava asked her husband, glancing warily at the prisoner. She wouldn’t use any sort of pet names or even Poe’s name, unwilling to give any information away to this intruder. Every sense in her body screamed to be alert, stay guarded, not trust anything.

“We need your particular skills,” Poe stated in a low voice, his arms folded over his chest, head slightly bowed, glancing up at her from under his thick brows. “She says she doesn’t know how she got here. You can tell if she’s being deceptive, right?”

“Yes,” Ava nodded. Searching the feelings of others was a handy Force tool. She sometimes used it to understand why Luke was lashing out without a seeming reason, but she tried not to do so too often. “She said she doesn’t know how she got here?”

The officers all nodded. Ava shifted her weight from one foot to the other, leaning to one side to get another look at their captive. She wasn’t struggling against her bonds and she didn’t look uncomfortable or upset. Ava almost expected her to look annoyed but even that wasn’t the case. Her eyes were wide and she chewed lightly on her bottom lip. Her fingers curled and uncurled and tapped on the arms of the chair. Fear poured off her in waves that threatened to knock Ava over.

“Sit with me and we’ll see what we can find out,” Poe nodded his head in the direction of the table and Ava followed as he led the way over.

The other officers shuffled out of the room, but Ava knew they were just going to the adjoined observation room. There was a window and a speaker system, so they could hear everything and see it all but not interrupt. The pair of them sat down side by side across from the alien woman and Poe clicked on a recording device. Ava had never sat in on anything like this, but she knew it happened when an enemy operative was captured. Leia had conducted these types of interrogations previously, her connection to the Force undoubtedly an asset just as Ava’s would be.

“We have a few questions for you,” Poe began, glancing over at Ava who nodded in encouragement. “We won’t harm you, so you don’t need to be afraid. But we’d appreciate honest answers.”

“You’re a lot nicer about it than the Order would be,” the woman scoffed slightly.

“We do things a little differently around here,” he stated, leaning forward, hands clasped in front of him on the table. “First off, can I get your name?”

It wasn’t a common question in an interrogation, but Ava knew her husband, knew his heart. He treated everyone with decency, like a living breathing being with a soul. His kindness wouldn’t ever end with only people belonging to the Resistance.

“Captain Isaria Obles,” she didn’t hesitate. “Who are you?”

“Poe,” he answered with as little information as possible, but Ava watched as Isaria’s eyes widened in recognition and admiration.

“Poe Dameron?” She got a little giddy even. Poe nodded, his brow furrowing in confusion. “General Poe Dameron? The one who led the attack on Star Killer base?”

“Yes…” Poe drew the word out, clearly at a loss as to what was happening.

“Cor,” she whistled. “You’re a legend! I got to see you in action. I’ve never seen flying like that before. The way you move that X-Wing,” she shook her head. “It’s like poetry in motion.”

Poe laughed, licking his bottom lip and scratching at his scalp, clearly taken aback but chuffed that someone, even on the opposite side, held his skill in such high regard. Ava didn’t mind it, but they had an objective to complete, so she cleared her throat, hinting that he needed to get things back on track.

“Who’s your friend here?” Isaria tipped her head in Ava’s direction.

“I’m Ava.”

“Just Ava?” The captive held a hint of curiosity in her tone and it was difficult to place what drove it.

“Just Ava,” Poe interjected, clearly not wanting Isaria getting too chummy with her. “Now, Isaria, I have to ask, are you alone? Our radar hasn’t picked up any other ships in the area but that doesn’t mean anything.”

“I’m a defector,” the alien claimed. “I told you before, I’m on my own, intentionally.”

Ava couldn’t feel anything disingenuous about her or her claim. She felt determination and a desperation to be believed but not from a driver of deception, rather one of wanting safety.

“You’ll forgive me if it’s difficult to believe you,” Poe insisted. He stayed calm and curt, but somehow kind, his tone very similar to how he addressed Luke when their son had done something wrong. Poe never spoke in anger to him but rather moved to get Luke to examine his feelings and thoughts and correct his missteps. His patience was a marvel and Ava felt proud watching him now, though she knew she really needed to focus.

“Your men searched my ship and me,” Isaria said. “I have no tracking devices, nothing transmitting a signal, nothing encrypted or otherwise. That ship doesn’t even belong to the First Order. I got it on Keslar Six. Traded my Tie for it. The buyer clearly got the better end of that deal, piece of shit…” she mumbled through a stream of curses in her native language that neither Ava nor Poe understood but Ava could feel the emotion behind the words and she was genuinely angry about having lost her Tie fighter and having been cheated into a junk ship.

“Why would you want to defect from the First Order?” Ava asked this time, drawing her out of her mumbled tirade. Isaria stared blankly at her, blinking once or twice.

“Why would anyone stay?” She countered. “I assume you’ve been with the Resistance for quite some time?” Ava nodded. “You’ve seen what they do, what they’re like. It’s gotten infinitely worse since Supreme Leader Snoke’s murder. General Hux is a monster. Supreme Leader Ren does nothing to rein him in.”

“Worse how?” Poe’s cheek twitched slightly as he asked, almost afraid to hear the answer. The girl’s gaze turned to him, eyes ablaze.

“I’ve seen village after village slaughtered. Down to every last baby. Used to be that people would be forced to labor camps. Now Hux has them killed. I know labor camps are bad too, don’t give me that look,” she scowled. “But at least they were alive. There’s forced occupation more than ever. Storm Troopers posted in mines and production lines to work people until they collapse. The Order is in desperate need of supplies and terror seems to be the only way to get them. He obliterated an entire city of a million people from orbit because they refused to allow their mines to be conscripted. He wanted to make an example of them.”

Ava felt her heart twisting in agony and grief, seeing Poe’s expression she knew he felt the same. The First Order may not have a super weapon capable of destroying planets in one strike anymore, but they were still deadly. Even if they were in their death throes, they would fight to the end without an ounce of humanity.

“I couldn’t be part of it anymore,” Isaria shook her head. “I joined the Order because I believed in it as a unifying force that the galaxy needed after the fall of the empire, saw them as a strong hand that the Republic simply didn’t have that was necessary to maintain peace and order. But that’s not order. It’s terror.”

“But why come to us?” Ava asked. “Why not just run away?”

“I don’t know,” Isaria frowned. “I didn’t plan to join the Resistance. I don’t even know how I knew how to get here. Something just…possessed me. I wish I could explain it better than that, but I can’t.”

“You didn’t know we were here before you left the First Order?” Poe asked, one brow going up quizzically. Isaria shook her head. “Did you ask around once you got away from the Order?” Another head shake. “And you didn’t hear any rumors and decide to check them out?” Another headshake.

“I thought I was just running away. I don’t know why I felt compelled to come here. I can’t explain it. It’s like I wasn’t in control my body just autopiloted me here,” she insisted. “Like it was hardwired into my brain.”

Ava felt her pulse quicken. She knew there was only one real explanation for that sensation. Getting up from her seat, she went around the table, unafraid since Isaria was still shackled to the chair. She didn’t warn her, didn’t say anything, the all consuming need to know the truth, a fear mingled with hope, driving her beyond her usual use of manners. Reaching out a hand, she kept it lingering with her fingertips about an inch from the alien girl’s temple. Pulling in a deep breath as though about to plunge under water, Ava tapped into the Force and dove into the depths of Isaria’s mind and memories. What wasn’t clear to her, what had been hidden, could easily be revealed through the Force. Shutting her eyes, she pushed her way into the deep recesses that the girl couldn’t access any longer herself.

“What is she doing?” Isaria sounded panicked and Ava heard the rattle of the metal cuffs on the chair.

“She won’t hurt you,” Poe tried to calm her. “She might be able to find answers for you.”

“I don’t like it,” Isaria complained. “What is this, some kind of hoodoo?”

“She’s a Jedi,” Poe stated, pride undeniable in his voice.

“Kriff,” Isaria whistled but said nothing else.

Ava saw it all. Saw the doubts that had plagued the girl that she held back whenever new and more deplorable orders came down the chain of command. How she had guarded her doubts while others who spoke openly in condemnation were tortured and even executed. Ava saw the nights of desperation trying to formulate a plan with stolen galactic maps hidden carefully in her quarters. And then there was him, like an ominous shadow, towering, imposing, and terrifying.

Do you doubt the cause of the First Order Captain? The deep familiar voice echoed in Ava’s mind as she saw Isaria’s memories.

No Supreme Leader.

The lie would sound convincing enough to the untrained ear. The shadowy man, robed and cloaked in black said nothing, simply pressed his full lips together and raised a brow. Ava knew that face, knew the mind behind it. She dug a little deeper. There was something there, blocking her but she powered past it.

You will go to Paxis, Ben’s voice rang out and he then gave the coordinates. Once there you will find Poe Dameron and give him this holo-drive. If you’re caught you won’t remember the coordinates to Paxis or that it’s a rebel base. You will believe you were simply running away. You will not remember that I sent you. You will not tell anyone that I sent you. If Dameron asks where you got your information, you will say you stole it.

Ava nearly collapsed to her knees from the effort it took to break down the barriers Ben had put in place, her whole body shaking from exhaustion but also utter shock. Rey had been right. Despite Ben being upset about Ava marrying Poe, despite his behaving childishly to her, he was turning back to the light.

“Isaria, is there something you needed to give to Poe?” She gave a verbal nudge, wondering why that hadn’t come up before.

“A holo-drive,” the captive nodded. “It has information about trade routes, lists of base locations, layouts, everything I could compile without getting caught.”

“Where is it?” Ava asked.

“They took it,” Isaria shrugged.

“She’s being honest,” Ava turned her attention back to Poe, walking with shaking steps back over to her chair and dropping into it, still in a haze of disbelief. “She didn’t know we were here. She didn’t have any control over coming here. But she’d not a threat.”

“We’ll give you quarters,” Poe said, slow to turn his attention away from his wife, “you’ll be under watch for a while, you understand.”

“You aren’t going to lock me up?” Isaria balked.

“You’re not a prisoner,” Poe assured her. “We have to be wary and you’ll be limited to where you can go but we won’t lock you in a cell and leave you to rot.” He waved a hand for the other officers to come back into the room. “Captain Isaacs has been working to get a place ready for you. She’ll accompany you there and introduce you to the fighters who will be in charge of keeping an eye on you.”

Isaacs strode effortlessly into the room and unlocked the cuffs on the chair. Isaria stood up slowly, confusion mingling with relief in her expression. Hesitantly she held out a hand for Poe.

“Thank you, General,” she could hardly speak above a whisper.

“You’re welcome,” Poe shook her hand with a curt nod.

Isaria straightened before unbuttoning her uniform Jacket and shrugging it off, letting it drop on the floor. She still looked like a member of the First Order in her military boots, grey pants, and black undershirt, but at least the insignia was gone. She stepped on the jacket and twisted her foot a little, rubbing it into the ground with disdain before walking out of the room with Isaacs, not bothering to look back.

“It was Ben,” Ava murmured once the door shut. “He put together the information on the drive. He used the Force to send her here.”

“He knows where we are?” Poe’s alarm wasn’t unwarranted. “How?”

“My guess is whatever his weird bond with Rey is gave him insight,” Ava shrugged. “You know none of us would tell him. You know we’re very guarded about details that might give us away.”

“We’ve been getting word of a lot of defectors lately,” Poe mused. “Defectors with information that ultimately gets back to us. Do you think he could be behind that?”

“I don’t know,” she propped her elbows on the table and leaned forward, raking her fingers through her hair, struggling to make sense of what she’d witnessed. “The First Order has a lot of problems on its own. But if Ben truly wanted to make things right, he’d be smart enough to take advantage of that and his position. No one would suspect the Supreme Leader of undermining the whole Order, would they?”

“No, I don’t think they would,” Poe bit his bottom lip, head tilting to the side as he mulled it over. “Atmon is looking over the holo-drive on a secure device right now. We’ve expanded the radar perimeter and have everyone on alert still in case we have to evacuate. This could all be an elaborate trap.”

“It could,” Ava nodded. “But I hope it isn’t.”

“You still want him to come back, don’t you?” Poe didn’t hold any anger in the question, didn’t seem upset even. He reached out and rubbed her back with one hand as she nodded, momentarily mute. “If Leia didn’t give up hope, then neither will we,” he offered her a fond smile. “He’s still our Ben, no matter what we’ve all been through. He’s still family.”

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robotlit · 3 years

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“Rock Opera”

[PROMPT: You are the guitarist in a rock band, living in a world where music has been outlawed by a totalitarian, fun-hating government.]

Your band is about to play a concert for an audience of people who will be shocked and horrified at what you do.

You have no idea how this is going to go down. Will they love your music? Hate it? Or maybe even both?

The only thing that can save you now is your own ability to perform. If you fail, you're going to be executed. If you succeed, you'll be a national hero and that might not be enough.

Good luck.

The show has started. Warn your friends. The whole world is watching.

The curtain opens and you stand upon a raised platform, the rest of your band behind you. You look out at the crowd and begin playing. You're not a particularly good instrumentalist, but your musical acclaim is sufficient to carry you through. Still, you must remain focused. Any slip-up now could prove fatal.

Suddenly, the guitarist next to you drops his instrument and clutches at his head. He begins screaming into his hands and railing against you and the government. He's right. This is your only shot. The world is watching.

You pick up your own instrument and begin to play. You're not going to let some crazy man ruin your moment. He tries to stop you, but the guards restrain him.

He continues to struggle and eventually manages to pull one of the guns from a guard and begin shooting at you all.

You continue to play, despite the fear and panic that have overcome you. You don't know if you'll make it out of this alive. The gunshots begin and ring throughout the auditorium.

You make a glance at the audience and see that there is no longer an audience. There is only pain. Blood. Grief.

The gunshots continue and you find yourself hit by a stray bullet. You fall to the stage and watch as your fellow musicians continue to play, hoping that you'll eventually be saved.

You're dying. This is what death feels like. It's cold. It's dark. It's all around you. You can't hear the band anymore, they're just a memory now. Maybe they finished their set. Maybe they stopped playing altogether and ran away. Maybe they're still there, continuing to play despite your death.

What does it matter? Your vision is starting to fade. It's black. There is nothing but black.

"Anyone can play guitar."

No. You're not having this. You didn't die for this. You kept playing. You didn't win the battle, but you came out on top.

"Anyone can play an instrument."

You have to disagree. They're not anything special. They're just instruments that people wanted to have in their performances. They're not one in a million, they're just average.

"Everyone can't be a rockstar."

Everyone can be something. Something they achieve in their life time. Something that makes a difference.

"You're already gone."

Correct. But you didn't die here. You survived, unlike those around you. You're still here, aren't you?

"I can still make it."

You know the end is near when you hear the beginning. There is no more music left to play. Only the silence will follow. There is nothing left to say. The world has ended around you.

You force yourself to stand, ignoring the pain that shoots through your body. You make it to the edge of the stage and begin to make your way off of it. You're moving slower than you normally do. You're not as spry as you once were. Your reflexes aren't what they used to be either. That's fine. You don't need them anymore.

The flashing lights and heating Auditorium stage lights are making you vision blurry. That's fine too. You look down and see your feet move forward. You watch as your legs push the ground into action. It's all so easy now.

You hear one more gunshot ring out. You can't tell where it came from, or even if it's real. It might have just run out of bullets. Doesn't matter. All that matters is you're moving forward.

You take one last look back before leaving the stage entirely. The auditorium is in chaos. Bodies lay on the ground. Your ears are bleeding. You've got a hole in your head. None of that matters. You've kept playing. You can only assume that the rest of the band did as well, seeing as the performance is over.

"Anyone can play music."

Correct. But only the best will get to play themselves.

Your body continues to limp along as you walk through the dead. You're almost out of here. Just one more hallway and you'll be home free.

The games over. Time for real life to begin.

There's a figure ahead of you, stumbling along. He's holding a single bullet in his hand. His face is bloody and he's clearly wounded, but he's still alive. He turns his head and looks at you. His eyes are lifeless, but his mouth is moving. He's trying to tell you something. You lean in close to hear what he's trying to say.

"Your girlfriend is safe."

What? Who? Is this some sort of code language?

"Your girlfriend...she's..."

What? You have no idea. You walk closer to him, but he steps back. He's struggling to say something.

"Your girlfriend...she's..."

He looks up at the ceiling and takes a deep breath. The words seem to escape his lips even as they remain stuck in his throat.

"Your girlfriend is fine." He looks down and spasms a bit. You don't know what he's trying to say. You're not sure if you even want to know.

"Your girlfriend is fine."

You hear these words over and over again in your head. What does he mean? Is it a question? A statement? A threat? A promise? You have no idea. Your hearing is bad. Your hearing has let you down on numerous occasions. You've decided to not dwell on it any longer.

You continue walking forward. You can see the exit in the distance. Only a few feet away now. You've survived this far after all.

The man in front of you looks at you with a blank expression. He looks so lifeless that you almost wonder if he's dead. You're not sure. His lips move, but no sound emerges. He seems to be asking you a question.

"What?" you ask in response. He seems to be struggling to talk. "What's wrong with him?"

I don't know. He just looks so sad. He looks so lonely.

"He wants to know your name."

I don't know. It's not like you keep track of all of that. You've been a hermit for so long. Your mind tends to forget such mundane details.

"You don't know?" asks the hitchhiker. "I thought musicians were the most mnemonic people."

You shrug and keep walking. "Maybe they are. I'm out of practice though."

The man looks down, but not before giving you a quick wink. You've stopped responding to his sporadic attempts at communication. He seems to have given up on that pursuit.

You hear another gunshot in the distance. It still seems so far away. Someone else is dead. In fact, someone has just entered the hallway you're in. It's the bloody corpse of the hitchhiker you've been Passing Back. He was going so fast that he must have regained consciousness briefly in the middle of his death throes. This just seemed to prove that you're better off alone.

As you approach the counter at the front of the store, a figure materializes in front of you. It's your mother. She doesn't look well.

"Where has she been?" she asks frantically. "I've been looking all over for you!"

This question confuses you. Where has who been? Your mom has been passing by your home every day. You can see her from your window. She looks embarrassed.

"I don't mean your dad...I'm talking about your girlfriend of course."

You don't understand.

"What?"

"Stop acting so surprised! I've been out looking for you every since...well I can't believe I'm telling you this."

Your eyes widen. Your mouth gapes wide open.

"She was found dead in her apartment!" Your mother turns away and covers her face. She can't look at you anymore. "I'm sorry," she whispers, "I just can't...I just can't take it anymore."

A customer walks up to the counter. He glances briefly at you, ignores you, and buys a newspaper. As he turns to leave, you realize you're shaking. You sit down in a chair and try to compose yourself.

There has to be an explanation. A logical explanation. But what? What could your mother mean? What is happening to this world? Has it always been like this? Why have you not noticed?

Eventually, you compose yourself. You hug your knees and your shoulders stoop low. You don't want to face this world anymore. You can't. The world has lost all color and charm. There is nothing to smile about anymore. You don't feel like laughing or crying. You just feel empty.

You sniffle and wipe away a stray tear. You stand up tall. You're ready to take on the brightened tomorrow.

You exit the store and are hit by a rush of wind. You look up at the sky. The sun peering through the gray clouds feels so comforting.

I wish I could go back to bed. I wish this whole day would just go away.

You hum a little tune to yourself. This seems to calm you. This seems to make you happy. Although it's the wrong thing, you smile.

I'm so tired. I wish I could sleep forever.

You turn to head home. Maybe you'll find that place where it's always happy and bright. A place that doesn't exist in the real world.

You're so tired...

#robotlit #ai dungeon 2

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becbibliophile · 4 years

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So here they are the top 5 reads for 2019. This year was a hard one to narrow down but each of these books totally took me to new levels in reading that I hadn’t ever reached before or hadn’t for a while. There is a nice mix of angsty, fun and breathtaking reads. And I hope that each of you checks them out and if you haven’t read them yet, add them to your TBR right away!

#WomensLit #SecondChance #Family

The New York Times bestselling author of Rainy Day Friends and Lost and Found Sisters returns to Wildstone, California…

Brooke Lemon has always led the life she wanted, wild adventures—and mistakes—included, something her perfect sister, Mindy, never understood. So when Mindy shows up on Brooke’s doorstep in the throes of a break-down with her three little kids in tow, Brooke’s shocked.

Wanting to make amends, Brooke agrees to trade places, taking the kids back to Wildstone for a few days so Mindy can pick up the pieces and put herself back together. What Brooke doesn’t admit is she’s just as broken . . . Also how does one go home after seven years away? It doesn’t take long for Brooke to come face-to-face with her past, in the form of one tall, dark, sexy mistake. But Garrett’s no longer interested. Only his words don’t match his actions, leaving Brooke feeling things she’d shoved deep.

Soon the sisters begin to wonder: Are they lemons in life? In love? All they know is that neither seems to be able to run far enough to outpace her demons. And when secrets surface, they’ll have to learn that sometimes the one person who can help you the most is the one you never thought to ask.

GOODREADS | AMAZON | B&N | APPLE BOOKS | KOBO

MY THOUGHTS

First off, Jill Shalvis… I devour just about every book she releases. But for some reason, I had missed this series and so The Lemon Sisters was my first book (Book 3 in the series) that I had read.

As I dove into the book I was immediately taken by these sisters. My sister and I were so close as kids, then life going in different directions tore us apart as adults. I think a lot of sisters can relate to this. Maybe it was the emotions of my real-life situation that made me latch onto these sisters and I was totally emersed in their tale. The dual stories of the sister who has detached from the daily life of the sister that is struggling with being a mom, a wife, a businesswoman and wanting it all to go so smoothly. It just all hit home in a very real way to me. So much of the storyline spoke to me and even shouted at me. I laughed and cried and sighed along with the characters. I started the book and didn’t put it down for more than 5 minutes at a time before I had to get back to see what was going on with Mindy, Garrett, Brooke, and Linc… plus don’t forget about those adorable children too.

This is a book on second chances, both with sisters and the guy. It’s about repairing relationships. Learning to love yourself and be happy with the life given to you. It’s about new beginnings and putting the past in the past. It’s a book I won’t soon forget.

#SecondChance #BestFriendsSister #Forbidden

There’s two sides to every love story. The how you fell in love, and the how you fell apart.

This is ours.

The cardinal rule of friendship is you don’t mess with your friend’s sister. That goes double when she’s his little sister.

It was just supposed to be fun.

She wasn’t supposed to end up being the love of my life. And I definitely wasn’t supposed to break her heart.

Ainsley is a wedding dress designer. That should’ve been a warning that she’s a hopeless romantic. That should’ve clued me in that she believes love conquers all.

But there are some things that love can’t fix. I’m one of them.

She thinks love is the answer.

But love is the reason I let her go.

GOODREADS | AMAZON | B&N | APPLE BOOKS | KOBO

MY THOUGHTS

This book… THIS BOOK!!! I cried… I laughed… I cried again… It had all the emotions and boy did I ever fall for these characters! Hands down will be in my top 5 for 2019. (SEE I KNEW!)

I’ve been reading Prescott for a while and this book is by far her best yet. She has a great way of weaving the story and grabbing your attention, making you feel each of the excitement of the characters, the passion, the remorse, the love, the grief.

This is a journey of two people who fall madly in love. Its a secret though, since she is his best friend and business partner’s little sister. But the moment these two connect on the page, you know they are destined to be together. But when tragedy strikes, is love, JUST LOVE enough?

I felt so much reading this book. I had to put it down at times to get take in the moments – the emotional pulls, the heartache and then the healing.

Although the book has some light moments, for the most part, it’s a heavy book. I had a good cry reading it. And fell in love with the hope that love can conquer all. Read this book. You won’t be sorry.

#ROMCOM

Cowritten by USA Today best-selling author Tara Sivec and award-winning narrator Andi Arndt, a hysterically funny, heartfelt romance about starting over and taking chances.

Nothing good ever comes from drinking a box of wine alone. So when I decided to entertain my drunken self by setting up some hand-me-down podcasting equipment and reading the steamy parts from romance novels, I never thought anyone would actually listen. The fact that I admitted my huge crush on my sexy next-door neighbor made the whole thing even more mortifying. But sometimes life surprises you, and that’s how my podcast, Heidi’s Discount Erotica, was born.

Now I, Heidi Larsen, a sweet former kindergarten teacher in Waconia, Minnesota, lead a scandalous double life reading erotic novels to the listening world. And with each episode, I find myself embracing my new alter ego more and more. Now I’m starting to feel more comfortable in my own skin and do things I never would have dreamed of – like kissing my neighbor.

Look out, Waconia, because Heidi’s on the loose! She’s in your ears, in your hearts, and down your pants…wait, that didn’t sound as good as it did in my head. Well, you get the picture, don’tcha know!

MY THOUGHTS

This had to be one of the funniest books I’ve ever read/listened to! This book was EVERYTHING and I recommend it to everyone who is looking for a fun, witty, excitingly sexy book.

A former kindergarten teacher steps out of her comfort zone, taking a job at an audiobook company. She becomes best friends with one of the biggest movie stars out there along with his romance novelist wife. All while trying to get up enough guts to approach the super sexy new next-door neighbor, that she feels she’s too plain jane to catch his eye. All while starting a podcast to help her take her unsexy to super hot!

Once again, being from North Dakota, this book brought back all the memories. The accents alone took me there. I just could not stop laughing!!

That being said, if you get the chance (and are part of the romance package with Audibles it’s FREE to listen to) YOU MUST LISTEN TO THE AUDIOBOOK!!! I was laughing like a maniac and I’m sure I had quite a few people ready to call the police on me as I was driving, wiping away tears and spewing soda out of my nose from laughing so hard (PS – Don’t drink anything while listening if you don’t want this to happen).

Get this book!!! The End

#FakeRomance #SiblingRivalary

FROM THE #1 ‘NEW YORK TIMES’ BESTSELLING AUTHOR COMES AN UNEXPECTED LOVE STORY OF FAMILY, SECRETS, AND THE MOST INTIMATE OF DECEPTIONS.

My estranged twin brother, Julian, was always the wonder boy – and soon-to-be CEO of our ruthless father’s corporation. My mother and me? Left behind. Now, years after tearing our family apart, my father dares to ask ��me” for a favor? Pretend to be Julian while he fights to survive a tragic accident. It can save the company. Nobody will be the wiser. It’ll be our secret.

I can play Dad’s favorite. I’ll do anything for Julian. And for my mother, who’ll want for nothing.

But this double life comes with a beauty of a hitch: my very real feelings for Julian’s fiancée, Isobel. Not only am I betraying Julian, I’m deceiving a woman I love. She doesn’t suspect a thing. As lies compound, lines are crossed and loyalties tested, all I can ask myself is. . .what have I done?

Because sooner or later something’s got to give. There’s no way I’m giving up Isobel. But once the truth is exposed, it might not be my choice at all.

GOODREADS | AMAZON

MY THOUGHTS

I think this book is RVD’s best book to date. It was filled with so much angsty goodness and I immediately fell for our hero (or is he?) Bridge. I understood his need to do the things he did (I know vague much? But I can’t give any spoilers away!)

The story is about twin brothers, Bridge and Julian, who were torn apart in middle school by their parent’s divorce and pitted against each other by their father. Full of twists and turns. Secrets and lies. Throw in a fake relationship and angst and you’ve got yourself a winner! Julian and Bridge are as different as night and day which makes what happens even that more intriguing.

Just know that you will be sucked into the story from the first chapter and if you’re like me, once you start, you’ll be putting your life on hold until you finish the last page. (Remember bookmarks are for quitters!)

Each book with Rachel gets better and better and I think Stealing Her takes her fans back to her earlier works. And the best part is we get book two in the series (each book is a standalone) in February of 2020.

#RomanticSuspense #SmallTown #LawEnforcment #Celebrity #BrothersBestFriend

Ok, so there are really THREE books that made my number one this year. All by the same author and all from the same series. I had too hard of a time picking just one of the books – so here you have the entire series, from a new author that popped into the Romance scene in 2019. And I see nothing but bigger and better things heading her way. The Sutter Lake Series by Catherine Cowles is my top read for 2019.

Beautifully Broken Pieces – Book One

vimeo

A woman who’s lost everything.

Taylor is looking for peace and quiet away from the memories of all she’s lost. A small mountain town where no one knows her seems like the perfect escape.

A man battling the ghosts of his past.

Walker loves his life just the way it is. His town, his family, his brothers in blue. Everything simple and easy—until a chance encounter changes it all.

When Taylor’s solitude is interrupted by the rugged cop, they find that the very thing they were avoiding might be just what they both need. As their iron wills clash and passion flares…a killer lurks.

And you never know who might be caught in the crosshairs.

GOODREADS | AMAZON | B&N | APPLE BOOKS | KOBO

Beautifully Broken Life – Book Two

vimeo

She’s on the run…

Tessa has finally found a safe haven in Sutter Lake, hiding in plain sight—just as long as no one asks too many questions.

He can’t escape…

Liam knows better than anyone how one wrong word, a single whisper can ruin a life. After seeing the darker side of fame, he’s desperate to retreat and find his voice again.

Two people from opposite worlds, brought together by a connection neither expected.

But the forces they’re both running from still lurk in the shadows…

And you never know when they might strike.

GOODREADS | AMAZON | B&N | APPLE BOOKS | KOBO

Beautifully Broken Spirit – Book Three

vimeo

She’s always been his safe place to land.

Jensen has shared a special bond with Tuck for as long as she can remember, their friendship a language that never needed words. But as life threw her one curveball after another, that secret language turned to stony silence.

He’s always been her protector.

Tuck has looked out for Jensen since the day she was born. As his best friend’s little sister, he’s tried to keep her firmly in the friend category. But she’s always been more.

All it takes is one moment of weakness to send Tuck’s fiercely guarded walls crumbling to the ground. As a new fire burns between them, someone watches. Someone who doesn’t like the new life Jensen’s building for herself.

And they’ll stop at nothing to keep her in the dark.

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MY THOUGHTS

Set in the idyllic setting of Sutter Lakes, Oregon, these books are interconnected standalone novels full of suspense and romance. Each book I was immediately thrown into the life of our main heroines – who all are running in some way from their pasts and starting new in this small town. They are strong, independent and a lot of the times stubborn, in both the good and pain in the ass way, paired with men who support and connect with them in just about spiritual ways. And all are super sexy (Sherrif, Musician, Tracker) and make a girl swoon.

Sutter Lake is home to a herd of wild horses which also play a big part in each of the novels. After reading this series, I promptly begged my husband to look for a job in Oregon. Catherine makes you fall not only for her characters but also for the scenery which becomes a character within itself. I can vividly imagine where these men and women walk as everything is painted so clearly for the reader.

Catherine has definitely become my go-to author for romantic suspense. You get lost immediately upon cracking open the book and she takes you and her characters on a journey that keeps you riveted to the page and falling hook, line, and sinker into the storyline. She had a busy year publishing three books with the conclusion of the series being published in early February 2020. (Beautifully Broken Control). These books were everything to me. Catherine is my most recommended author for 2019. And so, my number one book(s) for 2019 is the Sutter Lake Series.

I hope that you were able to find some new authors and books to add to I’m sure your never-ending To Be Read List. Be sure to enter to win a $25 Amazon GC below and Happy New Year!

XO-

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Top Reads of 2019 /Books 5-1 Here they are my TOP READS of 2019... @JillShalvis @PrescottLane1 @TaraSivec @andi_arndt @RachVD @CatherineCowles So here they are the top 5 reads for 2019. This year was a hard one to narrow down but each of these books totally took me to new levels in reading that I hadn't ever reached before or hadn't for a while.

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madluv · 7 years

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CHOKE / a jarley fanfiction

Written by Lemily @madluv

NSFW Fluff/Smut

Harley Quinn’s jealous streak gets the better of her and Joker is going to pay!

She was red hot fury. Veins burning with a potent, vile rage, that had her fingers trembling, her heart hammering. She had screamed, cried, smeared her once immaculate make-up, thrown her favourite bottle of perfume and let Bud and Lou feast a frenzy on his extensive collection of footwear. But it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t enough to wreck havoc on his and her belongings, pent up in the penthouse alone and stewing. She needed to see him – hurt him – just as he had been hurting her.

She didn’t believe it at first. The newspaper article, the photo print, of none other than her puddin’ stirring chaos in the city. And if she hadn’t been admiring him so, she would of missed the most important detail, the thing that had made her blood boil and her jaw clench tight. As beside him stood a woman civilian, red-headed, red-lipped, wrapped up in his free arm, awfully, dreadfully, close to her one and only. And Harley squinted, further studied the photograph, donned her glasses, and had spotted then, how her puddin’s hand was around the wench’s wrist. How they were together admist the carnage. Together. How the snapshot had caught him in the act.

The lyin’ cheatin’ sleazy good fer nothin’ son-of-a-bitch!

Harley tried to tell herself briefly, that it was purely coincidence. That the circumstance must have been different. It was funny if you’d been there – that kinda thing! To save herself the heartache. To try and stop the floods of tears that were prickling behind her searching eyes. It’s not what it looks like, she told herself – not what it looks like MY ASS – and she couldn’t stop her imagination running away, just like J had clearly been doin’ with his HUSSY, parading around the town as they would do. Probably having taken his new squeeze to their local haunts too, kissing under neon lights, just like their kiss, arm in arm, once upon a dream. And captured in the lens, it was undeniable evidence! Not dissimilar to the many clippings that donned the wall of their bedroom. Harley’s loving memoirs. HA HA HA. She seethed.

A few hours had been spent solely dedicated to tearing up said bedroom, since he was absent and she couldn’t tear at his STUPID FACE. She’d screamed and screeched and sobbed so hard that it had pained her. Her chest splitting and heaving with anger and grief. She’d thrown herself onto their bed, only to throw herself back off again, and had fought with the sheets like a rabid animal, in the throes of her despair she had decided, there was no better time for revenge.

She couldn’t let another minute pass by, leaving him to think and gloat on how he’d fooled her. Harley was no idiot, and she was going to prove to J just how quickly she’d caught him at his little game. And so, clad in nothing but a thin nightdress, mascara running, tiny heels, she took his favourite car and sped recklessly, dangerously, stupidly to his bar, accompanied by a small ball-hammer placed delicately upon the incriminating newspaper in the passenger seat.

Harley parked (horrifically) with no care in the world of who or what she damaged, bumping three other vehicles and scoffing at the sound of paint peeling under pressure. She inched the car crunch-crunch-CRUNCHING into it’s space. J loved that car. She loved J. Fortunately cars were much easier to fix than broken, battered hearts. And soon to be broken, battered bodies. She got out, SHATTERING the windscreen with one grand and gratitious SWING! Laughing through hysterical tears, Harley stormed towards the back door of his club. Her heart bled, and his would too before the night was done.

The doorman, dressed like a clown, looked less of a fool than she was feeling. And she glared at the goon from behind watery eyelashes, demanding simply, “where is he?” Her tone was low, and with a fist around the handle of her hammer, had him stammering.

“Ahh – hey Quinn, you know – Jay don’t want no visitors tonight –" his gloved hands were up in surrender to the scorned woman at his station.

“Why, is he fuckin’ her?”

The clown’s brows raised high at the question, the facepaint couldn’t hide the confusion. But Harley didn’t need clarification. He was fuckin’ her. Just as they would do in the private intimacy of his office, when the simple order would circulate: Do not disturb.

“He is fuckin’ her ain’t he?”

“Woah – what? Look, Quinn, no offence to ya’ really, you know we love ya’, but this ain’t the first time you’ve come knockin’ with questions like this. This is Jay we are talkin’ about here–”

What was his point? Yeah it was J she was talking about. Who else other than the cheatin’ back-stabbin’–

“Look, Harley, I’ll do you a favour and let you inside, but you can’t tell the boss that I did.”

So, Harley’s most beloved was screwin’ around on work time (quite literally!) couldn’t this clown see she had more pressing problems to deal with, than his career concerns? “It’ll be our little secret,” she told him, barging through.

The thrumming of loud, steady music, the murmer of the punters, dancers, criminals and celebrities alike, ebbed through the brickwork and through to the back. Harley weaved through the narrow corridors, manned by all manner of lackeys, recieving nods of recognition and respect. This was, after all, just as much her place now, as his. They’d been together long enough that every door, every meeting, every nook, every cranny of Joker’s nightclub was open and accessible to none other than the notorious Harley Quinn. It was their empire. No secrets. Or so he’d said. FUNNY GUY. Real funny.

Though anger spurred her onward to his office on the third floor, a feeling of utmost dread weighed heavy in the pit of her stomach. She wasn’t prepared for the scene she was conjuring, and it bought with it more tears, more pain. So much pain! If the scarlet harlot was in there, with him, legs at his hips and back pressed against the desk – there would be a crimson crescendo before Harley was done.

She booted the door, one bold, brave move. Her breath hitched, crying, cringing, tensing for the moment her heart would be torn wide open. Her hammer poised to strike rested at her cheek and Harley charged into his office in one rapid movement, a manical mess spilling forth.

What Harley saw then, shocked her more than all of her impure imaginings. The Joker, her Mister J, the light and love of her life, sat, alone and contemplative. And he smiled at her, gladly, despite her unexpected entrance. A single brow raised as he noted her attire (or lack thereof) and cocked his head curiously at the weapon she was wielding.

“Harley, baby!”

He went to stand, arms wide and beckoning but Harley ignored him, bewildered, eyes darting the room, desperately seeking what she had been certain to find. Where was he keeping his floozy? Had the men given him time to usher her into a hidin’? Had he been warned? Prepared? Were there accomplices in this bitter and twisted betrayal?

“Looking for something?” Joker asked, and watched as she pulled open his wardrobe, tugging each and every suit jacket off of it’s hanger and onto the floor. “Baby?”

“I’m lookin’ for her!” She snapped, turning to shove the newspaper clipping into his face – “where are you hidin’ her huh? You think I wouldn’t find out?” Harley’s breath was ragged and she shook with fury as he surveyed the article, squinting at the image therein.

J sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, “not this again –”

“Well?” she wanted an answer, or would find it herself! And took to pulling out the contents of his glass cabinets, knocking down vintage drinks and shattering tumblers. She began to work around him at his desk, unsheathing every drawer and emptying every last sheet of paper, every pen, every paperweight.

“Who do you think I’m hiding Harls, Tinkerbell?” He barked a laugh, but she could tell from his tone he wasn’t amused. Funnily enough – neither was she.

Harley turned her warpath onto him – THIS AIN’T THE TIME FOR JOKES – and threw her hammer onto his desk, freeing her hands up to grapple at his throat. She took J by surprise and pinned him instantly, easily, pressing hard upon his adam’s apple.

“Harls –” he choked, “sweetness, it’s not– what you think!”

“Sure, it ain’t Mister J!”

“I don’t know – who she is!” His voice was high and cracking under the tightness of her grip. “Honestly – I was just – gonna kill her.” It sounded like something J would say, it sounded a lot like somethin’ he’d do too.

“Gonna?!” Harley searched his humoured features, even with her crushing his windpipe, he still smiled for her. “Is that before or after ya’ decided to fuck?”

He blinked. “What? No – I didn’t get to kill her – cause of – cause of the Batman.” He gave a limp (g a s p ing) shrug.

Funny. She had wanted to question his swollen lip and busted brow, and the purple, yellow hues that clouded around his bloodshot eyes. Her hold on him eased slightly, and her temper faltered.

“C'mon Harley, you know – I’ve only got eyes for you!”

How many times had she heard him say those words? And yet, every time, her heart skipped a beat. It skipped a beat now, no matter her anger, her hurt or embarrassment. She sniffled, and drew away from him. “Y–you really mean it?”

He ran a hand through the tangled matt of her hair, wiping a fallen tear with the soft pad of his thumb. “Harley, Harley, Harley,” he tutted, “what am I gonna do with you?” He spoke with a soft endearment no matter her behaviour. He seemed to have some idea on what to do, however, planting a firm kiss upon her cracked lips.

She melted, despite herself, despite all her doubts and displeasures. Harley could not resist his gentle eyes and gentle touch. When he was with her, like this, in a way he was with no one else, she could not fight her endless and insatiable love for him. Anything goes.

Harley’s wrath turned to wanting, and she flung herself into his arms, reciprocating his kiss with a fiery hunger. She was already fumbling with the buttons of his shirt, and he, his belt. Hell, maybe he could fuck the mania out of her. And could keep on, keep on, trying.

Neither of them bothered to get undressed, Harley’s nightgown ridden up to her belly, as J swung her around and onto the desk, a cold hand pressed against the liquid flesh between her thighs. She gasped, giggled, and guided his palm against her pussy. She twitched, involuntary, as he slipped away two fingers and she rode against the curve of his wrist, having known, enjoyed always, the uncomplicated manner of their love-making.

His lips were at her ear, at her neck, and sent tingling pleasure to the tips of her toes, and she turned her head aside to give him more skin to traverse. He took a nipple in his mouth and shocked her with a sharp nip of his teeth. Harley thighs tensed, and she pulled him closer with the wrap of her legs. And he left small, peppered apologetic kisses all along her throat.

His fingers curved inside of her, a slow and deliberate motion, both frustrating and fulfilling, as she teetered on nearness of an orgasm. But it didn’t come, she didn’t cum – and she grinded harder, pressing on his hand with her own and eager to reach that level of ecstasy. PLEASE –

J removed his hand then, to fuck her instead with his cock. The sudden change of rhythm, sensation, fulfillness, sent her reeling from her first climax. She took a fistful of his hair and tugging. And he winced, but he did not stop, hooking one of her legs up and over his shoulder. Harley gasped against his open mouth, urging him to kiss her as deep as he was fucking her. Please just love me.

His hands were careful with her, compliant, calm. Cupping her face and kissing with a practiced tenderness. Harley, however, was fervent beneath him, clawing at his shoulders, she savoured every slightest touch.

When he was mad, he fucked like a madman, left bruises and marks in his wake, but when he was placid, he fucked with a deliberate, conscious care that was far more torturous, more delightful, more dangerous. And he refused to quicken his pace, or match hers, no matter how much she squirmed and rocked against him. He drew her pleasure out and out, until she were about to explode. That her pussy would ache with want even though it had got. That she would ride on the edge of climax after climax, until the extent of her pleasure turned into delirium, and all her thoughts were of fucking, of how good it felt, and how it was never going to end.

She just wanted him to choke her, slap her, do somethin’ to wake her up from her haze of endless indulgence. And her body was shaken, shaking, from a countless string of orgasms. He muttered quiet nothings against her chest though she was too far gone to hear them. And Harley moaned in her many defeats beneath him.

His breath was ragged, rough, hot air against sore cheeks. His mouth lingered over hers, rewarding each of her long and lingering kisses with tiny pecks of his own. She was driven mad by the sparing contact, that only her pussy was being plowed, forcing her wave after wave, despite exhaustion, the agony, to cum.

Her thighs were slick with her own juices, and she clung to J as though her life depended on it. She wanted to stop – not to stop – to keep goin’ – for him to let her go – her back arched and she pulled him inward, felt his cock nudge the tender hilt of her cervix. Fuck.

With her free leg, Harley trapped him, tight as she could against her hips, so that each thrust, deep or shallow, hit the same sweet spot that had her pussy soaking. She desperately wanted him to kiss her further, flick a breast with his tongue, or suck on her neck but he deliberately ignored each and every one of her erogenous places, except for her neck, and obviously her pussy, and a thumb gently teased from her clit, another painful (perfect) orgasm. She groaned for him to cum – PLEASE – she couldn’t go on.

He fucked Harley harder, nudging her once to keep her from slipping away and into a state of total sensory overload. But she couldn’t keep focus – another orgasm had her lower body rigid – and it hurt, so good, she cried out for him, her voice cracking.

She wasn’t conscious when he came, and her limbs were limp and useless. Though J kissed her into rousing and helped to get her cleaned down and coherent. They both drank deep from a bottle of Jack, the only bottle she hadn’t yet smashed. And luckily, since her thirst was immense after their intense bout of sex.

“You’re the only one for me,” he hushed against her hair, and after some time for decompression and many a softly spoken reassurances, J sent her on her merry way again. Face flushed and vibrant having had the fury fucked out of her system.

And a month passed by, another honeymoon period, after another, after another. And Harley sat, clacking away at her keyboard, browsing the internet, online shopping, and quickly reading the news – just in case she’d got a mention or two – and there, illuminated on the screen of Gotham City Network, was another photo of her Mister J, suited and booted, with a gun pointed to an older woman outside a large and lavish jewellery store, a dashing smile etched across his face. And Harley pondered, for a moment, the image infront of her. And had to stop, think, and quell her instant jealousy. This time she knew – just knew it was harmless. But was there also any harm in making sure of that? She turned to the ball-hammer on her left, and his office keys beside them, pressed print on the article and prepared for another round.

#harley quinn #joker #joker x harley #my harley #eventually maybe my stories will show up in the tags #jarley #my writing

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whowouldhavethoughts · 7 years

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Option B: Sheryl Sandberg Shares Her Advice on Grieving & Building Resilience as a Muscle

Photo Courtesy: Knopf

After the unexpected death of her husband in 2015, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg found herself in the devastating throes of grief. The Lean In creator and author suddenly had to cope with being a widow, while also trying to comfort her children who lost their father, Dave Goldberg, way too soon.

Sandberg turned to her friend Adam Grant, a Wharton professor and psychologist, to help her through the dark time, and together they wrote Option B: Facing Adversity, Building Resilience, and Finding Joy. The book is very personal, as Sandberg shares intimate details and her experience in the aftermath of her spouse’s death, but it also serves as a self-help book for others going through adversity.

In a satellite interview with Sandberg, we discussed how she’s coped, what this book taught her and how she hopes to help others dealing with grief.

The following interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

Ngozi Ekeledo: You’ve gone through so much over the last two years with the sudden passing of your husband. You talked about the aftermath in a beautiful Facebook post in 2015, and in that post, you discussed the idea of “Option B” – which is the title of your new book. What made you want to open up and share these personal details, and were you scared to do so with this book? Was it cathartic?

Sheryl Sandberg: Well, I was definitely scared to do this. When I lost my husband suddenly two years ago, it’s the unimaginable. I thought I would never get through another day, let alone another week. My biggest fear was that my kids wouldn’t get through it [and] that their happiness would be destroyed in the instant we lost Dave. So I turned to my friend Adam Grant, a psychologist, and said, “What do I do? How do I get my kids through this? How do I get myself through this?”

What I learned is that we’re not born with a fixed amount of resilience. It’s a muscle.

We build it, and we can build it on ourselves and in each other. Option B is my attempt to share what we learned. My husband Dave was an amazing man. He was so generous and gave so much to so many people, and so if Option B can help anyone recover and move on, I think it honors the life he led, and that’s why I wanted to do this.

Ekeledo: Similar to your Lean In organization, with Option B you’ve also created a nonprofit initiative by the same name. What made you decide to start this system of support groups? What’s the biggest thing you hope someone can take away from Adam and your message or what you guys are trying to present?

Sandberg: Well I’m hoping that this book and this community, OptionB.org, can kick a lot of elephants out of rooms because when the hardest things happen, we don’t know what to say – so we often say nothing at all. Someone gets cancer, someone goes to prison, someone loses a job, someone loses a child – we don’t want to say the wrong thing, so often we let them suffer in silence. Acknowledging pain, saying, “I know you’re suffering, I’m here with you, and we’re going to go through this together” – that’s not going to take away all of the hardship, but it will [help]. In some ways it already is in the OptionB.org community helping bring people together to support each other.

I can’t get Dave back. I can’t go back and live as I would live if I could have one more day with him. But I can try to help other people see what I didn’t see in the beginning, which is that it gets better. These are very universal experiences, and that means that we can help each other through them.

Photo Courtesy: Elizabeth Maisel/Lean In

Ekeledo: With Adam’s portion of the book, he talks about the research behind grieving. Were there any findings from him that surprised you? What were some of the biggest things you learned from him?

Sandberg: I learned so much. One of the most surprising things was the role gratitude plays. Adam’s one of the most brilliant people I know, but one day he looked at me and said, “You should think about how things could be worse.” I looked at him like he was crazy. Worse? I just lost my husband. Then he said, “Dave could have had that same cardiac arrhythmia driving your children.” You say that, and I say, “Okay, I’m good. My kids are alive.”

Ironically, I came out of the worst tragedy of my life with more gratitude because it never occurred to me that Dave would not grow old or that I would not grow old. My cousin Laura turned 50 years old two months ago. I called and said, “I wanna call and say happy birthday, but I also want to call you because in case you woke up with that whole ‘Oh my god I’m fifty’ thing – we’ve all done that, I’ve done that – don’t do that. Because this is the year Dave won’t turn 50, and I’m so grateful that you’ve lived till this year.” I’ll never make another joke about growing older because I’m grateful for every day, and I’m hoping that through Option B, more people can find that.

Ekeledo: You mentioned in that Facebook post how hard it can be to find the right thing to say to someone who is grieving. From what you’ve experienced and learned, what advice do you have for a friend or family member who wants to support a loved one going through a tough time?

Sandberg: The most important thing is to acknowledge the pain, and I got this wrong before. When I saw someone who was going through something hard, maybe I’d say something the first time, but then I wouldn’t say anything because I thought I was reminding them. You can’t remind me that Dave died. I know that. I know that every minute of every day, and so when people didn’t say anything, it was really hard for me. So rather than saying nothing at all, say, “I acknowledge your pain. I know you’re suffering, and I’m here to go through it with you if I can.”

Photo Courtesy: Elizabeth Maisel/Lean In

Ekeledo: You’ve said that tragedy presents a choice, and that you can either give in or choose meaning. You said when you were ready, you wanted to choose the latter. Do you feel like you’ve been able to do that? What steps have helped you along the way?

Sandberg: Well I don’t choose meaning and joy every day but much more than I did in the beginning. I now know that it’s not just getting back to recovery, but it’s finding joy. My amazing brother-in-law Rob called me a couple of months in, and he said, “All Dave ever wanted was for you and your kids to be happy. Don’t take that away from him in death.”

I had to find ways to find joy and not waiting for the big stuff because the big stuff wasn’t going to get better. Joy can be found in the little things – a cup of coffee, my daughter giving me a hug without my begging her for it – and I started noticing those. Adam suggested I write down three moments of joy every day, and I realized most of my life I went to bed worried about what went wrong, but [now] I was going to go to bed thinking about the things that went right. I’m hoping that Option B can help people not just recover but rebound and find the joy, the laughter and the happiness.

#sheryl sandberg #option b #lean in #facebook #book #interview #adam grant #literature #technology #grieving #adversity #coping #writing #writer #journalism

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