continution of stormlight au 14, where kaladin keeps it together just a little longer:
Adolin: Storms! So both you and bridgeboy have been radiants—
Kaladin: surgebinders.
Adolin: surgebinders, this whole time? Unbelievable! Anyone else here secretly a surgebinder?
Renarin:
Shallan: I— your cousin. Jasnah. She didn't have a soulcaster. She was one.
Kaladin: Wait. I thought you said she died.
Shallan: Radiants can be killed! She had a sword through her chest!
Kaladin: I mean...I haven't tested that out specifically. But I've been shot a lot. And I was basically flayed alive. Teft nursed me back to life with a few diamond chips.
Adolin: Hah! The assassin did get you with a shardblade, didn't he? And you healed from it!
Navani: I knew it. She's impossible to kill.
Shallan: I— but I sank the boat. Oh stormfather...
Kaladin: I can also survive without breathing a while. 20 minutes easily. haven't timed my limits.
Adolin:
Shallan:
Shallan: I — wait, did you say you were flayed alive? What? Why?
Kaladin: It's — it's how the whole stormblessed title happened. Got strung up in a highstorm.
Adolin: Huh. At this point I was wondering if you got the title talking to the stormfather himself, ha!
Kaladin:
Adolin: ....Bridgeboy?
Kaladin: It. I mean during highstorms sometimes...
Adolin: I swear if you say you thought it was a hallucination I'm throwing you as far as I can. And I'm wearing plate right now.
Kaladin: It— it can't have been real.
Adolin: I'll do it bridgeboy. I know you can take it.
Kaladin: Fine. Anyway. That's how I got the stormblessed name. Sadeas ordered me outside, left upside down in a highstorm. Not fun, but I lived.
Shallan: So... she really could be alive...
Adolin: My captain of the guard, my bethrothed, and my cousin! Ha! Renarin, you'd tell me if you were a radiant — I mean a surgebinder, right?
Renarin:
Adolin: Renarin?
Renarin:
Adolin: Renarin...I...but why wouldn't you tell me?
Renarin (crying): I thought I was going mad. I was seeing things, I could hear screaming from my shardblade...
Kaladin: I hear that too!
Shallan: There's...something wrong with most shardblades.
Renarin: I thought it was...
Adolin (gripping Renarin's shoulder): Brother.
Adolin: I don't think hallucinations are real.
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it's been more than a month yet thinking about how Neil said season 2 is a bridge to what was supposed to be in the book sequel still keeps me awake at night 'cause the math isn't mathing for me
you see, i can’t see how it was supposed to work, taking into consideration Aziraphale's book personality. i mean, Aziraphale's final s2 decision, in my humble opinion, wouldn’t at all work for his book!version (and radio!version, obviously. I'm still not really sure if it works for me even in terms of his show!version), since book!Aziraphale, how do i put it? yeah, i doubt he’d give a single fuck about the idea of reforming heaven and making it better and stuff. like under no circumstances whatsoever
because — though I might be wrong — I always thought the point of Aziraphale's character is that he doesn’t believe in heaven being right. it's evident from this part of the book when he interferes in a TV program while on a search for a body. he calls heaven propagandistic here and says it doesn't matter who wins, hell or heaven, because humanity loses either way
and it's not, in fact, the first time Aziraphale shows disapproval of heaven and its methods. he has already said himself that hell and heaven are practically the same before here, while discussing their head offices with Crowley
so he knows for a fact that heaven is just as thirsty for blood and cruel as hell. they are not the side of the light. he knows it from the start, and the fact that heaven wants war just as much as hell does is not an insight for him. it just reassures him of what he's known before. and he's quite strong in his beliefs, too
and i just keep trying to figure out how we were supposed to get to book!Aziraphale not only going back there but also taking up an archangel position — and if we ever were, really
i honestly can’t find an answer to this in my head, so i thought i might share it here. i can’t be the only one thinking about this on repeat, and maybe someone else has found an answer or a loophole they’ll want to share so i can find peace again
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The Monk and the Monkey
''What are you?'' The monk asks the animal- no, the creature before him. It stands on its hind legs without any trouble nor struggle. It does not hunch, it does not move. He watches it warily, and his eyes struggle to maintain eye contact, and not to stare at the way he has been carried away from. Where the carcass of the enormous tiger that stands fallen, in a pool of blood and the heavy smell of the metallic blood that he no longer can see or smell.
But to get distracted in the human’s case, would be a mistake if not the being was quite happy yet best not to risk it.
One second, it stares and the next, it stands before him with a bright grin and a tilted head. He startles, dropping his staff as it opens its dangerous jaw to answer his question.
''I am many things,'' It starts speaking, and the Monk thinks it can see the silhouette of a monster behind, watching, in smokes and another thing, another thing that smiles, amused while the human starts to sweat, his palms getting colder and colder.
‘’A wicked demon,’’ It states, grinning with a mouth far too wide, and a grin far too sharp, while the monk gulps with tense shoulders.
‘’A celestial being,’’ It states, as it smiles with gratitude, and a smile full of joy, and the monk relaxes, without being aware, for its genuine smile resembles that of a child a bit too much, tricking him into a false sense of security.
A false sense of security it is,
For a shark may be content, but it still has a mouth full of sharp teeth and a hunger for blood when you cut open your heart and lay it bare.
‘’But moreover, I am human.’’ It says, shrugging and standing back while the monk stares. He continues to stare as it stares up at him, with its tail lazily swaying behind it. He is well aware that he should probably try to find a way to leave, instead of interacting with it, but he blurts out without thinking before his mind can catch up with him.
‘’H-human? Y-you don’t look human!’’ He exclaims, and rightfully so as well, for the being standing before him is a tad bit too hairy, with hands instead of feet and of course, not to mention, the tail it has!
‘’...’’ It stares at him in silence, and it looks up and down while he nervously shuffles.
‘’Your close minded view, as much as it amazes me, is also disappointing.’’ It finally states after an awkward amount of silence and the monk can only drape his bamboo hat over his face, halfway to avoid eye contact since it unnerves him and says nothing to refute its claims more so because he is too meek to argue with a creature who can topple over a demon four times its size.
‘’Tell me what is a god, and what is a demon?’’ It asks, and the monk has no answer which seems to frustrate the creature before him as it invades his personal space once again, forcing him to stare right into its bloody eyes with the moon in them.
The monk stutters as it sighs, snapping its fingers and the human sees magic come to life before his eyes.
‘’A god represents the ‘kind’ side of humanity, while a demon represents the ‘foul’,’’ It says with a crescent smile but a condescending tone, and the monk steps back as his eyes jump back and forth between the mirrored version of the creature.
‘’Here’s a riddle for you,’’ It doesn't look at him as it becomes one, but he thinks it might see inside him anyway.
‘’If I am both, then what am I?’’
The silence scratches on, as tiny crickets pass, and the forest quiets down as if to listen to his answer.
It's a lot of pressure, he thinks when he sees it watching him like a hawk, like the rest of the world that holds its breath.
The human thinks as he lowers his head and thinks. He eventually comes to an answer as opens his mouth as the being before him stares at him nonchalantly, yet with a slightly wagging tail, clearly full of expectations about his answer.
‘’A monkey?’’
The monk, obviously, plays it safe for he feels like this is a trap.
The monkey’s nose scrunches up, and his eyes squint.
‘’Hmph,’’ It- He almost sneers at the human. His eyebrow twitch, irritated, and his tail thumps the ground once, twice and stops still. The monk, for a second, thinks he almost might see a pout.
‘’Typical mortals.’’
He says with distaste and the Monk, Tang Sanzang,can only stare at the tiny murder monkey and think:
What are the chances that if I beg, he’ll leave me alone?’
But the monk can only weep for it will be a long fourteen years.
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