#so who better than Dante to take a last name from?

[eldritcmor]

Tournament of champions

Chapter 1

“What’s this?” John squinted at the Computer screen. An email from Laswell had been waiting for him today, something that actually required his attention if the subject line was anything to go by. He slowly mouthed the words of the email to himself, deciphering the code and language used. He pinched the bridge of his nose, letting out a sigh as he grabbed the phone on his desk. A soft click as the line connected near immediately after he dialed a long memorized number. “Really, Kate? What’s your play here?” “What’s wrong, John? Thought you, of all people, would be jumping at the gun for this one.” “We just got back, Laswell. Apologizes if we need a break.” “Good thing you’re not tackling this alone then, John.” John felt a prickle crawl down his spine. “Who else, Laswell?” “Relax, John. They’re trustworthy. Dug them up myself.” “Who, Kate?” John heard Laswell sigh. “Taskforce Dante and a PMC squad from S.H.C. Don't bother looking up that last one. They really don’t like it, besides they have a familiar player.” “Wilson and his group are familiar, Laswell. No PMCs Kate, you know this. Not after the Las Almas Incident.” “Not even for an old squad member?” John huffed a breath as he weighed his gut against his head. “Fine, but if this even shows one sign of going like Las Almas did, I’m kicking their head in myself.” “Agreed.”

Joseph jerked awake as the plane touched down. Gods, they should be used to this by now. Long plane rides weren’t exactly uncommon in their line of work but still, it sucked. They stretched as The plane taxied down the little runway, shoving Avery’s head off their shoulder. They glanced around the cabin realizing they were the only one awake at the moment. Well that needed to change. They still had a couple hours drive after this to the actual event grounds for this mission. Apparently a week of military games with some of the best in the business, sponsored by some of the biggest names to boot. Lots of eyes on this apparently. Not that Joseph cared at the moment, as they shook Avery awake. Avery jerked up and Joseph dodged the fist aimed for his throat. “Easy, Storm cloud. We just hit the gate. We’re officially in Greece.” Avery groaned as they waved Joseph off. Joseph nodded and went around the cabin waking the others. Dodging fists and sleepy mumbles in a variety of languages. After that, everything was mostly smooth as they gathered up their gear and disembarked. Joys of being partnered with one of the most damn secretive PMC’s, deep pockets and private travel.

Joseph jogged to keep up with O’Neil and Wilson’s longer strides. “So, who’s our contact? The brief said we weren’t the only two on this assignment.” “Some old friends of Avery’s. An SAS squad that works closely with Kate.” Wilson hummed as followed the signs to the exit. “SAS? We got a name for them?” “One Four One. That’s all Kate really gave us.” O’Neil paused. “Oh! I’m an idiot. We can ask Avery for information. Though it might be a few months out of date. Go grill Scott, Ferret.” Joseph grinned and nodded. Any excuse to go annoy their Pseudo Sibling is a good excuse. Joseph dropped back to Avery. “Hey Avery. I have questions.” Avery hummed as they kept pace with Joseph. “Who are the one four one?” Avery’s eyes widened before they relaxed as if realizing something. “British, SAS, and Legends in their own right. Why?” Joseph grinned, a feral thing. “Does that make you a legend too, storm cloud?” Avery immediately shook their head. “Nope.” Joseph briefly pouted as Avery didn’t take the bait. “Alright, so what makes them legends? Cause You worked with them before Six, surely you must know the truth better than some recruits.” Avery snorted. “I was just a recruit myself. Don't know why in the fuck I ended up in their squad. History aside, there’s four main members. Captain Price, Lieutenant Riley, Sergeant Garrick, and Sergeant MacTavish. They run the same wheel house we do, though their missions are infamous for going fucking sideways.” Joseph raised an eyebrow. “Fucking sideways?” “You remember the clean up for Las almas, right?” “Yeah sure. We got quite a few new friends out of that.” Avery clicked their tongue. “Well guess who was heavily involved?” “No, no fucking way!” “Yup.” “Were you there for that?” Avery shook their head. “No, I was in hospice at the time.” Joseph made an ah noise. “The reason you left, I’m assuming.” Avery nodded. “Not doing any good from a hospital bed, Jo.” “Think We’ll meet them? At this weird tournament, I mean.” “It’s possible, but we’ll see.” Joseph nodded as they lapsed into silence.

Ghost leaned against the front of the SUV, a lit cigarette between his lips. Price had him on pick up duty. Something about needing some goddamn peace after the flight from London to Greece. Everyone else had grumbled their agreements. Ghost snuffed his cigarette under his boot as his target wandered out from the airport. A tired looking bunch of soldiers. Ghost pressed two fingers and whistled. A high shrill sound. The group’s heads all snapped to him and damn if it wasn't unnerving. He cursed as the group moved in his direction. There was a familiar face among them alright. Sergeant Scott. Someone who left without so much as a goodbye, and barely a word since then. Ghost wanted to be pissed, but right now he needed to at least put up a good front. “Lieutenant Riley of One Four One. I’m your pick up.” He held his hand for a shake to the man before him. The man smiled. “Captain Wilson of Dante, and this is Captain O’Neil of SH6.” The man gestured to his fellow captain who was overseeing getting everyone’s gear in the car. “Pleasure to meet you, Lieutenant.” Ghost mentally shivered. Captain Wilson’s accent was incredibly close to Graves and it did not bring back good memories. “Pleasure’s all mine, sir. We’re staying at a hotel nearby. We’ll be heading out to the actual location tomorrow, if that’s alright by you sir?”

Captain Wilson looked relieved. “That’s the best plan I’ve heard all day. I’m assuming The second SUV is also ours.” Ghost nodded. “Yes sir.” Captain Wilson nodded before turning to the others in his group. “Listen Up! We Got Two Vehicles! Split Up And Get Ready To move!” A chorus of “Yes Sir!” met Wilson’s shout. Ghost nodded as he slipped into the driver seat of his own vehicle. He barely paid attention when others piled in as he started the vehicle. Cursing up a blue streak when he turned and found Scott had taken the passenger seat. “Bloody Fuckin Hell! Storm!” Ghost hissed. Avery just raised an eyebrow. “Hey Lieutenant.” “Don’t “Hey!” Me Sergeant. Haven’t heard from you in a long time. Where the fuck have you been?” Avery shrugged. “I’m not a Sergeant anymore, Ghost. As for your question, around.” “Around? Around?! Avery Storm Scott! You vanish without so much as a goodbye and all you can say is around! And what do you mean you’re not a Sergeant anymore?” Ghost narrowed his eyes at Avery after his hissed exclamations. Avery shifted uncomfortably in their seat. “SHC functions a little differently, I’m technically a corporal now.” Avery sighed. “Look, Ghost. I felt like I was doing the right thing, alright? I wasn't exactly being useful from a hospital bed while you guys went through hell. I thought it would be better if I didn’t make a big deal out of leaving, okay?” Ghost pinched the bridge of his nose as he merged onto the highway leaving the airport. “Avery, Avery, Avery. We had just dug you out of the ground after weeks of torture. You weren’t useless. You were recovering.” Avery snorted. “I still stand by my decision to leave, Ghost.” “And I doubt anything I say would change your mind, so I’m not going to Avery.” Avery curled a little on themselves. “Does Price know?” Ghost hummed. “He knows we're working with a PMC and another Task-Force, Not who’s who. Which one are you playing for anyways?” “PMC.” Ghost nodded. “Are they good to you?” Avery nodded. “We were the clean up crew for Las Almas. Captain O’Neil swore up a blue streak when he saw the damage Philip had brought. We helped where we could.” “Good. Try not to get slapped at breakfast, Storm. Though expect to get Tackled by Johnny. He’s been worried about you.” Avery chuckled as the SUV pulled to stop in the hotel parking garage. “No guarantees Lieutenant.”

Taina flipped through the stack of papers handed in her hand. “Are we sure about this?” Her eyes flicked over to Jordan as he spoke. Harry sighed as he set his own list on his desk. “Yes, Trace. Rainbow can’t be everywhere at once. This is a good way to scout out new recruits and allies.” “But It also paints a huge target on our backs, Harry! Especially if we let the public in.” “It would draw attention even if we didn’t Jordan. An abandoned stadium suddenly being in active use. This way we control what they see.” Taina continued to flip through the list of names in her hand, ignoring the argument between Red hammer’s Captain and Six. Multiple Militaries, PMCs, and Specialized law enforcement agencies were attending this apparently, including but not limited to her own, BOPE. On the Surface, Harry was correct. Rainbow couldn’t be everywhere at once. But Jordan did bring up some very compelling points. This whole tournament of champions seemed like a poor way to handle it. Especially since Harry seemed dead set on televising it.

Taina huffed a breath as she looked closer at the roster of names, Three especially popping out to her. “Excuse me! Six, I have a question.” Taina hummed as Harry and Jordan’s heads snapped to her. They were barely inches from each other’s throats. Harry backed away first. “Yes, Caveira?” “Why are three of Laswell’s Squads involved with this?” “Laswell’s squads?” “Yes, Task-Force 141, Task-Force Dante, And SH6. One is responsible for the events at Las Almas. The other Two for the cover up of Las Almas.” Taina had lost a lot of good intel with the whole incident. El Sin Nombre might be considered small in the grand scheme of global drug rings but they were an incredibly powerful trafficking ring and well connected. “What’s your question, Cav?” Jordan hummed as he settled in his chair again. “Why are they participating in this event? This does not seem like them considering the events at Las Almas.” Harry Pushed his glasses up his nose. “They’re here as a peace offering. They will be participating in the events. Not in the deals that may take place around the events. Does that satisfy your curiosities, Caveira?” Taina hummed for a moment. “For now, sir.”

taglist:taglist: @skylordgrey @bluegiragi @batw3nch @stick-the-dumbass @lilpothoscuttings @im-making-an-effort @stupidwingboy @apocalypticseagull @resident-cryptid @warenai @sleepyendymion @sellenedragon @queenofwolves210 @makayla-666 @gogh-with-the-flow @blue-blue0

#taskforce 141 #eld writes #cod mw2 #john soap mactavish #storm au #kyle gaz garrick #captain john price #rainbow 6 siege #rainbow six siege #taina Caveira pereira #caveira #r6s caveira #r6s thermite #jordan thermite trace #thermite #wer6community #call of duty oc #call of duty fanfic #cod mwii

[mrchiipchrome]

I hate people who say ‘swearing doesn’t make you cooler it just makes you sound immature’ like bitch I don’t do it for you or to sound cool I do it bc I need to express myself in the way I fucking feel like. Do you expect me to say ‘holy moly I had a really bad lesson’??? Like ffs if I wanna tell my teacher that the lesson went like fucking shit then I should be able to without fucking criticism, I literally don’t even do it for anyone except myself so you can shut your fat ass up and keep failing everything you fucking piece of shit pick me ‘I’m so much better than everyone else because I don’t swear’ ass bitch. Like we’re not even friends so how can you fucking dare try to tell me what to do, unprovoked and unprompted, I don’t tell you to stop being so fucking stupid and yet you are, fucking no ass, no friends, no nothing ass person trying to make me be like her loser ass self like shut the fuck up and disappear not like you’d be missed by anyone you fucking worthless piece of human garbage. Instead of trying to tell me to check my language, try checking the door before you walk in the room you Oompa Loompa, 10000 kg, no sense of style, looking like you got dressed in the dark, paler than a fucking vampire, failure, no one likes you, no bitches, no future ass bitch. She honestly needs to check her superiority complex because she’s truly more pathetic than me trying to find a gf, I swear even if she was the last woman in the world not a single person would hit, looking like an iguana mixed with a trash can and lighter fluid, she looks like the melted version of wheelchair Barbie only if wheelchair Barbie was plus size Barbie, no eyebrows ass bitch, no eyelashes ass bitch, caca eyes ass bitch, shit stained face ass bitch, skid mark ass bitch, looking like her name is skidmore muncy, cankles having ass bitch. When I say that your standards would have to be in Dante’s 8th circle of hell to even look her way I am not fucking lying, her wannabe goody two shoes ass persona is so fucking annoying I swear it makes me want to rip my ears and eyes out the second I hear and see her, and don’t even get me started on her fucking voice that sounds like a giraffes shit hitting your head whilst someone plays an out of tune piano and drags their nails over a chalkboard. Her entire being is like a a cancerous cell, I swear that she’s a failed fucking abortion because there is genuinely no way anyone would willingly give birth to that creature, someone had to have a gun to her mothers head all throughout labour to keep her pushing bc that child would never be born otherwise. I swear I couldn’t be paid to be that annoying ass bitches friend, it would make me even more suicidal than just hearing her from afar would. And she pretends that she’s so good just because she listens to girl in red like fucking congratulations you’re like 90 fucking percent of lesbians, no one cares about your fucking ass music taste because you’re not important, the world doesn’t stop spinning just because you’re listening to some stereotypical artist. I swear she’s like the hitler of the school, you always have to be so fucking politically correct when you’re even near her bc otherwise she’ll start her fucking crying again like shut the fuck up and get a personality. Literally the plain boiled chicken breast of the school, she doesn’t even realize that no one likes her, and that people are only remotely nice to her because they feel bad that she has the personality of a piece of coal, she’s more boring than the word boring. She’s a pimple on the day you take the school pictures, she’s an air bubble in your veins, she’s that fucking annoying ass hoe you never want to see but always do, she’s the paper McDonald’s toys, she’s a hole in the bottom of your shoe on a rainy day, she’s the ball that hits you in the face in PE, she’s everything i strive not to be both looks wise and personality wise because if I end up like her I would legit kill myself.

[neverchecking]

My coming out.

You have all turned me. This is it. I am officially a Ko*idai simp. You all have won. So for turning me, I offer you as my humble apology for the slander against his name.

A wonderful collab between my lovely and wonderful wife, whom you all should go follow right now >:( @angry-trashcan

Bro, it’s not gay if you say no homo, bro.

Koridai looked down to Dalton, “Golly”

A moment of silence fell around them, heavy and tense. The sweltering heat around them created a sheen of sweat, making their bodies glisten. Brown connected with blue, the fire of passion igniting in the pits of their pupils. A single resolute nod fell between them. “No Homo.”

Dalton and Dante bobbed their heads in agreement.

You looked up to them, watching as their moment continued. Their ga(y)ze was deep into one another’s eyes, too distracted too pay mind to you. Dalton and Dante danced above you, bumping into once another, their sides brushing together with a lingering kiss.

Never once did Courage, nor Ko*idai for that matter, break eye contact. They simply remained, frozen in the moment, encased in the wondrous star maps that laid in the other’s ga(y)ze. Your own eyes darted back down to Dalton and Dante. A part of you wondered if you should be worried about their reddened heads. Another part of you was too over this entire debacle to care. 

All of Courage’s courage couldn’t have prepared him for this. The way Dante would move about, the way Kor*dai’s eyes were boring into him, the way you were watching with a startled expression. Kor*dai didn’t know how to handle this, he didn’t have much adventuring under his belt after all. All he had was Dalton.

Dalton had been a long standing friend. Something familiar to Ko*idai, A friend he had known his entire life. He was more than happy to share this moment with him. Even if it came (heh came) with Courage. Courage and his dastardly sinful ga(y)ze that refused to leave his. It was a game at this point, of who would break first. And Courage would not break. 

He was too courageous. He would watch Kor*dai’s brown eyed ga(y)ze as long as he physically could, which was a long time. He was a well travelled hero afterall, unlike his counterpart. Kor*dai had never been on his own adventure, and, golly was that unfortunate for their staring contest.

Dante wept from the lack of attention, once again returning to pestering jabs at Dalton, just to see the other sway back and forth. Your eyes followed them. Then they returned to the standing duo. A moment passed. A moment where you wondered if Legend was still awake. Or Twilight. They wouldn’t do this to you. 

You watched their staring for a moment longer, wondering, hoping, praying that it would either end or last longer. You weren’t sure which outcome was better for you, honestly. Your hands rested on the side of the too small bed, taking a deep breath and watching the two dancing partners continue their waltz.

You could play their silly game. That was always an option. You could open your eyes all wide and innocent and flutter those pretty lashes. Maybe, if that got no reaction you would even dare utter the single utterance you swore in your life you never would. The no good, vile phrase. But it might’ve just been enough to get what you want. With a breath, you steeled yourself, tucking away your dignity in a trunk before throwing it into the endless abyss of ‘never to be seen again’. Then your lips parted, “Golly.”

Blue and brown did not fall from one another as you muttered the words, though Dalton did add a hard sway to his fateful dance. You could almost feel yourself dry completely at the thought of what you did and to no effect. You slowly pulled your legs to yourself and rolled off the bed. Though no eyes seemed to meet you.

Though Dalton did weep at your absence, you paid it no mind. Though Dante did attempt to stand tall to catch your attention, you still turned away. You had much better things, nay, people to do. You had much better people to do, and this pity fuck had gone from sad to downright desperate. 

Though Dante and Dalton weeped together, they held eachother tall through the loss. The ga(y)zing men continued their ga(y)zing. The thought of you never crossing their minds as their eyes bore into one another’s very soul, very existence. 

You could’ve pretended to sneak out. But it wouldn’t have made a damn lick of a difference. They were too lost in the challenge. Too engaged in each other’s limitless ga(y)ze. Nothing would break this moment between them. Tender and almost intimate one might dare to say. You did not dare. You only tried to recall which room was the Vet’s. 

A hard knock at the door and it swung open, revealing Legend’s very awake face. He dared not to question why you were there, knowing where you had been. Instead only letting you in and locking the door tight behind you.

Not even the repetitive thumping echo of the room beside theirs could break their moment. It remained steadfast and unyielding, even as Dante and Dalton wilted away. Shriveling into themselves in shame. They would remain that way even as the briefest hints of sunrise broke across the room, painting it in an array of yellows and reds. Almost like the reds of Dalton and Dante’s heads last night. 

It seemed nothing could pull the men from one another’s ga(y)ze into the other’s soul. When Legend opened the door the next morning to wake them, they were still staring deep into one anothers. The shock of it almost sent him into a deep ga(y)ze himself. He took off a boot, throwing it in the direction of the men, which somehow startled them out of their trance. Courage looked to the empty bed.

“What did you do with Y/N, you-you- rapscallion?!” Courage barked, stance widening as Dante swung loyally by his side. Legend’s shock turned into a mean and sharp grin. The marks on his neck were welted in your signature color. “Everything. Which part do you wanna hear about?”

“All of it.” Ko*idai began only for Courage to cut him off with a harsh jab. “None of it, is what he meant to say.”

Legend’s grin only grew, “Okay, it started when she came to my room last night. Complaining you two wouldn’t treat her right.” Dalton shrunk ever more into himself at the words. “She would never!” Courage cried out. “Oh, but she did!”

Legend gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “You two ding-dong’s really screwed the pooch there. Lost out on a night I certainly won’t be forgetting anytime soon. But, hey, maybe you can try again. The Golden three know I’m a patient man. I’ll wait for her to come by my room once more.” Collecting his boot, he swatted it at the two, refusing to even spare a glance at Dalton and Dante. “And put some pants on would ya? It’s getting weird.” 

The two watched Legend leave the room, closing the door behind him. Kor*dai looked down at Dalton then Dante, before letting his ga(y)ze go up to Courage’s eyes. “No homo?” He asked. “No homo.” Courage replied.

With a hearty hand clapping to the other’s shoulders, Courage finally grinned. “Rule number one of adventuring? It’s never gay to kiss the homies goodnight. It’s a sign of good faith.” Ko*idai nodded excitedly, bangs flopping about much in the same way Dante did. “Right. Legend just doesn’t understand that. He has no homies.”

“Legend thinks it’s gay to kiss the homies. But we know better.” Courage says, leaning forward and placing a kiss to Kor*dai’s cheek. “Now lets get some pants on, bro. I bet breakfast is ready and I’m warn out from that crazy night we had.”

Ko*idai placed a hand to his cheek, which quickly hued into a soft red. “Golly,” He muttered, foot twirling itself on it’s toes. It was absolutely not gay to kiss the homies and if Legend didn’t see that, he felt bad for that merchant friend of his.  He would kiss his homies and be happy with it. With a wave, he said his goodbyes to Dante and Dalton, knowing he’d see them again soon enough.

Afterall, no one said where the kisses had to be, right?

#Dalton and Dante are their PP's #Now go ahead and re-read that with that knowlegde #linked universe x reader #linked universe #yandere legend of zelda #legend of zelda #linkeduniverse #link x reader #loz #lu koridai #lu koridai x reader #yandere lu koridai #yandere lu koridai x reader #y'all have turned me #yandere linked universe #yandere linked universe x reader

[matchbet-allofthetime]

I saw that requests for DMC were open and I was curious as to if you could write a little scenario where V and reader decide to leave the house for a bit (mission or a date, you can choose) and they have a kid so they decide, "ya know what? Let's let Griffon, Shadow and Nightmare care for the kid while we're away." (It's okay if you want to remove some of the familiars from the babysitting job if you want to).

Have a good day/night

(very long) A/N: my love, your ask has utterly enamoured me and despite me never having wanted kids, this ask has warmed my heart. still don't want children, but i hope you can enjoy! This is so very all over the place and took some time (very busy :') )and I am so very sorry for that.

For a little context, V is half-devil because he came from Vergil. Thus, I decided to make the little child half-devil (technically quarter devil?? I don't consider it a big difference.) Their name is Malacoda (taken from one of the demons in The Divine Comedy)

Bibi is a gender neutral term for parent (in SOME cultures)

Also, multiple POV switches. Sorry lol

Latin translations (and words) have SEVERAL meanings and connotations, so I have made a list of those used in order:

ad minima inferno- the tiny inferno amica parum pueri- darling little child/wonderful child infernum pueri- hell's child/spawn of hell dulcedo- sweetling/sweetness parvus- small, little (used as a term of endearment)

Tending To The Flame

Word Count: 2026

Have a lovely day/night yourself, dear, and…

…Enjoy below the cut!

─────────────────⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅─────────────────

After the last mission, a date was a need, not a want. The tension finally left my shoulders after a day or two, but was quick to return with the stresses of having a child- and said child being half-devil.

I sigh heavily, Malacoda finally resting on their uncle Dante's shoulder. The older man laughs fondly and brushes the thick silver hair on Malacoda's head out of their eyes. He shakes his head fondly at the exhausted toddler. I smile.

"Y'know, Dante, you don't need to help tire the kid out." I say, laughing as he adjusts his long legs on the couch in the DMC's parlour. He just shakes his head at me.

"Nah, it's fine. 'Sides, didn't play much with Vergil when we were young because of the fire, so… I really don't mind keeping watch of the kid sometimes. In any case, I guess ad minima inferno is cute enough to keep around." Dante jokes, moving his free arm to grab a blanket and swaddle my child. I grin.

A clack is heard and I turn, seeing Nero and Vergil coming in from their mission. Both smile at Malacoda and Vergil walks over to rest a hand on their head.

"You're a good parent, you know? Taking care of such a demon and doing so with a better heart than most would." Vergil states. His voice is softer than usual and he smiles at the child currently nestled into his twin's bicep and shoulder like a sloth wrapped around the branches of a tree.

Nero laughs behind me. "Maybe you two-" He says, pointing over to V before continuing, "-should take a day off. Leave the kid to someone else for the day." My eyes go a bit wide but I find I laugh with him. I shake my head as V stifles a laugh behind me.

I press into him with a practiced sort of ease and he kisses my hair.

"Wouldn't that be something, love, a day for just us, away from our amica parum pueri, hm? Perhaps enjoying the stars, or a lovely dinner?" V replies coolly, directing his attention toward me as he kisses me. Vergil chuckles and Nero makes a fake gagging noise before smiling. I drop my shoulders.

"Maybe we could? I don't wanna leave my baby, but… a day would be nice. Are you sure? Who would we leave them with? I'm sure none of these three would want a toddler on their hands as… fickle as our Malacoda." I say, looking to Dante. He tosses up his free hand in surrender and mouths "not fuckin' me." Nero whistles and leaves the room and Vergil merely shakes his head, a sly grin present on his lips. I groan.

Dante lifts Malacoda gently and pads up the stairs to put my child to bed for the night and as V and I follow, we talk. I didn't expect what V might suggest as Dante leaves the room, though.

"My love, truly, it's going to be alright. They shall not hurt our infernum pueri, I promise that." V says, attempting to win a night with just us. I slump in bed.

"Okay, say we do this- I can understand Shadow. She's a delicate thing and fond of Malacoda. But… Can Griffon and Nightmare really be trusted with her?" I ask, concerned, even as I brush my hands through his beautiful hair. He takes my hands and kisses my wrists. I giggle as memories of watching Gomez and Morticia Addams growing up floods my mind. V was always so gentle and loving. I see him smile cheekily from where his head dips low. He nods.

"Nightmare is just as enamoured with the little one as Shadow is. And Griffon, as foul-mouthed and moody as he can be, he truly does want to try to care for them. He likes the little thing we've created. And he's worried about you." V responds, rubbing soothing circles on my palms. At his words, Shadow, Griffon, and Nightmare appear in the doorway. I laugh at the silly display. Shadow is attempting to lick frosting off of her moist nose, Nightmare is wearing a frilly pink and green apron embroidered with strawberries and wildflowers and has a plate of cupcakes balanced gently in his root-like hands. On his shoulder perches the aforementioned Griffon, and he's busy gnawing his way through blueberries and blackberries.

At the scene, V laughs with me until we're doubled over. I gather myself just in time to feel a soft, wet, warm nose push against my hand where it hangs off the bed. I turn and scritch gently at Shadow's snout and she huffs out a content purr. As I move to scratch at her ears and under her chin, she gives a very puma-cat-like smile and she blinks her eyes shut momentarily, enjoying the affections. She opens her eyes pleadingly and the soft look she gives warms me.

Similarly, Griffon glides down from the great golem's shoulder, the golem setting the cupcakes down gently. They smell warm. Griffon tucks himself into the bedspread and allows my second hand to gently run through thick black feathers. He rolls over, spreading his wings in a display of satisfaction and I laugh. I pet his belly.

"Thanks, nothin' quite like good belly rubs to end a good day!" Griffon says, voice loud but happy. Shadow purrs her agreement deeply into my lap where her head lays. Nightmare, for his part, has sat gently on the carpet alongside the unholy puma, and nods his own approval.

V nuzzles into my shoulder and kisses at my skin. "I promise my love, they've been desperately awaiting the moment to care for Malacoda. They've not left me alone since-" V is cut off by Griffon.

"Since we saw the kid and wanted to meet 'em!" Griffon finishes. V chuckles and nods.

"Very true. They were all so excited to meet a small demon. They've never seen one." V continues. "They'll take care of our little demon, I promise you, dulcedo."

I nod and finally give in. I couldn't say no to cupcakes and sad puma eyes.

•─────⋅☾ ☽⋅─────•

As I finished getting ready for the night, I hear V come up behind me. He's dressed brilliantly, cane still by his side, his green and black suit complimenting his dark eyes. I give a little squeal of excitement and he laughs, kissing me.

I myself am well-dressed, set upon making this night a very good one. "Are they ready for us to go?" I ask V, brushing his hair away from his cheekbones. He holds my hand and nods.

"Yes, they are more than ready. Griffon is a bit nervous, but I promise, my love, no harm will come to our little one." V promises, kissing my hand.

"Okay, so," I start, taking a shaky breath before continuing, "We're gonna leave, so please: no burning the DMC down, no excess rude words, and I swear on Sparda's disembodied corpse: if anything happens to my beautiful little hellspawn and I find out about it, I am single-handedly making everything that has ever occurred in Hell seem like second grade recess. I will give you a reason to fear me like Sparda would had he ever met me." My tone is light and playful, but not without its serious notes to it. I was willing to kick some familiar ass and they all three knew it.

Nightmare dips his body some in understanding and I move to pet Shadow's chin. Griffon nods sharply once and fluffs his wings nervously. I reach to pet him too and pat Nightmare's arm.

"I know you're all gonna do great. Just no talons or teeth when playing, okay? And if Malacoda goes demon on you, just give them some snacks. Always calms them down. Alright, i think that's it. Be safe, all of you We'll be back late, so don't wait." I say, joy lacing my voice. My little devil grins at me, showing sharp teeth.

"Bye bibi, bye da!" Malacoda says from their perch on Nightmare's shoulder. Their bright green eyes glow and their little horns are showing clear as day through the tufts of their braided hair. I blow them a little kiss.

V smiles down at me and with that, we're off.

•─────⋅☾ ☽⋅─────•

Later in the night, loud purring and playful feline growling is heard throughout the- mostly- empty DMC. In the kitchen, food is being made by none other than Nightmare while Shadow playfully bats at Malacoda as they try to snag her tail. The moment little clawed hands grab it successfully, Shadow flips over onto her back, playing weak. The child giggles loudly.

"Won, I won!!" They yell, gently tapping their hands on Shadow/s belly. She rumbles with joy.

"Yeah you did, good job kid!" Griffon replies, pattering his way over to the two. He places a baggie of sweet treats in Malacoda's arms. "Don't tell your parents, but I snuck you some treats from Dante's cabinet with his permission. Your bibi'll kick my ass if they find out." He chirps, gently pecking at the little tail of the child flipping wildly.

At the cuss, Nightmare growls deeply.

"Aight aight, I'm sorry! Forgot for a moment… Didn't mean it." Shadow squawks out, flapping his wings.

Nightmare simply growls out a small noise of satisfaction and drags a few plates of food out.They're set unceremoniously onto the tiled floor. They're all content to eat on the floor of the kitchen, uncaring of the potential mess to be made. It was simply easier for a golem, panther, and bird- not to mention a messy toddler currently gnawing through lamb meat, green beans, and potatoes while trying to simultaneously grab the poor vulture's feathers. Griffon squawks playfully and gnaws into his own leg of lamb.

Once the meal is over, there's quite a mess- one that Nightmare is quick to clean as Griffon wrangles the child going through an after-dinner energetic spree. Their horns singe at the tips, a byproduct of their bloodline, and they, of course, run rampant through the living room as any toddler does. Their little tail flicks excitedly and the building is filled with loud childish giggles and a concerned "kid, you'll hurt yourself-!".

As the bird tries to wear the child out while keeping them safe, Shadow and Nightmare take to respectively dragging blankets to the couch and cleaning the dishes for the evening. Soon, Malacoda lays down on the floor at Griffon's feet.

"Aww, parvus, you're tired, aren't'cha?" Griffon coos at the little half-devil. He gently digs claws into the child's shirt and drags them gently up the couch, nestling them in like a baby bird. Shadow follows, tucking herself under the blankets and resting with the child. The demon-spawn is beginning to doze, and Nightmare sits by the couch, taking his own time to rest for the night.

As they all doze, Griffon realizes he'd love to do this again. And he loved the kid too- how could he not?

•─────⋅☾ ☽⋅─────•

Late in the night, the DMC is quiet, but the front doors open as you and V walk in. It was a lovely evening, peaceful and filled with poetry and romance. It always happened that way with V, it seemed.

The two of you are quick to note nothing seems out of order- not any more than Dante usually keeps it, anyways. You set out to explore the building and when V comes across his sleeping familiars and child, he snickers. He's quick to call you from the other room.

"Come over, my love. You'll love to see this, I imagine." V speaks softly. You round the corner into the living room, only to smile widely. You dip into V's shoulder, resting your head against him. He kisses your hair. "I told you they'd do wonderfully."

You laugh quietly. "Mm, true. How about we let them sleep and head to bed? My husband owes me a few more kisses." You say.

"Oh, an enticing offer, my dear. Shall we?" And with that, V takes your hand and guides you both away.

#DMC #DMC5 #Devil May Cry #Devil May Cry 5 #DMC V #DMC Vitale #Vitale #DMC5 V #DMCV #DMC V x Reader #V x Reader #Vitale x Reader #DMC Dante #DMC Vergil #dohma.txt #requests #Hopefully I got all the tags jsdhfhdfg

[elvenbeard]

Today's modding shenanigans!

Today I wanted to test out ACM a bit :D I think I'd most enjoy using it as an additional tool for making custom outfits and seeing how different item appearances work together, less as my primary tool to creating custom outfits as such (also, it is a bit buggy for me and I can't seem to export appearances reliably for some reason).

Since you can alter custom appearances with it too, though, you could definitely mod one "base outfit" and then change the colors spontaneously for a different vibe (for example, I could make an apperance for Kerry wearing one t-shirt and then change the shirt decal or color on the fly in game without cluttering his .app file with a dozen different appearances that are virtually the same just different colors!). Wondering though if there exists a resource that lists every item's appearance names (cause some are super specific and hard to guess, like... instead of "black" or "smiley-face" you have appearances like "6th street" or "black_capsules") for this purpose... and if not, I'll probably make one just because I would find it useful to have xD

Also, ACM is really neat for taking off Kerry's jewelry on the fly for certain pics XD Or changing nail colors and things like that! In all these regards this is a super useful resource as is already, but I'm excited where the mod makers will take it :D (also... random sidenote, but can we talk about Dante for a moment? I'm a little bit in love, and I need his shirt not only for Kerry but also for Vince XD).

Then some silly behind the scenes stuff xDD @netcess said that Reed really needs a party outfit with a cool hat, so I put something quick and simple together for her and... I wanted to take a pic and as I went into Photomode, Vince spawned straight across from Reed and looked so disappointed at him partying without him when so many pressing issues are at hand XD Just really fun little moment I wanted to capture, intensified by facepalm XD

Honestly he rocks it XD Might make a recolor to fit his suit when the mood strikes xD

And finally: who wore it better? XD

(giggling and kicking my feet at how his hair and beard match now :3)

No but I actually tried my hand at editing this hair mesh for Kerry, cause it was clipping a bit here and there! This is done super quick and dirty like... In theory I know I could export his headmesh and then fit it exactly to that, but for now this aint so bad already actually! :D No more clipping into the side of his head and the hairline in the front looks better. I left out Johnny's hair cap and all that because I wanted to go for a really really short, very freshly shaved look for this like...

Something he would've done at the end of his tour right before coming back to Night City. Keeping the long hair consistent for all concerts. And as I said, I 100% get why he has that look, like... It has old, seasoned rocker vibes, it's so much less clean and more himself than his 2077-appearance like... natural hair color, not styled at all, embracing himself again with the whole "I'm gonna name my next album "Kerry Eurodyne" and go back to my roots thing, he looks like he just came off stage, sweaty and tousled, so... yes!! I do love it for all those reasons, but idk... I feel like, it's also at the same time something low maintenance that he doesn't have to pay a lot of mind to, escaping into his music and career after apparently losing V. And I think with the tour over and with getting V back so unexpectedly, he'd change things up a bit again. It's a concert/tour look for me. And this style is also low maintenance, while still Kerry, still rebellious, but a little more cleaned-up, in control of his life, if that makes sense?

@pinkyjulien sorry for stealing your tags from my other post, but you put it into words so well, on point!!

Especially your last point, cutting/shaving your hair to mark a new beginning is 100% such a thing he'd do!! So yeah, I think I'll stick with this for his two-years-plus-four-months-later look xD

#elven tries modding cyberpunk #cyberpunk 2077 #phantom liberty #kerry eurodyne #solomon reed #phantom liberty spoilers #just in case

[strangefellows]

I’ve been shouting about it on Twitter for the past two days, so I’m going to put it here too:

CANTO IV PART 3 SPOILERS! Or, why the Yi Sang and Ayin parallels in this chapter got me extremely fucked up.

Like. Dear sweet absolute FUCK, I was getting the parallels already from the basics and the fact that both Fourth Match Flame Yi Sang (the outfit) and Spicebush Yi Sang (the eyes) make him look incredibly similar to Ayin, more than he already does with the exhaustion and similar dark hair. But then the dungeon came out and hit me like a warp train.

Like. Okay. There’s a lab. A group of people with like minds that came together to better the city and make people happy, even if it’s just in small ways, under the leadership of someone they all looked up to. Little by little, it begins to crack and crumble apart...and then it is betrayed, raided by City officials. Some people die. Some kill themselves. Some give up and let themselves be caught. Some flee. Some fight back tooth and nail til the very end. But in the end, two people are left alive...one of them completely, utterly broken; the one who had always had trouble expressing themselves and their feelings towards others, but who cared deeply for them.

That broken person ends up in a room, trapped there by their own misery, working on their project, their dream, given in part to them by the person they looked up to-- to the point they’re wasting away little by little, drowning in despair and depression, wishing for the people they loved and the place they felt they belonged. There is a person, the other survivor, who had only ever been there for their sake in the first place, that wants to keep them there forever. There is their other self, who at turns seems to want to help them and seems to want to take advantage of their pain.

Who am I talking about?

Then there is the script-- the scripts Yi Sang left for the others to read, to play out what happened.

Then there is the fact that the dungeon backgrounds are an exaggerated, overlarge tableau of the lab-office in Yi Sang’s memories, similar in no small part to the Keter Suppression’s office background -- and how that white room looks very similar to the white room of the final day in Lobcorp.

Then there is the finale of the fight with Dongrang (who spoke to Carmen by name and whose mechanic, though this is reaching, involves seeds) -- where he has one final conversation with that other self, who encourages him and comforts him and who guides him to the beautiful finale of self-realization: wings made of shimmering light. This reminded me so much of Day 50 in Lobcorp that I almost cried just thinking about it again today.

Then there is the last little bit, that final narration, the last letter from Yi Sang, where he says of the Sinners, paraphrased “I would like to consider them my friends, even if I don’t know how they feel about me”. Maybe a bit of a reach, again, but I feel as if it mirrors how Ayin feels about the Sephirah, though it might be conjecture here.

I’d even venture to point out how this whole canto has Yi Sang’s narration take forefront even over Dante’s in some places, similar to Ayin narrating his own flashbacks. 

There’s just so much there that it’s impossible not to notice after a point. I really appreciate all of it among the insane lore drops about the City and the wonderful character development of the other Sinners beyond Yi Sang, who the chapter stands on its own for without thinking about the parallels and who is now firmly one of my favorite characters in the game. 

(Not to mention the hints about Dante, which considering all of this just solidifies my theory that they’re Ayin, but that’s a whole other post.)

Nonetheless, whether or not my theory is true, this is so good, and what I feel like is just the start of them giving Ayin’s character more room to breathe and context for Lobcorp he never got before.

#ayin lobcorp #limbus yi sang #yi sang #ayin #limbus company #lobotomy corporation #limbus spoilers #projmoonblogging

[maleyanderecafe]

Hey! You might like the game Dead Wishes. The main concept is that all the love interests are yanderes (some debatable, imo, but all interesting). It's about 50/50 male vs. female love interests. I want to say it's about $10 on Steam, and it has a LOT of content.

Phew, yeah sorry for taking so long to get to this ask, it is a lot longer than I expected. I actually did know about Dead Wishes way back when I first started this blog, but I only really knew briefly about Mateo's route. I honestly thought that the game would be a lot darker than it was (which I mean, don't get me wrong- it CAN be), but it was nice and fun to play. There is about 1-2 male yanderes, and 2-3 female yanderes depending on interpretation. It is well worth the 10 dollars though- there is indeed a LOT of content. It is also pretty r18 despite not having any actual sex scenes or anything as it can get gory or talk about more sensitive topics. You can find more information about this and other games at @violetstudiogames. This is going to be VERY long, so bare with me.

Starting out, I'll give a brief summary of each non-yandere route including some of my brief opinions on it. We will save the yandere (or yanderesque) routes for last since I have more to say on it. The main character's default name is Dante, so we will use that name when discussing relationships. I'll go in order from how me and Cherry played it, skipping the yandere routes until the end. Generally the idea is that the more innocent the character looks, the more terrible their route is and the more problematic they look the more sweet their route is (not always true, but it is to a certain extent)

The game starts out with Dante moving into a new apartment. They are really behind on rent and the landlady is trying to come in and get them to pay her.

Clement's route starts with Dante getting help from the landlady in finding a job. Dante ends up working with Clement at his restaurant. While Clement is generally very angry when people do stupid things in his restaurant (so like Gordan Ramsy), though he is for the most part kind towards Dante because he has an interest in them. Dante and Clement eventually get close to each other. We learn about Dante's past and how they moved away because they accidentally killed their parents in a car accident, and still feel survivor's guilt for it. The two get into a relationship after some cute moments.

Clement's route is very cute all things considered and is the most fluffiest route out of all of them. The route is pretty solid, but I think that Dante's personality in this route was a tad annoying. Not the worse one, but just a bit annoying. If you came into this game not knowing about all of the warnings about how dark it is, Clement's route will very easily fool you into thinking it is a sweet game when it really is not. He's a caring person though and he just wants Dante to be happy. Very sweet.

Festus's route starts with Dante promising to pay the landlady and attempting to steal from a nearby church (and failing). Festus gives them a place to stay in the church and Dante ends up helping out at the church. Dante finds out pretty fast that Anise is sort of corrupting Festus with sexual desires, which is causing his duties as a priest to become worse. Festus persists that it is his own desires that lead him to Anise, but it's also obvious that Anise is enabling them and taking advantage of him. Dante is able to help Festus break of from Anise and continue to lead his life as a priest the way that he wants to.

I actually did like Festus's route. I thought it would be a bit more dark, but it is for the most part rather wholesome the way that Dante tries to help Festus throughout it and that he's not just a sly and promiscuous person, but someone who cares deeply about the community. Dante in this one is probably one of the better main characters (in my opinion) because they are able to help Festus the way that he was able to help them (plus I think that them trying to steal from a broke church is funny). Unfortunately, despite how good the route is, it is relatively forgettable compared to other routes.

Nanako's route starts with Dante going to work for them thanks to the land lady. We are greeted by Nanako and her sister Kazue. Initially Nanako doesn't really have anything for Dante to do, but as Kazue gets clingy towards Dante, Nanako tasks us to take care of Kazue. As Dante takes care of Kazue, we see that her mental state is degrading, becoming very capricious at times. Eventually, Nanako introduce us to her friend Eira, who has been stalking a man named Mateo for her. Mateo seems to have done something to Kazue, which is why her mental state has deteriorated so heavily. Eventually following Mateo leads us to a back alley, where Nanako is able to kill Mateo once and for all.

Nanako's route is where the dark parts of the story become more obvious, with the start of Mateo and his master coming into play. Really Nanako's route feels more like a Kazue route feat Nanako, since it seems mostly platonic but more importantly that she's not really in the route. It's not really a bad route, it's just not really "Nanako's" route, if you know what I mean.

Lucian's route starts with Dante being kicked out of their apartment and them living on the streets. Lucian ends up picking them up and giving them a place to stay at his escort business. They end up working as a receptionist with Lucian flirting every now and then with them. Eventually though, while getting close to Lucian, Dante reads a diary on the side of his bed depicting scenes of being molested, raped, witnessing murder as a child and being abused by his parents. Lucian catches them and is understandably enraged by this, which leads Dante into feeling incredibly distraught. The two are able to make up because of Dante's gift, and Lucian ends up trying to force them even despite their pleas. This leaves Lucian upset that Dante has rejected his advances, which lingers until they make up. Dante is kidnapped by Sergio and his gang to his location, with Sergio trying to warn them about Lucian. Dante refuses to believe him and Lucian comes to rescue him, leading to the two of them shooting him. All seems well afterwards with Lucian being together with Dante.

Lucian in his route is mostly pretty nice to Dante given that you get his good route, but boy does Lucian do pretty bad things in other routes. In his own route, getting a neutral or bad ending will have Lucian turn Dante into an escort against their will, either by manipulating them or telling them that he's spent too much resources on them and makes them work it off in this way. He definitely has one of the worst backstories in the game, but this of course doesn't justify his behavior. He and Sergio were a couple, but Lucian seems to not care or think about Sergio at all, which is especially telling since he sleeps with a lot of other people (and in Ophelia's route, used to "break them in", and even attempts to rape Ophelia as well) and it doesn't even seem like he and Sergio have been broken up for that long. He is written to be the playboy done straight, which definitely is done well since it elicits pretty strong reactions (which for me is disgust, mostly, but I've never liked playboys in the first place). Dante in this version is written to be the doe eye innocent character like a lot of otome girl protagonists, which works on his route since he really needs to have a main character who is that naive for it to be pulled off.

Sergio's route starts with the land lady calling the repo men after Dante refuses to talk to her, leading to Mateo coming in and taking their stuff. Given that Dante pretty much has nothing, Mateo just kidnaps them and brings them to Sergio. Sergio is annoyed, but takes a liking to Dante and gives them a job as a black jack dealer and a place to stay. During this time, Mateo pesters Dante and Sergio tries to flirt with them, leading to Mateo getting beat up by Sergio after letting a customer get away with a ton of money. Mateo ends up trying to get Dante to escape with him, but they refuse. Sergio is pissed that Mateo left suddenly, and gets Dante to stay in his room for the time being. Sergio ends up confessing accidentally (and very cutely) to Dante, who continues to tease him. Eventually getting closer to Sergio, he tells Dante about his history with Lucian, how they were together, but Lucian suddenly broke up with him (due to the fact that he was afraid of his status and him being afraid of them being extremely homophobic to him) and stealing half of his company. This entire time he knows he has to take down Lucian for this, but he is still too shaken up by the break up and still cares for him. With Dante's reassurance, Lucian is able to kidnap Ophelia and Allegra, confining them to the dungeon (which is actually very well furnished with a shower). Dante is tasks to take care of them and gets Sergio to collaborate with Ophelia to get rid of Lucian (since she hates his guts). This leads to an attack on his lounge, but when Sergio and Lucian are seen face to face, Sergio can't shoot him, leading to his right hand lady Eira doing it for him.

Sergio is really cute, but that's no surprise because that's coming from me. Despite his position as mafia boss, he is surprisingly easy to tease and actually pretty kind all things considered. He's in a pretty stressful situation given that Lucian has stolen half of his business and he needs to keep his business afloat. He is also probably the most sensitive of the guys in this game, still attached to Lucian despite all of the horrible things he's done to him/other people. He's trying very hard to keep up the façade, despite the fact that I think he mostly treats everyone pretty well all things considered (Mateo is an exception, but it's kind of understandable given Mateo's personality). Also, canonically is submissive and breedable according to the wikia, which would never lie to me. I think Dante in this route is very bratty, but it works with this route because of Sergio's cute reactions, otherwise, I probably would have been more annoyed at Dante's behavior. He also has one of the worst endings (in my opinion) given that in the bad ending, Sergio misses his shot, causing her and Eira to be shot fatally. Dante is then raped by Lucian in front of Sergio's dying body and eventually sold off as an escort afterwards, thus showing that Lucian is still worst boy and that Sergio has every right to kill him as best boy. That's just my opinion, but man Sergio is adorable, is all I'm saying.

Ophelias route branches off of Lucian's after Dante asks to work with her instead. Initially, Ophelia seems to just be very mean spirited and direct person, spitting on Dante after not understanding how important skincare and fashion is. Initially, Dante doesn't see the big deal of it, but slowly sees just how much work Ophelia does and just how good she is as it, touching up all of the escorts. Ophelia is blunt and mean, sure, but she never lies and is in the end trying to help people, despite how it may come out. Dante slowly learns about all the work she has to do and admires her drive for it. Ophelia starts to let Dante in, telling them just how much work she does for Lucian's lounge and how much she despises him, only working for him as a paycheck. Eventually, Ophelia ends up snapping at Lucian after he tries to force Dante into an escort position, leading to Ophelia stabbing his eye and peeling his face off of his corpse. Ophelia explains to Dante that he was trying to hurt them and that she was only protecting them, adding that Lucian would often sleep with his escorts to "break them in" and even tried to rape Ophelia. After this, Ophelia ends up taking over the business thanks to Sergio and Eira, and the two work together.

Ophelia being one of the poster children for this series has a pretty fun route, all things considered, though I can definitely see people trying to label her as a yandere. She initially does seem like one considering her good ending, killing Lucian to protect Dante, but in her bad ending, its revealed she does this quite frequently to people who don't listen to her and even skins Dante for this very reason. She is much more of a yangire, and I can see why people might have more split opinions on her route. I actually did like her route quite a bit, partially because I just like cute looking characters and because she is very competent at what she does with her advice, while said in a callous way, very useful and generally trying to help people, and if you get in her way, she will kill you. Plus her friendship/love for Allegra is very cute and the two compliment each other very well.

Eira's route starts with Dante going to the bank trying to get a job from Vincent only to be turned down. They are then scouted by Eira and brought to Sergio, where they work as a bartender. Dante gets more and more curious and worried about Eira as she seems to be sneaking around and Dante keeps trying to butt in so that Eira will tell them what's going on. Eira brings Dante to her house where she's renovating and they have some cute moments together, until Eira brings them to meet Nanako. They stalk around in Mateo's turf for a while, before Eira has to go and help Sergio dispatch Lucian. During this time Dante talks to some of the children in Mateo's turf and brings that information back to Eira. Eira returns wounded after being shot, and soon after tending them, the two go out to get rid of Mateo. The two get sucked into the blackhole where Mateo's master lives, leading to a weird scene where Eira and Dante are together.

I really like Eira, but her route is very confusing. I understand it's suppose to sort of tie in with the true ending of Mateo's master, but it sacrifices Eira's route for it, which is not great (at least in her happy ending). I felt really bad though in her normal ending, as instead we get Sergio to help, but before Mateo dies, he outs that Eira has been using Sergio to get to Mateo. Given that, Sergio has no choice but to shoot her, despite how heartbroken he is, leading either Dante to sacrifice themselves or Eira to die. Personally, I wasn't a fan of Dante in this route because while I understand the general idea was to get Dante to push about what Eira is hiding so that she doesn't have to carry the burden herself, it is written in a way that makes Dante seem very annoying, especially since Eira herself states that she doesn't want Dante to get hurt and that Dante doesn't have any way or training to defend themselves. There are cute moments between them, but the ending of the happy ending is jarring and unsatisfying. Probably the worst of all routes just because of that.

Alright, now let's talk about the yandere/ yanderesque characters. The three characters I consider as certain yanderes are Vincent, Kazue and Allegra (in her bad ending) and the ones that can be more debatable are Anise and Mateo.

Allegra's route starts with Dante attempting to steal from her bouquet only to be caught and reprehended by her. Dante ends up crying and telling Allegra about their situation, to which Allegra gives them a job working at the bouquet alongside her. Things go mostly smoothly, though Dante has to learn to work with Allegra's temper when she gets pissed off, until someone attempts to rob the bouquet. Allegra is able to knock him out, but after pissing her off, she ends up killing him, causing Dante to panic. Allegra tries to calm them down, telling them they can sell the body off to Mateo so that the evidence won't be found. Allegra ends up teaching Dante about designing clothing, but also both have to do a favor for Mateo. This results in the two luring a deaf girl named Eden into the alleyway for Mateo's master to leave, which leaves a bad taste in Dante's mouth. With the help of Ophelia, the two are able to escape Mateo's debt and work together in the bouquet together.

In her bad ending, Dante is scared out of their wits of Allegra, despite how hard Allegra is at trying to keep her temper and be nice to them. In the end, Dante seems to be so scared or uncomfortable with Allegra that they reject a matching outfits she designed for them. This leads to Allegra knocking out Dante and Allegra confronting them about how they're still afraid of her. Allegra takes her clothes cutter promising that she will take care of Dante until they learn to no longer fear them and cuts off their legs and arms.

Allegra's yandere ending is pretty cool since a lot of times yanderes use fear as a way to get with their lover (especially male yanderes, in which it often turns them on) but with her, it's the opposite-trying to get Dante to NOT be afraid of her (albeit by cutting off their arms and legs). I think it's a pretty good subversion of that trope and although we only see her do this in her bad ending, it was still pretty cool to see. Her route as a whole is very nice and I think Dante's personality paired very well with it. Despite being dangerous, she still maintains a sweet side and just wants to be loved.

Vincent's route (which is the main one we care about on a male yandere blog) starts out with Dante going to the bank to get a job. Unlike in Eira's route, Vincent is very understanding of Dante's position and proceeds to pay off their rent as long as they work in the bank to pay it off. Dante is very grateful for this and starts to work at the bank, but feels extreme pressure due to the fact that they feel like they're slipping behind despite instruction. This leads to Vincent inviting them over to his house to talk about this, only for Vincent to drug them. Upon waking up, Dante is chained to the bed, while Vincent explains that they are now his wife (yes, wife- doesn't matter what Dante's actual gender is, Vincent will call them his wife). Vincent states his very strong rules about how Dante will be his wife- waking up early to choose his clothes, cooking meals for him and saying goodbye and welcome home when he comes back. Failing to do so will cause Dante to be punished. We see this on the first day when Dante fails to wake up and cook breakfast for Vincent, with Vincent forcing them to strip and walk around naked for the rest of the day. Vincent implies he's put cameras around the apartment, so they can't put on their clothes or risk getting punished. While trying to make food for Vincent's dinner, Dante gets burned and leaves the food to accidentally burn. When Vincent comes home and finds out, he punishes Dante by forcibly placing their arm over an open stove, causing them to be severely burned. As the days go by, Dante gets better at becoming a housewife and despite some hiccups (like chewing loudly), Vincent comes to be more soft and accommodating, even happy when Dante calls Vincent using an old phone that is used for emergencies. While cleaning one day, Dante ends up passing out due to the bleach fumes, leading to an extremely worried Vincent. He reveals that he wanted to have a family for so long, but was always lonely-happy that Dante is now with them to make the perfect family. Vincent ends up adopting two children from the streets after trying to make a baby with Dante (again, doesn't matter gender, baby's gotta be made) whom are also chained to complete Vincent's perfect family. Dante gets punished by Vincent a couple of times for failing to be a good wife, but ultimately Dante gets used to it. Eventually, Vincent lets Dante go out with him to the flower shop. In the end, Dante is fully stockholm sydrome and takes care of Vincent, and the they all stay together as a happy family.

If Dante does try to run away, Vincent will catch them, leading to him killing the two children in front of Dante before killing them, stating that it's their fault that they (and the children) died and that they destroyed his perfect family.

In the bad ending, Vincent is tired that Dante is not the perfect wife and kills them with a knife. Dante is killed, but finally feels free of their shackles.

Vincent runs a pretty fun idea of enforcing traditional values with a yandere twist of confinement and stockholm syndrome. He loves Dante, but wants them to follow his set of rules to be his perfect life, whether they want to or not. I was pretty surprised that Dante was pretty lax in this route, not really attempting to run away but instead succumbing to the stockholm syndrome in the end. As a yandere, he enacts punishments to mold Dante into the perfect housewife, but also worries about them when they are hurt by accident, and is extremely happy when they don't leave him, as he is a lonely person who just wants to have his happy family. He even tells the landlady that the two are dating and that Dante will move in when he pays Dante's rent. There's something both familiar and unique about this situations that Vincent has when it comes to yandere media, which is in my opinion very nice and still adds to the wariness of horror while having a loving aspect to him. It's interesting that the traits for Vincent's route to activate to include submissiveness since he does believe that it is part of his lover to be a wife, and that wives are subserviently in this way. Personally I feel like Vincent and Kazue are kind of an OTP not really because they would have a good relationship (god would they not have a stable relationship) but rather because their traits and personalities compliment each other to a T, with Vincent wanting a loving a supportive wife and Kazue wanting to be useful and being extremely good at housework. They would manipulate each other to hell and back and are too strong of a yandere couple. Also, Cherry really liked him and I liked his route, but I would be turned into fried chicken really fast because boy am I not good at housework. Also, this entire route I was trying to mimic Markplier's voice (because that's kind of what Vincent sounds like sometimes) and I think it's really funny that Vincent kinda just kidnapped two kids off of the streets to be in his family. I understand why, it's just the image of it is hilarious. Stockholm syndrome go brr.

Kazue's route is an extension of Nanako's route, where Dante pays attention more to Kazue. Initially it is very sweet, with the two teasing each other and while Kazue does have her fits of capricious crying, is mostly very kind to Dante...and starts to cling very hard to them. While the two like each other, Kazue gets very jealous whenever they are near Nanako, even if it's just to do certain tasks for Kazue. Kazue also gets very obsessive, sniffing Dante's clothing and using their bathwater. She talks about missing her departed husband Daichi dearly, and wishing that she were more useful despite her broken body- happy that Dante is very similar to how kind Daichi is. Kazue is able to convince Dante to move in with them, and then convinces them to go out and meet Kazue's friend, which is Mateo's master. After passing out and being brought back, they try to tell Nanako what's happened, but can't find her anywhere. Dante continues to tell themselves that Kazue is a sweet person and that she isn't capable of doing horrible things, even though at some point Kazue ends up sexually assaulting Dante and continues to manipulate them into believing that they're being cruel by not doing what she says. Eventually, Dante finds Nanako's corpse in her bedroom, and despite Kazue nonchalantly stating that she was the on who killed her, Dante starts to get attached to Kazue and is fully manipulated at this point. The two are finally married in front of Mateo's master.

In the normal ending, Dante isn't fully manipulated and tries to convince her that she will find someone even better to get married to. Kazue can't accept this and ends up bounding Dante to the bed until they realize they are Kazue's true love.

In the bad ending, Dante pushes her away, leading her to kill Dante. Dante is able to see Kazue keep their dead body, delusionally holding them and taking care of their and Nanako's corpses.

Kazue's route is what I would expect a female route to be like- which is to say less on the physically violent side and more on the manipulative side. I'm not saying that female yanderes can't be violent, but I think that this type of yandere is more found in female yandere routes rather than male ones. That being said, I do kind of wish that there were male yanderes that feign weakness and get the MC to depend on them through emotional manipulation (I call these yanderes "Damsel yanderes" for feigning weakness to get their lover to be with them.) Still though, Kazue's route is very twisted because while Kazue is seemingly weak, she does do a quite a lot of horrible things such as committing sororicide, emotional manipulation, rape or sexual assault and just killing, yet it doesn't feel as scary as Vincent's route. I suppose it's the difference of thrown into lava or being slowly boiled alive- one is more immediately dangerous, while the other seems fine until it's too late, which in many cases, is sometimes even more terrifying. Eventually the two become one, and I can see Kazue as a bunch of types of yanderes from delusional, to a replacement type (Dante replacing Daichi), to manipulative and it works very well without it feeling like it's just tacked on. Still pretty horror esque, though in the way that something is creeping up behind you that you don't see. Again, Kazue and Vincent OTP, causing chaos everywhere they go.

Finally the two yanderes that are more debatable... I can see an argument for both ways.

Mateo's route starts through Sergio's- by running away with Mateo to avoid Sergio's wrath. Mateo drags them off to the alleyways where there are children living in boxes. Mateo is very volatile, one second being cutesy and nice while the other spitting out obscenities' and choking Dante to sleep. Dante helps the children the next day find boxes to make new houses but when Mateo returns, he ends up chaining himself to Dante. After not eating nor sleeping well for a while, (and having Mateo nearly killing Dante when peeing on a plant), Mateo and Dante go out to get food for the children, which involve killing Clement and feeding him to the children. He also gets other bodies to feed his master, the giant hole in the alleyway. Dante refuses to cannibalize and tries to get Eira to help them (silently) while the two are chained up. Mateo continues to be volatile, choking Dante, screaming at a child for bringing dead animals all as Dante grows weaker and weaker with little food or water. Eira tries to kill Mateo and free Dante, but ends up shooting Dante in the leg by accident and presumably being fed to Mateo's master. To stop the bleeding, Mateo cuts off both of Dante's legs in a gruesome fashion, and Dante snaps, angering Mateo. Mateo throws Dante into the trash, where Dante slowly grows insane, refusing to eat their own leg which Mateo throws into with them all as they suffer from the pain in the remains of their legs. Eventually, Dante starts to befriend the maggots living in their chopped off leg. Completely mindbroken, they eat cannibalize whatever flesh Mateo throws into the bin and is eventually rescued by Mateo. Completely mindbroken, Dante happily agrees with Mateo about his point of view and even tries to resew their other leg off, only to have Mateo cut off their hand instead, something which Dante accepts happily. Mateo brings Dante to Kazue's place and ends up killing both of them. Mateo and Dante live... happily until Mateo mentions that his master wants to eat Dante, but he doesn't want them to go. Unwilling to let them be eaten the two seemingly run away together.

In his normal ending, Mateo ends up leaving forever (presumably eaten by his master) while Dante waits happily forever for his return.

In the bad ending, Mateo brings Dante to be eaten (though with great distraughtness) and he eventually gets eaten as well by his master.

Mateo's route is the darkest route with the two creators trying to up themselves in every time. It has rape jokes, cannibalism, cutting off body parts, mindbreak, and basically you really feel for poor Dante in this route. Now the question comes down to the thought of Mateo actually does love Dante in this route or is just incredibly insane and does not do this out of love but out of insanity. You can make a case for both, since Mateo does end up mindbreaking Dante to understanding his point of view. Mateo views humans as lumps of flesh and undeserving since they caused problems for the world, and sees anything that harms the innocent (namely animals as plants) as atrocities, thus has no qualms with killing people or doing horrible things to them like stitching and sewing body parts on weird places. Does breaking Dante's will and personality to understand all of this make him a yandere? Personally, I think it does through the impetration that all of this is Mateo's twisted way of showing love in the sense that he wants Dante to understand his love. I think of it as an extreme Vincent, where Vincent does love Dante but also punishes them to make them follow their rules, to come to an understanding of their place as a housewife. Similarly, Mateo does love Dante (he presents them as his lover to Kazue, has a wedding of sorts in his epilogue in front of his master, constantly keeps them alive despite him having every opportunity and reason to kill them and in the endings is always reluctant to have Dante die by his masters hands, which to him is the most important thing) but is trying to make Dante understand his point of view with his extreme hatred of humans even if it comes to mindbreaking them. If this is actually what Mateo believes as showing love, then I can see him as a yandere since he does love them to this much of an extreme, especially if its through the eyes of a delusional yandere. Understandably, I can see why people don't see him as one, since all of his actions pretty much cause harm to Dante, it's not what you would standardly think of love and is closer to sadism, and he does mindbreak them making you wonder if they cared about Dante in the first place. It's understandable, so that's why I think it can be either or depending on the interpretation of "love".

Anise's route is the final route, starting off with meeting her in the church. Dante then cycles through all of the characters, berating them for leaving them, either their relationship or getting them killed amongst other things. We finally see Anise in her pure form, seeing that she is the master that Mateo so greatly worships. She reveals that everyone is already dead, living in a sort of Dante's Inferno, all wandering around her web until they are filled with so much suffering that Anise eats them. Anise is some sort of god like being, unable to die and consumed by boredom. All the characters are brought because of their strong desire and wishes (get it, dead wishes?) and slowly get more corrupted the longer they are there. Anise and Dante then kind of go off into a morality questionaire, where they can either leave or stay with Anise. Staying with Anise affirms that the two of them are the same, while leaving showcases Dante's strong conviction and Anise waiting for them to come back.

The thing with Anise's route is about the mortality of doing bad or good things and that if our actions in the game make us similar to her, sadistic and cruel or make us different. Honestly, I can understand the concept, but there isn't really any indication that we are jumping from route to route in the game and that we are messing up the relationships we've already made, and for all I knew, I was simply starting a new timeline every time. Personally, I feel like it falls short because not only were we completely unaware we were essentially leaving people behind constantly, but also because Anise goes on and on about how selfish we are, yet in most of the routes, Dante is kind of just reacting to certain things as opposed to purposefully doing bad things. To me there is a difference between choosing to purposefully kill someone (for any reason) and going along with someone killing's because of self defense. While they are both bad, one of them does imply a level of choice while the other restrains it. For instance, in Allegra's route, Dante has the choice to call the police after the man is killed, but it will always lead to Dante being killed by Allegra. There is also a difference between knowing and purposefully ending a route to cut off someone's happiness and moving onto the next one and being unaware that you are doing so, since there then is an actual knowledge of consequence to your actions. Finally, despite all of the bad things we've done of jumping from route to route, Anise makes it feel like it's all Dante's fault and that they've destroyed the happy endings of all of the characters while doing so, when honestly, it shouldn't be up to Dante to determine whether or not they are happy. Yes, it does suck that Dante left them, but regardless of their situation, people are responsible for their own happiness and shouldn't blame it on others. Anise is fascinated by Dante throughout the routes as they see them as like her, callous in the fates of others and using them all as toys when in reality we were most likely oblivious to the suffering we caused.

Anise pretty desperately wants someone like her, to understand what she's like and thus grows obsessed with Dante when she believes they are similar. Despite the fact that she seems to despise the idea of love, she's also strangely fascinated by it when it comes to Dante being similar? The best I can see her as a yandere is kind of an extreme narcissist that projects onto Dante in that they are similar because she's just that lonely, but I can't really say that she is (in my opinion) since she seems to despise love and doesn't hold anything remotely close to love (romantically, platonically or otherwise), only fascination. It's kind of like projecting onto an ant and being fascinated by it because you both are hard workers- it's not really love, just an interest. Still, I suppose if Anise did actually feel love at some point, I could see it as one, but considering again how much Anise despises love... eh...

Also, sidenote, I wish I could get a job as fast as Dante does, cuz this person gets jobs left and right without even trying. I get that they're in a limbo of sorts, but please... I wish I could very easily get a job by attempting to rob someone or something like that.

Anyways, Dead Wishes overall is a very well made game from the voice acting, to the routes, to the UI and soundtrack. All of it is well worth $10s and has a good mix of characters to keep everything interesting and well thought out. I got to play their other games because I heard there was another yandere in one of their other games, so you know how it is. If you are interested, please give it a try- it does not disappoint.

#male yandere #yandere #yandere boy #recommendations #asks #dead wishes #my fingers hurt again...

[aristocratic-otter]

Hello all! Well, COVID has passed me, not with a bang but with a whimper. I.E., I got it, I think (never tested positive), but with very very faint symptoms, and I'm fine now, so phew. Also, I'm going to see the Book of Mormon this week (the play), so I'm hyped right now!

Thank you to all who've tagged me in the last week. Even when I don't have time or feel up to posting, I love reading what y'all are doing. It's so diverse and interesting!

My thanks to: @j-nipper-95, @artsyunderstudy, @aroace-genderfluid-sheep, @nightimedreamersghost, @cosmicalart, @larkral, @angelsfalling16, @wellbelesbian, @cutestkilla, @confused-bi-queer, @hushed-chorus, @bookish-bogwitch, @ileadacharmedlife and @you-remind-me-of-the-babe.

There'll be no snippet from Westward Son this week. Not that I'm not making progress (I am), but everything I've written this week is extremely smutty, lol.

From my Age of Sail AU, which now has a name! It's Stars, Flowers, and Children, from the Dante quote: "Three things remain to us from paradise: stars, flowers, and children." It's extremely fitting, as you'll eventually see.

The Snip:

I don’t look at Baz. I’m feeling a little tetchy after being so soft with him. After a moment, he rolls back onto his back as well. Neither of us talk about it. But just as I’m drifting off, I’m almost certain I hear him whisper, “Thank you.”

Every night, for years afterward, I always give him a hug and a kiss goodnight.

From: To Heal a Broken Mind (coming down to the wire on this one!)

I want Baz. I want to wrap myself around him. I want to pull him inside of me so that our two hearts merge into one. 

He wants it too. And I’m too weak to deny him. To deny myself the comfort of his arms tonight. 

From Saving Simon Snow (I've hit a rough patch, but I think there will be a new chapter sometime this week):

“Shit,” he hisses. 

I spin to face him, half expecting a monster to have burst out of the fixtures and attacked him. But he’s fine. There’s no monster. Just Baz. Who for some reason is glaring at this very pretty bed. 

From Snow Fox (Next chapter definitely up this week!) (TW: for emetophobics):

“Basilton, what are you—” my father says, frowning. 

Before he can finish, though, Tarleton sends me a cocky grin and says, “I could land that hit with my eyes shut, Mr. Pitch.” 

“Show me?” I breathe, biting my lip as if enthralled by him. I’m not. I’m disgusted. If he tried to kiss me, I might vomit in his mouth.

From this year's CORB, The Heart In The Well (the name just came to me, I can't explain why it takes months for some fics and days for others!)

“This is your fault!”

Baz crosses his arms over his chest and narrows his eyes at me. “Really, Snow,” he drawls. I swear he sounds posher the more annoyed he is. Which is quite a trick, given that he’s sitting in the dirt, his stork legs stretched out nearly from one side of the well to the other, and wearing a dirty and tattered Watford uniform. 

Still he manages to look better than me.

Aaaand...a tease from something I've been calling "Simon as a TikTok dancer" (but which is absolutely a lot more than that):

Shepard smiles at my apparent interest. “This footage still needs a lot of editing before I can post it. But we post it on the internet, which is a way everyone in the world can see it if they want. And if enough people see it, we might get noticed. And we might start making money. More than the tips we get for our live performances at least.”

Half of what he says is nonsense to me, but I’m quivering with curiosity now. 

(and no, this isn't the mystery project I've teased. Which makes this...wince...my seventh WIP)

Tags and High Fives to everyone above and :

@angelsfalling16, @bazzybelle, @carryonsimoncarryonbaz, @dragoneggos, @erzbethluna, @frjsti, @fatalfangirl, @facewithoutheart, @ionlydrinkhotwater, @ivelovedhimthroughworse, @jasonfunderberkerthefrogexists, @krisrix, @messofthejess, @moments-au-crayon22, @alexalexinii, @moodandmist, @mostlymaudlin, @prettylightsbigcity, @rimeswithpurple, @raenestee, @thehoneyedhufflepuff, @theearlgreymage, @tea-brigade, @technetiumai, @upuntil6am, @whogaveyoupermission, @whatevertheweather, @yellobb-old.

#cotta2023 #COTTA 2021 #American Revolution AU #carry on reverse bang #canon divergence #forced marriage #Blue lagoon au #House AU #Magickal AU #co/ws/awtwb #six sentence sunday #simon snow series #carry on through the ages

[xgoddessoffandomsx]

Name: Beckett "Beck" O'Connor

Nickname: Little O'Connor

Age: 32

Hair Color: Blond

Eye Color: Blue

Psychical Appearance: Tall and blond with muscles and tattoos.

Relationships

Natalie Hale (Wife)

Alexis Hale-O'Connor (Daughter)

Brian O'Connor (Older Brother)

Tess (Older Sister)

Eric Reisner/Little Nobody (Older Brother)

Frank Petty/Mr Nobody (Father)

Ms O'Connor (Mother)

Dominic Toretto (Brother in law)

Mia Toretto (Sister in law)

Letty Ortiz (Sister in law)

Jakob Toretto (Brother in law)

Jack O'Connor-Toretto (Nephew)

Brian Marcos Toretto (Nephew)

Cipher (Enemy, situational ally)

Roman (Ally)

Tej (Ally)

Suki (Ally)

Ramsey (Ally)

Gisele Yashar (Ally)

Han Lue (Ally)

Sean Boswell (Ally, rival)

Twinkie (Ally)

Earl (Ally)

Leon (Ally)

Jesse (Ally)

Vince (Ally)

Deckard Shaw (Enemy, situational ally)

Owen Shaw (Enemy, captor, situation ally)

Role in films

The Fast and the Furious

Beck is first mentioned when Brian tells Dom about him and how he would move heaven and hell for him

2 Fast 2 Furious

When Tej asks about him, Brian says he recently joined the special forces. Roman asks about him, Tess and Eric later.

Fast and Furious

Beck appears for the first time, having recently retired, with information on Letty's death for Brian. He also says that he can't hide his feelings for Dom forever.

Fast Five

Appears with his wife Natalie and daughter Alexis, gives the team info on Reyes and his money houses. Beck joins temporarily to help Brian. Natalie bonds with Dom over their love for their dumb blonds who get into trouble.

Fast and Furious 6

Now living in Brazil with Natalie and Alexis, he volunteers with Elena Neves, another ally, to keep watch on Mia and her son. Before Natalie leaves with the crew, Beck promises that this will be their final favor for Brian. When Vegh and Klaus are sent to kidnap Mia and Jack, he distracts them long enough to allow them to escape, being used as a hostage instead to control Brian. Natalie later helps her brother in law kill Vegh and reunites with her husband. Beck comforts her and asks if she is okay rather than him.

Furious 7

Like his brother, Beck has a hard time adjusting to regular life after his time in special forces and as a criminal. He relays to Dom that Brian told him he misses the violence. He and Natalie don't take part in the mission against Deckard Shaw but has to be physically held back by his brother from punching their father. He hugs Mia and Letty goodbye when they decide to retire, Letty having regained most of her memories. He celebrates after Dom proposes to Brian. Beck also urges them to adopt a child so he wasn't the only one who had one.

Fate of the Furious

Beck punches Eric upon reuniting with him, and also makes various gestures at Roman to stop mocking his brother. Due to his family and retirement, Beck reluctantly leaves. Natalie tells him to stop pretending that he doesn't miss being a member of the crew and that she loves him no matter what. He returns towards the end to help his brother. He decides to attempt a permanent retirement after Deckard saves Dom's son.

F9

Beck comes out of retirement to help his brother again. He asks Mia how Letty is handling babysitting his nephews and if her memory is better. Sean makes various jokes about him being dumb because he's blond, he asks if they can give Sean to Jakob. He retires again at the end, joking that it won't last long.

Fast X

Beck is mentioned by Tess when she explains to Aimes her family history. Eric asks Dom if he and his wife are safe, to which Brian says yes. However Beck and Natalie appear as targets on Dante's list.

Trivia:

Nicknamed Little O'Connor because of the age difference between him and his siblings, Brian being in his early fifties, Tess in her mid forties and Eric in his early forties.

He met Natalie sometime after he was discharged.

Despite not being biologically related, he's close with his nephew Jack.

His car is a Charger Hellcat.

Beck tried to stay away from the Agency's radar for years.

#my oc #orginal character #beckett o'connor #beck o'connor #little o'connor

[aggressivenesswhilecrying]

Dante, do you like that slow burn?

Summery:

Ren and martyn are the final two, all their allies and enemies are dead. And on the black heart alter, ren and martyn stand, axe and sword in hand.

Martyns entire life revoles around his king, he knows ren better than he knows himself. And he knows ren isn't made for spring. And well. Martyn will always follow were his king goes.

TW!! MAIN CHARACTER DEATH, HURT NO COMFORT, VIOLENCE!!

Beta read and edited!!

(This is for day one of treebark week, prompt flower/frost!!)

The air is turning warm finally in dogwarts, and the two who rule over it stand on th black heart altar. The king and his hand. Winter has finally passed, and ice and snow are melting away to reveal green grass. The trees are decorated in blossoms, and birds are singing happily. The air tastes like pollen in ren and martyn’s mouths.

Red winter has passed. And spring has come.

And yet there is still red decorating the ground. Poppies burst from the ground, and the tops of beetroots. Red winter has passed and yet a cardinal sits proudly in the tree overhead. Tilting its head as it gazes at the two. Wonder in its sound.

Spring is here, and the light and growth are returning to dogwarts in every way they possibly can.

And there are only two left. Two stand on the ruined earth. They won. It’s, well, it’s almost over. They have almost done it. Soon, there will be nothing but whispers of their lives in these abandoned walls. Ren's ears are low, his sunglasses discarded on the ground, tail between his legs. His hair is matted, and his crown long since gone. His cape curled up at his feet, and Martyn wants to weep. His classic green hoodie is stained brown, red having soaked in. The time is pink now, it’s green, it’s beautiful and alive, life takes over the corpses of their enemies. And yet here two dead men walking are. They aren't made for the gentle spring.

They made the winter with their bare hands, it’s far too late for them to bloom into spring.

Martyn can feel his torn jean shorts against his legs. His sandals painfully digging into his feet, the red winter axe in his hand held tight. He can feel the shaking of despair traveling up his spine. It leaves him feeling breathless and his knee’s shaking.

No matter how gentle the air is, he can't seem to breathe right. He feels sick to his stomach.

Death game. It’s in the name. Everyone dies. Everyone kills each other. Teams are never meant to last here. No. They rot, and fall away like old wood. Lasting for the moment, but after a while, after rain, it always rots away, it always opens up to a hole.

Death game.

They have to kill each other. After all this time they have to tear their weapons through beautiful, loved skin. Skin they grew to worship. Kisses whispered prayers late at night during the beginning of the end. The skin of those they love so deeply. The skin they cared for in the deepest parts of their souls, the skin they both vowed to try to keep safe from harm.

The ax falls from martyn’s hand, and he lets out an ugly sob, back shaking as he loses even more breath in his air from his lungs, he brings the balls of his hands to his eyes each, voice raw as tears start to run down his face, slowly he hears the sound of ren dropping his own weapon, and it’s slow, hesitant even, before ren is running, desperate to get to martyn.

Steps once slow, now quick and rushed as there is no longer any space between them, ren clawing, latching onto martyn, claw like nails digging into clothing, and almost skin as he tugs martyn to his chest. His own breathing is shaky. And his own tears coming to his eyes, there is no space between them to even breathe as he holds martyn like his life depends on it.

If anything Ren is safer away from martyn, but at this point, they don't even care.

“Gods- i- fuck ren, i dont want to, i dont want to do this..!!'' Martyn's voice is a wet scream near the end as he curls into the rough and worn fabric, tears falling like a waterfall, soaking into ren clothing. Rens head settles on top of martyns own, and the king shakes and hiccups, his own tears falling into martyn’s hair, it’s almost nice to know that ren is feeling the same way martyn is right now, just a little bit of reassurance, a “maybe he loves me too, maybe it was true.” but Martyn knows it was. Martyn knows how honest Ren is, and he could not have faked that long, looked into Martyn's eyes, and lied for that long. He knows Ren loved him. And he loves Ren the same. Of course he does. How could he not?

He loves Ren with everything he is. He loves Ren with everything in his soul. He has given his life to ren, every single life. He has listened to every single command ren has ever dished out. He has given everything to ren, loved ren like how someone would love a prayer. It’s all their wishes, dreams, deepest fears. It’s everything they are, is only a few words. Or in this case, one man.

“I don't want to either..”

The silly accent is dropped of ren shivers against martyn, hand tangling into his hair as he holds on like his life depends on it. Like it's his entire life on the line. And he cries. Ren lets out a deep sob, and he cries. Full of love for martyn, love for the home they built. And hate, hate for the situation and how he cant do anything to change their fate.

He can't fix anything, this is the end after all.

Martyn tilts his head up just barely, looking at Ren with tear filled eyes. And he makes a decision as he looks at ren. He makes a decision he could never take back.

He meets Ren's eyes, and for one final moment, one moment of love, he whispers the words he’s meant for ages, in reality, it has only been maybe 8 weeks, but they mean so much more than he’s willing to admit. And he kisses ren.

His king's lips are chapped and scratches against his painfully, but he doesn't so much as care about how it hurts, no, he focuses on the way Ren sobs into his lips. How his grip tightens on martyn. How everything feels like it’s crashing in. He lets himself enjoy it, just for a moment, a moment of peace, of happiness. A moment of love in the end.

Martyn couldn't tell you how long they spent like that, desperate for every moment they can get, holding onto each other lips pressed against each other, breath stolen in these moment, and tears shed, they could have spent hours like that for all they knew, they could have spent years holding each other and it wouldn't have made any difference to them. Cuz in the end they still pull away, they still separate, and they still know what has to happen. There is no other option, no other choice, no other way out.

And so, they get into fighting stances on either side of the altar, they leave the sentimental weapons on the side, and they weep oh so openly. As they prepare to fight, to kill each other in cold blood on the altar that means oh so much to them, they raise their fists, getting ready, a sob racks through ren, he leaves his sunglasses off, and red eyes hold onto red eyes, as they wish, and pray this wasn't the way it ends.

The first hit is thrown by Martyn, because he knows Ren won't take it, he knows Ren won't throw it, so he does. Martyn hears his fist connect with Ren's face, he doesn't see exactly where, but he can feel it through his entire arm.

Like a racing fire up his body, the bloodlust of being red starts to cloud his mind. He feels the fog fill his mind. But he knows he won't win. He knows it. And so he lets Ren take the next, he gives the act of missing as Ren takes another. Martyn lets it happen, because he’s just the king's hand, his role is to give everything to his king, his lord. It’s his job to let Ren take swing, after swing. It’s his job to fall to his knees, and even further as Ren doesn't stop. The redness in his eyes near glowing as he throws hit, after hit.

Martyns face isn't right, and the humid air leaves him feeling sticky. Ren does not relent, even as martyn face turns into some shape it was not supposed to be before, as it no longer looks like martyn, it doesn't even look human to some degree, no, he can't see anymore. Martyn can't see, and he isn't able to talk right, but try as he might, he whispers the words, over, and over, and over again. Broken prayers, to the god that is harming him, in a voice that it can't even hear. Broken and sorrowful declarations to the man he deems his god. To the man he devoted every whim of his life to.

Declarations of love. Of home. Of everything he can say. But Ren will never hear them, as Martyn's voice is drowned out by the blood that fills his mouth. His world is spinning, and he promises that it’s all rens, but all ren can hear is painful gurgling. All Ren is able to feel is shame. All that is there, is martyns bloodied body on the ground below him.

All that remains is a man made god, sobbing at his lover's feet. All that remains is a body that drifts off into dust in the wind. And a man with bloodied fists crying over a pool of red. Whispering his own prayers, and sorrows, and his own declarations of how if the gods aren't cruel, then maybe they will get another shot at this, another life time together, another maybe, and another please, and another im sorry. And everything he can give to the space that once hosted martyn. Another i love you, maybe he deserves this. To lose a lover he held so close, maybe he did something, in some other life, to be the sole survivor in such a painful way.

Ren stumbles over his feet, reaching, begging his arms to grab onto the sword. Praying that as he thrusts the blade into his chest, that him and martyn can be somewhere else, at another time. Maybe they could have lived in a small cottage on the hill, maybe their story doesn't always end in red and death, maybe they mold themselves for spring.

#fanfic #aggressivewrites #fanfiction #martyn inthelittlewood #rendog #3rd life #tw violence #tw death #treebarkweek2024

[liminalpebble]

Violet: Chapter 3, I Say Unto You, He Will Call You By Name

Masterlist 

Chapter 3: I Say Unto You, He Will Call You by Name

Reverend William Ransome noticed his name was already clearly written on the blackboard in those three formal words when he rushed in, late by a few minutes due to the rain.

 Although his black clothing and white collar were still neat from the protection of his coat, his unruly gingery hair and flushed cheeks were still a little damp from the London downpour. He strode in quickly, setting his pile of books on the desk with a tense hand. Violet thought to herself for the first time (but certainly not the last) that his brisk way of moving made it seem as if he was trying to tacitly run away from something. What an odd man,she thought.

“Good morning, ladies. I'm terribly sorry for the delay,” he said breathless from hurrying and nerves. He introduced himself politely but without smiling and then announced that he would be taking attendance. Violet found her mind wondering as he droned out each name and it was met with a perky soft-spoken “present.” She didn't care who they were. She barely cared who he was. She was thinking about Dante, Milton, and William Blake, contrasting heaven and hell in her mind. When the alphabet finally reached “V” she heard her name and her attention rapidly returned to Earth. The Reverend was saying clearly, in his deep commanding voice, “Violetta Vespero!”

Her eyes snapped forward again. Judging by the giggles of her classmates, and the annoyed glare of his intensely blue eyes, it was not the first time he had called her name.

She said, “Oh...uh, here, and it's Violet.”

He frowned at his paper, “Is it not Violetta?”

She gulped. He was tall and thin-faced, seeming strangely severe and intense, but not in the cruel self-righteous way that many of the religious were. The man of God looked too thin, too empty, and it filled her with a tender sadness, wondering what could have made him so. Hungry she thought he seems hungry in some abstract way.

He needs a good meal, the pupil mused, maybe several. Violetta allowed herself interest in only a singular domestic skill, and as with all things she set her mind to, she approached it as a perfectionist, seeking expertise and virtuosity. She made the most scrumptious food. To merely call it cooking or baking would be a travesty. It was more as if she conjured courses and delicacies into existence like a sorceress. The riotous color palette and steaming aromas rising from their silver platters would entice her dinner guests like a mouth-watering siren call. The courses of the meal would present themselves before the hungry visitors like vibrant Dutch still-life paintings of perfectly luminous color, shape and dimension; each one a masterpiece. In part, she'd fostered the skill for the sheer pleasure of inventing and then enjoy the ripe fruits of her labor. It was purely selfish; sensually and mentally stimulating, not mastered for a theoretical husband or family. If that were the case, she'd do better learning only to stew meat and potatoes day after day and that seemed a fate worse than death.

Violetta wondered if her delicacies, luscious and aromatic, arrayed before him, could tempt him to close his eyes in transcendence, savoring each bite as an unknown pleasure. Or could it bring a glow of indulgent delight to his features; the crinkle of a grin to the edges of his thin lips and the corners of his eyes? Those mournful eyes, the color of a crushed robin's egg.  Still, she couldn't quite comprehend who or what he was, or determine exactly where his appetites might lie, though she would like to find out.

“In Italy it is Violetta, however, I find the English prefer Violet as it is easier to pronounce” she said in an English accent even more polished than his own, but betrayed in small inflections by her native Italian. He noticed her voice was deep, low, and commanding for a woman. It was a voice “polished” in the sense of a sharp knife, rather than a shiny trinket. The other students looked a bit uncomfortable with the rather long and awkward detour caused by their unusual classmate and equally odd teacher. Reverend Ransome seemed immune to this, though, and pressed on.

“I see. And did I pronounce it incorrectly?”

“No, Father.”

“It's Reverend, Miss Vespero, or Mr. Ransome. Thank you for the clarification.”

Then without a smile, and barely a glance at her, he wrote a note on his paper and continued on. The intent parson didn't even seem to noticed how the other socialites were releasing dainty little sighs of laughter under their breath. William Ransome isn't the type to let social concerns interfere with his curiosity, Miss Vespero wrote in the notebook of her mind, committing it to memory like any other lesson. Violet considered that this tendency might be unfortunate for the both of them, since she was the same way. She could see locked horns in her future, and she didn't need to be a fortune teller to predict it.

Delightful, she thought. The first day and I'm already starting off on the wrong foot. Why must it be so easy to do that? Oh well. I was bound to make everyone uncomfortable sooner or later. I might as well start now.

Taglist: @coldnique @muddyorbs @goblingirlsarah @acidcasualties @jennyggggrrr @holymultiplefandomsbatman @icytrickster17 @pati52 @marcotheflychair @ladyofthestayingpower @gigglingtigger @alexakeyloveloki @letsg00000honey @bitchyexpertprincess @lokisgoodgirl @sweetsigyn  

#lusty vicarettes #will ransome #the essex serpent #the essex serpent fanfic #sas

[staryarn]

Alright I've had enough What is Lor? You've posted enough, I'm intrigued

LOR stands for library of ruina, project moons second game. It'd also my catchall tag for project moon because changing all the posts to that is a lot of effort and I'm a mobile user.

Project moon has three games out: Lobotomy corporation, Library of Ruina, and the newly released Limbus Company (each with a lot of world building)

Lobotomy corporation is an scp manager (monster management etc), Library of Ruina is a deck building game (/ card game), and Limbus Company is a dungeon crawler rpg (I think?? Also a gacha but is f2p / free to play friendly)

Both lobotomy corporation and Library of Ruina share most of the same cast while Limbus company has a completely new cast (though the whole game isn't out yet so I have no idea if anyone from past games show up but I hope they do).

In both Lobcorp and LOR you have Angela and the 9 Sephirah (Maluth, Yesod, Hod, Netzach, Tiphereth, Gebura , Chesed, Binah, and Hokma) as well as Roland in LOR. (I'm not about to name 9ff all of the reverberation ensemble but theyre the general antagonists of that game)

In Limbus company you have Dante, Vergilius, Charon , and the twelve sinners (Gregor, Rodion, Sinclair, Yi Sang, Ishmael, Heathcliff, Don Quixote, Hong Lu, Ryōshū, Meursault, Outis, and Faust).

All of these games take place in a place called The City. The city has 26 districts (A-Z but Z isn't on the map). The city has a place called a wing (megacorp who runs a district) which have nests (towns) , feathere (people inside the nests), and backstreets (the place the nest doesn't encompass. Also where syndicates control. Each being the Five fingers ( The Thumb, The index (hands out prescripts), The middle, The ring, and The pinky). Each syndicate has subsidiaries but I'm not getting into that). ) There are also Fixers (hired mercenaries). Theyre graded from 9 (lowest) to 1 (highest) and then given a color (color Fixers are higher than 1). Theyre given these ranks by the Hana association (big association that hands out fixer titles etc).

Notable Color Fixers are The red mist, the blue reverberation (guy in my icon), the purple tear, and the black silence. (The vermillion crost exists but I'm not mentioning that bc spoilers. Also the Red Gaze but that's for limbus company)

In Lobcorp you're tasked with managing your abnormalities (scp) to make power (and I won't spoil how that goes)

In LOR you're tasked with fighting people (in receptions) and turning them into books so Angela (head librarian) can learn more about the city

In Limbus company you're tasked with finding and retrieving Golden Boughs (leftovers from the seed of light)

This is the like, easiest way I can explain them without slapping spoilers all over the place and trying to explain them in full.

(Library of ruina cast shitpost meme)

(+ the startup text / information that limbus company gives you when you download the game)

Beware of spoilers but here are videos that probably can explain it better than I did (roughly two hours in length if you watch them all but you can scale it down by watching the last two)

#there are videos i can link but they spoil a lot of shit like endings for the first two games #long post #i also can explain in more detail but its a lot and again spoilers #this also is very quickly explained bc to explain it all it takes like an hour + long video #please note that i just three this together #i probably could put together a propwr essay w research but the wikis are right there #asks #theroofcat #lor

[spinningwebsandtales]

Enjoying Halloween After A Long Night With Dante

Dante X FemReader

Rating: T+

Warnings: Mentions of blood and gore

Word Count: 1.6k

Halloween arrived and it has always been Dante’s least favorite holiday in the world. It was always his most busiest time of the year with demons popping up more often than normal. It took everything he could to dish out and handle the chaos all alone. Now that he had you and had a team, this holiday was finally a lot easier on him. Though Dante still grumbled and dreaded every time Halloween rolled around. This year though you were determined to help Dante have one good memory to make Halloween seem not so bad. So with the help of Nero, Trish, and Lady your plan began to take form and you were more than ready to go out and fight. Though you tried your best to keep your idea a secret, Dante knew you were up to something. He couldn’t figure out what but the way you had been acting all week had him suspicious. That mixed with his dread had him a little cranky, though the team was used to his cranky outbursts. They were rare but being the twin of Vergil, he was apt to have them too. Which in turn made everyone nickname him Vergil Jr on these particular days, and it only made him crankier. Though the madder he got the funnier everyone thought it was. Now as Halloween arrived Dante was even further in the dumpster fire of a mood he’d been keeping.

Night had fallen quickly and the streets echoed with the sounds of children's’ laughter when the demons stopped screaming. You were quickly coated in blood, panting heavily as you dodged another clawed swipe. Now you were beginning to feel a taste of bitterness that Dante carried inside, but you were not going to let this ruin everything. Dante couldn’t hate the spooky season forever, though he was stubborn enough to try. Nero had given you a thumbs up when the teams split up. You didn’t want to leave them at the busiest time so you and Dante would stay as long as you deemed necessary. Dante was covered in blood and grime too but faring a lot better than you were. For one moment you were jealous of the Sparda blood flowing through his veins, until you remembered all the dangers and horrors it pertained. Shaking your head you barely saved your head when the creature swiped again. Getting ticked off you charged forward, sick of playing a deadly game of dodge the claws you went on the offensive. Swinging and stabbing, trying everything to get this battle over with.

“Nice moves babe,” Dante yelled. He was still messing with the demon he was battling against, so it wasn’t anything for him to keep an eye on you too.

“Thanks! I call them ‘trying not to die’ moves!”

“Ten out of ten,” he leapt back making faces at the demon who only roared in rage. “Keep up the good work honey!”

“Dante,” you snorted, “don’t torture the poor thing!”

Your only reply was a pout before you had to focus back on trying not to get cut up. You danced around, swinging your weapon before your stamina started to deplete. The demon smirked ready to finish the fight when a painful roar, followed by silence split the sky. Before you could try for one last bout a flash of red stood in between you and your foe. With a blade whistling in the air the demon was dispatched splashing blood all over Dante’s clothes and the walls.

“Are you okay,” he asked turning around while worry swam in the blue of his eyes.

“Yeah,” you panted thankfully. “You weren’t joking when you said they’re stronger on Halloween.”

“Since when do I ever joke about anything?”

You hummed seeming to think, “How many breaths do you take during the day babe?”

Before Dante could say another word your phone began to vibrate in your pocket. Nero’s name flashed across the screen while his ringtone you picked for him played.

“We got it from here on out. Get my uncle out of here and cheer him up before I wind up tossing him off a bridge,” Nero said before hanging up. Dante looked confused but you just stretched before sheathing your katana.

“Okay babe. Nero has given the all clear we’re going back home.”

“Halloween is not nearly over yet,” Dante raised his eyebrow at you crossing his arms. You rolled your eyes embracing for that famous Sparda stubbornness. “You know that we can’t just leave everyone alone to handle everything.”

“We can, we will, we are,” you argued back taking his arm. “Let’s go.”

“What could possibly more important than saving lives tonight,” Dante glared.

“Letting you have one fun Halloween for a change Dante,” you glared right back. “I’m tired of seeing you hate Halloween. Yeah the whole demons running amok thing sucks. You didn’t get to have a normal childhood and I am sorry for that! But if I can give you one good memory that you can look back on later and say maybe it wasn’t so bad after all. Then I’ll be danged if I don’t help you out. Now shut up and follow me Vergil Jr!”

Dante didn’t say another word on the way back to the Devil May Cry office. You felt kinda bad for yelling at him but not bad enough to apologize for doing what was best for him. It was funny how you felt the need to hide your weapons from the publics’ eye but when Halloween came around you didn’t feel the pressing urge to hide them. It was the atmosphere of the season and the children running around with the plastic equivalent. You snickered to yourself, gaining a look from Dante. You hurried to his side nuzzling into him as you both walked. He still wasn’t fully himself yet but it didn’t stop him from taking your hand into his and intertwining your fingers with his.

“Don’t be so gloomy,” you cooed looking up at him with a smile. “I promise that you’ll enjoy this just as much as killing underworld dwellers.”

His whole look he shot your way just screamed doubtful. You shrugged trying to fight the grin threatening to come back. You were basically bouncing around when the office came into view. You beat Dante to the door tapping your foot impatiently while he took his sweet time getting there. His eyes glimmered mischievously as he was definitely getting revenge for calling him out earlier before. What he wasn’t expecting though was the office to be lit inside with orange lights. He looked to you in confusion when you shooed him through the door. The office had been cleared a little, an aired up mattress in the middle of the floor right in front of the older style TV, clean pillows and blankets were littered around, while the smell of food drifted from the kitchen.

“How did you,” Dante whorled around, feeling a little guilty from the way he had been treating you all week.

“I got Kyrie to help out. She set everything up while we were out and I ordered the pizza to be delivered while she was setting up. Happy Halloween Dante.”

“Babe,” he sucked in a breath before taking your hands. “I’m sorry I’ve been acting like Vergil towards you all week.”

“Whoa the great Dante is apologizing?! It’s a Halloween miracle,” you laughed before cupping his cheek. “It’s okay. You don’t like secrets I don’t blame you. Now go get all that demon blood and guts off of your smokin sexy body and I will do the same and then we feast and watch all the gory and gruesome slasher flicks we can handle!”

“Sounds like a plan.” He swatted your rear before escaping into the downstairs bathroom.

“I’ll let that slide this time,” you shouted.

“What’s that babe?! I can’t hear you with the water going,” Dante answered back.

You rolled your eyes before heading upstairs to take your shower. You shot Nero a quick text thanking him for taking one for the team before texting Kyrie you promised you’d get in touch with her for the girls day you promised. You didn’t want Kyrie to do all the work for free, though she would.

When you and Dante were all clean you had him go settle himself comfortably while you went to go get the two pizza boxes, popcorn, and various other assortments of junk food goods. You set them before Dante, praying that there would be some left by the time you got the movie in. Sliding the tape into the VCR player (you told Dante it was time to make the transition to the 21st century) before settling back down beside him. The Nightmare on Elm Street began to play as Dante held a pizza slice out to you.

  “Look at that,” you teased, “ he does share.”

“Keep talking and I’ll take it back,” he snarled playfully. You hurriedly took a bite, chewing thoughtfully you stuck out your tongue. Everything was perfect, Dante was smiling the whole time watching the cheesy bloody scenes while he ate an entire pizza by himself before starting on the popcorn.

“Happy Halloween Dante,” you yawned curling into his side. The warmth of his body and the food in your stomach was beginning to lull you into sleep.

“Happy Halloween (Y/N). Thank you for making this one to remember,” he kissed your temple letting you ease into a peaceful slumber as he continued to watch the movie. While Halloween may be his least favorite because of his job that didn’t mean he was beyond enjoying it with you. Dante was quickly beginning to change his outlook, especially when he got to spend some alone time with you. Maybe Halloween wasn’t so bad after all.

#Dante X Reader #Dante / Reader #Devil May Cry #DMC #Dante Imagine #Devil May Cry Imagine #DMC Imagine #Imagine #Not My Gif #My Writing

[radioactivepeasant]

Fic Prompts: Folklore Friday

Someday I'm going to finish writing this story. It would help if I could actually remember where I put my notebook that had the outline and third chapter in it lol

This is a bit from the first chapter, setting up the main character, Dantes. For context, rulers in the kingdom of Hieracium are elected, and each takes the family name of the very first ruler of the kingdom -- an unlucky woman who was volunteered for the job because she knew how to do math related to switching currencies and nobody else did. So the Ulfric Clan isn't a bloodline, it's more of a title.

His father and mother had raised him to work as hard as any farmer or farrier or fisherman. Their particular branch of the ever-growing Ulfric clan had not always been rulers, the late Queen Mother had reasoned, and there had been no guarantee that Dantes would be elected as Maya's successor when she retired. Better to be a Jack-of-all-trades than to find yourself out of work with no practical skills.

But Dantes was more than happy to pull his share of the weight in both the capitol and the city. Perhaps his advisers did tend to gently poke fun at his habit of treating the staff like housemates rather than employees trying to do their jobs. And perhaps some foreign dignitaries looked down on Hieracium a little for having a ruler who was willing to scrub flagstones and scatter reeds with the scullion staff. But the Hieracia people loved him for it. It was a reminder to those within their kingdom and those watching from without that rulers were only mortals, like their subjects.

Dantes had just finished setting a cauldron of water to boil when the head cook shuffled into the kitchen. He smiled at her, dusted off his hands, and began to measure tea leaves into an enormous pot.

“Morning, Mrs. Bolton,” he said cheerfully, “Were the dormitories warm enough last night? I saw frost on the windowpane this morning.”

The elderly woman wrapped her pink wool shawl a little tighter around her shoulders and sucked on her teeth thoughtfully before pushing past the king to add several cups of dried oats to the cauldron. Her hands were not as steady as they once were, and she looked altogether too pale.

“Here, give me that,” Dantes said, trying to take the next cup of oats from the cook. “Sit down and warm yourself before you freeze!”

“Leave off, you!” The cook retorted, gently batting his hand away, “I’m a grown girl, I can handle it well enough.”

She made a face as the last of the oats for the porridge disappeared into the water, and held her hands out to warm them over the steam.

“Truth be told,” she admitted, “Twas a mighty cold night. I can’t speak for the others, of course. But me and Mr. Bolton, we do chill easier than we used to.”

Dantes tutted sympathetically. “I’m sorry to hear it,” he said. “I’ve heard that in Nermorn they’ve begun using little coal stoves to heat rooms without fireplaces. Shall I order some for the dormitories? I’ve heard they’re a little messy, but efficient.”

Mrs. Bolton patted his arm with the bold familiarity of one who had known him for most of his life.

“You’re a dear, your majesty,” she told him fondly. “Now you seat yourself! And, and, take some breakfast while you can, afore the rest of my kitchen miscreants wake to scrape the pot clean! I’ll not have it said of me that I let a king go hungry.”

“Yes marm,” Dantes chuckled. He let her push him to a stool by the fire -- no mean feat for a little old woman half his size -- and hand him a steaming bowl of porridge. 

It was bland stuff. Dantes waited until Mrs. Bolton’s back was turned, and tossed two handfuls of nutmeg into the pot. He swiftly brushed his hand off on his trousers, lest the traces give him away, but his attempt at concealment failed anyway.

The instant the cook smelled the nutmeg, she crossed her arms and sighed. “Now sire, you know we need that for baking! You can’t turn every staff breakfast into something fancy.”

“I can try,” the king retorted, with a most unkingly pout.

A few of the other cooks, bakers, and kitchen staff trailed in as the fire warmed the stones. They each greeted the king respectfully, then collected their bowls of porridge and drifted away to begin their morning routines. There was bread to be baked, turnovers to be filled, and enough food to feed a castle to be prepared.

“Colin, get another pot of porridge going,” Mrs. Bolton ordered one of her assistants, “Tis cold enough to freeze the marrow this morn. Make up ten bowls for Jemmy to bring up to the night watch -- and mind you don’t let certain individuals meddle with the recipe!”

“We’re down to one more sack of oats, marm,” the flustered man warned, “All the rest went into the oat farls last night. For the upstairs’ breakfast, remember?”

“Nevermind,” Dantes interjected, pointing his spoon in Colin’s direction. “I’ll see to it that we buy more the next time we ride through Ainselv.”

The king visited the city of Ainselv often. It was only four hours’ ride from Iconos, the capital of Hieracium. As it was a little newer than Iconos, and a little larger, it had a much nicer library, and much nicer merchant stalls. Being so close to the shores of Lake Striga, they had first pick of the goods shipped across the lake from Nermorn. Being further east, Iconos often got what was left over.

“Ordering food is the cellarer’s job, your majesty,” the Assistant Head Cook said in mild reproof.

“Well I’m in charge of all the jobs, aren’t I?” Dantes defended himself, “I can give the cellarer less work today if I like!”

“Sure, and you’re not only looking for new tomes of frightful tales, your majesty?” Mrs. Bolton’s assistant teased.

“Now see here, Mrs. Poppy!” Dantes laughed, then spent an embarrassing two seconds cleaning bits of porridge out of his beard. “See here! That was one time! Heavens, come home with a book instead of a bull once, and you never live it down!”

“Who forgets an entire cow?!” Mrs. Bolton called from the dough table.

“A bookwyrm, that’s who!” Dantes retorted. “I’ll make that oat order, never you fear. Besides, I may as well find something new for the court intendant to read.” He made a face. “She’s up all hours like an owl with those tawdry war romances. May as well find her something with a little more substance, eh?”

“I...don’t know that the Lady Hawksbit is the sort who would care for your tales of knights and monsters, sire,” Mrs. Poppy muttered, but said nothing more about it.

Dantes poured himself a mug of hot mint tea, wished the kitchen staff a pleasant morning, and excused himself. “Off to work!” he announced, “It’s Thursday: out-of-doors work today.”

“Ooo! Mind you wear lots and lots of coats, sire!” squealed a scullion's child on the way to breakfast, “Mother said it’s wicked cold today!”

“And she’s quite right!” Dantes answered. “Oh, Charley, tell the butler I’m requiring a rotation of breaks by the fires today, won’t you? We want no frozen fingers here! Laundry will keep until the sun is properly up.”

“Yes sire!” the child chirped, “If there’s to be lots of breaks, will we get to play in the snow?”

“That’s a question for your mum, not me!” the king called over his shoulder. He took the stairs two at a time and came out in a cozy parlor that had once been an office.

Dantes had never really relished the idea of doing his share of the kingdom’s bookkeeping in the same windowless room his mother had favored. He found it unbearably stuffy in the warmer months. Upon taking the throne, one of the first things he’d done was to make sure his private office had windows that could be opened in the summer. That did incur the risk of pigeons coming to investigate the budget, but there were worse things in life.

Dantes hastily sipped his half-cooled tea as he backed out of the study and made his way up the north stairs to the grand hall. On Thursdays, instead of hearing from advisers all day, Ulfric Dantes was more accustomed to holding court for only four hours. Ministers of agriculture, water control, public health, and other departments related to the kingdom’s overall environment would present their reports to the king during this time. If anything was amiss, the king would ride out to personally contact whoever had been placed in command over the town named in the report. Married rulers usually delegated this sort of thing to their spouses, as that was the job of the vice-rulers. But Dantes remained cheerfully and stubbornly single, and liked to take care of things himself.

Thursday afternoons were generally spent in one of Hieracium’s six cities, holding town hall meetings with city government and civilians alike. They usually had much more specific ideas of what the royal court could improve upon than the advisers in Iconos did.

And, thus far, none of the civilians had tried to badger the king into some kind of political marriage. That was another point in their favor.

#folklore friday #fic prompts #writing prompts #original characters #original story #king and coven #ulfric dantes maximilian #clearly i was in a Redwall mood when I first wrote this #Dantes' main issue is that he wants to retire and adopt a bunch of kids but he's contractually obligated to find a successor first #his would-be first pick for a successor Does Not Want To Be King and will scream if both Dantes AND the population elect him #in Hieracium the people select a couple candidates and they intern with the ruler to see if it works #then the council does electoral votes to pick which one replaces the former king or queen #one of the main candidates would do anything to be chosen. the other wants nothing to do with it. the rival does not know this #original worlds

[modernamericangirl]

Coming in slightly late but complete: here’s my contribution to the delightful Cobert challenge created by @avoverud! 

My prompt was “saying ‘I love you’ as a goodbye.” 

I’m sorry that this is probably a bit long to read on tumblr; I’ll try to post on FF or A03 as well! 

I.

Robert stood in the corner of the library nursing a glass of whiskey as he took in the scene. Harold and his friends were crowded round a card table lodging boisterous insults at one another; the smoke from their cigars curled slowly upwards before settling above them like a heavy raincloud. They were all drunk, horribly so, on illicit booze carted up by the caseload from the basement of Harold’s townhouse off East 58th street.

Robert shifted on his feet and pressed a thumb against his own glass, watching as a fingerprint appeared in the condensation. He considered that he might be rather drunk as well—a thought he quickly doused with the anesthetic burn of alcohol, taking the last sip from his now-empty glass. A footman materialized seemingly out of thin air with a decanter to refill the vessel. Yes, down with prohibition, he muttered to the waiting servant.

Had it been only three weeks since he arrived at that grimy New York port? He looked up to better calculate the time passed and was distracted by the mahogany-paneled ceiling. The dancing light from the immense marble fireplace reflected against the surface, and it made him dizzy. Yes—no—yes. It had been three weeks since he’d arrived. A month since last he was home.

The slap of a hand against the card table was enough to startle him to attention, and he listened as the raucous group of Americans pointed cigars and fingers into one another’s faces, laughing as they lodged claims of card counting and other tricks at their opponents. Robert watched his brother-in-law wave them back into their seats and gesture for the footman with the decanter in one fluid motion. With their glasses refilled, the game was allowed to continue in this den of iniquity.

Really, he’d hardly seen Harold save a few dinners and this week at the trial. His trip had been spent almost entirely at Martha’s immense Italianate home a few blocks away. Martha insisted he stay with her—calling Harold’s looming trial a witch hunt and an impossible blemish on the family name in equal measure—and had paraded him around at any number of tea parties, lunches, and social events. He poured tea and coffee and politely answered question after question about the estate, the peerage, and even the after-effects of the war, as grey-haired women drenched in floral perfume and decked out in glittering diamonds and rubies smiled at him and complimented his charming accent. Very often, they asked after Cora. The questions would come as they talked of crowded ballrooms from lifetimes ago. They would claim a daughter or a niece had been such close friends with the beautiful Cora Levinson. They were the only questions that didn’t seem to set his teeth on edge, really, for he could smile genuinely, and he could tell them what he imagined Cora would want him to share: stories about the girls, about their grandchildren, about the London season. And they cooed with praise for his wife. She’d pulled it all off so seamlessly. And indeed, she had.

He downed the last of his drink now and rubbed a hand against his aching chest. Oh, he missed her—perhaps tonight even more than yesterday if that were possible. He trudged to an empty leather chair and waved, his arm loose and inaccurate, for the bloody footman with the whiskey. The man did not materialize this time, but his inelegant movement did have the unwitting effect of alerting his brother-in-law to his discontent.

Harold, who sat only a few feet away at the edge of the table, grinned at him with a fat cigar stuck between his teeth. Smoke wafted all around him and Robert, surrounded by the gleaming, dark wood of the library, was reminded of the opening passage of Dante’s Inferno.

“My champion!” Harold’s voice rang out; his friends clapped in loud, maddening unison. “Come and sit by me.”

Harold gestured with his own half-full tumbler to a seat already occupied by one of his adoring sycophants. The man moved immediately, though it took Robert longer than it should have to unsteadily reach the table. Immediately, he was drawn into Harold’s embrace, and the shorter man’s attempt to put an arm around his shoulder was enough to make him chuckle.  

“Have I told you all what a stand-up guy he is?” Harold grinned.

Robert shook his head, ready to protest, but he continued.

“—no, no. He is. You are.”

Harold was quite drunk. His eyes were glassy, and he peered at Robert with a curious expression.

“All the way from England for this bullshit. Stand-up guy, my brother-in-law.” With his free hand, for the cigar had been dropped onto a gold dish beside him, he picked up his glass and clinked it rather aggressively against Robert’s.  

“I was happy to help.”

Robert was surprised by the low tone of his own voice. He blinked once, twice, and then a third time; the men across the table had doubled in his vision, and he watched with passive interest as they seemed to float back and forth.

“Sure, sure.” Harold clapped him on the back and nodded at the footman.

Again, their glasses were filled. “You’re a real sport.”

Robert felt, certainly not for the first time that evening, a twinge of annoyance. It was late, far later than they ever stayed up these days, and he wondered if there might be some way to make an unnoticed escape back to Martha’s. But the room only seemed to grow louder in protest, someone turning on a record player, and Harold was still saying something, for he heard his name again in the brash tone of the man’s voice.

“—no, of course it wasn’t necessary,” he said to the dark-haired man nearest to them. Robert couldn’t for the life of him remember the chap’s name, though he was fairly certain he was a man of business. No—no. An architect. “—Mother insisted. But I think Robert’s had more of a positive effect on her tea parties than on today’s proceedings.”

Robert coughed at that and cleared his throat in what he hoped was a gesture of clear displeasure.  

“You know what I mean, Robert.” Harold smiled and wrenched the decanter from the servant just behind them. He poured two fingers of whiskey into their glasses.

“Or—”

He spoke slowly now, turning his attention from the task back to Robert, “maybe you don’t. My brother-in-law doesn’t have much of a head for business,” he explained to the men surrounding them. They’d all dropped their cards onto the table sometime during the exchange, having picked up on the frisson of tension between the brothers-in-law, and assessed the rather drunk aristocrat before them.

“Perhaps not.”

Robert spoke the words into his upturned glass. He swallowed slowly, very slowly, and the burn did little to calm his temper. “Though I do have rather a head for avoiding charges of bribery and conspiracy.”  

Harold’s face was impassive. If he was offended, his frozen half-smile and unblinking eyes did not reveal that fact. In some way, the blue, staring eyes reminded him of Cora—Cora when she was unhappy with him but would not say so. And the similarity chilled him. Harold continued to stare, letting silence fall over the table, and took a sip from his glass.

“You’re right,” Harold said finally. He nodded sagely at his own words. “Best to keep out of the fray. Right, gentlemen?” The men, wearing uneasy smiles, nodded in passive agreement.

“Carter!” Harold shouted for his butler and slapped a hand against Robert’s back. “Champagne. We need champagne! We’re celebrating, after all.”

“Here, here!” Glasses clinked together and claps sounded out. The men returned to their cards. But Harold’s hand remained pressed against Robert’s back, and he leaned in to speak quietly to him.

“Apologies,” he said, offering him another smile. “It’s been a long day for me.”

Robert nodded and rubbed a hand over his own tired eyes. “As I said, I was happy to help.”

Harold chuckled, though the sound lacked any mirth. “I appreciate your selflessness.”

“You’re family.” Robert answered politely.

“True. And it only cost us what—a million and a half? Two? Father never said exactly.”

The men at the table did not hear their exchange; indeed, their voices were nearly drowned out by the sound of corks popping. But it was enough to rouse him. And, oh, he hated him then—hated all of them, really. Harold was a spoilt, immature little man with an endless parade of dull, drunken friends to follow behind.

  Robert stood, clenched his swollen fingers into a fist, and wondered through the haze of drink how he could explain to Cora a physical fight with her own brother. It would make him feel better, he thought, to knock the man right onto the ground. But, no. That would not do. He could not hit him—not when Harold was still sitting and smiling up at him. What reason would he give her, in any case? After all, Harold was only telling the truth. The shameful, long-buried truth that somehow conspired to, even now, make him flush with embarrassment and regret. He said nothing but watched as Harold laughed loudly at his anger, the mirth from earlier miraculously returned to his countenance.

“Only joking,” Harold replied through peals of laughter. “Lighten up.”

But before Robert could respond, the door to the main hall opened and flooded the room with artificial light, revealing a gaggle of women in short, glamorous beaded dresses with bleach-blonde hair and lips painted red.

“Now it’s a party,” he heard Harold shout, and the room nearly vibrated with the hoots and hollers of vulgar cheers and greetings.

Robert knew he was far too drunk to stay for anything of this sort. And he objected to the way they were all drawn like moths to the light of the open door—to women who looked, in his bleary estimation, to be younger than Rose. It was, he thought seriously, ungentlemanly for these men to behave in such a fashion. And so, he escaped almost instantly, finding his freedom via the back-left corner of the library. He’d noticed a door carved out of the mahogany wall there earlier and had just enough sense left in him to recall it now. Finding it unlocked, Robert spilled into Harold’s office entirely unnoticed.

He could hear peals of laughter as he turned the latch behind him and poked around the room. They only seemed to grow louder once he sat at Harold’s desk and listened more intently to the sounds of the party.

He supposed he could wait them out.

He yawned.

He stretched his legs, and his muscles groaned in protest.

Minutes passed, but his heart still thundered as he turned the words over in his mind.

Harold thought him a fool. That much was clear. Perhaps he was a fool for coming here. But he owed her that much. Not in the way Harold had implied. But he owed her nevertheless: owed her for the way her hand slipped into his own at night, for her palm pressed against his forehead whenever he felt unwell, for every little sacrifice she made for their family without complaint, and for the very love they shared so freely even now, so many years gone. There was never a decision to be made; of course she needn’t have asked him to go. He would have captained the blasted boat himself to get here in time.  

But, oh, he missed her. He’d thought of her constantly. He thought of her asleep in their bed, her hair smelling of lavender and her skin pale in the early-morning light. He thought of her smiling at him from across the dinner table, her face aglow in candlelight. He thought of her voice and her laughter and thought perhaps most often of all of what she’d whispered into his ear in the great hall just before he’d gone.

Out of boredom or curiosity, Robert began to rifle through the compartments of Harold’s desk. He found an untouched flask of what was, upon further inspection, gin, and thick files filled with marked-up numerical reports. The mountains of paperwork were mostly unintelligible to him, and he began to consider if Harold’s assessment of his business acumen was not altogether incorrect.

Opening up another drawer, he found a packet of cigarettes, some wadded up cash, and, tucked between the pages of an address book that he flipped through, a yellowed family photograph dated December 1886 on the back in pencil. Even in the dim firelight he saw immediately a young Cora, standing taller than her brother, between her parents. He recognized the impassive half-smile as the one she often wore in the early months of their marriage. She looked impossibly young, yet somehow still herself, and it unsettled him to realize that he had not known this version of his wife. They had lived nearly all their lives together and yet there had been some time in the long-distant past when they had existed wholly without one another.

Robert considered pocketing the photograph but thought better of the potential theft when his eye cast over what he had been in pursuit of: a stack of unused writing sheets and envelopes. Snatching up a fountain pen from its stand atop the desk, he blinked down at the page before him, willing his vision to correct itself, and set pen to paper.

Darling, my dear

Cora, my darling Cora

Cora, if I could put to page what you mean

My darlling Cora, I have thought of nothing but your words to me

Cora, my darling, you must allow me to tell you how ardently I

He paused midway through this last attempt. No—that wasn’t right. It was Byron, wasn’t it? Or perhaps Shelley. No, he shook his head, cursing aloud. It was Austen, of course. Cora’s favorite. Ignoring a splash of ink on his palm, he reached for another sheet and tried once more, settling on a familiar turn of phrase.

My dearest one…

The scratch of the metal nib drowned out the raucous proceedings in the library, and before long he had a number of pages complete—and envelops addressed, too. But as he signed the final version, noting he still saw his name printed in double vision, he wondered if perhaps he might be better off reviewing the draft come morning. And so, he pocketed what he thought was his best work and clumsily gathered up the rest to dispose of once he returned to Martha’s, smoothing out the other papers he’d rifled through on the desk as well.

Engrossed as he had been in his task, Robert hoped for one blessed moment that the party had rounded to a close. But as he stood from the creaking leather chair, distant strains of decadent laughter and merriment sounded out once more. There was, he knew then, no clean escape route out of the townhouse. Taking Harold’s flask as a consolation prize, he exited the office from the alternate door across the room and flagged down the first servant he crossed paths with in the dark, marbled hallway to ask for a bed to be made up for him there instead.

II.

When Robert awoke the next morning to a deafening thump, thump, thump, he was stunned to realize the Americans were still somehow celebrating Harold’s serendipitous legal victory. He was even more stunned to realize a moment later that the sound was in fact emanating from his own head, which felt heavier than a block of ice and pulsed violently in protest when he moved himself to a seated position.

He hadn’t a clue of the time, though bright morning light was streaming clearly through the open curtains. The servants must have been through, too; emerging from beneath the heavy bedclothes in only his pants, he found his suit from the night before hanging and freshly pressed and another suit, somehow ferried over from his things at Martha’s, hanging beside it.

Robert dressed himself, moving slower than molasses without Barrow’s assistance, and cursed every sip of alcohol he’d taken the night before as he trudged downstairs and readied himself to face the Levinsons for yet another day.

Impossibly, Harold looked no worse for wear when Robert came upon him at the breakfast table, his face half-covered by the morning newspaper. An enormous plate of food lay on the table before him, and he held a cup suspended in mid-air as a footman refreshed his coffee.

“You’re up earlier than I expected,” he commented once Robert took the seat opposite.

“Quite.”

Harold offered him half the newspaper, but Robert shook his head—even that movement conspiring to make him wince in pain. A footman appeared with another plate of breakfast food, or what he assumed was breakfast to an American, and he looked up at the ceiling to avoid the smell. Moments passed before his stomach felt sure enough to hazard a bite.

He chewed slowly on a piece of bacon as Harold finally set the newspaper down in front of him.

“I apologize for what I said last night,” he said abruptly.

Robert hesitated. He remembered snippets of dialogue; he remembered briefly wanting to punch Harold right in the middle of the library among all his idiot friends. But he remembered little of what they’d said to one another.

“There’s no need,” he answered finally, swallowing the bacon and saying a silent prayer it stayed down.

Harold cleared his throat. “No, there is. It was unkind. What I said about the money.”

Ah. The money. Cora’s dowry. It remained in many ways the albatross around his neck—even now, even years after it was lost. He had come to realize, years into their marriage, that the shame would likely never leave him. Not completely.

“Maybe so. But you did not say anything that was untrue.”

Harold looked at him strangely, then. He folded the newspaper and set it onto the table beside him.

“You know, I never understood why my parents did what they did. Or, why Cora did what she did. In a way, I always thought she’d come back—”

Robert frowned, but Harold, who had been looking down at his plate, looked up with a faint smile.

“—I think I understand it a bit more now.”

“I—don’t follow.”

Harold chuckled. Without further comment, he reached into his breast pocket, pulled out a few folded pieces of paper, and passed them across the table.

“I’m glad you came, Robert. Really. Thank you for everything.” He stood, nodded once, and exited the breakfast room in a few quick steps, leaving Robert to unfold the small bundle on his own.

Momentarily confused, his eyes scanned a series of smudged, crinkled pages before recollections of the night before settled heavily upon him.

My darlling Cora, I have thought of nothing but your words to me upon our farewell goodbye and I must, must tell you how desperately, no, madly, I love you  

He balled up the page quicker than he would have otherwise thought possible given his dulled reflexes and shoved the offending pages into his trouser pocket. Good god–hadn’t he stuffed those into his jacket? Or thrown them into the wastepaper bin? He thought hazily back over the events of the previous night and could now only recall stealing upstairs with Harold’s gleaming silver flask full of gin. Red cheeked, he pushed around the food on his plate and thought miserably about the four more days standing between him and the ship leaving the New York harbor.

He pushed a hand into his pocket once more and felt the sharp corners of his ill-begotten letter. Hadn’t he done his familial duty? Perhaps he might now be granted an early reprieve. He would do nearly anything, he considered, to return home to Cora.

III.

Robert stretched lazily and felt himself sink deeper into the soft bedsheets. The bedroom was blessedly warm and quiet, and he felt perfectly happy as he awoke in the sun-drenched room. Cora grinned at him as she crossed the foot of the bed, having extracted herself from his arms to gather up her rumpled nightclothes from the floor and to ring for breakfast.

“You look very content,” she smiled, pulling the nightdress over her head before slipping back beneath the sheets. She rolled to her side and pressed a smooth hand to the rough skin of his cheek.

“I am rather.” He reached up to grasp her hand and kissed her palm.

He’d been home for nearly a week now and had mostly found his way back into long-held routines. The house was together again after the bazaar, and he’d returned to a number of ongoing projects across the estate with Mary and Tom. He had not yet, however, returned to the breakfast table—electing instead to steal bits of toast and tea from Cora’s tray as he listened to her chatter on about all manner of things. Seeing her in the afternoon for a walk or for tea in the library was not yet enough. He had returned from America a man starved, and each moment spent with her now seemed to restore him to fuller health.

He shuffled just a bit closer and leaned in to kiss her, delighting in the way she hummed against his mouth.

“Darling—”

“Hm?”

He opened his eyes again and kissed the edge of her chin before returning to her lips.

“I’ve already rung for Baxter,” she murmured, halfheartedly pushing him back to his side of the bed.

“Tell her—”

He paused, then, and reached a hand below the sheets to find the edge of her nightgown. “Tell her we’ve changed our minds; we don’t need breakfast.”

He kissed her once more, his hand finding the smooth skin at her hip then, and felt his stomach flip as she smiled and laughed unguardedly into the small space between them.

“I do need breakfast after last night,” she said, applying a firmer hand to his shoulder to push him backward into the pillows. He frowned in mock consternation.

“Fine.” Cora laughed again at the dramatic sigh he emitted and reached far into the tangled bedclothes, nearly down to their feet, to produce his discarded pajamas from the night before.

“Put these on before you scandalize Baxter,” she teased.

He’d only just wrestled the still-buttoned top over his head when the woman in question knocked once, twice, and a third time at the solid wood door. Cora waited just a pause before calling her in.

Robert smiled politely at the lady’s maid, who seemed to somehow be moving even faster and more efficiently this morning, if that were possible, and he noted in silent thanks that there appeared to be two servings of toast on the tray and an extra teacup.

Almost immediately after settling the tray on Cora’s lap, the woman bobbed her head once, offering the briefest Milord, Milady, before stepping backward and looking at the door. But before Baxter could perform her hasty retreat, Cora noticed a large bundle of post brought up and arranged inelegantly on the corner of the tray.

“What’s all this?”

There was a long pause before the lady’s maid responded.

“I—I think it’s all from America,” she said simply.

Frowning, Cora waved the woman off—the woman who seemed altogether too happy to pace quickly back out of the room—and reached for the stack to investigate further.

“If Harold’s done something else,” she muttered.

“What on earth else could he do?” Robert chuckled, grabbing for a piece of toast. “Become a pirate and smuggle treasure on the open seas?”

His laughter faltered, though, just as he bit into a piece of bread slathered with raspberry jam and settled his gaze on the all too familiar handwriting, and the all too familiar return address, scratched across the envelope—across, he realized with a lurch, each envelope that Cora had fanned out across her lap.

“Darling,” Cora laughed. “Did you send me—” He watched her count. “—five letters before you left?”

Dropping the toast onto his lap, Robert reached with great speed to snatch up the offending post only to have Cora slap away his hand.

“They’re addressed to me,” she grinned. “And be careful; you’ll have me spill my tea.”

They were, unfortunately, all addressed to her. Though his accuracy had been found rather wanting. The letters ranged in address from Cora, Countess of Grantham to Cora Crawley to simply Cora, with the rest of their address to follow.

Cora used the edge of her butter knife to slice open the first letter and Robert felt the tips of his ears begin to burn. Reading over her shoulder, he could see plainly enough his own handwriting looping across the first page.

Cora, my darling, you must allow me to tell you how ardently . . . . I admire and love you

The rest of the page was blank, save a Robert xxx at the very bottom.

“Robert,” she laughed lightly again and looked at him with a raised brow. “Is that Austen?”

“Well.” He looked up at the canopy and exhaled slowly. “You know we’d all had a bit to drink at your brother’s that last night.”

“Yes, you mentioned that.”

“I think a servant may have mistaken some…errant jottings…for post I intended to send.”

Her brow remained raised. “Why, pray tell, would they do that?”  

“I may have left them addressed in my breast pocket,” he said slowly, reaching up to scratch at the back of his neck.

“I see. And all the rest?” She nodded down at the remaining mail.

“Much the same, I’d imagine.”

“Perhaps I should open them just to be sure.”

“Cora—”

He pleaded for their return as she opened the second one with altogether too much glee. And then the third. And then the fourth. She laughed and grinned in equal measure as she read aloud bits of nonsensical dialogue. Until she reached the last one. When he chanced another look, he saw writing that did indeed look more familiar, for it was the one letter he did intend to send.

My dearest one…

She was quiet as she read through the few pages, the lettering much neater and precise. He could recall now, far beyond the haze of drink from that night, most of what he’d written. He sipped awkwardly from his teacup and stared out the window until he felt her slip her hand into his own.

“I want so very much for you to know,” she read aloud, her voice sounding strangely high to him, “that I think of you in each moment, with my every breath. And your words to me that day are what I take to bed each night and wake up to every morning.”

Cora placed the letter carefully down onto the blanket between them and looked up at him, her eyes bright. She made to laugh, as she often did when faced with strong emotion, but found her throat tight and settled for a lopsided grin instead.

“Heavens. That’s strong talk for an Englishman.”

“As I said,” he explained gruffly, “your brother and his friends had gotten me quite drunk.”

She grinned down at their clasped hands and squeezed lightly. “It’s very sweet. Thank you.”  

“Anyway. You started it.”

“Did I?” She looked confused, genuinely so, and he exhaled sharply.

“You most certainly did. In the great hall? As we were saying our goodbyes?”

He could see realization dawn on her, and could see, too, the moment she settled for a look of false confusion once again.

“I can hardly remember anything before the bazaar.”

Robert watched her carefully. She had turned her attention back to the breakfast tray and was poking carefully around the delicate bone china. He knew that she remembered just as well as he did their conversation that morning. The way everyone had filtered out of the house, leaving them alone just for a moment of privacy. The way they’d stood so close to one another, closer than they might have otherwise, and the way she’d looked up at him and told him to kiss her. And then after, as they’d walked toward the front door hand-in-hand, she’d tugged on his sleeve just before they reached the vestibule and their waiting family. She’d stopped short, holding them there for the briefest of moments, and leaned up to whisper in his ear, “I do love you so very, very much.”

He'd had to bite back a silly grin as he spoke to that Blake fellow and to Evelyn Napier. He’d hardly been able to look back at her as he said his farewells to the girls and to Mama. And he remembered thinking as the car pulled down the drive that it might not be too late to snatch up all the cases and barricade himself back inside the house. Oh, how he’d hated to leave her then.

But now, with weeks and two passages across the raging seas between them, he could see how she blushed down into her morning tea to recall that sudden burst of outward expression. Leaning over to kiss her cheek, he considered then that he did not need or want for anything at all.

“It’s alright,” he murmured into her hair.

She turned to look up at him and found him grinning madly.

“We’ll call it even,” he explained, grabbing the pile of blackmail-worthy letters.

Cora’s laughter joined his own and she shook her head in surrender. “Fine.”

They did not speak again for some minutes until Cora, breathless, pressed a hand to his chest. It was, he knew, getting rather late into the day. It was time to gather himself up, ring for Bates, and lurch into the myriad tasks ahead of him. They could return to this subject later in the evening. But as he moved backward slightly, in the direction of his own nightstand, Cora hooked a finger on his half-open pajama shirt and smiled wickedly.

“Go and put this over there,” she said, gesturing at the breakfast tray. “And come back to bed.”

“Really?”

She nodded indulgently. “Perhaps I can inspire another impassioned missive.”

He laughed and shook his head, crawling across the bed to cover her body with his own.

“My darling, you must allow me to tell you how ardently I should like nothing more.”

#Cobert #drabbles #Cora Crawley #Robert Crawley #Downton Abbey

[hellcatinnc]

Otometober Day 12 The One You Wish Had A Route

Well damn there is a few games that I had people in I liked that needed to have a route. I want to name a few Leo in Piofiore, Hansel in Code Realize Wintertide Miracles, Owen in Cupid Parasite, Sergio in Love Spell Written In The Stars, Watson in Code Realize as well as Miles too and last but not least . I can't choose between so just going to write a little bout what I would love to see in each.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Owen (Shelby's Assistant) - Cupid Parasite (Tell me they wouldn't be cute together)

You spend so much time with this man since Shelby is always working. I swear you see him more than you do Shelby so I took a liking to him. He is so damn cute even his shyness is adorable. I know in one route you set him up with someone but why not give him a route so you can see what it might be like to romance that awkward assistant for yourself. I feel like he might be a bit of a kuudere but I don't know he is just so cute I would love to get to know him. I mean come on you have to deal with Gil so why not have a chance with Owen which obviously is a better pick.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sergio in Love Spell Written In The Stars

This man comes out in the route of Marcello and he is the opposite gang member if I remember right. Anyways whether you die in the route or Marcello dies he has the sweetest demeaner that makes you feel like he would be a very romantic and loving love interest. There is talk of him becoming a route but only after the company makes enough money to do so. That being said I don't know if this man will ever really be a route.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Leo in Piofiore

Leo this is a sweet sweet man honestly he is very loyal and takes care of Liliana without questioning. Yes he is still young and still learning what to do like the guys that have grew up in it but he is always trying to learn. He is loyal to Dante for all that he has done for him and to Liliana as well. I honestly believe he would love her without question. Not even sure why he was never a love interest seems pretty stupid to me but here is to hoping one day he might be.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hansel in Code Realize Wintertide Miracles

This man is so damn hot, I know I have yet to play his route yet that he is in but I do know from reading around the internet his job is the same as Saint Germain's once was he works for the same organization. That being said I would love to see the back story of him like they did Saint as well as let him be a love interest, like who would not want to look at this man daily.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Watson - Code Realize - Wintertide & Future Blessings

This is a confliction to me like I love Sholmes but I know Watson is like the total opposite of him yet still intriguing. Sadly the confliction I have is he has such a great personality and even a bit of a flirt but he makes it very clear his dead wife is and always will be the only love for him. I respect him so much for this but damn I would love to see that loyalty on the side of romancing him as well.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Miles - Code Realize - Wintertide

I know absolutely nothing about this man I just surfed through Code Realize characters and saw him and drooled. Damn from his sexy smile to that beautiful face and the way he dresses.... ahhhh this man is too damn hot not to be a love interest.. Just WHY??

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Orion - Amnesia

I thought about him because my friend @misschimotosuwa-blog loves him and Leo but I wanted to add the other reasons I think it would be cool to have Orion too. I think yeah so he is a kid but everyone else ages in the other games so why couldn't they have done the same with him even if he was late teens still would have been able to work just felt they didn't bother which is sad yet brocon can make a route for a 12 yr old smh.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways thats my choices of men that I really wish had a route I might bring them to life in my own fanfic at some point. Also miss chi I'm sorry would love to add Mythril Rid Pod but I love him just not with Anne in anyway lol.

#otome #gaming #otometober #code realize #piofiore fated memories #love spell written in the stars #cupid parasite #otometober challenge #wish these men had routes #side character love