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colorsunimaginable · 2 years

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the spare // chapter twenty-three // death eater!tom hiddleston x plus size ofc - voldemort wins au

story summary: While on a mission to avenge the death of her best friend, Ilvermorny graduate Melisa Alder finds herself in the middle of the fight to defeat Voldemort. Upon capture after the Dark Lord’s triumph, she’s being sold at an auction with other muggle borns and blood traitors. Her only hope is also her only bidder - the tall, dark, and handsome Thomus Malfoy, Lucius Malfoy’s younger half-brother. Is he just another Death Eater or is he hiding more than just his face beneath the mask? Will she realize her true potential to be one of the resistance’s greatest weapons?

*a Voldemort Wins AU with Tom Hiddleston cast as an OC x a plus size protagonist* *takes place in The Auction Universe by Lovesbitca8*

words for this chapter: 3.4k warnings for this chapter: violence, sexual content, intentional vomiting

CHAPTER MASTERLIST

Chapter Twenty-Three:

But I never do.

My eyes on the plaque, my hand stalls in the air as velvety black smoke creeps across the floor into the edges of my sight. When I look up, I’m in a graveyard. One that I’ve been to all too often the past few months.

“Melllliiiiiissaaa,” a harsh raspy voice taunts. My eyes are as big as saucers when an ashen rotting hand shoots out of an open grave. It’s fingers dig into the stone floor, overgrown nails splitting and breaking as it pulls the connected body up. She says my name again as another thin boney arm swings out, clamping down on the ground to hoist itself out of the hole.

With eyes as white as the pale moon shining down, her stare locks onto me. Her once thick and beautiful curly hair is gone, only whisps remain, light as feathers around her skull. Her hollow, sunken in cheeks drag against the ground as she hooks a leg up over the edge, bringing her dress into view. The dress is dirty and torn, seams undone, moths clinging to the delicate fabric. All I can do is stare wide-eyed at her decaying face.

“This is all your fault, Melisa,” the voice slithers out of her gaped mouth. “You did this to me.” My hand holding the fang shakes and my eyes tear up as her words. I’m gripping the poisonous object so tight my palm feels like it’s molding to the shape forever.

“It’s only a matter of time before you kill them, too.” A blackened finger raises, pointing to a pile of… bodies, each of their faces someone I love. My parents, my brother, Jonathan, Cassidy, Professor Higgins… All of them dead.

“I won’t!” I force the words out, tears escape down my cheeks. “I would never!”

“Stop lying to yourself, mudblood,” her unnatural voice hisses. “They will die just like me.” The same black finger changes direction, pointing to a very dead, rotting version of myself. “And just like you.”

Dying – while it’s terrifying, it’s not my greatest fear. Losing the people I care about is what scares me the most. Sam wouldn’t even know what the term mudblood meant. This is just another vision. Destroying this dark evil soul that’s been in my head for months now sounds like a good first step to ensure that doesn’t happen.

Using both hands, I raise the fang far above my head, the dark velvety smoke has started to swirl around me. A vengeful cry tears its way out of my throat as I drive the tooth right into the heart of the plaque. The fang breaks upon impact, it’s point burrowing into the wood. The vision around me disappears as I blink away more tears. The golden Hogwarts crest melts as a small flame erupts from the splintered hole, quickly reducing to a smolder as it chars the wood.

Pieces of the tooth drop from my hands as I fall back. Professor Higgins rushes forward, kneeling down and pulling me into a tight embrace. I sigh with relief and cry into his shoulder. The change in atmosphere in the room is potent. The heavy darkness is gone.

When I pull back from Higgins, he doesn’t let me go far. His arms suddenly feel a lot stronger than they did before. I gasp when I see it’s not Higgins holding me, but the same handsome man with a pointed face and intense blue eyes. How many times have I seen him now? Who is he? Why -

~*~

By the time I return to the main living area of Bill and Fleur’s cottage, the trio have their heads together over the dinner table. From what I can hear, they’re continuing the hushed conversation we’d started on the landing. I sit just as Fleur brings out heaping plates of sausages, eggs, and toast. Conversation stops when Luna and Dean enter the room as well.

“So what did Ollivander say?” Ron asks me after almost engulfing a whole slice of toast.

I place the dark wood wand on the table next to my glass of pumpkin juice. “He said that it belonged to Thomus Malfoy, and that it’s also Hawthorn with a Unicorn Hair core.”

Ron shrugs, shaking his head. “Everyone from that family’s the bloody same, I swear –“

“Did he torture you, too?” Harry asks.

I shake my head. “He didn’t really get a chance to. I’d disarmed him and we just fought over the wand.” Absentmindedly I go to push my glasses further up my face, temporarily forgetting their absence. “Pretty bummed I lost my glasses.” I wince when my lip stretches too far.

“Zat reminds me,” Fleur bustles over to me. She grabs my chin and turns my face to her, muttering a healing spell with her wand pointed at my cut lip.

“Thanks,” I tell her afterwards. “Do you guys know anything about him? Thomus Malfoy?”

“Wasn’t he one of the ones who’d been in the graveyard, Harry?” Hermione asks. “When You-Know-Who came back?”

Harry doesn’t answer immediately, his eyes a bit glazed over, lost in thought. He blinks after Hermione nudges him with her elbow. He reaches for his glass of pumpkin juice. “No, I don’t think he was.”

“I overheard Dad telling Mum that Thomus Malfoy had been there when the Longbottom’s were tortured,” says Bill from the couch in the living room. “His father had kept his name out of the papers, but he was put on trial as well as the Lestranges. He was acquitted, but it was still a big scandal because he was underage at the time. A sixth year I believe. I’d been surprised because even though I’d only been a first year, he only seemed like a typical Slytherin arse. Didn’t seem to be the torturing type though.”

“That’s high praise for a Malfoy,” says Ron.

Bill shrugs. “That’s all I know.”

I pick up his wand, turning it over in my hand while the image of his seething gaze flashes across my mind. He’d been so angry that I –

~*~

My fingers drum along the wooden surface of my desk, my eyes flickering from the clock on the wall, to her office door. Skeeter’s going to make us late – again.

I sigh heavily, leaning back in the wooden swivel chair. My gaze brushes over the name on the door across from me as it travels above it to where the clock hangs. THOMUS MALFOY – INVESTIGATIONS. Then they go back to Skeeter’s door and I jump up when she finally opens –

~*~

“Dammit, will you stay up?” I say to my wand with an unfamiliar nasally voice while I stand in front of the mirror. It’s bad enough I’ve had to redo her penciled brow three times now, but to have my wand burn me in the process? That’s fucking annoying. I’m trying to curl this stupid blond hair, not get second degree burns.

Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Skeeter sneer at me. She struggles at her binds, her chair rocking back and forth. With a little wave, I turn on the wireless and Celestina Warbeck begins singing us a jazzy ballad while I concentrate. The song reminds me of –

~*~

“She’s got a pad on 34th and vine,” I belt out, projecting my voice over the jazzy tune and rush of wind from the open windows. “Sellin’ little bottles of Love Potion Number Niiiiine.”

My mother’s voice harmonizes with mine. It’s a song we know all too well. Any time there’s a road trip, especially the one that takes me back to Ilvermorny, this song plays on repeat.

We’d just hit the green rolling mountains, and I turn around to take in my favorite site as we pass it: Beverley Mill’s mossy rubble stone structure. I point it out to my brother, who’s come along with mom to drop me off. Then I turn back to the front, singing my heart out. he next song starts, and I ask my brother which verse he wants to solo this time. When he doesn't answer, I twist in my seat to look at him.

But my brother isn’t there. It’s someone else. As I stare at him, I can't hear the music anymore. The deafening pressure from the open windows becomes white noise. Time slows, my hair in the gush of air through the car billows as it weaves in and out of my line of sight. Long legs smushed up behind my mother's seat, the anguish is plain on his face. His dark curls dance in the wind.

“Thomus?”

~*~

There’s heavy rain, but I can still picture it clearly. The smell of the wildflowers in the garden. The coolness of the shady side of the blanket verses the heat from the sunny side. I use his pillow in my bed to revive his smell in my mind as I picture us there.

My breath is coming in quick as my two fingers swirl around my clit. They dip down and bring up moisture to play with the sensitive nub as I think about how he’d kiss me as he entered me. Hands grasping for mine while he tantalizingly draws out and back in. I’d be unable to hold back a moan or a whimper, just as I am now with my fingers driving me so close –

~*~

My hands stuck to the wall above me, I strain to touch him. Even as his teeth sink into my neck and his fingers curl inside of me in just the right way for me to –

~*~

I tear my eyes open as my hips grind against him. I’m unable to hold back the whimper of pleasure as our eyes keep contact during my orgasm. I revel in the tight grip his hands have on my hips as he –

~*~

“Finite Incantatum.”

My chest expands with an audible intake of air, as if I’d been underwater and I’ve come to resurface. My body drops onto a couch and I quickly sit up, frantically searching the unfamiliar room. The only light in the room is a fireplace roaring with green flames. Thomus is kneeling on the floor next to me, his hands gripping my upper arms. We’re alone.

“Where’s Ginny?” I gasp, trying to shrug his hold off. He doesn’t budge and he doesn’t answer me. I twist my body, getting one foot on the ground, the other under my thigh. Thomus is in my way. My eyes finally land on his face and I’m stunned by his vulnerable expression.

“Where is she?” I press again and tears quickly form. “I need to see that she’s okay.”

He presses his lips together, his thumbs rubbing gently against my skin. “She’s alive.” My eyes widen, and before I can say anything else, he says, “I need to get you out of here.”

Loud music and cheering from beyond a heavy wooden door come into focus. We’re still in Edinburgh. Still close to Ginny.

I shake my head. “I can’t just leave her,” I whisper. More shouting from beyond the door, this time closer. I jump when someone bangs on the door.

His hands slide down my arms to my hands and he holds them tightly in my lap. “I brought you in here while they were distracted, but it’s only a matter of time before Avery comes looking for you, too.”

Someone bangs on the door again. “Oi!”

Shock and fear still plastered on my face, I nod silently.

The hands gripping mine pull me to my feet, and he quickly guides me to the fireplace. He tells the floo where we want to go, and soon we’re back in our own living room.

The sudden silence is like stepping into another world. I pull out of his grasp, walking further into the room. My breathing is rapid and I’m trying not to freak out. I wring my hands and begin to pace, memories of what just happened front and center in my mind. Thomus clicks on the lamp by the armchair.

“Sit down,” he says, his voice calmer than before.

I whirl on him, my finger shaking as I point to him. “Don’t you fucking tell me what to do.”

His mouth shuts and his expression hardens.

“What the fuck happened?” I ask him. “What did you do to me?”

He shakes his head softly. “You know what I did.”

“No,” I say, my voice shakes, my fury rising. The lamp by his side flickers. “You had no goddamn right –“

“To protect you?” he scoffs. “I assure you that’s very well within my right.”

I bark out a bitter laugh. “Protect me? You call taking me a walk through a couple of my most painful memories protection?!” Beneath my feet I feel a low tremble.

He grits his teeth, his hands fist at his side. “It was not my intention –“

“To what?! To remind me that my best friend is dead? To make me relive what it was like losing her?” My face twists with pain and my lower lip quivers. I turn away and force deep breaths in and out. I can feel a humming in my chest, a familiar crack and sizzle. The attempt to control my breathing doesn’t work. He’s a few steps closer now. “This whole thing was my fault.”

He shakes his head. “No –“

My voice suddenly jumps in volume. “Why did you keep me from that?! Why did you –“

“Did you want to see her get fucked on the table?” he cuts, his voice menacing. “In several different ways while dozens of people watched –“

I let out a piercing scream. The furniture in the room begins to shake and topple over as if the earth under our feet is quaking. The lightbulbs burst and the glass from the window shatters, flying in every direction. I shield my eyes, but still feel cuts on my hands and arms. In the dim moonlight I see Thomus whip out his wand.

“Expelliarmus!” I desperately yell and his wand goes flying out of his hand with a flash of red light. I don’t see where it lands and I don’t bother to look. My eyes are glued to him, watching the white hot anger set in his face.

“Enough!” he hisses venomously, taking advancing steps towards me. “You need to calm the fuck down and just listen.”

“No!” I concentrate on giving him jelly legs, but it doesn’t work, so I say it out loud. “Locomotor Wiggly!” It works this time and he falls to his knees just before he reaches me.

I step forward and run my fingers through the hair at the top of his head, grasping it tightly to force his head back. I make sure he’s looking me dead in the eyes when I say, “Legillimens.”

The walls Thomus’s Occlumency built are strong and sturdy, determined to keep me out. My magic might be out of control right now, but it’s far from weak. I find my way in like a plant growing out of a crack in the sidewalk.

Once I’m in, I have a difficult time catching onto any of his memories for long. Whenever I think I have a grasp on one, he quickly yanks it away as if it were tied to a string. I get brief flashes of a younger Bellatrix, a younger Lucius, and even a young Draco shoving his small blond head into a Chaser’s helmet. A young woman with long dark hair and bright blue eyes smiles at Thomus as they sit together reading a book.

I know the memory I’m looking for. I know where it is. But now that I’m here I’m afraid of actually seeing it. Maybe he’d been right to keep it from me.

Anger flares up inside of me as I remember the memories he put me in, making me relive Sam’s death. At the thought of Sam, a memory opens up.

Voldemort’s voice slithers into my mind. “Find the filth,” he says. “Tell no one of your mission.”

Thomus’s head bows. “Yes, my Lord.”

Flashes of Sam’s face pop up in different memories. First in photos, then her name across documents, and then in person. He visits the coffee shop she works at, making sure to order from her. Thomus returns to Voldemort, relaying to him her location.

Pure shock and his own force pushes me out of his head. With a gasp I fall back, glass pieces digging into wherever my skin makes contact with the floor. Thomus has retrieved his wand, the jelly leg jinx worn off, and he forces me onto my back. He crawls on top of me so my arms are pinned. I can’t move under his weight. With a wave of his wand, he conjures a familiar vial of minty potion.

“No!” I cry with tears in my eyes. He presses the vial to my mouth, but I refuse to open it. So he pinches my nose shut and I’m forced to open my mouth to breathe. While the one vial is being poured, he conjures an identical one, and forces me to drink that one as well. The crackle and burn of my magic I’d felt before fades into non-existence.

Once I’ve swallowed it all, he releases me, moving away from me until his back is against the couch. I force myself to roll onto my knees, bracing on one hand, the other shoving two fingers as deep into my mouth as they’ll go. I know the potion’s already taken effect, but I’m desperate and it’s worth a fucking shot.

The moment Thomus hears my initial gag and sees my body heave, he’s on me again. He grabs my arms and yanks me until I fall back against the couch with him. His arms around me hold mine down as I continue to struggle against him.

“Melisa,” he says in my ear. My throat tightens because this is the first time I’ve ever heard him say my name and it only makes me want to cry more. “If you don’t calm down –“

“You’ll what?” I pant. I finally pull enough strength to elbow him in the ribs and he releases me with a painful groan. “What more could you do to me?”

I don’t pull away from him completely. I only move enough so I’m leaning against the couch instead of him, our legs still entwined. My body sags from exhaustion and my eyes close as my hands come up to cover my face. “Why did it have to be you?” I sob.

“I did what the Dark Lord commanded me to do,” I hear him say after a long moment.

“Why her?” I whisper.

I feel the couch move as his body sags against it as well. “I don’t know,” he says, his voice barely louder than my whisper. “I didn’t know that’s what he wanted her for.”

Sniffling loudly into the darkness, I use the sleeve of my dress to wipe away leakage from my nose. My hands fall into my lap. Emotional numbness is starting to spread through me. Emotional exhaustion might be more accurate. Another long moment passes before he speaks again.

“Did the Dark Lord see those?”

It takes me a moment to realize what he was talking about. The memories Voldemort would care about.

“No,” I reply, my voice emotionless. “I used Occlumency to hide and replace them.”

“Replace?” he repeats.

“I made alternate versions of what happened, like imaginary ones,” I explain. I turn my face towards him, trying to read his expression in the dark. “Like those ones with… you and me.”

His eyes are on my hands in my lap. “Why didn’t I see those?” he asks.

“It takes a lot of concentration. I had no idea what was happening until –“

“Right,” he cuts in. “Until it was over.”

I nod. I expect him to ask me more questions, but he doesn’t and it’s a relief. The things he saw… I dread having to explain it all to him.

Before he can change his mind and before I feel another round of batshit desperation, I push away from the couch. As I untwist our legs, I wonder if this will all look better in the morning. If I can look at things with a fresh mind.

I leave him sitting in the destroyed living room and go upstairs to bed.

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fire-dwelling · 1 year

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I also got another question on the other blog that I'll also respond to, that inspired this realization for me:

Tamaki is indeed supposed to be the anti-Blair, in all the worst ways.

Both cat themed.

Both here for fanservice.

But whereas Blair embraces her role, Tamaki refuses to, so she gets punished with unwilling fanservice. I don't say this to shame Blair: her body, her life, she can do what she wants (aside from ignoring that people like Soul don't want to be grabbed by her--which, yeah, shame her for that).

I say this to point out that Tamaki's existence in Fire Force, like so much of this manga, is just to be the anti-Soul Eater, failing to build a story on its own merits. Soul Eater made death less serious? Then Fire Force will take it super seriously. Soul Eater took a lighter approach to some serious topics? Fire Force will try to be a super-serious analysis about religion and state corruption. Soul Eater had a young teenage girl with pigtails as the lead, where she is not treated to a lot of current gross depictions of underage girls in manga? Fire Force will have an older teenage boy as the lead--and make the pigtail girl now be the subject of a lot of gross depictions of underage girls in manga. The cat woman in Soul Eater is fine being seen as sexual? We'll make the cat girl in Fire Force really bothered by being naked against her will.

And all so that this could make Fire Force into a prequel, where all the stuff that made it the anti-Soul Eater is stripped away. It was bad enough to make Fire Force just the opposite of Soul Eater rather than its own thing; to then make it an extension of Soul Eater is not as clever an inversion as many people think, now it's just somehow even more derivative.

And keep being gross, Ohkubo, you fucking hack. "Symbol of life" my foot. This nonsense again reduces women to just procreation, ignores complexities when considering women, men, cisgender identity, trans identity, gay and bi and queer identity. "Women are here to procreate, that is what makes them the symbol of life, so here, the creator will make this underage girl the chief moment of nudity and fanservice and titillation in this manga!"

God fucking damn it, we sat through Tamaki getting embarrassed and groped for this shit?

This is why I can't sit through that anime, having seen how the manga turns out. And so many of you want this shit to lead into a Soul Eater reboot that badly that you don't understand the hell of bad storytelling that awaits you.

#dwells whines about fire force

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messers-moony · 3 years

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Loyalty’s | R.B

Paring: Regulus Black X Potter!Fem!Reader

Summary: Instead of Regulus obeying the Dark Lord his loyalty’s lie with his girlfriend and becomes a spy for the Order.

The house was quiet. That was rare, especially after Fleamont and Euphemia took in Sirius Black. James and Sirius were like brothers, always causing mischief inside the manor while the younger Potter kept to herself more. Y/n Potter was only a year younger than James but was just as loved. Sirius Black became her brother just as much as James was, along with the other two Marauders. Unbeknownst to her brother - brothers if you will - she had been dating someone since her fifth year.

Y/n was in her seventh year while James and Sirius had graduated. James had already married Lily, and the war was raging on. Y/n was home for winter break. The Potter residence was to its fullest capacity. Remus and Sirius staying in the guest bedrooms. Y/n staying in her bedroom. James and Lily in James’ room. Fleamont and Euphemia had their master bedroom as well. It was dark outside, and all the young adults were in bed when a knock echoed on the door.

Fleamont held his wand tightly in his right hand as he approached the door. Euphemia was present at St. Mungo's for the night, and Fleamont was waiting for her to return home, but she never knocked. Hesitantly he made his way to the door and flung it open. Instantly Fleamonts wand made its presence known on the male's neck. The male had wavy black hair, grey-blue eyes, and sharp features. Resembling Sirius Black almost perfectly. The man gulped at the wand placed pointed at his throat.

“Sirius! James!”

Footsteps, “Yes, Mr. Potter?”

“ What’s up, dad?”

Both young adults focused on the man at the door, “No….” Sirius whimpered.

“What are you doing here!” Sirius yelled in distress, “Security question, Sirius.” Fleamont scolded.

“Where was my favorite place to hide when we were kids?” Sirius questioned, “Under Uncle Alphard’s cherry blossom tree.” He replied.

Fleamont didn’t back down, “What are you doing here?”

“I didn’t come here to see Sirius.” The man stated, “I came to see Y/n.”

James and Fleamont tensed, “What do you want with my daughter?” Fleamonts voice was stern and rigid.

“I-“ He swallowed, “I need to speak with her, please.”

“Regulus… You don’t know what you’re doing.” Sirius commented, “Please, Mr. Potter.” Regulus begged.

“James-“ Fleamont ordered, and James stood tall, “Go get your sister.”

He didn’t need any further instruction and woke his sister up, bringing her downstairs. There Y/n saw her father's wand to his neck. Before throwing her arms around him, she needed a security question. The pleading look in Regulus’ eyes broke her heart to pieces, but a war was going on.

Y/n’s heart raced, and her palms felt sweaty, but this was a question only he’d genuinely know, “When- When did we start dating?”

“November 16, 1976.”

“Reggie!” Y/n whimpered, throwing her arms around him.

Regulus held her back with the same amount of pressure. Holding her tight to his chest and never wanting to let go. The smell of her shampoo resonated in his nose and the faint breathing from her nose rested on the crook of his neck—a feeling he never wanted to lose. The world seemed to have stopped at that moment. Christmas break had been hell for Regulus so far, but now he felt hopeful.

But people were watching, and James snatched Y/n back, “Dating?! Are you bloody crazy?!”

“James-“ Fleamont began but was hastily cut off, “No, dad! She’s insane! Regulus is one of them! He’s a bloody death eater!” James exclaimed.

Sirius snapped, “He’s still my brother, ya’ know. If he’s here, then he’s defying mother’s orders. Let him talk.”

“C’mon. Everyone in the kitchen.”

The table was relatively large. It could seat eight. Fleamont took his usual seat at the end of the table. James sat on his left and Sirius on James’ left. Regulus sat in front of James and Y/n in front of Sirius. Regulus couldn’t face his brother at the minute because Sirius’ proud eyes were going to turn into disappointment soon enough.

Regulus held Y/n’s right hand tightly, “Lift your sleeve.” Fleamont ordered.

The younger Black brother obeyed; there it was; on his left forearm, “So it’s true. You obey the Dark Lord.” Fleamont commented.

“Dad please-“ Y/n began.

“No.”

Heads turned, “No?”

“No. I bare the mark, but I don’t obey.” Regulus stated coldly, “My loyalty’s lie with Y/n. She’s told me about the order, and I want to be your spy.”

James ran his fingers through his hair, “You told him! Y/n!”

“James, come off it!” Y/n scoffed.

“You want to be a spy for the order?” Sirius repeated, and Regulus nodded, retaking Y/n’s hand, “Yes, but there’s something I need to tell you all. Something I’ve found out.”

They leaned in, intrigued, “The Dark Lord has horcruxs. He’s split his soul into multiple different parts. I know where one of them is.” Regulus informed.

“How did you find this out?” Sirius inclined, “I told you, my loyalty’s lie with my girlfriend - you know, the girl I plan to marry - I’m a spy. Not a pawn.” Regulus countered.

James coughed, “You are not marrying my sister.”

“I’m afraid that isn’t your call.” Y/n retorted, crossing her arms, “Cut it out both of you.” Fleamont scolded.

“We’ll have to come back to you on whether or not you can join. However, you can stay with Y/n in her bedroom for the time being.” Fleamont informed, and James gawked, “Absolutely not! Sirius and Regulus can share. I don’t want him near her.”

Fleamont turned his head slowly towards his son, “James Fleamont Potter-“ He began in a low tone making James stiffen, “Y/n and Regulus will share a room. If he is stupid enough to try something while in my house, then I’ll be damned.”

“Remus, Sirius, and you will only be a room away. Hopefully-“ Mr. Potter turned to Regulus, “He knows better than to try something.”

“With all due respect, sir, I’d never purposely put Y/n in any way of danger. That’s why she didn’t know about the horcruxs.” Regulus stated, and Fleamont looked pleased, “We’ll work on it. Now, all of you, back to bed.”

When the four of them reached the hallway upstairs, James grabbed Regulus' collar, “We need to have a talk.”

Without another word, Sirius, Regulus, and James stepped into Sirius’ bedroom, knowing Lily was asleep. Hopefully, Remus was too. Y/n gave an audible sigh and walked into her bedroom. She was slightly organizing it and grabbing clothes that she had stolen from Regulus back at Hogwarts. Thankfully she made out. Y/n had one of Regulus’ hoodies and pair of sweatpants. Twenty minutes later, Regulus walked into the room.

“Um- I- Here.” Y/n stuttered, handing him the clothes, and he quietly changed, “I’m sorry about James.”

“No need for you to be sorry, love.” Regulus replied as he slipped on the sweatpants, “I know he’s protective. I’ve also got the mark.”

Y/n stood up and embraced him tightly, “That mark doesn’t make you a monster.”

“It makes me feel like one.”

“I know, but-“ Y/n pulled away slightly, looking him in the eyes, “Did you mean what you said out there?”

“Mean what, my love?”

“That your loyalty’s lie with me?”

Regulus smiled, “Of course, I did.”

The following days went by quietly. Regulus wouldn’t speak about the confrontation with James, but Y/n didn’t mind. But she didn’t miss the glares James sent his way every time he’d get close. Strangely enough, Remus was the most protective over her. Euphemia had been hospitable in his stay, providing for him as she did Sirius. It wasn’t until Christmas Day when Regulus got the news.

They all sat together in the sitting room, “You’re approved.” Fleamont stated.

“Pardon?”

“You can be our spy. Dumbledore believes the information you’ve given us is worthy of trust.”

Sirius could’ve cried out of joy, “Oh, Reggie.”

Both boys hugged for the first time since they were kids. James smiled fondly at them. Happy for Sirius that he got his little brother back. The boys sat beside each other. Sirius had his usual Sirius-like smirk placed upon his face. The same smirk he had before he made a joke.

“Seems like all it took was the Potter charm.” Sirius nudged Regulus’ elbow, making him blush, “Thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Potter, for letting him stay. It means a lot to me.”

“You know Mum, always taking in strays.” James teased, “James Potter!” Euphemia scolded with a bright grin.

Y/n shrugged, “He’s not wrong.”

“Y/n!”

“Sorry!”

“There’s an envelope under the tree for you, Regulus dear.” Euphemia commented before leaving into the kitchen, and Regulus stiffened, “It’s a present, not a howler.” Fleamont added, making him relax.

Regulus’ fingers reached for the green-colored envelope. Inside laid a paper in both James and Fleamonts handwriting. The paper inside made him gleeful. It was possible the best Christmas gift he could’ve ever received, and Regulus was a spoiled baby at the Black manor.

“You have my permission to marry my daughter.” -F.P

“Take care of my sister, or I’ll have your head!” -J.P

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justfangirlthingies · 3 years

Text

Morning Chase (Sunday Mornings) (Dad! Draco Malfoy)

Word count: 1477 words

This is just pure fluff!

Enjoy family time at Malfoy manor!

Here's part 2

Weekends at the Malfoy's were reserved solely for family. Especially the Sundays.

On Sundays there was no work, though the young parents wouldn't even have to go to work at all with the Malfoy and (L/n) fortunes combined. No special plans or duties. Just family. Maybe his parents, your parents or your siblings (if you don't have siblings just ignore the sibling part) would pay you a visit, but that didn't happen too often. Family visits were more of a Saturday afternoon thing after all.

Typically, it was quiet inside the manor when the sun rose and the first rays of light shone through the curtains in the master bedroom on a Sunday morning. At this time of day, Draco and (Y/n) Malfoy were usually still asleep. Her form nuzzled into his chest, their legs entangled. From time to time, their son would sleep in their bed as well, cuddled up in between the couple, basking in the warmth and comfort they provided. However, most nights from Saturday to Sunday the boy would sleep in his own room.

When the sunlight would finally find its way through a slit in the heavy curtains, it would oh so often gently dance across Draco's nose and the rest of his face. This would cause him to pull you closer and hide his face in your hair or his pillow in order to escape the light, which was sure to blind him slightly if he dared to open his eyes. Eventually, the stirring and shuffling of your husband would wake you. On days like these you would pull each other closer, still half asleep when you'd hear the sound of a door opening and closing down the hall, followed by the pitter patter of small feet and thereafter, the noise of the wooden bedroom door squeaking as it was opened, the small footsteps resuming.

Seeing as your face was practically buried in Draco's chest, you were certain he felt the smile that made its way onto your face when you felt the mattress dip slightly, due to the little boy who was climbing onto the bed. Soon there was a lot of shuffling surrounding you and you could feel the light weight of your darling son shift around on top of you as he climbed over you as carefully as he could manage. Once he had succeeded in stepping over you, he'd try to squeeze his small form between the two of you. A quiet chuckle resonated from where your head was placed and you finally opened one of your eyes. Your (e/c) eye meeting a pair of silver irises. Those he had inherited from his father, no doubt, just like the hair and nose. "Good morning sweetheart, did you sleep well?" you smiled at him as you opened your other eye as well, caressing the soft skin of his cheek with one hand as you untangled yourself from your husband, to make some space for the boy. "Good mornin mummy! I slept well!" He returned your greeting gleefully and engulfed you in a hug, which you returned immediately. Fingers gently running through his soft platinum hair. Draco admired the two of you, adoration filled his gaze as he watched you engage with each other, sometimes he was still baffled how he had made it this far. It happened often that he questioned himself about how he possibly deserved you and why you had decided to give him a chance back then. Why you had chosen to stay with him of all people, a bully and former death eater. He couldn't help but wonder how he deserved such a perfect, loving little family. But it didn't matter how and why, all that really mattered was that he had the two of you and that he'd give everything in his power to keep you safe and happy- His thoughts were cut off when he was pulled back to reality by his son "Daddy!" the smaller looking version of Draco must've just noticed that his other parent was awake as well, so he left your embrace to jump into his father's arms. "Scorpius!" Your husband exclaimed, he sat up rather quickly, just in time to catch the child in his arms. A loud, rather overdramatic "OOF!" fell from the blonde's lips as he let himself fall backwards into the bed again, but not before emitting another over exaggerated groan. The young Malfoy held onto his father as he squealed in delight. You yourself couldn't help but giggle at the scene before you. You were absolutely bedazzled with the way your two boys interacted. You watched as a sly smirk crossed Draco's features, he whispered something to Scorpius, all the while keeping his steely gaze directed at you. The way your son's lips curled up into a huge grin as he took in whatever it was that your husband instructed could only mean mischief. You decided to play along, after all Sundays were for family. So you got up cautiously, two pairs of eyes trained on your every move as you sprinted out of the room and through the house. Your son's laughter could be heard somewhere not so far behind you. You were quick to hide in the playroom, a place where you knew they'd surely find you. It was a game after all and not one you intended to win. You were right because after a few minutes the door to the playroom opened and you came face to face with Scorpius. Just as he was about to call for his dad you pressed a gentle finger to his lips " Hey buddy, how about we do whatever you and daddy have planned for me, to daddy?" He seemed to ponder for a moment before a grin appeared on his lips and he nodded "DADDY! I FOUND MOMMY IN THE PLAYROOM!" Not even 10 seconds later the love of your life stood in the door frame, a mysterious glimmer in his eyes as he approached you. Then from one moment to the next you were scooped up bridal style in the man's arms "We've got you now!" a cocky smirk was plastered on his face, yet his eyes were full of affection. Grey eyes you could always get lost in. He raised an eyebrow in amusement, that act effectively ripped you from your trance and was also your clue to start acting distressed. So you did.

"No! Please let me go!" you laughed, thrashing around in his arms, but Draco didn't budge, he just held onto you tighter, by doing so he restrained you from your little play fight and just carried you back to the bedroom where he threw you onto the king-sized bed. "Never!" he played along and trapped you under his body. Scorpius let out a joyful laugh and when he saw you wiggle your eyebrows at him and then shift your gaze to his father, he took the hint and tackled Draco with all his might. Having caught the man off guard he actually lost balance and rolled off you, the groan leaving his throat this time was an authentic one "Scorpius, you can't just betray me like that!" The adult whined. Needless to say, you hadn't expected your son to do that either, he was always such a gentle soul, which is why you were taken by surprise for a moment. The realization that the tackle attack actually happened and your husband's reaction to it caused you to wheeze and roll around the bed because you had found it so funny. "Oh, so you think this is funny, do you?" Draco frowned. "Yes" you took a deep breath before your laughing continued, tears forming in the corner of your eyes from the fun you were having "Yes I think this is hilarious" A smaller hand pulled on your fingers to get you to stop laughing, a bright, flashing smile belonged to the owner of the small hand "Come on mommy, help" You tried to compose yourself as you watched the four-year-old climb onto your husband's chest and start tickling him. As soon as you managed to calm down and gained control over your breathing back, you joined in and helped with tickling Draco, who laughed and wiggled around to escape, until he declared surrender "I give up! Please stop, I yield! I yield!" ▪︎ ▪︎ ▪︎ Sunday mornings were quality time spent together. Sunday mornings meant relieving the house elves of their duty to prepare breakfast and to try yourself instead. Those days stood for a mess in the kitchen and big smiles on everyone's faces. Sunday mornings were reserved for family breakfast and tabletop games. For story time and cuddles on the large living room couch. Sunday mornings were followed by family lunch and Sunday afternoons. ▪︎ ▪︎ ▪︎

Now, what happened on Sunday afternoons?

Taglist: @ateez-star

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starbuckie · 3 years

Text

𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐜𝐤

challenge: time travel challenge by @justagirlinafandomworld

prompt: “we’re divorced?”

pairing: sirius black x reader

words: 5.7k words

warnings: FOURTH WALL BREAK!!(sorry im very excited about that), lots of angst, almost smut(hehe), sirius lowkey has a breeding kink, sirius is an asshole for a bit, the smallest bit of fluff, fix-it, and the same time travel theory as back to the future

summary: an unnatural occurrence lets a woman go back in time to try and change everything she’s known for the past twenty years.

a/n: wow, i normally don’t write for harry potter so this was a nice change. anyways, this is for yvette’s time travel writing challenge, and everybody say HAPPY BIRTHDAY YVETTE! i’m so sorry this is late, it got deleted and i needed to re-edit, but i truly appreciate your friendship and your lovely, amazingly beautiful self, and I’m so so glad that we became friends :) this fic is not beta-read at all, so if you see any mistakes tell me, but otherwise i really hope you enjoy this fic<3

main masterlist || harry potter masterlist

It still wasn’t over. After all she had lost, more specifically everyone she had lost, and the shitty cycle that she had to call her life, it still wasn’t over. The people she had watched the life drain from, the screams of those suffering from the loss caused by the Dark Lord, and yet life still hadn’t had its fill of torturing Y/N. Grimmauld Place felt empty without the kids, without the Weasleys, but they had gone back to their home and soon enough she would have to as well. Harry had gone back to Hogwarts with Dumbledore, though she’d argued to hold onto him just a bit longer after-

After Sirius had died.

Time had passed, maybe two or three weeks, but no matter what the woman couldn’t bring herself to get out of Sirius’ old bedroom, simply staring at the ceiling with her tears at bay. Her and Sirius had been a complicated thing, to say the least, a topic nobody had brought up since 1983, when she had banned it. Not as if there was much to talk about after the divorce and Sirius going to Azkaban. After Lily and James had died, after she had fought with Dumbledore for custody of Harry, after she had become a professor at Beauxbatons and moved to France without a second thought. Sirius had been locked up after he’d hurt her in the worst possible way, and Y/N’s heartbroken soul found no other reason to return to England.

But, she pushed those bad memories to the back of her mind. It seemed so trivial, looking back on it. Not the broken house, of course, that had been his own mistake. But Y/N had many regrets, all of them seeming to revolve around the mischievous black-haired man who she had fallen in love with as a teen. The night it went down, the night their relationship had fractured at the seams and fallen down, was her greatest one however. It had been so stupid, so, so stupid, but they’d both gotten caught up in the moment, and Y/N had let him die without knowing how much she was sorry for that night that they let their fears consume them.

The cries that she had tried so hard to contain finally broke free from the restraints of her heart. “I’m so sorry, Siri,” she whispered into the air, “I couldn’t save you this time.” As the hot, salty tears ran down her cheeks, Y/N shuffled across the room, letting her feet drag her to the old Black family room, the dark green walls embracing her rainy emotions.

A little gasp escaped her lips as she looked at the portraits among the wall. The Black family tree was faded along the age-old wall, but what she was really looking for was the burned out image of her raven-haired love. There, right next to Regulus, was a black spot, scorned and scarred by the prestigious family for being a blood traitor. Y/N smiled and traced the burn with her finger, remembering their fourth year when she had accompanied him home for the holidays so he wouldn’t be completely alone in the hellhole he had to call his house. Sirius had snuck them up to this room and spent the night talking in hushed whispers sworn secrets. “I’ll be yours forever, Siri, and I’m sorry for fighting with you. I wish-” she sniffled, glaring at the spot in the wall as she tried to garble out her words, “I wish, I could go back in time, and just fix it. Just me and you, and that stupid night, with the bloody fight about children because you deserve it all, darling.”

“Ah, I think you can.”

Y/N turned around, her eyes wide with fear. That was not Kreacher’s voice. There stood a younger woman, around nineteen, a scroll of paper and a quill in her hand. There was a whisper of a smirk on her face, brown eyes glittering even in the dimness in the room. “Who the hell are you?” Y/N looked at the door, which was still closed as she left it. She cast her wand out, pointing it at the stranger who did nothing but smile. “How did you get in here? Are you with the Lord?”

“With Voldemort?” The woman simply laughed. “Dude, I’m not with ‘the Lord’,” she added with air quotations. “Also I’m not really even here, so don’t you worry about that. My name’s Malia.”

Malia held her hand out, but Y/N kept her guard up. “You’re American. What brings you here? Are you a muggle?”

“Oh, nope, not a wizard, I’m just the author of this story.” Malia confided. “I’m here to tell you that you can fix this.”

“Fix… what?” Malia just rolled her eyes and sighed, staring up towards the ceiling as she spoke.

“God, did I write you to be hard of hearing now, too? I ought to fix that when I get back.” The woman blankly stared at the strange girl, wondering what the actual fuck she was talking about. “I can give you the chance to go back in time, Y/N. It won’t be for long, it’s really not gonna be interesting for more than two hours at most, but that should be enough time to tell the gang about what’s to come with Voldemort.”

“Like... time travel?” Y/N asked. The only way she knew how to time travel was the time turners. “But all of the ti-”

“Time turners were destroyed in the Department of Mysteries, I know, I know. Trust me, I’ve read Harry Potter more times than I’ve said ‘I love you’ to my parents.” Malia smiled. “I’m the author, I make the rules, and my rule is that I’m giving you two hours in 1978 to talk to Sirius so he can fix the emotional fucking mess left behind by J.K. Rowling.”

“Who’s J.K. Rowling?” Malia shuddered at the name.

“A raggedy-ass, transphobic bitch who wrote y’all into existence, but she’s not of importance right now.” She checked the small, rectangular box in her hand, which glowed and provided little light in the darkened room. “Let’s see, it’s currently eleven-forty, so you have until one-forty to find the Marauders and fix this future. It may not be fixed in the books in the future, but if you are able to do it here that’s all that matters.” Malia’s brown eyes were downcast, her bright and loud personality dimming for just a moment before returning to Y/N’s confused gaze once more. “Try not to screw up too much while you’re there, just enough that you defeat the Dark Lord the first time. Tell Sirius all you know and that should be enough for him to fix all the mistakes, but do not under any circumstances let him or anyone else know who you are. I wish you luck, Y/N, it was nice to meet ya in person.”

And with a peace sign in front of her face, she disappeared into a flash of neon pink light.

“Bloody hell! Fix my future? Talk to Sirius? If this even is time travel, then how am I supposed to get there- AH!” Y/N’s body felt like it was turning inside out, her guts being torn from her stomach and back into it again. A delirious giggle arose from her lips in the black void she was pulled into, and a soft chatter could be heard, like voices at the end of a tunnel.

“Blimey, looks like we got ourselves a nutter on school grounds.” Y/N’s arms flailed around, desperately seeking some sort of grounding surface to hold on to when her back hit a rough surface. There was an audible crack somewhere in her body, but she felt so sick that she couldn’t tell where.

“Are you okay, ma’am? You just appeared from the sky and hit the ground.” Warm, brown eyes met Y/N’s, a familiar mess of black curls resting atop of the boy’s head. Large, rounded glasses sat perched on the tip of his nose, and an impish smile, one she used to know so well before he died, met his lips.

“James,” she sighed. The boy stared at her strangely, and only then did she notice the three other boys and girls each behind them. Remus, Peter, Sirius, Lily, Marlene, and Alice.

Sirius.

The sight that met her eyes made her nearly emotional. It had technically been only three weeks since she had seen him, but here was the young boy she had fallen in love with. The one who charmed her with his smart words and witty retorts to her brush-offs, who used to hold her in his arms in the most intimate and gentle ways. His grey eyes sparkled with curiosity, the infamous Marauder mischief swirling within the silvery pools.

Seeing him so young tugged at her heartstrings, and though she wanted nothing more than to hold him in her arms and never let go, a small, niggling feeling at the back of her head held her back. Was there something wrong?

“You know me?” Oh right, she was currently thirty-five. Looking around she noticed that she was outside the quidditch pitch, and there were other students, staring at her with widened eyes. No one knew she was Y/N L/N, their fellow schoolmate and probably one of the very few of them that survived the Death Eaters attacks. None of them were aware how it ended, or how it was currently going for them back in 1996, and in this time there was the first Wizarding War going on and they had every right to be terrified for their lives.

James now took a more defensive stance, standing tall and holding his wand out. “Who are you?”

She couldn’t give him the answer, instead letting her mouth gape open as she stared at him with wide eyes. Y/N looked across the grounds for the nearest exit, which was down by Hagrid’s hut and into the Forbidden Forest. It was her only choice at this point, to hide in the dark, creepy space, maybe just until the students went away so she could find Sirius and talk to him alone. It’d be hard to separate him from the boys, but if Lily were occupied with James it sure would be easy.

Her younger, seventh-year self didn’t seem to be in the audience, thank Merlin, and with that knowledge, she got up and ran, ignoring her screaming muscles. That time travel really did a number on her.

As she ran through the crowd, shoving people aside, she heard the students mutter, too much in shock and disarray to stop the crazy, old woman who knew James Potter.

“This is dodgy.”

“Someone ought to tell Dumbledore about this.”

“She kinda looks like Y/N L/N.’

“Don’t insult the poor girl like that, that wonker is ages old.”

“Come back here! Who the bloody hell are you?” Y/N’s heart beat quickly in her chest, threatening to burst out. Only three minutes in the past and it was all going straight to shit. “Stupefy!”

Shit. “No, James, please don’t-“ Her body hit the ground and her eyes closed, the last thing she saw being the pumpkin patch by the hut.

“I see you’re awake now, Ms. L/N.” Dumbledore stood above Y/N in the hospital ward bed, his grey beard dangling in front of her face. Her first instinct was to start blaming him for everything that had happened, starting from Lily and James’ deaths to Sirius’, already opening her mouth to call him an old, senile cow, but then she realized that Harry hadn’t been sent to the Dursleys yet, much less been born yet, so none of it would have an effect on him. Y/N’s second instinct was to question how Dumbledore knew who she was in 1978, but her former Headmaster started to speak before she could do so. “I must admit, it’s very courageous, that stunt you just pulled. I don’t think Ms. Louie will be too happy about that.” Y/N sent him a questioning stare. “Malia, the girl you met earlier. Malia Louie.”

“Headmaster Dumbledore, how did you know it was me?” She was dressed in a white gown that went to her knees, and behind him she could see her blouse and jeans folded and clean. Ah, the Hospital Wing. She had brought the boys here more times than she could count in her years at Hogwarts. “I don’t exactly look as young as I used to.”

“Ah, don’t worry Ms. L/N, you’ve kept your good looks quite nicely, even in your older age.” He stroked his beard thoughtfully, his wrinkled eyes sparkling with joy. “And speaking of young, if you are still worrying yourself about your younger self, you can put that to a stop. I am aware that you are not able to tell anyone who you are, and time travel is exceptionally dangerous if you are seen by the other version of yourself. I’ve already told the students that you were just a stray witch, misguided in your ways and that you were well taken care of. However, I think that brings us to the question of what your intentions are in the past, Ms. L/N.”

“Headmaster, I don’t think I can tell you about my business here. I’ve already messed up by letting the school see me by letting everyone see me, I don’t know why that girl even sent me here, it’s clear that this was a mistake.” Y/N sat up on the headboard, feeling her eyes fill with tears once again. The tall arches of windows let the sun in the room, and she could see the specks of dust swirling around in the golden light. It had to be close to the end of the year for them, maybe sometime around April or May, near the end of N.E.W.T.s at least. She could imagine that it’d be easy for her to get out of Hogwarts for the day, with all the students studying for the stressful exams in the library, maybe she'd make her way to Hogsmeade and walk around or visit Hagrid under a false name to have some tea. He was always open for a nice cuppa with strangers on any free day he had. “Thank you Headmaster, for your kindness, but I really ought to be going. I-it was nice to see you.”

Y/N started to help herself out of the bed, swinging her feet over to touch the cool stone ground. Bones cracked with pain and fatigue, her muscles stretching sluggishly. Merlin, that she was not expecting that much hurt from the fall, but she should have never underestimated James Potter. No one ever should if they want to keep their good mind and sanity.

Dumbledore handed her her clothes, cracked lips set in a straight line as he nodded solemnly. “I hope you accomplish whatever it is you are here to do, Ms. L/N, but I have no doubt that you will.” With a sly wink, he added, “You were always one of our most ardent and bright students.”

Y/N let herself smile, and with a wave, swiftly brought herself to the door. “Thank you, Headmaster.”

After slipping outside, she ran down the corridors, echoes of her feet ringing lightly behind her. The courtyard proved to be empty and she quickly ducked behind a column and tugged her jeans on hastily, making sure that no professors came walking past. Though the sky proved to be bright and cheerful, a slight breeze carried through, making her fall off balance and fall on the cemented ground.

“Are you okay, darling? You look like you’re in need of a little help.” Y/N looked up to the speaking figure, one that she both loved and dreaded to see.

She gathered herself quickly, her mind running fast and heart beating out of her chest as she tried to get out. “Yes, I am okay, thank you for asking. I think I’ll just get up and going now, I don’t need to take time out of your day like this-”

“I know who you are, Y/N.”

Y/N came to a full stop, going against her brain that screamed at her to run away. Sirius looked downtrodden, his grey eyes watering despite the small hint of a smirk on his face. Though he was always one for playing around and not taking anything seriously, she knew when it was time to stop pretending and get real. “How’d you know it was me, Sirius?”

“You really don’t look bad for your age, darling.” He offered her a hand to help her up and she took it graciously, eyeing him nearly guiltily and forgetting about her promise to Y/N. But that was useless now, this moment with her first love was much more important. “Also you have the tattoo on your chest. I knew it was you the moment you landed on school grounds.”

She traced his gaze to her left collarbone, where a paw print, just barely visible beneath her low-cut blouse, sat. It was his, or Snuffles’, paw print, and at this point in time they had probably gotten it done about three months before. He had one for her too, a horseshoe for her horse patronus, right on his left side of his chest too. So they’d always be right next to each other’s hearts, as cheesy as it seemed.

But they were dumb, lovesick teenagers, and they acted the part well too. Their love was all-consuming, shagging in under the bleachers at the quidditch pitch and making out under the stars. It was fast, everything was fast, decisions, ideas, classes, all of them under the impression that they had to do everything right then or they’d be dead before they got to actually live. They had dreams of marriage, and a big, big family, obviously so far away from his family so they could never hurt their children’s lives the way they had hurt his.

They were fantasies, Y/N had known that well enough when she and Sirius got divorced, but it was something that eighteen year-old Sirius Black held close to his heart. No matter how shitty his life got, he was always a firm believer in a happy ending. In their happy ending.

“How am I right now?” They now stood over the Black Lake, staring into the glittering depths of the water where some mermaids could be seen sneaking peeks at the handsome boy and the strange lady who had fallen from the sky.

Sirius stared at her questioningly for a moment. “How are you doing right now? I mean, I believe that I should be asking you that ques- oh, Merlin, I’m such a git, you meant your younger self.” Y/N laughed at that, her heart lifting with the goofiness of the old Sirius relieving an ache in her heart that she had had for so long. Not that old (it felt weird to say that) Sirius had been anything less than silly and snarky, but it was never directed towards her. It was nice to have the resemblance of their old relationship back, even if it was just for a fleeting moment. “I suppose that you’re okay. You didn’t see, well, your big moment on the field, but at this point Lily has probably opened her big, fat mouth and told you. N.E.W.T.s are just finishing up, so you’re much more light-hearted than during the study season.”

“I really did have a stick up my arse during exam time, you always told me to loosen up-”

“Y/N, cut out the small talk, I think it’s okay for me to ask how and what is happening.” Sirius cut in.

So she told him. Y/N had always been upfront with people about everything. Or rather, she had learned how to be upfront with people after her and Sirius’ divorce. Without details of the deaths, she explained how she was sent back into the past to fix it in some conceivable way. However, she did tell him about the fall out. Maybe she wanted him to understand her pain, even though it was a younger him, but she had to admit to herself that it was because she just wanted Sirius, in whatever form life gave her to hear out her grievances and apologies.

Since her Sirius was dead before she could.

“We’re divorced?” Sirius looked about ready to break down into tears, almost as if the concept of them breaking up or separating was foreign to him. “What exactly did we fight over, Y/N? That doesn’t seem normal for the two of us.” Sirius asked.

“Well, to be fair, it wasn’t a normal predicament for us. either…”

Sirius slammed the door shut, efficiently pinning her against it with his white button up ruffled up, navy tie hanging from his neck loosely. Y/N’s arms were held down tightly against the oak wood, the sensation of the cold door burning into her rather warm skin making her squeal. Her husband’s tongue worked its way through her parted lips, low groans rising from the back of his throat from the way she moaned in tandem with his hips pushing into hers. Legs wrapped around his tapered waist, the pink, floral skirt Y/N wore rising high on her thighs, revealing more of her flesh to the lust-filled man. Both of their giggles echoed off the hallway walls of their small cottage home, just four miles west of their best friends’.

As the twenty year-old man threw his wife unceremoniously on the bed, he shed himself of his shirt and swiftly unbuttoned his slacks, throwing them haphazardly across the room. Merlin, Y/N looked ethereal laying spread out on the bed, panties around her left ankle, swollen lips parted with short puffs of air leaving them. “You just get right down to business, don’t you, Black.”

Crawling over his body, his hot breath hit her neck as he growled against her skin. “Could say the same thing about you, darling.” Sirius’ lips made their way down every inch, every curve, nook, and cranny of Y/N’s body, smoothly slipping her clothes off as he did so. Her sweet gasps filled the bedroom, back arching off the bed to meet his chest. “I’m going to put a baby in you tonight, sweetheart, we’re-”

Y/N sat up straight, her eyebrows trained in confusion at her husband. “What? A baby?”

Sirius’ heart pounded in his chest. “Yes.” He remarked in a clipped tone. “Is that not what you wanted?”

Her mind recalled her words from earlier that day, as she chatted happily with Lily about the news of her pregnancy. “Siri, I said I may one day enjoy having a kid of my own. Not right now, of course, but later. After all, we only got married a few months ago, don’t you think we should hold off a bit on that? We’re twenty years-old, Siri, there’s so many years for that.”

Rage filled Sirius’ blood like a spreading fire. In all honesty, it wasn’t so much about his anger as it was his hurt and fear. Fear that she had realized how fucked up he truly was, fear that she realized what he had known all along- that she deserved better than him. “So you don’t want a baby with me?”

“I never said I didn’t want that, Sirius, I just said that I’m not ready!” Y/N yelled back. At this point both of them stood on opposite sides of the bed, faces hot with tears. “We’re in the middle of a bloody war, people we know, people we love, have lost their lives, and it is not the ideal environment to raise a child, Sirius! Just because James and Lily are ready to have one doesn’t mean that I am too!”

“When will you be ready, Y/N? When will it ever be enough time for you? When will I be enough for you?” The heartbroken girl tried to interject, but her voice was cut off by her husband’s quickly enough. Sirius climbed onto the bed, holding her chin harshly with one hand. “Tell me, did you ever want to be with me in the first place?”

“Yes, Sirius, of course I wanted to be with you.” His heart hurt looking at the love of his life in tears, but even that was able to melt his cold facade. “I love you more than anything in the world.”

“Then fucking prove it, Y/N.” With that declaration, he removed his hand from her face and gathered his clothes, slamming everything in their shared room as Y/N quivered, knees ready to buckle on the spot. “I’m going out, don’t wait up for me.”

As soon as the front door shut, she fell to the ground in tears, the laughter that once filled their home replaced with the sound of her shattered heart.

Y/N had done her best to not tear up during her explanation of the events that had taken that night, but Sirius' eyes watered, refusing to believe the truth. “No. No. I didn’t do that. Y/N, tell me,” he gripped her biceps with trembling hands, “please tell me I didn’t really do that. I can’t believe that I-I, that I-”

“You were drunk, Sirius, I don’t think you truly knew what you were saying at the time.” She sighed, “But people always say that drunken words are just sober thoughts.” Y/N rubbed her arms, just shivering slightly in the Scotland breeze. “You came back two hours later punching the wall and breaking it, and that’s when I knew that we wouldn’t last.”

The raven-haired boy’s head started to shake, even more mortified of the actions that his future self, the man he’d be in just two years' time, had done. “I packed up my things, not that there were many, we’d only moved into the house a month before, left, and I sent the divorce papers a week later. It was probably better that way, you would’ve divorced me if I hadn’t done it first.” Y/N had gotten used to telling her sob story to colleagues at Beauxbatons, to her family, but it felt different with pre-divorce Sirius. Of course, she had never thought she’d be in this citation either, so no one could really blame her for feeling weird. “You signed them easily, and my lawyer made sure that I never had to see you again.” Until Lily and James died.

“Until…” Sirius led on.

“Merlin’s beard, Sirius, you’ve always been able to read my mind. Shouldn’t have doubted it for a second.” He smiled at the sentiment, gesturing for her to continue. “I can’t tell you, Sirius, I hope you can understand that.”

“Why, Y/N, what happens that can be any worse in the future?” Oh dear, Sirius, you really do not want the answer to that question. She needed any way out of this conversation, after all running away was what she did best, and her eyes already searched for several routes to which she could run. Not that Y/N could ever outrun Sirius in his animagus form, but it was nice to have the belief that she could. The boy sensed her distress and grabbed hold of her hand. “You don’t have to tell me, darling, but I have to admit that I am a bit worried, just in the slightest.”

Y/N let herself calm down, squeezing Sirius’ hand and noticing his watch. She had actually given him that watch, gold-plated and dark grey metal, but it wasn’t the beauty of the gift that caught her eye, but rather the actual time on it. One-thirty.

How had that much time gone by so quickly? She was going to be sucked into the black void of time travel again in ten minutes, and that wasn’t nearly enough time to unload nearly twenty years worth of history onto Sirius. No, he would go insane from that much knowledge, which was exactly against what Malia had advised.

“I don’t have enough time to tell you everything that happens in the future, Sirius. But what I am about to tell you is vital, absolutely vital for the good of all of us in the future.” Sirius nodded with a serious sort of smile on his face. “Don’t let Peter be Lily and James’ secret keeper. When the time comes that they move away, I’m not going to tell you where yet, do not under any circumstances let Peter be their secret keeper. I know he’s one of our best friends right now, and do not tell anyone about this, but he’s going to betray us in the worst way possible.”

While Sirius was shocked, he nodded solemnly and ran a hand through his long hair. “I won’t tell anyone, Y/N. Can I fix us, Y/N? I don’t know if you should be letting the key to a happier future rest in my hands.”

“I full heartedly trust that you’ll do some good, whatever the outcome may be. As for fixing us, I hope you can, but depending on what happens we’ll just have to wait and see.” She sighed, “If you want my opinion on it, I think that we both should have waited longer to get married. It was right after James and Lily got married, but we aren’t and never will be them. We both had a lot of growing up to do, so I would take it slowly. Communicate your wants and needs in the relationship and in the end it may not even be us together. But I know you, Siri, don’t let this get in the way of your entire life. The most important part is that you tell James and Lily about Peter.”

She glanced back up the school grounds where students could start to be seen leaving their classes. “You better get back to the castle, Sirius. McGonagall is going to come for your arse and this time the boys aren’t going to be able to cover for you.”

“If they knew where I was, darling, I don’t even think they’d believe me.” Sirius chuckled.

Y/N nodded in agreement and pulled Sirius into a tight hug. “You can do this, sweetheart, and even if you can’t, it will not stop me from loving you any less. Maybe the future wasn’t meant to be changed, but regardless of whether that is true or not, I know that you will try your hardest, Sirius. Just try not to die, okay?”

The boy was still clutching onto her tightly, his tears soaking her rose-colored blouse. “I’ll do my best, darling.”

With one last kiss on the forehead, she smiled at him. “I know you will, Siri.”

Y/N’s arse hit the floor once again, her spine cracking once again. “What’s the year?” She yelled out, reaching for the walls of the black family room.

But it wasn’t there. Upon opening her eyes, she saw James, Lily, and Sirius sitting at a wooden table in her old white cottage. A nice tea set, her grandmother’s as she realized later, sat in the center, along with a large stack of letters. “Y/N, what the bloody hell happened to you, I’ve been worried sick!”

Her red-headed best friend scurried over to her, brushing invisible dirt off her shoulders and pulling her up abruptly. James fixed the glasses on his nose, cleaning them off with his striped jumper. “You look a little disheveled right now, Y/N, what ran you over?”

“You know who she reminds me of right now, Jamie? That crazy witch friend of Dumbledore’s that made her way onto campus back in seventh year.” Lily giggled as she hugged Y/N.

“Merlin’s beard, you’re right!” James walked over to the woman of the hour, ruffling her hair with a smirk on his face. “If you were about twenty years older I’d have no trouble believing you were the same person.”

While Lily and James recalled their memories from the strange woman all those years ago at Hogwarts, Sirius pulled Y/N aside, an arm wrapped around her waist. The warmth radiating from his body was nice, embracing her in a comfort she hadn’t felt in so long.

“I’m going to go ahead and believe that I did something right?” Sirius grabbed her hand, and only then did she notice the coolness of metal sitting on her left ring finger. There sat the single band of gold, a small ruby encased in its plating. She had once joked that diamonds were too overrated, and he went out and got her the most vibrant gem he could find, claiming that it was just like her. But regardless of its shape, size, or type of gem, it was there.

“Yeah, Siri,” Y/N replied with tears in her eyes, “you did good.”

“Oi, Blacks, stop making out and get over here, we got a letter from Minnie!” James yelled, making both wives chuckle. “Harry’s gotten himself in detention for punching Malfoy again.”

“Oh, thank Merlin, the boy deserves a few more good hits.” Sirius laughed.

“McGonagall still talks to us?” Y/N asked in amazement. “You’ve got to get me caught up.”

“Don’t worry, darling, we’ve got all the time in the world.” Sirius gently placed his lips onto hers, and for once in nearly twenty years, Y/N felt at peace. There were no more hasty warnings of the future, no psychotic old men coming after her family, no young girls rushing in to tell her how to fix her screwed up life. Cracked, pink lips moving against her own, his tongue delving into her mouth, and Y/N knew she was finally off the clock.

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kueruzu · 3 years

Text

Guess who finally has the confidence to share the drabble they made based on the jumbled up Soul Eater divergence au they made up.

Me!

I do!

So this is a Soul Eater Canon Divergence drabble I did based on an au I randomly conjured up around Maka and Soul doing some “evil” shit.

Please note of something like this exists I had no idea of it!

Trigger/Content Warning:

This includes, Emotional Manipulation, Aggression, Chaining up/Imprisonment depicted (probably/assumably) incorrectly

There was no proof-reading either— Have f u n—

Here we go!

The cell floor hurt. Her legs hurt, again. The dripping water grated her nerves. The lack of things to pull her attention made her unfocused.

But she couldn't complain. She put herself there. She chose to do bad and for that long? It's a miracle Shinigami showed her mercy, even if she had been the one to outsmart his rules and get off without dying.

Was death that bad though? Compared to living in this dirty cell with her meals brought to her and someone coming in to make sure she exercised each day, death seemed like a nice release.

She looked up as the slider at the top of the door in front of her moved. Green eyes peered at her with pity before the door opened. She saw her chance immediately.

Were they dumb enough to send him of all people?

“Maka...”

Apparently so.

She began to struggle back as he approached, crocodile tears welling up.

“Go away! Go away!”

“Maka there’s no need fo-”

“You might as well have gagged me too! I never want to see you again! Go away!”

He kneeled in front of her, still a ways away for her comfort. Still ever the ‘caring’ father.

“You watched them... You let them lock me up...”

“Maka there was nothing I-”

No words or proper syllables came out, just a guttural scream in his face as the tears poured. He kept calm though, his expression was still soft. But she knew he’d crack. She just needed to hurt him more. Just a tad bit more.

“You watched them do it... You helped! You..! You..! You threw me away! You never lo-”

“Maka you know I love you-”

“LIAR!”

His composition began to crumble and internally she smirked. So close. So, so, so close.

“Maka, please...”

“No! You! Mama! Sid! All of you! You all loved it when I went off the deep end huh?! You were all waiting for it! You were so thrilled to get the waste of talent out the academ-”

“MAKA!”

Silence befell them again. Maka’s tears streamed down her cheek. Spirit watched her as tears welled in his eyes. Her head tilted down in shame as Spirit placed down the food he had brought. His hands lifted to cup soft cheeks as his thumbs brushed away the excess tears.

“Maka. I couldn't do anything. You... You did something unspeakable. You... It’s a miracle you weaseled your way out of being on his list... I know it doesn't seem like it but really, I do lo-”

“My arms hurt... Papa my arms hurt...”

In seconds he was leaning over, peppering soft kisses on her cheeks and atop her tears. She hiccuped and sobbed as he did, beginning to struggle in the restraints.

“Papa, Papa my arms hurt. Please, please they hurt a lot. Papa-”

Soon he was shushing her, trying to soothe her to the best of his ability without crossing lines. But she kept crying and struggling and she knew he was right at the edge of his rope. Soon he’d give in. But for now, she accepted the fake affections.

Mama, Sid, Stein, Him, even Shinigami-sama. She hadn’t been lying in her accusations. She knew they were true. She knew they all saw her as weak. She was nothing more than a burden for her team. They must have celebrated when she was gone. Kid, Star, those two must have been elated. She knew it. Deep down she could hear their voices so clearly, each hiding behind those fake words of praise. They either pitied her for being so unbelievably weak or wished she’d simply die in battle so they never had to see her again. All of them did, all of them still do.

Except him. Lord Death bless him, he never thought of her as weak. He saw her as a partner, an equal, his friend, his most prized and treasured person.

And soon she’ll find him again.

“I know it hurts. I know Maka... But soon you’ll get council with Lord Death or I. Then we can discuss the proper punishment. You just... Just need to stop trying to escape...”

She whined and he sighed.

“Just behave..? Please? It hurts. I know it hurts. But if you behave, your council won’t keep getting pushed back..!”

No response came from her. She could almost hear how he fell off the ledge.

“Maka? Maka? Sweetie? Please. Talk to me... I’m sorry..”

And just like that, she wrapped him around her little finger. Just a few more words and she’d be free from these chains.

“Papa...” she watched his face light up as she gently nuzzled against his warm palm, “Papa can you take them off? Can you take them off? The arm and leg cuffs. Please..?”

“Maka you-”

“Daddy please..?”

Like that, he was uncuffing her.

People are so easy with the right words.

Her arms fell to her sides and she shifted her legs. She smiled shakily, looking up at him and sniffling. Seconds after she was engulfed in a hug. Slowly, she hugged back, her arms snaking around his neck and returning the hug. Her head rested on his shoulder as she blabbered her apologies.

Not yet.

She pushed him away gently, trying to stand after the long hours of sitting with little movement. Shakily, she got to her feet, stretching and holding his hands for support. Giggles erupted from her and she looked up at him with a beaming smile.

A bit more.

He let her walk around him, fixing her balance all on her own. Soon enough she was hugging him again, burying her face in his chest. A solemn smile curled on his face when she looked up. He closed his eyes and hugged her against him.

Now.

She pulled away, Spirit still relaxed with their moment. She grabbed his wrists firmly, a quiet hum and escaping him in confusion before she pulled and kneed him in the crotch. With a yelp, he fell forward, the girl taking the opportunity to grab him in an unrelenting chokehold.

It took only a mere 50 seconds to knock him down, what with all his struggling and confusion. Plus, he wouldn’t dare hurt his ‘pride and joy’ of a daughter. She existed in his heart as his little ray of sunshine behind the clouds.

People are so easy with the right tricks.

His body was dropped to the ground with a decisive hum. She grabbed his ID card, the keys for her restraints, two pieces of gum to chew on, and snuck off, hoping to be able to use it in her endeavors.

She crept her way towards the door, peeking out to look through the hallways. Once deducting that the coast was clear she let herself out, silently finding her way to his cell. She popped a piece gum in her mouth as she did, much too happy to enjoy the treat.

They thought putting him far away would affect her soul perception? She could find him in a sea of doppelganger easier than an addict can find their next buzz. Soul was almost like her drug anyway.

After a few minutes of careful walking and dodging other faculty members, she found his cell. After looking through the slider to double-check that it indeed was him, she began to fiddle with the lock.

A few quiet curses slipped before she got it. Why was this whole place so easy?! It’ll like Shinigami-sama made it to cater for children!

The door opened and she hummed.

“Eat shit.”

“That’s no way to talk to me.”

His eyes shot up, widening with understandable confusion. Soon he couldn't deny who stood before him. Just as he realized it wasn’t some sick joke, she lunged.

She hugged him close, a hiss of pain the only response before he nuzzled his face against her hair. She took a deep breath in, enjoying the soft embrace.

When they pulled apart, reluctantly, of course, she began to uncuff him as well.

Soon enough, he was wrapping his arms around her and she was burying her face into his chest once more. Slender pianist fingers carded through blonde strands. Small and calloused hands gripped onto his sides like a lifeline.

“It’s only been like 18 days.”

“Three weeks.”

He nodded at her stern tone. She kept track of each day. Surely she wanted to escape right? Surely she wanted to get out right? Surely she wasn’t going to simply stay here till time ran out right?

“I missed you… Your hugs are warm.”

He chuckled, tucking a stray strand of hair behind her ear.

“Hmm? Then I’ll have to give you more.”

A simple nod, “yes please.”

They both giggled, sighing and laying against each other before Maka stood, trying to get him to stand as well.

Footsteps came before she could.

The door slammed open and she yelped, falling against him instinctively. His arms wrapped around her, holding her to his chest protectively.

“Maka Albarn!”

Sid.

“Wait no!”

Papa?

“She’s good I swear!”

Sod stood in the doorway, managing a menacing glare at the two. While Soul glared back just as angrily, Maka held him like a vice. Actual tears welled up this time. She was so close to some sort of escape! Yet she ruined it with her sentimentality for him. She should have just took off the restraints and had him transform. It wouldn’t have taken so long and she’d probably cover more ground with a big fuckin scythe opposed to just sitting there like a dumbass.

“Sid stop it! She’s not all bad I swear!”

“She knocked you out!”

“We made a deal!”

Sid begrudgingly dropped his glare and stepped back. Spirit walked ahead of him, stopping in front of Maka.

“He-”

“I-I’m sorry. Don’t lock me away again. Please don't lock me away again.”

He sighed, crouching down in front of her. Vague memories of five-year-old her looking up at her cool Papa came to mind before she squashed them.

“I can’t say we won’t. But-”

“You hate me! You really hate me! You want to throw me away into a cell so you never have to see me again!”

“Maka no! I-”

“You’re gonna let him lock me away again! You’re gonna let him lock Soul away again! I bet you told Kid and BlackStar we would be fine! You lied to them too huh?! I-”

“Let him speak!” roared through the cell, abruptly shutting up Maka’s cries and Spirit’s sputters. After Sid’s demand, Spirit fixed his tie and opened his arms for her.

“We can sort this out, Maka. I know you wouldn't have done something like that. You’re your mother’s daughter. You grew up in Death City. You understand why Shibusen is so important. Please, let me help you.”

The room was quiet save for the dripping of water that wasn’t too far off due to a faulty pipe.

Maka glanced at Soul who only motioned with his head for her to move. She tentatively squeezed Soul’s hand before moving away to wrap her arms around Spirit’s neck again. He closed his arms around her torso, hugging her close and standing up straight. He turned to face Sid, smiling and humming as she latched to him. A smug look was thrown at the zombie and Sid sighed.

Spirit’s pained yelp pulled Sod from his relaxation. Maka jumped out his hands as Spirit crumbled. Soul, fixing himself back into position as Maka landed, shot a glare at Sid. Maka darted for the door, hoping to squeeze past him in his momentary shock but she should have known getting past an assassin would be no easy task on her own.

Her arms were grabbed and she was pinned before she could get ahold of what was happening. She squirmed and kicked, screeching about him putting too much pressure and hurting her. He retorted that the only reason she hurt was her own resistance. It didn't stop completely but she calmed.

Soul stood, about to attack Sid when Maka shot him a glare from against the wall. His body stiffened and he bit back the angered insult he was about to throw.

“Spirit this is the fifth time! If she’s so good, why is she so annoying! I wasn't the type of guy to give up but really! Don’t you think this is eno-”

With a hiss, Spirit got to his feet. But he fell over just as quickly. He shook his head, “She’s just-”

“Rebelling? Angry? A teenager? Misguided? Trust me I've heard them all. I've said them all. Spirit I'm taking her to the tighter cells. She already had the same treatment Medusa had but clearly-”

Her scream came out broken and shaken. Granted, that's exactly what she wanted, “Papa!”

Sid pitied the poor man. His daughter could manipulate him easier than Medusa did Crona and he couldn't see it. Love is blind and that doesn't stop when it’s familial.

Spirit ripped his pant leg, tying it around his wound. Soon he began to protest, began to sputter out some retort to make it so Maka wouldn’t be hurt. But both knew how this ended. All four knew despite two struggling against it and two keeping their tongues tied.

“A-Arachne had that moral manipulator, right? Sh-she must have done something to Maka to make her act like this..! Maka... Maka would never!”

Soul rolled his eyes in the background and Sid sighed.

“Spirit. You can’t prove that. Besides. Even if she did, Maka still did those things...”

Spirit sighed dejectedly, sitting down and nodded.

“Ain’t she your daughter? You’re really gonna abandon her like that. You are one messed up geezer-“

“Mr. Eater.”

The shark-toothed weapon looked up with disdain upon hearing his name but his words ceased.

“You’re to be dealt with ne-“

“Soul didn’t do anything!”

And like that, the room was silent for a moment. At least, till she began sputtering just like her father had earlier.

“I-I used the machine on him! H-he didn’t want to follow along with my plans! S-so I manipulated his morals to-“

Soul stepped forward, only stopped by Spirit’s outstretched hand. Maka kept going, looking at her father with some sort of appreciation even if it was small.

“I manipulated his morals to align with mine! A-along with his loyalty and trust! I did it! Please don’t-“

“The hell is wrong with you? Stop lying!”

She twisted and struggled to try and lock eyes with Sid. To an extent she was successful but now the cold stone pressed against her cheek. She whined, her eyes pleading as she continued.

“S-see! With the manipulation his loyalty only amplified! I did everything! I did it all of my own accord and dragged him along!”

“Maka shut up!”

“I take responsibility as the Meister!”

And yet again, silence fell upon them. Spirit hung his head and Sid nodded. Soul gawked. He was the first to break the silence.

“Y-you don’t believe her right..?! I-I’d follow her to the ends of the earth to keep her safe! I did that before! Come on,” he stepped forward, grabbing at Spirit’s suit sleeve, tugging it harshly, “You gotta believe me. If she’s getting put in some sort of solitary confinement then-”

Sid began to lead her out. Spirit kept his head low. Soul tried running after him but Spirit’s hand wrapped around his wrist was firm.

The last thing she heard before being taken away was Soul’s screams. They weren't painful. At least, not in the absolute physical sense. But they were pained. Both knew this was the end of their partnership. Neither accepted it easily. Yet everyone seemed to think it was for the best.

#soul eater #soul eater evans #maka albarn #soul evans #sid barrett #spirit albarn #lord death #evil!au #soul x maka

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whenihaveyouromione · 3 years

Text

When I Have You - Chapter 44

Read on Fanfiction.net or ao3.

Join me and others on a Discord book club/community where we talk about books!

---

Chapter 44

"Hey, how was the honeymoon?"

Ron sat back in his chair, placing his quill on the desk. The workload of an Auror was triple that of what he'd ever had at Hogwarts, and he was only considered a junior Auror — given limited work.

Not to mention that these days, most of the work was kept in the office. Everything was quiet on the front of Dark wizards, and there wasn't much field work on offer. Plus, with Harry off enjoying a holiday, the other new Aurors had been dumped with his share of the office work for the three weeks he’d been gone.

But Harry was back now, albeit a little late, and looking ridiculously happy and relaxed.

Grinning, Harry collapsed into the seat next to Ron’s desk. “Fantastic,” he said. “We got back late last night, and I’ve… never been on a holiday before.”

“You haven’t?” Ron asked, surprised. Although, now that he thought about it, Harry hadn’t exactly been given many opportunities to go on a holiday. Unless he counted camping in a tent for months on end, trying to find parts of Lord Voldemort’s soul, which he suspected Harry didn’t.

“No. Imagine what a nice family holiday that would have been — tagging along with the Dursleys.”

“Huh,” Ron said. “Well, I’m glad you’re back. We missed you around here.” He picked up a pile of paperwork and dumped it on Harry’s desk. “Welcome back.”

Harry looked at the pile in front of him. Surprisingly, he didn’t look defeated at all. In fact, his smile grew.

“You can do mine, too, if it makes you that happy.” Ron smirked.

“Have any of you been out anywhere?” Harry asked, sifting through the pile of work.

“Twice,” Ron said. “Not for much, though. Death Eaters are too scared to do anything wrong, I think.”

“It’ll pick up,” Harry said. “Once we get more experience as well. For now, I guess it’s just desk work.”

“I don’t mind too much,” Ron said. “I mean… I get to see Hermione most days on her lunch break… if she’s not working through it, that is.” He frowned.

Harry snorted.

“She’ll be happy to see you and hear all about your honeymoon,” Ron said. “I’m sure you’ll be enough to drag her away from whatever it is she’s doing today.”

“There’s not much to tell really,” Harry said. “Not much you’d want to hear about, anyway.”

“Yeah… well, just tell the holiday parts,” Ron said, turning back to the work he’d been focusing on prior to Harry’s arrival. “Hermione and I finally picked a date for our wedding, and with any luck and if no one else jumps in, it’ll be March twenty-first. It’s a Thursday, so you better ask for that day off.”

“Why a Thursday?” Harry asked.

“Because that’s when we could get the place we wanted in the month we wanted.”

Harry smiled. “I’ll be sure to ask for that day off. I’m glad you’re finally starting to get things sorted. You really know how to take things slow, don’t you?”

“What’s the rush?” Ron said, not bothering to mention his own concerns about doing everything slowly with Hermione a few weeks back.

“None to either of you, apparently.” Harry laughed. “But that’s great. Something to look forward to… and if you have a meltdown right before, I’ll be there to assure you everything’s okay. Getting married, it’s really not as scary as it seems. Quite nice, actually. Easy.”

Ron grinned. “Thanks, mate.” He thought for a moment. “You know, I think marrying her will be pretty easy.”

“Yes, well, I thought that until the day approached,” Harry reminded him. “And you saw me. But it’s easy once you see her.”

Ron scribbled some more notes onto one of the pieces of parchment in front of him, smiling to himself. He had no doubt that on the day of their wedding, he’d feel incredibly nervous, but he didn’t think — or at least he hoped — he’d reach Harry’s level of nervousness.

“Oh, Harry, you’re back!”

Ron and Harry turned around. Hermione was standing in the Auror office doorway. She smiled as she hurried forward to embrace Harry.

“It’s so good to see you again. How was your honeymoon? Oh, I bet it was so romantic. Ginny told me about what you had planned for it on the day of your wedding. It sounds amazing.”

“Yeah, it was pretty nice,” Harry said. “I’ll tell you about it at lunch.”

“I look forward to it!” Hermione said cheerfully. She then looked at Ron, suddenly appearing slightly guilty. “If that’s alright. I know we were going to —”

“Nah, already invited Harry,” Ron said, smiling at her. “I figured if you knew Harry was coming, it would actually make you take a break. I don’t seem to have the same effect.”

“That’s not true,” Hermione said, sounding put-out. “I like it when our lunches align.”

“You brushed me off the last two days,” Ron reminded her.

“I didn’t — I just had a really busy week. I’ll be there today, I promise.”

“Yeah, because Harry’s here.”

“Well, if you’d prefer, I can just meet Harry?” Hermione asked, her tone taking on an air of annoyance. “And, I’m not sure if I want to tell you what I came here to say anymore, Ron.”

“What’s that?” Ron asked.

Hermione glared at him for a moment, as if his teasing insult a moment ago really had changed her mind about whatever it was she wanted to tell him. Eventually, she seemed to accept that he was only joking and said, “Make sure you’re free tonight.”

“Why?” Ron said. “And I’m always free.”

She smiled. “I… have something at home. An engagement present for you.”

Ron stared at her for a moment. Then, “Was I supposed to get you something?” He didn’t know that that was something he was supposed to do. They’d been engaged for months now, and she’d not mentioned this before. Weren’t other people supposed to get them presents?

“No, this is just something I wanted to do for you. Just promise me you’re free tonight?”

“I have no plans,” Ron said. “Except to see you, of course.”

She beamed. “Great. I’ll see you tonight.”

“Or at lunch?” Ron asked.

She nodded. “Lunch. Yes.”

“Love you,” Ron said as she hurried out of the office.

He shook his head, grinning and wondering what exactly it was that she had planned. Now that he thought about it, he’d found her a little bit frazzled at times over the past week. He’d just assumed she was stressed with work.

He wondered if it was this that had gotten her so worked up, and then he wondered just what her engagement present might be. A million ideas went through his head in that moment and most were probably impossible. But a few… well, a few he liked the idea of.

“Anyway,” Harry said, bringing Ron back from his thoughts. “We should probably get through all of this stuff and hope that one day we’ll actually get to leave this office and do something exciting.”

Ron smiled. “Welcome back to work, mate. It’s good to see you again.”

…

Harry and Ginny had had the best honeymoon. Harry had spent all of lunch telling Ron and Hermione all about the three weeks they’d spent working their way through Europe, visiting many sights and discovering parts of the wizarding world in other countries.

They’d stayed with Fleur’s parents in France and apparently met up with Viktor Krum in Bulgaria, and then explored the tiny wizarding villages that were spread throughout the continent.

It had been — as Harry described it — the best holiday he’d ever had. Or, as Ron had helpfully pointed out, the only holiday.

“It sounds so lovely,” Hermione had sighed, and Ron had told her they could do that too if that was what she wanted — so long as they skipped Bulgaria.

She’d just smiled and said that she’d have to think about it.

If he was being honest, though, Ron didn’t particularly like the idea of copying Harry and Ginny. It already felt that way because they’d become engaged only a short time after them. He wanted that to be where the similarities ended.

Harry was his best friend and Ginny was his sister, but Hermione was everything else and he wanted to do life their own way.

He'd also spent the day wondering what it was exactly that Hermione wanted to give him and why she was so keen to have him home that evening, acting as if he never came straight home after work. She'd reminded him three times during lunch and then another two times afterwards — one in person, one via a memo. Whatever it was, she was super excited about it, which made him excited, too.

Hermione never really did much in the sense of romance. That was Ron's department, but it didn't bother him. He liked doing the things he did for her and his reward was seeing how happy those things made her.

She was the one who was focused on her work, who liked to work into the early hours and then come to bed and cuddle up to him after a long day. He was the one who liked to find things to help relax her, make her smile, and in return, her happiness made him happy.

Ron was an Auror, and he enjoyed what he did, but he couldn't really see himself advancing any further than becoming a senior Auror. Not with Harry Potter working in the same field.

But Hermione was someone who could achieve anything and probably would eventually achieve all those things. And he was more than happy to sit back and watch her do that.

He'd always found her approach to everything amusing, but in an admirable way. Now he simply loved that about her.

He arrived home shortly after five, having used one of the Ministry fireplaces to do so. The living room was empty.

"Hermione?" he called. It would be typical for her to pester him about being home on time, only for her to have found something else to do at work.

But to his surprise, a reply came from upstairs. "In the study!"

The study?

He made his way — now feeling slightly apprehensive — up to the study. The door was closed, and when he pushed it open, he found Hermione on the floor, a lot of photos scattered around her, and her hair was a total ball of frizz, which meant that she was stressed about something.

He couldn't help but smile. "What are you doing?" He laughed.

She looked up, a guilty look on her face. "Oh, Ron, I tried."

"Tried what?" he asked. "To make a mess?"

"No, to do something… nice."

"What do you mean?" Ron asked, eyeing the photos scattered across the floor.

Hermione buried her face in her hands. She looked rather upset. “I was trying to be romantic.”

“Er… how?”

Hermione sniffed. “I was trying to make you something… by hand… but it didn’t really work out. Apparently I’m not crafty at all.”

For a moment, Ron didn’t have anything to say. He bent down and reached out to touch her shoulder gently. “It’s alright,” he said. “That’s okay.”

“Oh, Ron, how do you do it?” She got to her feet and turned to him. She wasn’t crying, but she looked as if she might start soon.

“Do what?” Ron asked, once again looking at the mess on the floor. There were bits of paper that appeared to have been scrunched up among the photos.

“You do such nice things for me all the time, I just wanted to return the favour for once. It didn’t work, though. I’m sorry.”

Ron couldn’t help but smile. In the few minutes he’d been in the study with her, her hair had become even frizzier. He drew her into a hug.

“I love you,” he said, laughing. “I love you so much. And I’ve never made you anything in my life. Unless you count dinner.”

“Maybe I should have cooked something,” Hermione sniffed into his shoulder.

“What was it you were making, anyway?” he asked.

Hermione pulled away, wiping her eyes. She bent back down on the floor and picked up a book. “A photo album,” she said. “It seems so stupid now. And it’s terrible. I don’t want you to look at it.”

But Ron took it from her hands. It reminded him a lot of the one Harry owned of his parents, and he wouldn’t have been surprised if that was where the idea had come from.

He flipped through the pages. She had stuck in a handful of photos — some from school, most from more recent times. Of them. Just the two of them. In all of them.

Hermione had apparently attempted to decorate each page, but he had to admit that she was much better at magic than she was at this.

He grinned. “I love it. I love you.”

She gave a small smile. “You can tell me the truth.”

“I did,” he said.

“I just thought it would be a good memory to have, you know, before we were married. Something to look back on. I should have just given you the stupid photos and been done with it.”

“You know, I was wondering what had you so worked up these past few days,” Ron said, attempting to brush some strands of hair away from her face with little success. “I thought it was work.”

“The whole romance thing works better when you do it,” Hermione said.

“I can guarantee that had I attempted to create a photo album myself… well… I never would have. We can suck together. Anyway, who needs to be able to do that when you have a wand?”

She smiled again, looking up at him. “So, you still want to marry someone who can’t even make some photos look nice on a page?” she asked.

“Somehow even more than I did five minutes ago,” Ron said. “And I didn’t even think that was possible.”

Hermione wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head on his chest. Ron held her, the album still in his hands.

“You can throw that out,” she said.

“Never. I’m going to keep it. Forever. I’ll be looking at it when we’re both one hundred, remembering the times when I wasn’t old and grey with lots of wrinkles, and then feeling really grateful for the amazing fiance — hopefully wife — I was lucky enough to have in my life after all those years.”

She hugged him tighter.

“I just wanted to do something nice for you. Next time I’ll just take you out for dinner or something.”

“Nah, this is better,” Ron said. “I love it, and I mean that. You amuse me in a very good way. I love this side of you.”

“What? The super-stressed perfectionist side?” Hermione asked. “The side of me I’ve come to realise doesn’t like to fail?”

“Yeah, it’s my favourite part. Maybe the part that I loved about you first. The rest is just a bonus. As I said, you amuse me.”

“Well, how about to make up for my pathetic attempt at handmaking something, I make us dinner tonight? What do you feel like?”

“I’ll eat anything,” Ron said. “I’m really hungry.”

Hermione smiled. “Good, because it’s the end of our shopping week, and unless you’ve had time to get things, I don’t think we have much left.”

“We are very organised, aren’t we?” Ron teased. “How many times have we reached the end of our food supply? When we have kids, they’ll go hungry often.”

Before Hermione could say anything, he added, “You know, when you said you had something to show me tonight, I briefly wondered if you were going to tell me we were having a baby.”

Hermione pulled away from him, her smile slightly wider. “And you know that there’s a spell to prevent that from happening and I am very particular about ensuring it is consistently effective. Spells are something I can perform very accurately.”

Ron grinned at her. “Yeah, I know. But the thing is, the thought didn’t actually terrify me. As brief as that thought was,” he added hurriedly at the look on Hermione’s face.

“Do you want dinner, Ron, or do you want a baby?” Hermione asked, smiling at him.

“Tonight, just dinner,” Ron assured her.

Hermione raised an eyebrow, but said nothing else. She left the study with Ron trailing slightly behind her. As they went downstairs into the kitchen, Ron couldn’t help but wonder if him bringing up the topic of babies had frightened her or intrigued her. It was sometimes hard to tell.

He hadn’t even intended to say it. No one had said anything to him during the day. It had just been a thought that had occurred to him that maybe… even though he knew how pedantic Hermione was with all of that side of things. It would be virtually impossible for anything to happen by mistake with her. He definitely knew that.

And even though the thought hadn’t scared him, Hermione had been pretty dismissive of the topic, which was a massive hint. Maybe he’d bring it up again in a year’s time. Maybe then she’d be more willing to discuss the idea. Besides, they had a wedding to plan first.

#ron and hermione #ronandhermione #ronandhermionefanfiction #ron and hermione fanfiction #romione #romione fanfiction #ron x hermione #hermione x ron #hermione and ron #hermione and ron fanfiction #ron weasley #hermione granger #hermione #romance #slice of life #multi chapter

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drazavonia · 4 years

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She will no longer "Embrace Destiny"

Destiny is more often that not a goal or fate one's life is chained to. If destiny is a force of the universe, no one can "control" destiny so to speak. However someone of a higher power, domain or "providence" can change the destiny of one with lesser power, control and/or knowledge (of their own destiny).

Kairi was only four years old when Apprentice Xehanort took her, experimented on her and shipped her off of her world for two purposes apparently:

1) For her "Heart of Pure Light" to resonate with the "key bearer" and lead Xehanort to them.

2) As of Melody of Memory, apparently Apprentice Xehanort also wanted Kairi to arrive in a world of neither light or darkness which could possibly be The Final World. Ironically, this would mean he was successful on both accounts by the end of this game.

However, it's clear up above Kairi is upset and that line of "You're the one who keeps messing with my fate" implies much like how Aqua finally figured out in Kh3/Remind that Xehanort possessed Terra, Kairi will finally find out how and why she was ripped away from her grandma and home of Radiant Garden. Not only that, but it shows us she never really had a choice in how her fate was twisted and manipulated to whichever way the Xehanorts needed at the time:

- Apprentice Xehanort shipping Kairi off to Sora and Riku

- Ansem SOD/Riku sacrificing Destiny Islands causing Kairi's heart to take refuge in Sora's heart.

-Xemnas and Xehanort taking Kairi to crystalize her heart to use as a final gambit to open Kingdom Hearts.

The next lines "If it weren't for you Sora and everyone would be safe...I won't let you walk away" indicate for Sora, her friends and herself, she will no longer allow anyone control over her destiny. She has the strength and determination now to make her own destiny and fight against anyone who messes with her fate again.

This is the reason I can see Kairi getting a new keyblade.

A lot of the main characters' keyblades are symbolic of their hearts and roles within the series, as well as how they've grown and evolved over the course of their journeys.

The most obvious case being Riku.

Riku

Kingdom Key> Soul Eater

The Kingdom Key was originally meant for Riku, as he was the keyblade's chosen. But when he chose to give in to the darkness the keyblade went to Sora instead, and of course Soul Eater was a weapon of darkness given to him by Maleficent to signify his alignment with her.

Soul Eater> Way to Dawn

It's in the name.

But seriously Way to Dawn is a perfect symbol of Riku's journey of acceptance of his darkness and redemption from kh1 to kh2. The keychain is the dark heart on his "Dark Riku" form which signified his complete fall to darkness. But from the keychain upwards we see the "Gazing Eye" encircled by an angel wing and demon wing, symbolizing Riku's decision against alignment with light or darkness. Afterwards majority of the blade is the demon wing from Soul Eater largely because Riku's role within kh2 is him working from the shadows undercover as Ansem and doing his best to distance himself from his friends who walk the path of light. However at the very end, an angel wing meets the large demon wing which is symbolic of us teaming up with Riku finally, as he showcases his mastery of light and darkness alongside Sora and friends.

Way to Dawn> Braveheart

In DDD, Riku materializes Soul Eater and questions his worthiness as a keyblade wielder. He still has doubts but still continues to hold on to his true motivations being to protect Sora. Riku accepts that he can use the power of darkness while standing firmly on the side of light to protect his friends. He no longer needs to find or follow the way to dawn, because by the end of DDD came the Dawn of Riku, a Keyblade Master and Guardian of Light.

And "Braveheart" is pretty simple. Riku found the strength to protect what matters, and it's perfectly symbolized by Riku's sacrifice for Sora.

"I'm ready now, I'm in control now."

Terra and Aqua (technically Ven as well) have never left home by the beginning of BBS and throughout the game they experience trials and tribulations that challenge their friendship and we see by their Keyblades at the end the results of these trials.

Terra

Earthshaker> Ends of the Earth

Strong and powerful, after hearing Riku's motivation for strength being his friends he bestowed upon him the keyblade which reignited his devotion to his friends. This is also symbolized with Lingering Will, as that's the keyblade he's left with. He'll go to the ends of the earth to save his friends and right his wrongs.

Ends of the Earth> Chaos Ripper

Terra's devotion to protect his friends turns into rage against Xehanort for killing Eraqus, taking his home and manipulating him. Allowing darkness to further consume his heart.

Aqua

Rainfell> Stormfall

Aqua's journey mostly consist with things happening around her and to her friends. Aqua being the only master of the three and worried for their safety, Aqua does her best to assume responsibility and watch over them. Much like rain, it was a light and simple task. But Xehanort's manipulations and temptations with both Terra and Ven, increased Aqua's worry and need to have control over her friends to keep them out of danger. Unfortunately certain seeds had already been planted amongst them, causing Aqua's worry and concern to come off as patronizing and distrustful of her friends. This weakened the trust in the bonds they share making her job to protect them even more difficult and adding to the weight of responsibility she carries.

Stormfall> Brightcrest

Terra and Ventus have both lost their hearts to darkness. With Venuts sleeping in Castle Oblivion and Terra taken over by Xehanort, Aqua was their only chance of ever coming back. She was the only one who knew how to find Ventus and the only one left to defeat Xehanort once and for all. She stood tall and was willing to risk it all for her friends, she was their "light in the darkness".

Ventus

Wayward Wind + Lost Memory

Ventus' keyblade is the only one that doesn't evolve or change throughout the game. Instead Lost Memory is gained when Vanitas forces Ventus to remember how he came to be. Ventus gains a newfound acceptance for his fate with this knowledge and only cares if his friends are safe.

Axel/Lea (Dark Rescue)

Flame Liberator

Axel betrayed the organization. Axel did everything he could to keep Roxas and Xion unaware of the truth so they could live in blissful ignorance (or be happy). He saved Sora at the last minute in DDD and made it his mission in KH3 to get Roxas back. He even declared to Saix that he would bring him home as well. His keyblade represents his determination to save and free his friends from a cruel fate.

Destiny's Embrace also tells a story for Kairi, but much like how she got it, the symbolism isn't representative of her personal journey.

- The keychain of Destiny's Embrace is funny enough, a popular fruit. When two people share paopu fruits, their destinies become intertwined.

- The chain, unlike many others is a red thread in knots, most likely representative of the Red String of Destiny. The "Destiny Knot" (pokemon references ftw) is what ties two people together romantically or what ties two destinies together.

- The hilt of the keyblade is the King chess piece. The king in this case referring to Sora (Crown, Throne, Holds his keyblade like King Arthur in artwork). To me this is symbolic of how Kairi has literally held Sora's fate or destiny in her hands at certain points in the series.

• In kh1, Kairi reverts Sora back from a heartless/the darkness after sacrificing himself to restore her heart.

• In khcom, in order for Sora to regain his memories, he has to focus on his "light in the darkness".

• In kh2, it's not until after reading Kairi's letter to him that the Door to Light opens the way for Sora and Riku to return to Destiny Islands in the realm of light.

• In kh3, it's Kairi's light that keeps Sora from fading away within the demon tide and holds him together so he can save the other guardians.

- Surrounding the grip is a heart with half of it having a sea/ocean/wave aesthetic. It could be representative of Kairi's heart and the heart of her nobody counterpart Namine, whose name means wave.

- Half of the heart with the vine extending down the blade is identical to the keychains of Sora's Ultima Weapons in kh1,2,DDD,3.

The crown connects to the heart which belongs to both Kairi and Namine which makes sense because Sora and Kairi together created Namine.

- I'm not sure what the blade symbolizes aside from maybe fire because of her entanglement with Axel (doubt) or more likely the fires of Kairi's determination to improve, so she can stand by Sora and Riku.

- The flowers at the end with "logo" heart of course represents Radiant Garden. I think Nomura always planned to explore Kairi's past at some point especially with how connected it is to Union X, and that Kairi as well her grandma would be the bridge connecting the past and the present.

However, because of kh3 and most likely M.O.M, I think Kairi will quite literally be freed from "Destiny's Embrace", both Xehanort and the keyblade.

Like I said before, a lot of the symbolism for Destiny's Embrace is externally based. Mostly because Kairi never gets the chance to shine nor do we get to see what's going on inside of her head. Some of this is also because of Kairi's reluctance to bring up her past trauma when asked about it.

• Sora is gone, no need to be a plot device/motivation for him. Instead it's the other way around.

• Namine is her own person now.

• Melody of Memory will finally tackle and resolve Kairi's past.

Everything Destiny's Embrace represents will be resolved by the end of Melody of Memory. So just like how Riku completed his Darkness character arc by the end of DDD and got Way to Dawn replaced by Braveheart as a symbol of his newfound growth, either by the end of M.O.M or in KH4 Kairi will be rid off all of the things holding her character back from truly growing on a narrative and meta level and the keyblade that symbolizes all of those things:

Destiny's Embrace

*This is the other part of the Melody of Memory sticker post.

(Credit to Hartmann-lionhart for their Destiny's Embrace/Ultima Weapon Analysis)

#kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 3 #kingdom hearts 3 remind #kh kairi #kh3 kairi #kairi kingdom hearts #kairi #sora #sora kh #namine #namine kh #riku #terra #aqua #axel #lea #ventus

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tarajenkins · 4 years

Text

Please no more Square, I am at my (character) limit lmao

"The Light will not be denied!"

I really do still wonder how anyone who played through ShB could reach the conclusion that a child with no Blessing Of Light ever stood a chance against the will of a Lightwarden. And not just any child--a child the Ascians intended to use as a doorstop to prevent the First from being destroyed before the Rejoining could happen, a child whose own trusted parental figure was willing to gaslight and manipulate them for the sake of their own power. A child whose behavior would absolutely need to fit a certain mold to achieve their ends.

The Light corruption of a Sin Eater is confirmed by Halric's arc to be a lot like Tempering. Repeatedly Tempering someone, like Loonh Gah's mother in the Amalj'aa questchain, destroys their sanity. Emet-Selch's own dialogue up there confirms that the Warden essences in the WoL would not only drive them to madness, but violence. Vauthry had the essence of a Lightwarden forced into him before he was even born, and he had no higher power to protect him.

Selch puts it plainly: the corruption of a Lightwarden is absolute in time, even for the WoL. I have yet to hear a good reason why Vauthry’s corruption would have been the sole exception to this rule. The “half Sin Eater” bit is brought up sometimes, but that is just buying into the lies his father told. Vauthry was already an entirely Hume infant. He was never “half” anything. He was already complete. He was corrupted. Tempered, according to Halric’s arc--blaming him for not fighting it is like blaming Thancred for the Waking Sands. It’s not a thing anyone can fight.

There’s also Yoshi-P asking players to ask themselves if Vauthry was really a friend of the Sin Eaters, or was he being controlled by someone.

(On a side note, I could have sworn it was stated the Ascians can't handle Light well, or at all? How did Emet-Selch even do that in the first place? Bad Writing(tm) \o/)

Silence Is Golden:

In a world where everyone rightfully fears Sin Eaters, a world where Eulmorans had fought them and died to them for decades, where those corrupted by fallen Sin Eaters have to be put to death before turning themselves--how would the mayor of Eulmore even explain his son's "gift"? Explain his son having a second, Sin Eater face in his chest? Explain that he allowed his child to be corrupted by a rando in a cloak, with no input from his wife? How did he keep her silent? Besides Square not bothering to give her dialogue, of course.

(Also, there was at least one other Minifilia in Vauthry's lifetime. The Minis all fought for Eulmore, as per Moren's book. How did they miss the Lightwarden now residing in Mr. Mayor's child? Did Hydaelyn know?)

It's such poor writing on Square's part to have left the disturbing Echo of how Emet-Selch “made” Vauthry as a footnote, and even moreso to have Wrenden claim in the hilariously contradictory patch 5.1 that Vauthry's father was the "good old days" of Eulmore. A man that would agree to let that be done to his own wife and child, a man who vocalized such disregard for his own peoples' lives, that was the good old days, really? The mayor who had "unrest" and detractors "stirring up the citizenry"? THAT mayor?

This is how far the writers were willing to go to dehumanize a fat man who had absolutely no consent or control in his “destiny”. And, speaking of dehumanizing--

--Square couldn't be arsed to treat Vauthry's mother like a character and not a convenient and silent womb, so we have no idea what happened to her. (My money is still on the Obscenity theory.) But since Vauthry only mentioned "Father", it sounds like the mayor raised him alone.

What did Former Mayor do when his son had challenging questions about his father’s plans for him, or when the child balked at the answers given? How did he explain whatever happened to his wife? Just how much did "Father" have to manipulate that child's world to maintain the lies?

It’s strongly implied Former Mayor kept his son in a state of isolation where neither his word nor the Ascians' will could be questioned until the child was thoroughly brainwashed to believe, and there would be no questions then. Whether intended by Square or not, Vauthry does display many signs of an adult who suffered extreme isolation as a child.

An entire childhood, with his likely only trusted source of knowledge and solace being someone who was grooming him for a power grab--and all the while, he can’t escape the presence of a creature inside him that drives mortals mad.

One of “Father’s” directives stands out in particular between the lines during ShB, though we don’t know how it came about originally:

Don’t tell anyone what you really are.

Even though Vauthry was given a good reason “why he was born as man and sin eater both", it still leaves the impression he was born because Sin Eaters are bad, and Vauthry needed to stop them from doing bad things--plus hush, don’t tell, people would find his existence bad if they knew the truth of it. Kids ask questions. Kids wonder. Feeling like an outsider hurts, let alone an outsider made of the same stuff that everyone fears. If Sin Eaters are monsters, then what was he?

The fact Vauthry asked his father why was he born that way in the first place indicates the child instinctively felt there was something wrong.

The in-game dialogues appear to back this up. Although Vauthry's "heritage" was supposed to be this amazing thing, the true nature of it was instead lied about and kept hidden his entire life. Seems unusual for a guy supposedly convinced that he is “perfection”, doesn’t it? The fact that Eulmorans never once referred to Vauthry as "half Sin Eater" or a "God" during twenty years of his rule, the fact he only mentioned it himself before the Warden was about to claim him entirely; all well and good his father obviously invented some lie to placate the masses (“born with miraculous and convenient power” was all it took), but how did maintaining that lie, hiding who he really was, read to Vauthry all those years?

During ShB, he still seemed to keep to the isolation he likely always knew. He never left that room. The citizens came to him when they wanted something, but it was never implied or shown he sought social contact on his own. Nothing was scaled to him, utensils, glasses, plates, etc.--as though he refused to single himself out as different from everyone else.

He called the Lightwarden’s awakening a “trial” to be embraced during Crown Of The Immaculate. Odd that someone supposedly convinced of his godhood would ever think he needed testing--but it makes perfect sense in the context of someone who always felt they needed to prove that they were worthwhile.

He was proud of his power to protect his people, and proud of the paradise he built for them, but he didn’t want Alphinaud to paint a picture of him, he wanted a painting of the city. There were zero paintings or other monuments to himself in Eulmore. Lot of people in the fanbase speak of him being vain, yet he seemed to not want to be seen unless he had to be--almost as though, even toward the end, even through all the bluster, he still read being “half Sin Eater” as wrong.

With that in mind, there didn’t seem to be much evidence to even tell Vauthry he was born because he was wanted. He was born because his ability was needed. If not for his father’s ambition, however sweetly that may have been disguised, then to defend Eulmore against the monsters he was a part of. His ability was needed, not even him specifically--and the Eulmorans, with all their wishes and dreams to be fulfilled, could easily enforce the belief on the child that who he was didn’t matter, what he may want did not matter, only what he could do for others mattered. And what he did for them wouldn’t matter if they knew the truth of him. What a terrible, conditional ”love”. It could explain why he was so cynical about human nature. (Even though his predictions about human nature in the face of a dying world 110% came to pass in the Black Rose timeline. 6_9 gg G’raha)

Yet despite all this, Vauthry needed to be convinced he was doing good for the shattered world. He needed to be convinced what he was doing was right, despite having power enough to not care. If Amaurot was Utopia, then Eulmore reminded me very much of Ursula K. LeGuin’s Omelas--a paradise, at the cost of one child’s eternal suffering.

Food For Thought (and Bad Writing(tm)):

A lot of people have a boner for the cannibalism implications of meol despite the bad math behind it, but fucking meol, how does it work?

Sin eating historically was to cleanse one who has passed on of their earthly sins that they may find peace in the afterlife--this was done in different ways by different people, but one of the best known methods was ritualistically baking the sins of the dead into bread or cakes and consuming it. Yoshi-P has even said he thought of meol as a sweet bread. Quest text from the Unfulfilled Forager in Gate Town further backs up that meol is not meat-based:

(By the way, nothing was keeping this man from hunting a shit-ton of meat that was literally within walking distance.)

It suggests Vauthry could have been taught that by eating the sins of the world, a.k.a. Sin Eaters, a.k.a. meol (which in the Japanese version, was something he was apparently afraid of doing?) --he was saving someone’s soul.

“And for thy peace I pawn my own soul. Amen.”

In reality, there would be a point Mr. Mayor would not know how to feed the Warden forced on his child. Humes don't have a natural method of feeding on "living aether", yet the Warden would not reach its full potency without it. Making meol could either involve an instinctive act on the Warden’s part, or it was taught--and that seems very much beyond his father’s area of expertise, OR Vauthry himself, so I’d almost wonder if the Ascians had a part in it. But like mixing medicine in a favorite food, theoretically, the aether provided by meol would slowly build up. And as the Warden grew in power, it would need more, and more. It would explain that final “powerup” before Mt. Gulg.

Provided Sin Eaters have any living aether left. They never explained that bit. Sin Eaters have no bones, no blood, no meat, nothing but Light. We saw enough of them dissipate into the air, including in cutscenes. Even Tesleen, very recently turned, faded. There is nothing else to them but Light...and there should be nothing left but that “blank perfection”, the Eater would have ate the rest? So where is the “living aether” they require to survive?

Fresh-sliced sneater wing, empty as the plotholes of this arc.

I could buy him turning people into Eaters directly, but then what was the point of the bread?

That’s right folks, meol still doesn't make sense, surprise! Also: so many people in one city allegedly being "disappeared" over twenty years, from a stagnant population, to “feed” everyone every day--yet no panic, not so much as a hushed whisper about it? Eulmore is supposed to be the safest place anywhere -- no idea how it could gain that reputation with that theory. Square wrote Eulmore like it existed in a vacuum, no one knowing no one. The lack of depth is still jarring, three playthroughs later. Only one unreliable narrator of an NPC (Thoarich) even hinted this theory, to boot.

Side note I thought was strange: you never see any of the normal food in Vauthry’s chamber actually eaten, it’s all untouched. I wonder if the Warden somehow eventually affected his ability to tolerate the food a Hume would normally eat.

That said, his “mind control” of the populace was laughably ineffective, so I wonder what even was the point of feeding them meol. Perhaps it was again the Lightwarden instinct to create more of its own kind. Nothing else seems to fit. “Oh no, this Eulmoran is staggering randomly around, muttering about Vauthry! How can we survive this onslaught?” Yyyyeah no, lol. Alphinaud confirmed the Eulmorans were acting of their own free will until that final showdown, so the mind control seemed to be a panic move--I wonder if it was even took conscious effort at that point, or just another instinctive SOS from the Warden. Given his father’s trouble with the smallfolk, I have to wonder if it was Former Mayor’s idea, if there was a real reason behind it. Not a reason that would make good sense, but nothing in this arc does make good sense, so.

The thing is, meol was an optional dish. No one was forced to eat it. So Vauthry must not have been relying on controlling or turning anyone.

But despite the fact meol defies their own game logic, Square really did seem to relish hinting at the dehumanizing, Austin Powers “haha fat guy eats people” trope anyway, and seriously. They could do better than that--I hoped they’d BE better than that. But here we are, the company that is supposed to go so hard against harassment takes an easy target and encourages a very specific negative response to it. This is the reason I believe Eulmore was such an inconsistent arc--they almost entirely depended on Vauthry’s appearance to carry the weak narrative, explaining very lttle of his actual motivations because that would ruin their weak-ass “gotcha” that he was the Lightwarden of Kholusia. Of course he’d be evil, just look at him! Right guys? Look! He’s fat!

Just as they used nothing but thicc’qotes in the trailer to try establishing the evils in Eulmore. Thicc’qotes eating fresh fruit whilst having pleasant conversation is the root of it all in Square’s eye; not a noblewoman who tried to have her maidservant murdered, not the nobleman who pushed his bodyguard over the rails, or even that asshole on the balcony laughing about splitting someone’s head like a melon. No, fatness is the real wickedness. Square was full of shit for this one and it shows when looked at with even a little critical thought. I don’t know what I expected of someone who requested a human “Jabba The Hutt” to be the last-minute midboss, someone who looked at a heavier Lakshmi and said “that’s not cute”, or a jackass who told a cosplayer they needed to lose weight onstage at FanFest 2014.

Even more disappointing? All these questions here, all these inconsistencies? For the majority of the playerbase, “he’s fat” was good enough. The Ascians get a million thoughtful theories. One of their victims? The playerbase thinks he manifested from the womb as you see him in game. They don’t stop to think of what it implied, to be born corrupted and groomed as a tool not only for Ascians, but his own father. They avoid the fact the fandom darling directly violated a woman and child’s bodily autonomy even as they insist on Vauthry taking absolute 100% responsibility for everything he was made specifically to do. And there’s just one difference between him and literally every other villain in this game, aside from the fact he had no choice. Yeah. As much as some players hate to hear it, if Vauthry had swapped models with the fandom darling, we wouldn’t be hearing justifications for mass murder/dictatorships/skeevy noncon. We would definitely be hearing how Vauthry was used, though--and how tragic his story is.

Some players bring up Dulia-Chai as though she somehow counters all the bodyshaming bullshit elsewhere. It doesn’t. She was still in place along with all the other thicc’qotes as Square’s fucked-up shorthand for excess and indolence. I had to learn she kept books for the Stoneworks in optional dialogue. Maybe if she didn’t talk about cakes and such so much, but I mean, that’s what fat people do, right?

So if you’re laughing at fat men, we fat women know you’re actually laughing at us, too. Git gud or stop embarrassing yourselves.

“Tyranny”, aka you keep using that word, I don’t think it means what you think it means:

Whatever the Ascians did to make sure Vauthry’s "Ascension" was a time-release event, the "madness and fury" clearly had taken him when we met him in Shadowbringers. Punishments for those having broken the laws of the city changed from exile into vicious death sentences. Suddenly the God talk, where not even Alphinaud had heard that. It really makes a case that Vauthry was slowly declining into madness the longer he was exposed to the Warden--in fact, Thancred sort of confirms it, during the trailer: “This town certainly has changed, but not at all for the better.” He was only on The First for five years.

Vauthry likely had no introspective dialogues because much of who he actually had been was already gone, and the player is left with his remaining drive to do “good” and “justify your existence” wrapped around the instincts of a Lightwarden.

Yet a lot of things remain that really contradict the "bones of the poor" narrative the writers were trying to push about the city, and many times I felt a real disconnect between what our party was saying and what Eulmore was actually doing. A lot of it implies that, despite the Warden utterly subverting Vauthry as per the hard rules of Tempering, there was benevolence at work, once. The Minstreling Wanderer said that he could not say whether Vauthry was wicked in his youth, and I take this as a sign he was not.

First off, let’s just get this out of the way: The Crystarium also expected you to work for the city in some form if you were expecting to stay there.

”Layabouts”: a people who were the main line of defense against the Sin Eaters for all The First for eighty years, until the futility of it, and all the loss, broke their spirits entirely. Just another sample of how Square intended Eulmore be shown as fat=lazy, despite their own lore--until Square was lazy themselves and didn’t finish the thicc’qote models so Eulmore would be exclusively fat bodies as shown in the trailer.

The narrative often fudged with writer omnipotence regarding the protagonists, pressing to cast Eulmore in a negative light because they’d given up hope, even though loss is so important in excusing the Ascians’ actions. Our party had the WoL, whom they knew not only had a good chance of defeating Lightwardens, but G’raha seemed to know the WoL could contain them. Your average native inhabitant of the First would not be far off the mark feeling hopeless about the world, though, because they didn’t know about these extraordinary circumstances. Most of their oceans were lost in the Flood, and that in itself, realistically, is a death sentence. It’s all well and good G’raha was so perky and hopeful, and all well and good the game contrived a convenient deus ex machina to fix the issue (they never really addressed the issue anyway), but none of the locals could know any of this. I can see why Eulmore would think the Scions were full of shit, because for 80 years after the Flood, Eulmore tried to stop the Sin Eaters and could not. Honestly, I expected more sympathy for the Eulmorans, because they had been the front line for so long and lost so much. But lol fatties amirite?

Now, Square tried to dabble in many other Enlightened Social Commentaries with Eulmore, but immediately contradicted themselves so many times I was constantly asking myself why Alphinaud was being so goddamn extra dramatic. Gate Town/The Derelicts:

Not at Eulmore’s hand, Alphinaud honey, you can’t solo farms or communities. The people who remained behind were borked over by the ones who left. What are you even trying to say here, Square, help me out. Generosity--”largesse”-- is bad? Abandoning what you have, all others be damned, for something you were never given a promise of receiving....good? Sympathetic? Seriously, what is your point here, Square? How does this equal Eulmore being malicious? How does this not make the bulk of Gate Town hopefuls a bunch of dipshits? Wright is in sight from Gate Town, but no one ever thought going there might be better?

If Square meant for Eulmore to seem a prison for the “poor”, they did a shitty job of that, considering: 1) A big point about Gate Town was that the people staying there left viable homes, farms, and communities for a chance at getting in, a chance that was never guaranteed by anyone, and they refused any alternatives Alphinaud offered them, plus

2) No one was keeping anyone from leaving if they wanted to. No guards, no masked vigilantes, no rando singing Hotel California in your ear.

So ruthless a prison, there were not only invisible guards holding you against your will, there was an Amarokeep waiting in the Derelicts to whisk you away for 70 gil so you can pretend to make a daring escape, straight to the freebie Amaro that will take you to The Crystarium. Tell your friends! Tell Alphinaud! He will literally buy anything this expac.

- “Young Kai-Shirr” getting into Eulmore was never a “matter of life or death”, and I can’t tell if that was Alphinaud being pretentious again or the writing was just that bad. Kai-Shirr was offered work at the Crystarium and he refused it, “it has to be Eulmore”. How is that on anyone but him? (Plus why does no one ever question Kai-Shirr’s complete lack of caring for why Alphinaud wanted in, if that was true? Was Kai-Shirr then not dooming Alph to “death” instead when he robbed him? That’s not very cash money of him.)

This isn’t “life or death” either.

Neither is this.

Nnnno.

Considering Stilltide reported they have fish for all, and Wright’s trouble was not enough people, this is not only not “life or death”, but fucking creepy. Hopefully this better illustrates my confusion of what we were being told vs. what we were being shown in Gate Town/The Derelicts. d( ᐖ )

- The citizens In Gate Town/The Derelicts were not at the mercy of a "contest" to be let in. It was shown to be literally a help wanted board with jesters, and the “contest” was “do you have this certain skill someone is looking to hire”. I guess the Crystarium will hire a fishmonger to do the work of a chirurgeon or something?

The jongleurs were otherwise just "rule of cool", I guess--although the significant look the Red gave us, followed soon after by Emet-Selch’s lurking outside the Offer, made me wonder if they were not acting as monitors on Vauthry for the Ascians.

- There was at least one person in the Derelicts from the Crystarium, looking to make a quick gil on the extravagant “refuse” of the city, and several locals were doing the same. I guess those “layabouts” inside the city had their uses after all, Katliss.

- Meol was not the only food given to those outside the city. Produce and such that was not “pretty” enough for the fussy free citizenry was distributed to those camping the outskirts.

I’d have expected a “tyrant” to let that produce rot. Catty in Stilltide confirmed there was enough fish for everyone living there, and Zia-Bostt above seems to back that up. Game in the field was also aplenty even in terms of map mechanics--this was not some form of forced famine to hold the smallfolk in a state of dependence. Eulmore was still paying the villages for produce.

So much for the exploitation of big, bad Eulmore!

Again, Alphinaud himself bemoaned how the people were there of their own choice, and how they refused any and all alternatives he presented them with. The people in Gate Town wanted to wait for Eulmore, they left their own homes and farms freely for Eulmore, screwing over their neighbors in the process--and that is not Vauthry’s fault, that is on them?

Hurricane Florence left my husband and I homeless a while. You do not fucking pass up sure shelter and work and food to wait instead for a nebulous chance at Hollywood or Las Vegas--and if you do, that’s all your own tomfoolery, that’s not “injustice”, no BONES OF THE POOR required. It’s common sense, Square, goddamn lol

The Free Citizenry:

- The rich would not be permitted into the city if they did not give up their wealth for the benefit of all living there. This was a condition for the rich only. There is zero indication those funds were being put into Vauthry's pocket; it ran the city, and both free and bonded enjoyed the results (there seemed far more bonded residents in Eulmore than free, to boot.). There's a policy that would never fly in at least two allied citystates, lol.

It raises the question, if Wrenden and Former Mayor were so damn equitable, how were there even rich to begin with? There’s an old noble in Vauthry’s Eulmore who apparently does not know how to tie his shoes without a servant--a.k.a., the idle rich existed before Vauthry even came into power. The dialogue of Vauthry’s father also made it seem that these were systems in place long before he his son was even born -- except Vauthry’s system did not allow their hoarding of wealth, and distributed it instead to the benefit of everyone in the city. It was also a system that was so satisfactory, both free and bonded citizens became loudly dissatisfied after he was gone.

- The rich were the only ones guaranteed “Ascension”, and if you want to call that a perk I’m going to assume it’s because the entire system relied on their dosh--technically, they already did their “work” for the city. (”Buying a stairway to Heaven”, as it were.) So much for those "bones of the poor", Alph. Statistically, if bones built Eulmore, it was the bones of the rich.

Until Gaia, Ascension was only mentioned twice, but again, no real context was given. (jfc Square, we shouldn't have to buy an overpriced lorebook for this.) First time was the Weeping Warbler chain. Going by the quest dialogue, it sounded very much like something offered as mercy to terminal illness or otherwise impending death, as the Warbler's creepy patron lamented how he almost wished he could hasten his own to join her (btw, the right answer to that poor girl's fear that she'd be a burden more than a treasure was "YOU ARE MORE THAN YOUR VOICE”, asshole. >:| ). Players at the time were legit “oh that poor old man, she’s like his daughter :CCCCC” Ahahaha oh my sweet summer children

Either way, "Ascension” was definitely implied to be entirely voluntary. It was implied there were even rules and conditions to be granted it. And Vauthry did not seem to push anyone towards the idea, it was just there. (If it was for terminal illness, though, consider the following: Thoarich seemed confident the Warbler would live, but may lose her voice. If you have to be terminal to be Ascended, ironically Vauthry may have refused her patron's request.) The second mention was from Vauthry himself, for his “trial” when the Lightwarden awakened--so he certainly, tragically, believed what he claimed it was. The Bonded Residents:

- Even at his worst, there is no indication that the free citizens were encouraged by Vauthry to abuse their workers; in fact, the Amiable Maiden and her Ardent Attendant implied heavily that appreciation and respect for one's bonded was the ideal that was pushed by Eulmore, that "love for one's fellow man".

At no time were the bonded residents “slaves” (a new accusation from Twitter). They were “bonded” to the patrons who hired them by a work contract, and they sought those jobs willingly. No one kept them from leaving Gate Town, only kept them from getting in without a work arrangement--again, a prerequisite the Crystarium also had according to Katliss. The bonded residents were paid, and apparently paid well.

As the WoL, we were also bonded to the Chais, and were able to come and go later. It was like the writers knew they needed to sit the fence so the free citizens would be redeemable enough to help with the immersion-breaking giant Talos plot later, and so never pushed Eulmore to the evils they talked about but never showed--leaving behind the most disconnected, self-sabotaging arc I’ve ever seen from this MMO.

An evil slaveowner at work.

Alphinaud rewarded for being an agreeable yet melodramatic young boy.

- The bonded we met who fled Eulmore had fled their patrons, not Vauthry himself--even the Warbler thought Vauthry a “great man”. No one in Eulmore feared him.

- Tristol’s “grave sin” to be patronless and penniless was contradicted by Fathana, whose patron had died some time ago, and yet she remained in the city without one to help new workers--because her patron had been so kind to her. The clerk whom you first speak to upon entering Eulmore even says that if you are “fired” or otherwise lose your patronage, you can try to find another patron to remain in the city or work as a general laborer like Fathana until, presumably, you do find another patron. Or maybe you don’t even need a patron, and you are allowed to stay as your own boss at that point, she certainly was.

Since the Chais helped us leave the city, I’m not at all sure why they didn’t do the same for Tristol, especially if Vauthry’s violence was a well-known thing. It’s almost like violence from Vauthry wasn’t expected, and they’d never think that would happen. I mean, some recent time ago, Vauthry only exiled thieves from Eulmore.

(Hell, Square may have even fudged Tristol’s punishment, implying Vauthry had ordered him tossed off the balustrade of The Offer. Vauthry’s balcony appears to be the one directly above The Path To Glory, right above the gates into Eulmore. There doesn’t seem to be ocean nearby at any realistic distance or angle from that balcony. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)

- Laws that we saw in effect were for the benefit of patrons and bonded citizens alike. There was nothing to suggest those laws were unreasonable, either. The punishment became fuck no unreasonable (though as I pointed out earlier, the punishments seemed to ramp up in violence the longer the warden was part of him, from exile to a literal pound of flesh, much like Titania went from a benevolent ruler to Jumpscare Prime). But fraud being a crime is sort of expected anywhere, and creeps at the Beehive should not touch dancers unless dancers consent, lest they get the bouncer. ( another strangely thoughtful law for a “tyrant”. )

- The bonded residents inside seemed much happier with their lot than Alphinaud’s dramatic assessment, which was also confusing as hell.

- Entire families were allowed to enter if one member was hired. Alphinaud was able to drag us along with a minimum of fuss as his “assistant”. Vauthry’s definition of how one “gives” to Eulmore was not based solely on traditional work.

- Bonded residents were not afraid at all to speak of bending rules for perfect strangers when offering drinks to us, so Vauthry wasn't out prowling for blood 24/7 like an Inquisitor trying to fill their heretic quota. Not only was Dulia-Chai not afraid to go calm him down at the height of his rage, Chai-Nuzz didn't freak out at the idea she'd do it. Nuzz. Wasn’t nervous. Yeah, let that one sink in 9_6

The only time Vauthry acted seemed to be when an issue was brought forward directly to him. Otherwise, it seemed like standard Lightwarden behavior: stasis, until presented with a real and immediate threat to itself, which in Vauthry’s case was a threat to the order of his city, or the ones killing Lightwardens.

For allegedly being aggressive against Kholusia's neighbors, Vauthry seemed to have taken the Crystarium's refusal of his offer to lead them back in the day really well, as in, he did jack shit in retaliation and accepted it. In fact, he was so warlike, Emet-Selch was surprised Vauthry would move that army, even for a very clear threat against fulfilling the false destiny Emet-Selch forced on him.

While on the subject of aggression, the people in Amity have dialogue indicating they feared Vauthry would send the army after them--which he obviously never did, in all 20 years of his reign.

- “No one leaves” except hey whoa there hi, Lue-Reeq, who comes and goes as he pleases. Plus that bonded resident who came to Wright looking for ale. Plus us, also bonded residents, because Dulia-Chai once again had nothing to fear from Vauthry.

Also anyone who was exiled previously. For supposedly wanting to keep people inside Eulmore, Vauthry sure was terrible at doing it lmao

GCBTW: I'd really love to see Square and Alphinaud be similarly vocal and insistent with the actual horrors our own Allied city-states commit without the corruption of a Lightwarden in play. The selective outrage/pearl-clutching is really immersion-breaking.

Ishgard: “Highborn” genuinely exploiting the “lowborn” every other sidequest to this day. Genocide of the Au Ra. At least two FATEs, one job quest, one lorebook entry, and one dungeon indicate Ishgard has fucking disgusting levels of rape carried out by figures of authority. Rent is being charged for people from the Brume--the homeless, destitute people in the Brume--to live in the Firmament, but they can arrange payment plans! And this was all talked about while one of them was shivering in the cold nearby. What, can't the highborn be arsed to share what they have? Eulmore is the height of wickedness because they couldn't cram an island full of people into one tower, but Ishgard's our pal even though they can't manage to make space in their mansions for one small area of one city. My God, Vauthry had FOOD in his chamber, shame!--but that's okay, Aymeric, you rock that extravagant dinner spread in the dating sim cutscene. Maybe the Brume can fight over the Ishgardian Muffin crumbs.

(Yes, I know, Vauthry had more food than that in his chamber. He’s also approaching fifteen-plus feet tall. Proportionally, the food in his chamber would be the equivalent of you or me living on cocktail peanuts and thimbles of water. Once more, Square was so fixated on fatphobia they didn’t do the fucking math.)

Doma: “Hey yeah look guys I know child trafficking is bad but let’s just smile and nod at this guy who did it to Yotsuyu and give him a different post, okay? Okay. Remember to be polite. We will never speak of this again.”

“Let me laugh about your beliefs and call them bullshit while I angle you into a war that isn’t even yours, Xaela tribes.” Gridania: Lets people straight up die if the “elements” tell them it’s okay. Exiling a child for stealing a bag of flower seeds is normal and totally not at all fucked up. Open and accepted racism against the Duskwights with no sign of Kan-E-Senna saying fucking stop that shit.

Ul’dah: Human trafficking. Child trafficking. Human lab rats. Using prisoners for blood sports. The Syndicate living it up in finery, giving exactly nothing to people living in the streets. Notoriously corrupt Brass Blades. More implications of fucking disgusting levels of rape. Turning away the Doman refugees when they literally had nowhere else to go and nothing left. We smiled and nodded when Godbert said people mustn’t be given charity, they must work for their own good.

Limsa Lominsa: Fucks over the “beast tribes” at every opportunity, then complains they summon Primals.

But remember, folks, it was Vauthry’s Eulmore that was the real evil we had to desperately move against. Not the newer, capitalist Eulmore that didn’t feed two guys from Wright because they couldn’t afford it, shoosh those “bones of the poor” don’t count. The writers tried to retcon a lot in 5.1, it seemed--suddenly, it was implied people were forced to leave villages, conscripted, etc. Except the people were still there to tell us otherwise in 5.0, and there was still no sign of any Eulmoran forces keeping them in Gate Town. We went from Alphinaud demanding the free citizens take responsibility for what they’d done in Eulmore to posthumously blaming Vauthry’s “bad influence” for everything up to and including a noblewoman’s attempted murder of her maidservant, because the noblewoman’s husband was creeping on the girl.

Which leads us to another of my biggest peeves--all the while, despite “the truth” being so important when it came to Emet-Selch, the sins of Vauthry’s father and the suffering his wife and child endured because of Emet-Selch’s direct hand are left unspoken. We smile and nod silently to Eulmorans and then offer them up Vauthry and his “bad influence” as an excuse for their own misdeeds. I’ve never felt less a “hero” in this game as I did then. Yet Emet-Selch, who committed this atrocity on a child, was called a HERO because fandom darling, while the child is vilified and thoroughly dehumanized.

It’s really telling how much blind condemnation the fanbase dealt to Vauthry for reasons that were completely inaccurate, while the fandom darling of this expansion was 100% the founder of not one, but two civilizations based on domination, the most recent being a nation whose canon creed is "No lands must remain beyond our grasp. Go forth. Conquer. Rule.", a nation whose people have a habit of calling all the “lesser races” they conscript “savages”. Fandom Darling was also hype af for Black Rose and called it worthy of his bloodline! ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ

It’s really telling that the fanbase will randomly accuse Vauthry of being a sexual predator with Sin Eaters based on exactly zero evidence (but a lot of projection on their part), while the fandom darling 100% canonly used the actual Solus zos Galvus’ enthralled body to sire a child with Galvus’ unwitting wife, and going by the dialogue--

--he’s done that before. No wonder consent was no big deal when he made that offer to Former Mayor. But this was played for sympathy because fandom darling and what do you know, the fandom bought it.

Square “both sided” actual authoritarian characters--actual colonizers, actual mass murderers of entire worlds, actual skeevy-ass characters who don’t care about consent because “not really alive”--called it “heroic”, even (the latter was called “moral relativism”, and it’s genuinely unnerving how many players pushed that as absolution or relatable)--but throughout the course of the main expansion and two subsequent patches,Square went all-in that the fat guy who had his agency and sanity stolen from him in utero to be used as a tool of destruction was the real tyrant. We the player were encouraged to buddy up with E-S while we were never once given the option to wonder if something was terribly amiss with Vauthry, if he may need help. They didn’t even spare us a “jfc that poor man, the Eaters got to him” when he blindly twisted his neck 180 to neither see nor hear us. He was still “evil” because reasons, a.k.a., he was fat.

TL;DR, the playerbase:

I remain unconvinced the Ancients were not clever enough to suspect summoning the “Will Of The Star” may have an effect on their own wills, as their wishes for Zodiark carried an unspoken need for the Elder Primal to be granted control to achieve its end. Emet-Selch stated that Tempering was to be “expected”, even “natural”, though his appearance towards the end of 5.3 seems to contradict Tempering: has there ever been another instance that a Tempered being was able to act directly against the best interests of the primal that holds them in thrall? Elidibus sure couldn’t.

Disclaimer: I actually have no issue with liking the Ascians, be it shipping, writing, art, porn mods, whatever. But if you come into my yard with nothing but shit talk for Vauthry on reblogs of my art, yet have all the praise for the one who made him, you’re going to hear in my personal space about why you’re a hypocrite. Often. With receipts.

The End.

First off, it’s popular in the fandom to say the Lightwarden was Vauthry’s real body because it’s just so damn inconvenient to the dating sim mentality that the fat guy was the default. Thing is:

That is Innocence’s head and its wings inside Vauthry’s split-open back during the pre-phase two “transformation”. Between that and the second face that appeared to cave in most of Vauthry’s chest (on the heart side, interestingly enough), the face whose eyes opened and glowed upon the Warden’s “awakening”:

It doesn’t look at all like it was a “transformation”. It looks like the Lightwarden emerged and absorbed what was left of its host’s physical form while still retaining Vauthry’s broken mind. (Notice the nose, much longer than Vauthry’s actual nose, eye spacing, the bit of smile. That second face was the Warden.)

Before his death, Vauthry did not say "well dang, the Ascians promised I would be all-powerful so I could be evil! Curse them for cheating me!"

He said "Father told me...that I am hope. That I am righteousness. That I am...a god... That is why I was born...as man and sin eater both...I kept the people safe!"

Those lines make no sense if Vauthry interpreted Father’s manipulations as "haha I'm a spoiled evil brat I can do what I want". A spoiled evil brat wouldn't need to be convinced what they were doing was GOOD, would they? Why would that even have been a thing, wouldn't they just not care? He had the power to not give a shit. Instead, he would see his peoples’ “dreams fulfilled, their wishes granted.” EDIT - Canon as of 5.3 appears to support this analysis! \o/

Spoken at the end by G’raha Tia on the subject of enduring hope, and additionally supported by the Minstreling Wander, who told us in the Immaculate EX unlock he could not say if Vauthry was wicked in his youth. ”Vindicate his existence”. Vauthry was never in this for the evil selfish lulz. He believed he needed to prove the “half Sin Eater” heritage forced on him did not make him a monster, that it was good, that he was good, and he did it by doing everything he was gaslighted to believe was good by his father--until the Warden finally broke him entirely. To the people who debated so strongly he was just evil because reasons, or refused to hold other characters to the same standards of damnation they set for him because reasons, hope your shoe tastes good. Your reasons were always really clear, btw.

This remains the story of a child who needed a hero that never came, and players choose to discard it, like the free citizens snub produce, because Vauthry isn’t pretty enough for them. A fat character’s stolen life simply isn’t worth the effort of contemplation because the one who made him makes players horny on main.

What happened to this character, with just the little information the game gave us, was straight-up abuse. Yet too many in the fanbase thought no further than juvenile fat jokes (so cool) or unquestioning contempt for a character who was clearly in a state of mental breakdown (unless it was the fandom darling, he’s allowed, even if it destroys worlds) --while Square readily had their characters ace detective enough to detect his weight, but not his unnatural height, his pointed ears, his fogged over eyes, his bendy-straw neck, his second freaking face. Oh, and he can control Sin Eaters. Wait, you mean the Lightwarden was in him the whole time!? Seems legit gais, what an unexpected turn of events!

ᐠ( ᐛ )ᐟ

#FFXIV #long post #Vauthry #character analysis #Lord Vauthry #Eulmore #Shadowbringers

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magicalgirlagency · 3 years

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Oh, would you like to do a WMBR for Crona from Soul Eater? Maybe Maka too, but I love Crona and they deserved better.

I am a sham and a fool for nerds/otakus everywhere, because I have never ever bothered to check out Soul Eater in my whole life (but then again, given my disappointing experiences with the anime industry at large, I'm afraid to risk it...)

All that I know about it, is that it's one of the very few japanese series where its black characters aren't drawn like racist caricatures... oh, and that its creator has also brought us Fire Force.

There's also this prequel entitled Soul Eater NOT!, but apparently a lot of people dislike it...

NOTE: According to the series' wiki, Crona's gender is credited as "Unknown", and the character page uses they/them pronouns. Given that there's a confusion reguarding Crona's gender (such as the use of he/him pronouns in US), they'll be referred with the proper neutral pronouns.

Crona Gorgon is now Moon Witch Crona, Assigned Gemstone is Eudialyte, Essence is Chaos/Cosmos;

Ever since entering a whole new world where witches aren't considered chaotic and hostile, Crona aims to embrace witchcraft and incorporate it in a somewhat positive way;

They behave like a stereotypical witch, engaging in potion brewing, tarot reading and all sorts of strange and unusual;

Their source of power is the New Moon, as it symbolizes introspection and new beginnings;

Crona's moral compass is... warped, to say the least. But they've decided to side with the good guys in hopes of finally reuniting with Maka;

In fact, that's the main reason why they became a Magi. They aim to fulfill Maka's promise of meeting eachother again.

And speaking of her...

Maka Albarn is now Scarlet Reaper Maka, Assigned Gemstone is Red Amber, Essence is Chaos;

Soul is her shapeshifting "mascot". He's an unruly albino cat-like creature when outside of action;

Both Maka and Soul are still wary about Wondaria's history with witches. They need to work together to learn that not every witch is malicious;

Maka has developed an interest towards the concept of Assigned Gemstones, and dedicates herself to study about it;

Which it's rather ironic, as this could be categorized as a form of witchcraft in Wondaria...

She has recently discovered gothic lolita fashion, and is completely enamoured with it;

Just like Crona, she becomes a Magi in hopes of reuniting with them again.

#wondarian bureau of multiversal rescue

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fire-dwelling · 2 years

Text

So Yoshida disappears because her son says her role in this story comes to an end.

But no other characters disappear at all.

The implication then would be that those other characters still have a role to play in the rest of the story, so they don't disappear.

...

Okay, then what were they? What were the roles these other characters were supposed to fulfill for the rest of the manga? Because I don't see any reason those characters should have kept existing.

I know that sounds super nihilistic, but when your series ends with nihilism ("LOL religion is stupid but people are dumb and need it to keep going, and, oh yeah, let's have people not worry about how they can survive decapitation and have Honda and Juggernaut literally go 'whatever'"), it is hard to ignore the logical conclusion to that nihilism, namely, that the characters no longer have any role and therefore would have just disappeared like Yoshida did. You can't end your series saying that Death just loom over us at all times but act like offing your entire cast by wishing them into the cornfield is not also just as likely an ending.

Maybe there is a reasonable explanation. I mean, I could say, "Once Adolla was no longer merged with the Earth, and once Shinra and Lord Death got rid of pyrokinetic abilities, 'you disappear when your role ends' no longer applies." Fine, I can accept that rule for now.

But then we're to pretend that somehow Tamaki et al still had roles in the story? What are they? Because that would assume that their role in the story was going to persist even _after_ the world was brought back to life by Shinra in god form--and that, as with a lot of my complaints about this series, remains a big ask, a major moment of suspending disbelief. I don't think any character after Shinra restored the world really had any further bearing on the plot--not Ogun, not Takehisa, not Hibana, none of them.

If Tamaki existed just for Ohkubo to go red pill and tell his red-hat anime avatar weirdo audience that, "Yeah, that girl should just fulfill the role of fanservice and be nothing more," then how come Tamaki still exists in the story when there is no more obvious fanservice titillation around her? I mean, if her role is just fanservice, why give her any victory in this fight that was mostly based on her fighting ability and not the camera angles ogling her? Why not have her be fanservice in-your-face throughout the rest of the manga? I am not at all suggesting that he should keep using Tamaki as fanservice (she's underage, for Christ's sake), but if that's your argument, that she needs to embrace some role as fanservice, then wouldn't he have committed to that and done so? Wouldn't every last moment with Tamaki for the rest of the manga just be the most obvious fanservice shots? He can't even do that right--he states an intention, then doesn't follow through. I'm grateful he didn't commit to that, but he can't even be consistent with his awfulness: he's awful, then he gets bored with his awfulness and gives up. No wonder enough people thought he was just tired and wrapped up Soul Eater, NOT, and now Fire Force in the most tiresome ways possible. (Good thing he wasted time on Inca's "I want your sperm" nonsense--those pages totally were worth that nonsense rather than actually fixing what was wrong with his story.)

Why do the other characters exist after Tamaki's fight? So that Akitaru can die and lead Shinra to burn down the Earth? Why is Arthur still here, just to give Shinra that pep talk and plant into his head the idea to change reality? Why are any of these characters still around if they no longer serve any function to the story? Because, at a certain point, the story acts like anyone who is not Shinra does not matter. Sure, Sho and Mari are still there--but they just merge with Shinra, Mari says next to nothing, and Sho just keeps repeating the same "calm down" mantra. Haumea exists only to keep philosophizing about the death drive without saying anything significanlty new about it. The rest of the cast was burned down with the Earth. So, why do these other characters still exist if, as Yoshida's son said, a character disappears once their role in the story ends?

I get it, the characters still exist so that Shinra has someone to return to and hug in the "last" chapter. I get it, the other characters--good or bad, always dead or just dead in this final arc--are resurrected for an "everybody lives" ending. I understand those are the roles those characters serve in this story. But to act like _every_ character still had some role to play is bullshit. Look at the endings these characters got: Maki and Lisa are just shopping, Tamaki has a chemistry-less relationship with Juggernaut, Iris isn't thinking about how her family is resurrected but just whether her boyfriend is going to get Inca pregnant--what the hell is this crap? You can't say "this character is here because they serve some role" and have that role be so empty as "the girls out shopping, the girl getting put into a heteronormative relationship with little chemistry, and the girl failing the Bechdel test."

And this is all just so Ohkubo could rant for three chapters about anyone who didn't like his sexualizing of and embarrassing of an underage girl character in his manga and decided to dismiss all that criticism as "LOL bitchy old women that no one finds attractive." I swear, and I keep repeating this, his ability to write Maka and Crona was by accident, not by intention. The man has just fallen into the most toxic of thoughts, and I feel sorry for so many people looking forward to any Soul Eater anime reboot (if it ever happens) because he is going to find a way in this post-Fire Force world to make that worse than how Chapter 113 paid off.

#long post #dwells whines about fire force #(yet again)

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zxanthe · 4 years

Text

jealousy

for @soulxmakaweek day 3: jealousy

also available on ao3 and ff.net

side note: The Soul Eater manga was first released in 2004.

It isn’t that Soul is jealous, exactly.

Maka is, beneath the know-it-all and vaguely homicidal exterior, a kind person. It’s one of the things he likes most about her. He remembers the first time he played the piano for her – it feels like a lifetime ago, now – how she’d smiled and clapped after he finished, even though he knew she didn’t get it, really. But the wonder sparkling there in her green eyes, the open and gut-wrenching genuineness of the delight and enjoyment brazenly plastered on her face – no one had ever looked at him like that in his whole entire life, and even though he didn’t let it show he knew right then and there he’d follow this girl to the ends of the earth if she asked him to.

When she enfolds Crona in an embrace instead of dealing a killing blow, he doesn’t bother trying to keep the fond smile off his face, because that’s so typical of her. Always taking in strays.

So that’s why he wonders if it’s the madness, not just in him but in the world now that the Kishin Asura is free and raging, that makes a hard knot of something nagging and awful weigh in his chest like a stone when he sees Maka and Crona together. The Little Demon doesn’t help at all, always whispering ugly little nothings in the quiet in-between moments when he’s brushing his teeth or picking at the guitar he keeps on the wall of his room, things like she only cares about your weapon form you know and she loves them more than she ever loved you and (worst of all) she’s going to realize who you are and leave.

(It’s not like he isn’t used to people leaving. His father left him in all but name, preferring to shut himself up in his studio rather than deal with his children. His brother left him to go to college and make a name for himself. His grandmother left the planet entirely, going wherever dead people go.)

But he knows, deep down in his gut, that Maka isn’t like that. She takes her commitments seriously. She’s his meister, and he’s her weapon. He has to trust her. Has to trust that she wouldn’t leave him unless something bad happened. Something really, really bad.

Like a new best friend? the demon whispers, not bothering to hide the malicious glee in his voice. Soul just grits his teeth and tells him to shut the fuck up.

(He doesn’t want to resent either of them, despite the demon’s urgings and his own idiot, uncool feelings.)

But he can’t deny the reality - it feels like she spends more time with Crona than him nowadays. Soul isn’t exactly averse to that, but it still rankles, because Maka used to spend most of her time with him, or at least around him. But the kid’s had a hard life, harder than his by a long shot, and someone like Maka is good for them. In the short time they’ve been at the DWMA, Soul’s noticed them coming out of their shell a little more each day. It makes him wonder if he was something like that when he first arrived, fresh from New York, a fish out of water.

So that’s why, when Maka invites Crona over for a movie night one Friday after classes, he doesn’t object, despite the way his chest tightens a little.

“I-is that okay?” Crona asks, darting nervous glances towards Soul, who’s standing a little ways behind Maka. He doesn’t really know Crona all that well yet. The sentiment is mutual. Soul cringes inwardly, equal parts ashamed and nervous and just a little satisfied, damn it damn it not cool at all!

“’Course it is,” Soul makes himself say, and hopes that nobody notices the way his voice threatens to crack. “It’s Maka’s turn to cook, though, so you might wanna, uh. Eat beforehand.”

Maka rounds on him, her green eyes narrowed. “At least I don’t burn freaking rice!”

“Yeah, yeah, I was making a joke. Is that a crime?”

“Well, it wasn’t very funny.” She turns back to Crona with a roll of her eyes. “Anyway, tonight at 7 sound good? We can meet you at the Skullbuster.”

“Um…will there be many other p-people there? Besides you and…S-Soul?”

Maka shakes her head and smiles reassuringly. “No, don’t worry. I know large get-togethers still stress you out. It’ll just be us three.”

Crona darts one more glance at Soul. He’d smile, but his face feels like wood and his teeth would probably scare the kid half to death. He settles for a nod instead. One cool guy to another. Crona smiles hesitantly. “Yeah. That s-sounds great.”

“You good?” Maka asks him, once they’re outside the school and have said their goodbyes to their friends.

He shoots her a questioning look. “Huh? Yeah, I’m fine.”

“You just felt a little off earlier, that’s all,” she says.

Damn her and her soul perception. Soul just shakes his head. “Maybe your soul perception is just malfunctioning.”

She whaps him with the paperback she’s carrying in her hand. “Rude!”

“Ow, fuck you too!”

They walk down to the Skullbuster after Maka finishes cooking, leaving a plate of brownies cooling on the counter and a foil tray of mac n’ cheese being kept warm in the oven. Soul doesn’t think he’ll ever get over their whacko naming conventions in Death City – did they really have to replace the classic Blockbuster logo with a lurid blue and yellow skull biting a movie ticket with its cartoonishly sharp teeth? No, no they didn’t, but they did anyway, so here they fucking are. Soul shoots it a cautious look – it’s definitely more interesting than the usual, all things considered. Crona’s already waiting for them directly beneath the sign, a tall slim figure in their black – robe? Dress? Soul still isn’t sure what to make of it. He raises his hand in a wave as Maka calls out a greeting and bounds over to give them a hug. Soul ignores the twinge in his chest, gritting his teeth at the echo of laughter he hears from the demon.

Crona still looks spooked at the contact, but at least they raise their arms and pat her awkwardly on the back this time. Progress. Soul offers them a fist. Crona looks at it uncomprehendingly.

“Fistbump,” says Soul. Jesus, poor kid. “You make your hand into a fist – yeah, like that, now tap it with mine.”

Crona does so, feather-light and hesitant. Soul offers them a smile and then withdraws his fist, wiggling his fingers as he does so. Crona imitates him, awkwardly and with a slight frown.

“See, easy,” says Soul, cringing inwardly. He shouldn’t have done the finger wiggle, dammit, Crona wouldn’t get it and it just made them feel weird, ugh, why is he like this?

Maka, meanwhile, is smiling at the display. She reaches for Crona’s hand, easily, naturally, and leads them into the store. Soul trails after them, trying valiantly to ignore the way the knot in his chest aches.

“So, whatcha wanna watch?” Maka asks Crona, whose eyes widen in fear in the face of making an evening-altering decision.

“It’s okay,” says Maka gently. “Soul and I are fine with whatever you pick, right Soul?”

“Yeah,” Soul says, though secretly he’s hoping that Crona doesn’t pick a kids’ movie or a rom-com or something boring like that. He’d probably end up falling asleep, and then Maka’d get pissed at him, and he’d probably be woken up by a hardcover to the head.

“Take your time!” says Maka. “Dinner’s already ready, we’re in no rush.”

Crona nods but seems content to follow Maka around the store as she drifts from section to section. They gently shake their head at all the titles Maka holds up – mostly cheesy feel-good flicks or (dammit Maka) live-action Disney movies. Soul’s eye is caught by the horror section, and after a quick glance at the other two he drifts towards it. There’s a lot of DVDs on the shelves – they really need to get a DVD player, this is ridiculous – but there’s still plenty of VHS tapes. He hunkers down into a squat, examining some more recent titles, when Crona’s voice comes from above him, startling him in its proximity.

“How about that one?” they ask, and Soul looks up to see them holding a notoriously gory and barf-inducing horror film. Soul hasn’t seen it personally, but he’s heard the stories.

Soul quirks an eyebrow. “You sure about that?” he asks, at the same time that Maka says “Uh, I’m not sure you’d like it very much…”

“I want this one,” Crona says, a note of certainty in their voice. Soul suppresses a grin, seeing Crona in a new light. Maybe tonight won’t be so bad after all.

They pick out two other movies, an action flick and some kind of weird documentary (palate cleansers, Soul thinks), before heading back to the apartment. Ragnarok erupts from Crona’s back at the mention of dinner and is only kept from devouring both his and his meister’s share by Maka angrily wielding her heaviest dictionary. They don’t talk much because everyone’s too busy eating. Soul won’t admit it, but Maka makes a mean mac n’ cheese. Even Crona goes back for seconds. Afterwards Maka grabs the plate of brownies and they all drift into the living room and settle on the couch, Maka in the middle.

“Oh, damn!” Maka exclaims as soon as her butt touches the cushions. “I forgot to get popcorn! I’m going to run down to the convenience store – don’t you dare eat all those brownies, Ragnarok, or I will kill you!”

The door slams shut. “Stupid bitch,” Ragnarok mutters, and starts hassling Crona for a brownie. Crona, surprisingly, holds their ground, and eventually Ragnarok subsides back into Crona, grousing all the while.

The apartment is suddenly too quiet. Blair is out, Soul thinks, glancing around in mild panic. Crona doesn’t say anything.

Put them in their place, the demon growls. Soul clenches his hand into a fist, nails digging into the skin of his palm.

“So, uh,” Soul begins, and then stops, because he has no idea where he’s going with this. He shoots a quick glance at Crona. They’re not looking at him, and instead are pressed against the hard metal arm of the sofa.

Something in Soul softens. “Hey,” he tries again. Crona’s eyes dart to his before flitting back to their lap. Inwardly, Soul grimaces. He’s never been the best at talking to people or making friends, not like Maka. “Uh, did you manage to get all your homework done today?”

Ugh. Lame, stupid, uncool!

“N-no,” says Crona softly.

“Eh, no biggie,” Soul says, trying for jocular and coming out strained. “You’ve still got a whole weekend.”

Silence falls again. The remote is on the coffee table, beside the brownies. Soul wonders if he should grab it and turn on the TV. Something, anything to diffuse this awkwardness. Soul notices out of the corner of his eye that Crona keeps glancing at him now, like they want to say something but can’t quite manage it. Soul sucks on his bottom lip. Maybe he should –

“Do you hate me?” Crona blurts.

Soul flinches, startled and ashamed in equal measure. “No, why would I,” he says, before his brain catches up with his mouth and he looks down at his chest, at the scar covered by the soft cotton of his t-shirt. It’s still a bit pink and raw, and it aches if he stretches his torso too much in any direction. He looks at Crona. “No,” he repeats, quieter this time.

Crona stares at him uncomprehendingly. “B-but I…” They make a slashing motion. Their hand is trembling slightly, Soul notes.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “And I’d do it all over again.” He smiles, and it’s more genuine than any he’s given Crona thus far. “That shit’s in the past. You’re here now, and you’re trying to be better. It’s the soul that counts, y’know?”

“S-so…you don’t hate me?”

“Not at all,” Soul says. “I’m a lot like you, actually. People scare me too.”

Crona blinks. “R-really?”

Soul nods. “Yeah. I used to live in New York. When I first got off the plane I was scared shitless, didn’t know what the fuck I was doing. And now I feel more at home here than I ever did there.”

They’re listening raptly, and when Soul finishes, they swallow. “How…how did you…stop being scared?”

“I never did. But Maka and Black Star and the others are a big help.” He chuckles fondly. He feels lighter. The demon is quiet. “It’s what friends are for.”

When Maka comes back, Soul and Crona are chatting easily and munching on brownies. They greet her and she smiles, evidently happy that they’re getting along. When she returns from the kitchen with an overflowing bowl of popcorn, Crona shifts so that they’re sitting in the middle of Maka and Soul. Ragnarok emerges to gorge himself on popcorn and brownies while Soul pops the horror tape in the VHS.

The movie is so gory that it makes even Soul and Maka’s battle-hardened stomachs turn, but Crona and Ragnarok seem to be enjoying themselves. They make it through the documentary and about one-third of the action flick before Crona falls asleep on Soul’s shoulder.

“They seem like they’ve really warmed up to you,” Maka says quietly over Crona’s head. “What did you guys talk about when I was gone?”

Soul shrugs. “Nothing much, really.”

“That so?”

“Yeah.”

Maka just shakes her head and smiles.

#soulxmakaweek #somaweek2020 #somaweek #soulxmaka #soma #soul eater #soul eater fanfiction #soul/maka #se by z #zxanthe writes sometimes

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euphemiaelenablack · 3 years

Text

"Henry Potter....."

Henry Potter stood tall and firm in front of the Death Eaters. It was a cold, autumn day and Henry was standing in front of the group of Death Eaters in the middle of the forest.

And Henry knew something was going to go terribly wrong.

"What do you want?" Henry snapped. "I have nothing for you."

"You do, as a matter of fact." One Death Eater said coldly.

"Then what is it, if you're so smart?" Henry said sarcastically.

"The Sword Of Gryffindor!" Another Death Eater snapped impatiently.

"I'd rather die." Henry said.

"We might as well kill you..." One Death Eater said coldly.

"But not quite yet." Another said. "A duel. All of us against you, Potter. This Saturday at three in the afternoon. The field where they last held the Quidditch World Cup."

"Agreed." Henry said. "I'll be leaving now."

And with that, Henry Potter disappeared with a crack.

..........

You must know I'm so sorry. I love you all.

Charlus, my boy, you're my eldest son and you'll always have a special place in my heart and soul. Stay strong and safe. Look after yourself, Dorea and Henry Jr. I love you.

Edward (Sorry, Eddy) Roxanne is currently pregnant with your third child. Look after her. Look after yourself and the children. Stay strong and safe. I love you.

Daniel (Dan, sorry) the middle child. That must be annoying. I know it is, I was the middle child myself. Stay strong and safe. I love you.

Jackson (Jack, apologies) the second youngest. I remember that you were always the one to make anyone (and everyone) burst out laughing. Make people laugh after I'm gone. Stay strong and safe. I love you.

Fleamont (Monty... I'm doing this on purpose, you know) the youngest of my sons. I know my death will come as a hard blow to you, we were always particularly close. But stay strong. And safe (though it's not likely). I love you.

All my daughter in laws (there's too many of ye to name) like my five daughters I never had. Stay strong. Look after my sons after I'm gone. I love you.

All my grandchildren (again, far too many to name) remember your grandpa Henry when I'm gone and dead. I'll miss ye like hell and you're all my grandbabies. I'll miss ye all. I love you all. Stay strong and safe.

Sirius (yes, I know Sirius isn't a Potter by birth and blood but I don't fucking care and I'm giving him a message) I know what it's like to be abused. I went through that same thing when I was a kid because I was just a Hufflepuff. Yeah, it's stupid. But try to open to people. (And finally get Walburga and Orion locked in Azkaban where they deserve to be). Stay strong and safe. I love you

Remus (again, same reasons as Sirius, so shut the fuck up!) you're not one of my grandsons by blood and birth but you were like my grandson the moment you entered my life. Stay strong and safe. I love you.

Harry (he's my great grandson, I'll probably die in this duel so Harry deserves a long message, so again, shut the fuck up) you're my first great grandson. And the only great grandchild that I ever meet. Damn, you were just so tiny the day you were born. I remember the complete and utter joy that filled me when I first held you. I love you.

Minerva, you were my only niece. You were abandoned on our doorstep when you were only a couple of weeks old. Stay strong and safe. I love you.

Charlotte, my one true love. The first woman I ever loved with all my heart and soul. I'd die for you. I'll miss you too much to say. Stay strong and safe. I love you.

Whether you're a Potter or not, I love the whole fucking lot of you. I'm going to miss you all.

Your lovingly,

Henry Alexander Potter.

..............

Henry took a deep breath as he put the letter inside the envelope. There was no turning back.

It was Friday night. Ten o'clock. This time tomorrow Henry might be injured or worse - dead.

Henry dropped the envelope on top of the chair he was previously sitting on and walked out of his study to his bedroom.

"Hello love." Charlotte said to her husband. Henry smiled as his wife slipped her arms around his neck and kissed him on the lips.

"Hello there." Henry mumbled against Charlotte's warm lips. Charlotte smiled.

"Good Merlin, you're freezing." She said. Henry chuckled as Charlotte broke the kiss. She was already in her soft pyjamas.

"Yeah, it is a bit cold." Henry said as he changed into his pyjamas. Charlotte wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and gazed out of the window.

"The stars are beautiful." Charlotte said dreamily.

"Just like you, my love." Henry said softly as he wrapped her arms around Charlotte's neck.

"Come on, it's getting late." Charlotte said. "We better get into bed, I'm freezing."

Henry suddenly scooped Charlotte up in his arms. Charlotte giggled as Henry placed her down on the bed.

"I love you." Charlotte said, as Henry lay down beside her. Henry's heath beat faster as Charlotte cuddled up to him.

Henry wrapped his arms around Charlotte yet again. "You have no idea how much I love you."

Charlotte hummed sleepily as Henry drifted off to sleep. Henry, in his sleep, gripped Charlotte close to his chest just like he did when they were young.

............................

Henry woke up early the next morning, the sun shining brightly through the window, Charlotte still in his arms. She was still asleep as Henry ran his fingers through her greying red hair.

"I love you." Henry mumbled as Charlotte shifted in her sleep.

Henry remembered what day it was. Saturday. The day of the duel. The last day he'll spend with his, children, grandchildren and great grandson.

"Morning Harry." Charlotte said, yawning as she woke up in her husband's warm embrace.

"Morning Lottie." Henry said softly as he kissed Charlotte on her forehead. Charlotte streached out her arms and legs slowly, then nestled comfortably in Henry's arms once more.

"Can't we stay like this all day?" Charlotte mumbled as Henry rubbed her back.

"I wish we could." Henry said.

"Ten more minutes." Charlotte said pleadingly. She looked at Henry with wide brown eyes and Henry couldn't resist.

"Alright then." He said as he streached out his arms and legs slowly. Henry's eyes widened as Charlotte began to breathe heavily.

"Are you alright?" Henry panicked. Charlotte didn't respond as she say up in bed, Henry doing the same.

"It's alright" Henry said softly, kissing Charlotte on her forehead and smiled at her. "Breathe out slowly and gently to the count of four. Alright then?"

Charlotte breathed out gently to the count of four as Henry gently rubbed her back.

"Again." Henry said encouragingly. Charlotte nodded as she gripped onto Henry's pyjamas.

"Are you alright then?" Henry asked as Charlotte's breathing eventually returned to normal.

"I think so." Charlotte said. "Can I have cuddles?"

Henry smiled as Charlotte lay down on the bed, smiling as Henry lay down beside her.

"Thanks for this." Charlotte mumbled, her voice slightly muffled because she was snuggled against Henry's chest.

"You're welcome."

.............................

Henry stood in the middle of the field. The duel would begin in five minutes.

Henry was nervous, there was no doubt about that. But what would happen to his family if he said no? Henry shuddered to imagine the things the Death Eaters had done to innocent people

#Charlus Potter #Henry Potter #Daniel Potter #edward Potter #harry Potter #charlotte Potter

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amratsu · 4 years

Text

alright these girls have haunted me for about a whole month now time to break it all down for anyone vaguely interested in them

hololive/vtuber 101 below the read more

THE FUCK IS HOLOLIVE?: An idol agency except all of its roughly 20 or so girls are youtube streamers who have their identity protected by a live2d avatar. They recently had a very fun live concert and all of them have or will have 3d models, but the majority of content is just them streaming whatever's their fancy at the time. (As of 2/17/2020 a lot of them play a lot of ARK, thank Coco for that) Therefore, they're part of the new form of niche culture called Vtuber.

THE FUCK IS A VTUBER?: Virtual youtubers. Like a normal streamer but, again, live2d portrait instead of their actual face. That's basically it. Content is about as varied as any other youtuber.

ALRIGHT, WHO WE GOT?: Hololive's split into OG Tokino Sora, the girls alongside her who are also primarily 3d, and then 'generations'. Just plug in their names and you'll find their channel easy. Again, variety differs between all the girls, but expect a lot of Nintendo games, chat streams, karaoke, and Minecraft across the board.

-Tokino Sora OG mom slash idol, debuted all the way back in 2017. Probably the only proper idol in all of Hololive. Warm, friendly, relaxing. She mostly does 3d variety streams and song debuts so she's hard to follow without advanced japanese.

-Roboco(-san) Pose happy killer robo with a notably smokey voice and calming demeanor. Plays a large amount of minecraft and first-person games in general; recent streams include ARK, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon remaster, Apex, and Fortnite.

-Sakura Miko ELIIIITE MLG miko idol with a tendency to swear a bit. High energy, fully embraced 'press f', gives herself sunglasses during streams, great friends with Pekora. Also notably into eroge. Did a full playthrough of Papers Please lately and is one of the most addicted to ARK (21 streams at around 4-5 hours each.)

1st Generation -Yozora Mel Sleepy vampire with the occasional killer instinct. Soothing, gentle, kind of lewd. Very much into nintendo games with Smash, Ring Fit, SwoSh, and Mario Kart being her latest content, but she's a little slower with the output. Part of the lewd blonde club with Aki, Haato, and Choco, who were demonetized until recently.

-Aki Rosenthal Cyber elf with detachable twin tails. Pretty similar to Mel in disposition, though less sleepy and more...I want to say 'fantastical'. Recently gained popularity due to her buck naked superhuman beefcake character in ARK, with Kerbal, Go Home, and some ASMR rounding out the rest of her content.

-Natsuiro Matsuri Eternal 17 year old cheerleader from the class next door, Matsuri is a high energy raging lesbian who's also a complete sweetie. Her infamous bandaid clip is what got a lot of western fans into Hololive. Plays a wide variety of games but also twitcasts at random times of the day like when she's in bed or in the bath, just to chat with her viewers about what's on her mind. Well loved.

-Akai Haato The ESL transfer student, girl next door, Haato is, well, exactly that. Commonly traveling for studies, Haato is a bubbly girl with a fine sense for aesthetics; you'll catch her making elaborate builds in Minecraft or playing visual novels during streams, along with a smattering of other games. Notable in that she's the only girl that'll do purely English streams, likely to help with her own education. Also kind of a baka.

2nd Generation -Minato Aqua Disaster masochist maid who's actually stupidly good at video games sometimes. She's both mischievous and hard working, massively popular in China, and, again, stupidly good at games. Soulsborne speedruns, PUBG, ARK (also one of the most addicted), Minecraft (seeing a pattern?), League if you catch her bilibili streams...but she's also the one who will spend a stream calling the other girls and asking them to bully her. Wild card gremlin.

-Murasaki Shion Genius mage who doesn't do a lot with her magic. Pretty well known for her 'neeeeeee', with a distinctly smug avatar/voice. Pretty good at games too, with a variety of Pokemon, retro games, Minecraft, Smash, horror, Mario Kart, etc. Excellent singing voice too, would recommend her covers.

-Yuzuki Choco The totally-not-a-succubus demon nurse at your highschool, Choco embodies :sweating:. Obviously she's lewd, but there's also a silly and petulant side to her that's fun to watch too. ASMR is her specialty. She's also, surprisingly, really into Dead By Daylight, so if that combination sounds fun to you hit her up.

-Oozora Subaru If Haato is the girl next door, Subaru's the bro next door. A very down to earth but energetic and sporty tomgirl, she recently spent three streams and sixteen hours on trying to take down Sans. Other recent things include Live A Live, The Witch's House, and GTA. Refreshingly easy to relate to compared to the other girls sometimes.

-Nakiri Ayame Hello, honored humans~ Hololive's millenium old oni. Has a peculiar way of speaking, especially in her pronouns, which lends a certain charm if you can got on board with it; happy go lucky, easy to like, and really cute on top of all that. Recently recovered from sickness (as of 2/26) so was the last to get on the Ark craze, she's actually very fond of multiplayer games as a way of 'getting to know mortals'. Apex Legends, Mario Kart, Splatoon, etc.

GAMERS: A sort of generation on its own, and also a kind of weird designation when all the girls game so frequently. Oh well!

-Shirakami Fubuki Fox. Not a cat. Super cheerful, makes a lot of weird noises that people turn into youtube poops (that she encourages), and also a helluva gamer. Plays plenty of battle royales, ARK, and of course Nintendo/Minecraft stuff. Infamous for her absolute feral hunter instincts in Project Winter, where she commonly massacres the entire map on her lonesome when she's the traitor.

-Ookami Mio Mom wolf who has to play tsukkomi (straightman) to basically all of Hololive sometimes. Which makes it all the more hilarious during her semi-common charisma breaks, like during Haato's recent English Exam stream. Has been into EDF, Pokemon, Ghost Trick, and Splatoon lately.

-Nekomata Okayu The sleepy smug cat with the most chill personality. Notably very, VERY close with Korone, and in general kind of a playboy in general. Never denies it or any of her myriad transgressions though. Her Mother 2 run has been fun recently, but really you could just tune into her frequent chat streams and relax that way.

-Inugami Korone Dog. An oddball who kind of just goes at her own pace, playing all sorts of weird games like Nyanpo (the pokemon prototype) and weird PS1 retro games. Shows a disturbingly violent side sometimes; her ongoing Blasphemous run and recent RE4 runs have shown how much she's into that kind of stuff. But also she's still a dog, so really don't worry.

Inonaka Music: -AZKi AZKi is closely associated with Hololive but is really more of her own thing, being even more idol than Sora is. Doesn't stream much if at all, has her own album out, does music collabs more than anything else, etc. Helluva singer though.

-Hoshimachi Suisei The vtuber idol who's totally not a psychopath, and totally a goddess at tetris. Like Fubuki, made a name for herself with her psychotic rampages in Project Winter, and also very much unfazed by horror games. Really fucking good at tetris too, doing 98v1 streams lately in Tetris 99, and a godly songstress too. Her karaoke streams are to die for.

3rd Generation: Also known as Hololive Fantasy. These girls are particularly close to each other. If you can find translated clips, I definitely recommend their host club streams where they compete in seducing other Vtubers. (Yes. That's serious)

-Usada Pekora AH^HA^HA^. You'd think she was a cute rabbit, but no! It's a Tewi level shitposter combined with some legit video game skills. She likes playing the heel deliberately just for shits and giggles, like when she nearly walked off with Miko's Nether Star. She's in fact very close to Miko, their relationship being both great friends and great rivals. Definitely one of the most addicted to ARK too; she's been making headway in conquering the ocean.

-Shiranui Flare Handsome half-elf archer, Flare's the designated tsukkomi of the third generation. She's definitely the most down to earth of them, charismatic to boot, and does as she pleases with a relaxed personality and husky, smokey voice. Very very VERY close to Noel. You'll find some really fun playthroughs of various action games like Dark Souls, Bayonetta, and Sekiro on her channel, and thanks to her picking up game mechanics fast they're fun to watch for anyone.

-Shirogane Noel Knight Captain of the Shirogane Knights, Noel's...kind of an airhead, actually. But she's definitely a pleasant, softspoken sort of person who's incredibly relaxing to listen to. Also a big eater, you'll hear her talk about beef bowls and muscles a lot. Just try not to stare too much at her 'pectorals.' As mentioned, VERY close to Flare (they just had a two day long date to a ryokan). Plays whatever with no focus in particular.

-Uruha Rushia The cute, soft, innocent apprentice necromancer, Rushia occasionally comes out of the gates roaring with rage filled screams before chilling out. An absolute cutie though, who loves her fans very much (though really every Hololive member does), her attempts to be cool and reliable lend to some great comedy. She's got a great singing voice if you can find one of her bilibili streams, and otherwise plays a wide variety of things.

-Houshou Marine A~hoy~. The completely safe for work, modern, not-cosplay eternal 17 pirate...and everything I just said was a lie. Most of it anyways. Marine's a riot of a lady with an incredibly dirty mind and dirtier motor mouth, great voice acting ability, and knack for art that she'll happily show off (among other things). Definitely one of my favorites, you'll find plenty of chat and art content on her channel, along with some of the most Ark addiction and a full array of Touhou game playthroughs.

4th Generation: Hololive's newest five girls, it's been a month and change since they debuted. They're notable for working together on some of the most wild content Hololive's put out so far, all helmed by a certain dragon. But we'll get to that.

-Tokoyami Towa The little devil that does whatever she wants, Towa's known for a couple of other things at this point: refreshingly honest personality, Pokemon playthroughs with an eclectic choice in team comp, and her charmingly atypical tomboy voice (though her mic's not amazing). Great singer, super funny if you can find the rare translated clip of her, and was an absolute menace at the recent Hololive werewolf/mafia game. How she managed to fake being a Seer from day one and nearly win, I'll never know.

-Tsunomaki Watame Hololive's bouncy sheep. Ram? Something like that. A very girly, friendly, lightly ara-ara personality, she's an honest and open with her feelings sort of girl. Earnest laughter at chat and games, real emotional tears while watching the live concert with her generation mates, Watame's a total sweetheart who streams a bit of music everyday as the pre-show to Coco's Morning Shitposts (official name). She's also gotten very close to her senpais in some regards...but above all she likes singing, chilling out in Minecraft, and recently playing through a couple Kirby games.

-Himemori Luna If you want to see a completely innocent cinnamon roll looking character say things like 'ass' and 'don't f*cking take crystal m*th', Luna's your gal. Her high pitched, almost childlike voice takes a bit of getting used to but she's a sweetheart that just has fun no matter what she's doing. But she'll also say a bunch of really funny shit while doing it just from sheer juxtaposition of her voice/appearance and the vocabulary. Surprisingly good at video games too.

-Amane Kanata PP Tenshi. Perfect Pitch, Powerpoint...Kanata's a bit of a sheltered honor student sort of girl who has an incredible vocal range, so much you'd be forgiven for thinking she was a professional voice actor or singer. She loves playing along with jokes even if she doesn't get them some times, and is really close with Coco. If not for said dragon she'd be the biggest memelord in the 4th generation, but alas; her channel has lots of collabs with fellow members and a series of cute 'research' videos on the various generations of Hololive. Unfortunately untranslated though.

-Kiryuu Coco The one, the only, the President of Nishinari herself, Coco has been a force of nature since she debuted. Her vulgar sense of humor, rapid fire jokester nature, fluent English speaking, and complete conversion of Hololive to the wonders of dinosaur taming in Ark has made her one of the most subscribed girls in a matter of weeks. Every day at 6am JST or 1pm PST, she does a quick 20 minute gig called Coco News (officially translated as Coco's Morning Shitpost) where she reports on the various ongoings in Hololive. This ingeniously brings attention to the silly crap everyone's been up to, really fostering a sense of community between the girls you don't see elsewhere, while also being a riot to watch as she roasts everyone for their silliness (with full permission). Other notable memes include her stalwart boycotting of Nintendo Switches, her desire to fund a Hololive house, and her recent Hitman 2 run.

#Hololive #Virtual Youtuber #Inonaka Music

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