#the way he sees his own pain as inconsequential if it means his family is safe

[s0fter-sin]

thinking about the way daryl constantly places himself between aggressive men and the people he loves

#he directs anger onto himself and lets himself get hurt with zero hesitation #the way he sees his own pain as inconsequential if it means his family is safe #he can take it #better him than others #the main ones off the top of my head are tyrese when carol kills his girlfriend and the gang in s4 when they surround rick michonne and carl #and most obviously negan #daryl has so much fear especially of loud men #you see it most in s2 but it by no means goes away #but in the moments that his ptsd is justified and he could flinch away like he normally responds he directly puts himself in harms way #he must be so triggered in those moments and he still doesnt hesitate #daryl dixon breaks my heart and he deserves so much more than the show gives him #rest in peace. now get up and go to war #coming out of my cage and ive been doing just fine.txt #daryl dixon #twd #the walking dead

[romaritimeharbor]

FAMILY, OF SORTS. — in which kafka, blade, and silver wolf are an odd but quite special found family to be a part of.

— trigger & content warnings. mentions of unspecified injury.

— pairings & notes. fluff, found family. kafka & teen!reader, blade & teen!reader, silver wolf & teen!reader. 1.3k words. reader is a stellaron hunter. reader is gender neutral (they/them pronouns used).

— author's notes. the sillies <3 APHE POSTING???? APHELION POSTING REAL AND TRUE????????? i had a request for this on my old blog (from my dear beloved moot @starryshinyskies <3) so i decided to finish it 💪 nd tagging @www-brontide since i know you were excited for this post HEHE anyways how are we feeling about this formatting? if you guys don't like it i'm very open to changing it back. i'm just experimenting with my post format is all 🫶

kafka seems strangely motherly to me. caring and doting in her own unique ways, but also quite strange and odd in those same ways. an enigma of sorts.

she is the kind of person to always send the stellaron hunters' youngest member texts throughout the day; these texts range anywhere from silly and inconsequential to sweet messages letting [name] know that she was thinking about them.

(her doting nature is not dissimilar to how she thinks of and regards the trailblazer... hm.)

KAFKA

My coat got stained again :(

Won't you help me clean it when you get home, little one?

[ 1:22 PM ]

KAFKA

I saw a new movie today.

It made me think of you. It was quite to your tastes.

Perhaps we should go see it together sometime, hm?

Ah, but you're probably asleep by now...

That's fine. You do need it more than the rest of us.

Sleep well, darling.

[ 11:34 PM ]

she thinks of her little one quite frequently and has been known to pick up little trinkets from different planets that reminded her of them. a phone charm, a set of rings, something more practical like a new weapon... she once returned with a nice coat that matches one of hers. her gifts are always unpredictable but nonetheless very thoughtful.

and when or if they get injured, she is the one who treats their wound(s) with a tender hand.

she does chide them, however.

"you are a stellaron hunter, little one," she reminds, pulling the bandages wrapped around their wound a little tighter, making them wince. it is akin to a slap on the wrist—not enough pain to seriously harm them, but enough to force them to take her words to heart. "if it is not a part of the plan, try your best not to get caught or injured, hm? silver wolf doesn't like to see you this way, and it causes a unique stir in bladie. your getting injured causes quite the unrest among us all! do be more careful next time."

if there is ever a night during which they are struggling to sleep, they are more than welcome to seek out kafka's company.

she would be willing to read them to sleep, if that is what they desired.

however... a far easier method that would ensure they would stay asleep? her spirit whisper ability, of course.

they know kafka would not use it to harm them.

kafka finds their earnest trust beyond endearing. the trust of a little one like them is quite an important gift! the least she can do, she thinks, is assist them when her assistance is needed.

and sometimes, that just means lulling them to sleep.

blade is quite a difficult person to read, regardless of whether he intends to be so or not.

some days, he is distant and prefers to keep to himself. others, less so.

this, though, should not be mistaken for a lack of care. in fact, he cares quite deeply. his care is simply very quiet and he desperately, earnestly, truly does not wish to cause [name] harm.

he is also most likely the one who spars with them and trains them in the ways of combat, which... he isn't exactly the gentlest at doing. training sessions can be quite frustrating in that they often emerge sore and with new cuts and bruises (but really, these injuries are small and insignificant; they are confident in saying that blade would never truly hurt them, nobody in their family would). he does mean well in his tough methods, though.

the universe is not kind or gentle. it will never treat them that way. therefore, he does his best to prepare them so that they can effectively handle the universe's cruelty and defend themselves from it.

one of the ways in which his quiet care manifests is through his treatment of the small wounds he gives them during training. kafka has said many times that she can treat them, but blade always insists on doing it himself.

out of all of their coworkers, blade becomes the most restless when they're away. he gets particularly antsy when they've been gone for a long period or when they're out there alone. kafka always giggles and points out to him how utterly restless he becomes when such circumstances occur.

(he should be assured that they can handle themselves, given that he is their mentor—there is surely nobody else who would know their skills as well as he would—but somehow he simply isn't.)

blade is also, generally speaking, the most protective.

should they come back injured... if it is anything other than a shallow scratch on the cheek, a rage hotter than the brightest star burns under his skin. in those moments, he almost does not dare to touch them, for fear that he might harm them unwittingly... but he does. his hands are somewhat rough when he snatches their face and tilts their chin around to get a better look at the blood (is it theirs? he hopes not) and grime dirtying their face. there is a terrifying threat present in his voice when he demands, not asks, "who did this to you?"

(if kafka was not present in these moments, he might worry that his mara would get the best of him. thankfully, kafka is intentional and present in such situations.)

unless the ones responsible for the wound have already been adequately... taken care of, he will do so himself. there is nowhere in the universe that the perpetrators could hide from him.

it's about protecting them, but it is also about sending a message.

something along the lines of "anyone who lays hands on them will suffer a fate worse than death," perhaps.

death is anything but a terrible fate to blade, but he knows that it is the worst imaginable to some. he will be certain to deliver something infinitely worse, something beyond imagination, to those daring to hurt his younger teammate.

silver wolf is perhaps the least enigmatic of their little family. she isn't an open book, per se, but she's easier to read than kafka or blade... at least, for someone like [name], anyway.

she never fails to harrass them to play a few rounds (which tends to spiral into many, many rounds...) of a game or two with her. why them, specifically? she insists that blade isn't good at them and kafka is kafka. really, it may very well just be that she enjoys spending time with them, but she—of course—will not simply say that.

however... she bullies them terribly about how bad they are. it comes from a place of affection!

she is also the type to win them every single prize at carnivals, just because she likes the joy it seems to bring them. when she encounters rigged games, however, she becomes all the more motivated by her unadulterated annoyance to beat them.

what do you mean she of all people can't beat this awful and horrible rigged game? her???? the silver wolf????? seriously????????

unfortunately, it does not always end in her victory, even when she is infinitely motivated by her anger.

...and she really isn't above just taking one of the prizes when the stall's owner isn't looking. she has done so multiple times for [name].

she would definitely try to teach them hacking (keyword: try) if they aren't already familiar with it. since it has come in handy for her, she figures that they might also find use in it. it's her quiet way of looking out for them.

(her more obvious way of looking out for them is often seen when she is on missions with them. most commonly, it manifests as her snatching their arm and pulling them out of the way of an enemy before obliterating said threat.)

silver wolf is totally the sort of person to pinch their cheeks (to different degrees, kafka and blade also do this!). they are very cute to her.

overall they are a weird but very special little family to be a part of <3

please consider supporting your writers by reblogging and leaving a kind tag or comment. it really helps me out!

#✧— aphe's creations. #divider by @/cafekitsune ♡ #bonus: elio is your weird uncle that shows up on holidays gives you credits and tells you enigmatic secrets /hj /lh #hsr x reader #honkai star rail x reader #kafka x reader #blade x reader #silver wolf x reader #platonic hsr #platonic honkai star rail #hsr platonic #platonic x reader #platonic kafka x reader #platonic blade x reader #platonic silver wolf x reader

[feelyourno1z]

Chainsaw Man Chapter 113 Spoilers!!!

Okay so I know everyone is joking currently about how it really takes a certain kind of idiot to fumble being with Denji (agree, I mean if he could stand being around/with a girl who didn't flush the toilet at first and tried to get him killed, you must be fumbling BAD), but also I think we should acknowledge the character growth Denji has gone through at this point to be able to walk away from someone who is offering him companionship.

He started this series out so desperate for companionship he offered his life and body to his best friend should anything happen to them, so desperate for it he fell hook, line, and sinker for barely concealed manipulation, and so desperate to feel a connection to people that it was connection to others that was used to manipulate him the most. And we still see him longing for it in Phase 2 as well.

However, he's also learned and experienced what it was like to truly connect with others now too. He had his little found family that gave him the connection and purpose he was looking for with Aki and Power. He learned the difference between being used and being loved and cared for. He knows exactly what he's looking for now, what it's supposed to look and feel like, that others that care for you will be willing to make the small sacrifices for you and will care about what you want too.

Aki and Power would've been more than okay with seeing the penguins before the rest of what was planned to be seen, Denji wouldn't have even had to explain why he wanted to see them so badly. He knew it was a small, inconsequential sacrifice. It meant something to him and he was just told to shut up. He was shut down and made to feel insignificant. He may be desperate for human connection still, but after what happened the last time he let himself be walked over for it (he lost what he truly cared for), he isn't going to let it happen again.

Denji may not be book smart, and he may not always be the wisest about emotions, but he's still smart in terms of learning from the past and understanding what's been broken down and given to him. He may still put others above himself, but he knows he has his own worth now too, one that others sacrificed themselves for, and he isn't going to let that go to waste.

So yes, Asa fumbled everything terribly, a lot more than the memes about it really portray. Because while she's like Denji in being desperate for human connection, her devil doesn't actually wish the best for her and she hasn't lost everything multiple times and she hasn't had the kind of friends and mentors Denji has had in order to teach her what she's really looking for.

But Denji has grown so much, and I'm so proud of him, he's so horribly traumatized and he's known loss in such a worse way than most can imagine, but he's still holding out hope and he's still growing and he's still doing the best he can. I love seeing all the growth from him and it means so much to me and I hope that when Chainsaw Man's true ending comes, that despite all the heartache and pain and unfairness he's been through, that he at least finds some semblance of peace and happiness, even if it's not his picture perfect ending.

#csm #chainsaw man #chainsaw man spoilers #csm spoilers #csm 113 spoilers #csm 113 #chainsaw man 113 spoilers #chainsaw man 113 #denji #denji csm #denji chainsaw man #denji hayakawa #man I have a lot of feelings about this series and the characters #it all means a lot to me and I love seeing all the details and twists and turns #noiz.txt

[kazeofthemagun]

Anonymous asked the summoner:

How far does it go? When is it too much? When does the blood become so great it over flows the cup, O' great destroyer?

You are willing to burn worlds to the ground to complete your mission so long as they are not your own. So long as they are nothing you hold dear. So long as you don't have to heard the screams of the children dying. If you don't have to hear them then you can still call yourself just.

Just because you don't look them in the eye when you pull the trigger does not mean one young life after another hasn't been snuffed out by your rampaging. You seek to destroy the deep black ink of Chaos but only do so by destroying whatever lies in your path before chaos can sink it's claws in yet another world.

You disrupt harmonies. You destroy ecosystems. You throw away whatever you deem inconsequential in the name of destroying that beast but who made you the God with the power to deem things worthy of the fire in the first place?

God of Destruction when does it all become too great of a price to pay? Just how many lives does it take to tip the scales in a way that makes your bloodshed just as great as the creature you seek to destroy? You pull the trigger and still kill a child. Even when the life is full grown it was still someone's child, mother, brother, sister, sibling, family. You still steal away the lives of family you never had.

Are you jealous of them for being cast out? You stole the breath of your only family in the name of a "greater good" but it's only left you here more broken than you ever were before. Just how much more blood needs to be spilled before you finally see yourself as you really are?

You're just as monstrous as your prey is. In the end you're saving no one.

Destroy my muse on anon

The voices. Oh, by the Four Winds and their children - by the breath of the world, the lifeblood of Soil, the eternal turnings of the Spiral. There was no sleep that offered true solace, no night that offered silence. Not to a man like him, anyway. Less a being of living flesh and more an abominable thing of purpose, machinery interwoven with an undying corpse.

He stared on. The knife in his hand still slick with the blood of slaughtered prey. The remains cooked slowly over a fire, sizzling fat dripping into eager flames - even the spirit that dwelled within them needed its due fill. He should wipe the blood, now. A darker shade of red against the lighter crimson of the hunting dagger (too long for a dagger, too short for a sword) he had named Geryon. Names had power, somehow especially when unspoken. The tip rested against the ground, trembling slightly. Kaze moved closer to the fire, eyes gazing at the darkened treeline. Listening to the sounds of fire, listening inward.

Dead eyes that could see, dead ears that could hear. A dead heart that should no longer care, no matter the atrocities committed by his hand.

And ones it would yet commit.

...How far? How far will it go? Before the blood had been enough. Before the universe takes a look at this unsightly spectacle and speaks in a voice so very distinct from the ones he hears each and every night. Where does the invisible line fall and determine the exact number of lives he has to trade away for his quest's completion - and once the final soul dies screaming; The universe speaks. Looks the Destroyer in the eye and speaks.

No more.

...He had never called himself "just". Never. If there was anyone worthy of that title, it was the good, the kind, the hopeful. White Cloud was just, because he fought with all he had to save the lives of the innocents. Through his pain and sorrow, the heart that yet beat beneath ribs was gentle. Yes, they were both infected with violence. It was inevitable on this cursed path they trod. And yet, despite everything, only one of them embodied justice.

An idea of it, anyway.

Justice was a flawed concept, after all. An ideal. And ideals were a thing the man of the Black Wind hardly subscribed to.

It did not mean he didn't try. In a world ravaged by suffering, presented on a silver platter before a demon - the only justice to be had was to turn the Gun on the beast and see it pay tenfold for its crimes.

Even if the trigger was pulled by a hopeless criminal. What a cosmic joke - that a sinner like him was chosen to fell a greater sinner yet. The old sayings have always been true.

He who hunts monsters is fated to become a monster. But what if he had always been one? It would explain everything.

Starting from his cursed blood all the way to why his personal idea of "just" translated to "vengeful".

The reflection of fire danced so beautifully painted upon the metal of his blade. It was a calmer fire, a kinder fire. The same kind that dwelled within a hearth. A benevolent fire, a provider and guardian from woodland beasts. It was the fire that connected, a patron god of storytellers. There was a whispered warning among superstitious folk. The spirit of the bonfire did not take too kindly to silence. It provided him company, he had to provide it words.

At least symbolically.

"Nivaen-li."

Windarian. A verb for appreciation, both hearing and seeing, an acknowledgement of one's presence past, present and future.

Sometimes, being loved was synonymous to being heard. The fire could not speak in mortal language, but it always listened. In turn, it only asked to be heard.

Nivaen-li.

His greeting to the Phoenix, fire given form.

The Wind’s ears were saturated with the many voices of fire.

The kind voice before him. The cooking of a meal after a successful hunt.

And the roar when he set the world ablaze with a single gunshot from the Magun. What he did to Fungus' land he could do anywhere else. Yes, he could relive the funeral pyre of Windaria at a moment’s notice. All it took was three verses and a pull of the trigger.

The roar would drown out the screams if he only covered his ears. The blaze would hide his sins if he so much as closed his eyes, and waited.

Until the charred corpses became unrecognizable. Grimaces of pain reduced to but unidentifiable chunks of grey and black ash. Here and there, a strewn skull, a femur. Nothing that registered as once alive. And yet, they were the nameless remnants of those that once bore names of their very own. He did not need to know them to feel their weight.

Did not need to see or hear them to remember them forever in his dreams. And yet, doing so was one of the oldest promises he had made to himself and the world - with the Phoenix as his witness. Even before he learned to properly invoke the name of fire. Even before the Solar Triad marked his right eye.

Every time he took a life, he would not avert his eyes or drown out the sounds. Every living being was a grave of memories. A monument to the existence of those that came before.

Nivaen-li. I hear you. I see you. I will remember you.

You exist. You had existed. You will exist again.

His mind was a graveyard. Fitting, for he called Destroyer. And yet, he could not possibly witness and pray for every single soul he so unjustly slew.

Every single father, every single mother. Brother, sister, son and daughter. It was becoming inevitable, the itch in the backside of his brain he knew he could never scratch away. He could hear Bahamut calling. His ire, his flame. A howl to end Chaos no matter what it took. But since when could it feel so cold? So refined, so uncaring. Emotionless. Ripping out the corruption before it spread like burning weed. His patron god truly was a machine. How fitting that it was him who was that beast's vessel.

Who else but a monster could ever harbor such a demon? Such an irreplaceable demon. Destroyer - his name may as well be Necessity.

Necessity... such a name would only exist to make him feel better, would it not? An excuse for what he was destined to do.

The fire slowly dimmed. Its reflection upon Geryon flickered, dance slowing into a more tired pace. Blue eyes fell closed, as though the very presence of that oceanic gaze quenched the flames.

Destroyer. Let it end. Please, let it - no - he had no right to beg. No right to solace when he was the one whose actions had only ever caused pain.

From the day he was born. Unwanted. Accursed. As if they knew - as if it had always been set in stone. It was.

Wild wolf, so full of rage. Perhaps he only grew into the title Marduk because his affliction had forever branded him the perfect killer.

After all, who could murder his brother by choice so brutally? Shove a knife into his stomach and watch him bleed?

Get a grip. Get a grip. His fingers wrapped tighter around the hilt. Get a grip. The downturned blade quivered.

Who made him God? He was no God. This was a sick title. Gods did not exist. They were all monsters, all monsters. Divinity was forged in bared fangs. Fulfilling a damned purpose until the heart gave out. So much easier if you were heartless.

To judge what to feed to the fire was a curse. Because someone had to. By the universe's own fucking decree, someone had to. Or so he chose to believe to explain his own wretched existence.

Destroyer. Weapon. Beast. Killer. Chaos.

Chaos.

Chaos.

You wanted this. Shouldn't you be happy? You have your Magun. From the gutter to God.

Jealous. Jealous. Only ever a shunned beast or a deity, NEVER ONCE A MAN.

Not once. Not once. So why do you weep, Destroyer? What a pathetic Weapon.

He let go. The dagger rested softly on the ground. His sole hand rose, now covering an already half-hidden face. Almost as though unworthy of being seen by the very spirits of fire.

Nivaen-li. He did not deserve these words. Not one would ever see him, understand him for who he truly was. It was for the better. Only one was forged to know this burden. Only one to carry it out. The Unlimited were a pair; Ones named Salvation and Destruction. And yet, his cosmic reflection embodied a beast of pure light where he embodied darkness. Platinum white his scales may be, but they were only pale as Death himself.

Calloused digits tensed, nails digging into skin, breath lodged like stone in a clenching throat. The machine had a heart. Yes, even this ugly beast. And it was so hopelessly broken. Beating heavy outside of his chest like dynamite, its hammering could crush rock. Volatile. The Weapon he was wept gunpowder-scented tears. He had tried. Father... He had tried. But he could stop them no longer. The ocean's pressure had broken the dam, even if it would only rise anew stronger every time it was breached. A droplet meeting dark ground, then another. It felt like poison down his cheeks, past his fingers. The Sun was never meant to mix with the rain, for when it did, it only brought out the Rainbow. A sister he had no right to cry for. How could he cry for one when he ended so many others?

The voices were wrong. He had always seen it.

From the moment the Magun woke, he had always seen himself precisely as he really was.

In the end, he could only pray and beg for a Salvation he did not deserve. The only solace to soothe this pained, soot-scented soul was to know his evil would not be in vain. Not for his own sake, but for the sake of all those that would yet fall away before his cursed mission.

#good job!! #[[ask response #[[anon #Kaze's very bad no good night #[[drabble #[[Monstrous as I Must

[i-dreamed-i-had-a-son]

Just put this together and I know I've made like 800 posts just about episode one but I've been thinking about this for the past two days and it FINALLY makes sense

I have been puzzling over the oddly intense reaction Loki had to finding the collection of Infinity Stones in the drawer. I couldn't figure out why he was so affected by it--I mean, he seems gutted. Crushed. Because of how striking it was, that response screamed "this is an important moment," and I finally have an answer as to what makes it so.

When Mobius leaves the interrogation room, Loki takes the opportunity to escape. This is after Mobius has been psychologically attacking him and both Loki's verbal and physical outbursts have done nothing. He's tried reasoning and questioning, he's tried intimidating, he's tried attacking his environment and his captor, and has even tried other methods of escape--none of these have worked. To his massive credit, Loki keeps his wits about him enough to steal the only tool he knows can get him out of there, and uses it. But though he's escaped the room, he's still in the TVA. He needs something more powerful to get him out entirely.

That's the first, and more obvious, reason that Loki responds as he does when the Tesseract is just sitting in a drawer, lumped in with a bunch of other Infinity Stones. If something that powerful is useless in the TVA, then Loki really can't get out on his own. His last method of defense--escape--is gone, and nothing else he's done has worked. He is, effectively, helpless. I understand why that would cause a pretty dramatic response.

But then he stands, shaken to his core, and says, "Is this the greatest power in the universe?" He looks almost on the verge of tears. And I just...did not get it. Why that question, and why such a strong reaction? But then I remembered: this is 2012's Loki.

Thanos brutally tortured, manipulated, and abused Loki, for who knows how long, all so that Loki could be sent to Earth to get the Tesseract. One Infinity Stone. And the TVA uses that exact stone as a paperweight. If Thanos went to such lengths, and if Loki went through so much, to try to get something that is so inconsequential to the TVA, how powerful must they be? And, the more pressing question--what must they be capable of? They have hardly been hospitable to Loki; he's been being attacked, controlled, or manipulated since the moment he arrived. And Thanos, the last person who'd controlled him, was much less powerful than they were. If Loki went through so much at his hands, what horrors would his new captors be willing to inflict?

Additionally, Loki had just been on Earth, under Thanos' influence and threat, desperately trying to get the Tesseract, that very day. This isn't something he's had time to distance himself from; this is what he's been told mere hours before that if he did not deliver it to Thanos, he would "long for something as sweet as pain". And now it's sitting in a drawer. It can't even help Loki get out of the prison he's trapped in, having gone from one form of captivity to another; it is utterly useless. It's easy to imagine what Loki must have been thinking: it wasn't worth it. How could it have been? All that suffering, all that fear, all the death and destruction and pain he had had to cause, and for this?

The moment he realized that was another huge blow to Loki's mental state. At a loss, and unable to really go anywhere else, Loki returns to the room he'd escaped from, and goes to watch the life he'd escaped from the same. In that raw state, he cries over the family he won't get to see again. Maybe that releases some of the stress he's been feeling, maybe he feels a little safer. Maybe that means something.

And then he watches himself die at Thanos' hand.

For a paperweight.

"Glorious purpose" indeed.

This is the point at which Loki recognizes that he can't go back to his original timeline (despite having said previously that he'd "like to go home"); it's the first thing he says to Mobius when he returns. It breaks him, in a way--even if he were to escape, he wouldn't have anywhere to go. Fittingly, the TVA have left him only one way forward. So, out of options, and exhausted in every way from the sheer amount he's endured over the past 24 hours, Loki presents himself as open to work with the TVA. And while I think he will still be looking for an out, he's stopped actively fighting for his freedom, because--at least for the moment--he no longer believes he could win.

#loki #loki series #loki series spoilers #meta #my meta posts #quality meta seal of approval #not to hype my own post up i just put that on all meta posts so that i can find them #kay can i just catch my breath for a second #marvel #that's what the whole thing is about is it just hammers it into him that he's got no shot #starting from them knowing about his whole life to finding that the tesseract (and all infinity stones) are utterly useless #they are just clearly so much more massively powerful than him and he cannot handle any more than what he's already gone through #so basically i think loki's breakdown was genuine but i can't be 100% on what he says to mobius at the end #i think it's the truth--it is accurately how he perceives himself--but i tend to think he is still being strategic with it #but even the fact that they got him to cooperate is impressive and that is the thing i've been struggling to express #is i DON'T think he's only cooperating because he's 'trying to woo them' he is responding partially because he's being manipulated #and all the emotional elements present in the interrogation contributed to loki's more fragile state #i mean he didn't even need to be threatened too directly (although the tva did like. chase him down and try to kill him) #i don't know idk what i'm saying just it's important we recognize that loki is very fragile atm bc his actions are not normal for him #and i love him but he is vulnerable to manipulation we have seen it happen and that is partially what this is #mobius gets exactly the emotional responses out of loki that he wants. he gets loki to stop fighting back. even a genuine admission #and that last *may* have been strategic but the others were not #we do have that quote from the trailers: 'it's adorable that you think you can manipulate me' so to some degree loki knows what's going on #but i don't know that he fully recognizes the extent to which they're succeeding #anyways! #kay has a party in the tags #1k

[michaelmyersmalewife]

it is a very human thing to love

nanami kento x reader

taken from these prompts

A/N: gets nsfw-ish towards the end, nothing explicit tho

He has never pretended that he was above the wants and needs of an average man. It was less of a punishment and more of a mercy - one that he had not been given in his youth, so maybe, somehow, he could spare someone the pain that had driven him to this decision. It was the least he could do. Pushing people away was supposed to be a good thing.

Nanami wasn’t lonely by nature. He wasn’t one to keep a circle of friends, in fact he always found himself more at ease alone. His time spent at a desk and the overbearing coworkers that came with it had beaten what little want for interaction he still had left out of him, and the inherent strangeness that seemed to accompany his fellow sorcerers did enough to repel him. Which isn’t to say he was completely unsociable (though whenever asked to join his colleagues for a night out he would politely decline). When he would visit his regular string of family-owned restaurants and bakeries, striking pleasant but inconsequential conversations with their workers, he was satisfied enough.

He had managed as a businessman, and he was managing as a sorcerer. He was, until you picked him up from a mission instead of Ijichi. You.

You could hardly be considered a sorcerer, barely managing to create a basic curtain let alone having enough cursed energy to do so (though, you had no interest in fighting, you confessed to him once). You were hired as an assistant under Ijichi, who by all accounts was overworked as it is. It was only a matter of time, Nanami supposed. He was used to other man’s skittish demeanor, the tired way he followed orders like a drone. He was not expecting that look in your eyes, two parts concerned and relieved. He was not expecting you to sprint out of the car and insist on patching him up in that dingy alley, even after he assured you that Shoko could handle it. He didn’t feel like arguing after you had already brought out the first aid kit you apparently kept in your trunk.

“She works so hard,” you said to him, cleaning off the blood that had coagulated along the length of his arm where a curse had gnawed off a piece of skin. “I just wanna make it easier for her.”

He hummed.

“Besides,” keeping pressure on the gauze you had wrapped around the wound, you taped it together. “That has to hurt, I just wanna help when I can.”

You’re doing enough, he wanted to say. Nanami only sighed.

.

You had quickly become a consistency in his life - a welcome one, much to his surprise. You would drop him off or pick him up, make some friendly conversation (most times you would share a comfortable silence, occasionally he would be the one to bring something up). It was never anything of any importance until, one day, you happened to mention a restaurant he had been meaning to visit. It was more of a hole in the wall really, but he heard good things.

Asking you out had been an accident. You agreed of course, it was the polite thing to do, he thought. It was just a lunch between friends - no, not friends, coworkers. But one lunch became two, then five, and in no time at all a year had passed. Nanami thought of himself as a man without regrets. He still was. Despite this, he hadn’t realized what was happening until his idea of mercy could no longer be merciful.

He realized this around the same time he realized he liked watching you talk. The way your face would light up when you talked about something that interested you (and you were very open about the things you loved - it didn’t take him long to find that you had a lot in common, much to his surprise), when you would possess a sudden somberness when your conversations took a more serious turn. You tended to talk with your hands, he noticed. He sometimes wondered what you noticed about him.

.

It wasn’t forecasted to rain that day, though the sky was cloudier than it would be on a usual spring day. You had been late to the lunch that you didn’t even need to schedule anymore. Traffic had been particularly bad, you said. Nanami nodded. It happens. Things carried on as usual until a gentle shower draped the city in a fine mist of droplets. By the time you dropped him off at his apartment, it was a thundering downpour.

“You can wait it out inside.” he said. It was the first time he had invited you inside his home, his most personal of bubbles that hardly anyone in his life had accessed. He hated the flinch in his heart when he saw you hesitate.

“It’s okay, I don’t wanna bother you.”

He ached. “Would you rather be out here?” he said with a sigh.

It only took you a moment of thought before you jogged in after him.

He expected the rain to clear out in about an hour, maybe less. When it didn’t, felt a knot form in his chest. He put a kettle on, grabbing two bags of tea - one you had recommended some months back, he hadn’t expected to like it as much as he did.

“I’ll leave in a bit,” you said, blowing the steam from your mug. “It’s getting late.”

There was an unsteadiness to your voice, and you would flinch whenever the thunder boomed somewhere outside. Nanami let out a soft grunt as he pushed himself up from where he sat across from you. When he came back, a blanket and two pillows tucked beneath his arms, you found yourself unable to find the words to question him.

“You can sleep in my room, I’ll take the couch.” He silently thanked you when you didn’t fight him on this.

.

Like most things you had seemingly brought into his life, spending hours at a time in his home had become a regular thing for you. Sometimes you would bring the ingredients needed for a recipe he’d been wanting to try, or you would watch a movie one of you had picked out. Somehow, he wasn’t at all surprised when, one night, you had kissed him on your way out.

He knew what this meant, what it entailed. He wanted to let you go so badly, he didn’t want to drag you further into a world he already believed didn’t deserve a person like you. Loving you meant locking you in place, and Nanami didn’t want to think that he could be so cruel.

But Nanami is painfully human. You stayed the night the next day. You walked across his vision like something bright and burning, blinding him. He didn’t deserve to see you, to have you like this. Not with all the possibilities that he would list in his head right before he would walk out the door every morning.

“What’s wrong?” you asked, rubbing your thumb along the curve of his cheek, as though to coax whatever he was holding in out like a timid animal.

Nanami wasn’t sure what was worse: the possibility that he regretted every action that led to this moment, or the fact that he didn’t. Not a second. Not even close.

Slipping from your grasp, he lay on his side, cradling you against his chest as he rested his head on your shoulder. Kissing your temple, he closed his eyes.

“Nothing.”

#nanami kento #nanami x reader #nanami kento x reader #jjk #jujutsu kaisen #my fics

[lynkhart]

MAJOR spoilers for the C2 finale of Critical Role so read at your own risk of you haven’t caught up!

I have so many feelings regarding Caleb and Essek’s intertwining character arcs I needed to explore, so strap in folks, you’re in for a bit of a ride! (But seriously though, this is like 4000 words long, I basically wrote an essay 😂)

At the start of the campaign, Caleb Widogast was dripping in guilt and self loathing and refused to believe he could ever absolve himself of his sins. Essek Thelyss was a cold, aloof individual who betrayed his people for selfish goals, and their differing yet mirrored narratives have been an absolute delight to watch unfold.

In the beginning Caleb truly hated himself. He shot down any attempt at a compliment, described himself as a ‘disgusting person’, outright rejected the idea that he was worthy of love, and never let the blame shift from him for what he’d done. When Beauregard and Veth/Nott pointed out that he was coerced and manipulated into killing his parents, he reacts in an incredibly visceral way, and I’ve seen several comments likening it to a victim of child abuse who was groomed into believing they were as responsible as their abuser, and I think that’s exactly how it was meant to be read. He doesn’t see himself as a victim, only a murderer, and punishes himself for it every day. We see this in the way he presents himself, dirty and unkempt because in his mind he doesn’t deserve to feel good about himself in any way. Other than Nott/Veth and Beau to a certain degree, he purposefully isolates himself from the rest of the group and it’s a long time until he feels relaxed enough in their company to drop his defences a little.

(Speaking from a purely meta point of view, Liam did an absolutely phenomenal job of showing this through body language and I’d love to see someone do a compilation video of it. He starts off very hunched and guarded, leaning his body away from the closest person to him and avoiding eye contact and physical touch; but by the end stands tall and sure of himself.)

Early on there were a few moments where he had the option to do some pretty dark shit, and I’m sure there’s a possible timeline where he gave into his desire for revenge and really lost his way, but I’m glad he stuck it out and worked through his trauma in the way he did. His PTSD and disassociation when casting with fire was tragic, but over time he was able to work through it thanks to the constant love and support of his friends who kept him from going off at the deep end.

Molly’s death was the catalyst for change in a lot of the party, and Caleb is no exception. On the verge of leaving the group prior to his death, the grief they shared, combined with their frantic attempt to rescue the other half of their party put things in perspective and gradually he learned how to be a person again, to care.

Altering time to save his family had been Caleb’s only goal in life, and so when Essek and by extension, dunamancy was introduced, you could see his eyes light up at the possibilities.

A huge turning point for him is aligned so closely with Essek’s redemption arc which feels quite apt I think. When Essek confesses to his crimes, Caleb delivers a beautifully iconic piece of dialogue where he acknowledges their similarities and how much he himself has changed as a person since meeting the Mighty Nein. (Source - CR wiki)

‘You listen to me. I know what you are talking about. I know. And the difference between you and I is thinner than a razor. I know what it means to have other people complicate your desires and wishes. And I was like you. Was. I know what a fool I have been for years. You didn't account for us. Good. That is life. Shit hits you sideways in life and no one is prepared. No one is ready. These people changed me. These people can change you. You were not born with venom in your veins. You learned it. You learned it. You have a rare opportunity here, Thelyss. One chance to save yourself, and we are offering it.’

This is not the same Caleb we met back in the Nestled Nook inn way back in the first episode. While not yet fulfilled or entirely convinced of his own worth, he knows he’s on the right path. That alone is progress enough, but that he uses his own experiences to help another escape those same chains of guilt says such a lot for his development. When he tells Essek that his ‘venom’ was learned, he’s also talking about himself and his own history of being manipulated and gaslit, with the implication being that it can be un-learned just as efficiently.

Caleb Widogast is selfish no more, or at the very least, doesn’t let his goals undermine anyone else’s anymore. Contrary to what he himself might still think, he is in no way a bad person. He loves fiercely and cannot abide seeing those he cares about in pain.

Early game Essek is what Caleb could have been if he’d rejected his friends and focused solely on his own selfish goal to undo his mistakes. Both are impassive at first and see the Mighty Nein as means to an end...until they get to know them and then their fate is sealed. The Power of Friendship wins once again!

At the beginning Caleb said he wanted to ‘bend reality to my will’ (sic) and in the end he does just that, though not in the way he originally intended. Destroying the T-Dock, and by extension the one thing he’d been building towards from the start, the chance to go back and change time, for me personally was the absolute peak of his journey. I rewatched the scene where Caleb revealed the truth about his parents death today, and it was really jarring to see just how far he’d come since then. It made me oddly proud actually.

I always felt like his plan to save his parents was the one thing holding him back from truly accepting their deaths, which is why the final scene of him in the cemetery with the letters for them hit so hard. He never truly gave up hope that they’d be reunited, but ultimately he realised he was merely postponing the inevitable and never allowing himself to live his own life. While time travel shenanigans would have been incredibly interesting to explore in game, choosing to let the past lie and not go back for them finally allows him to grieve and move on, and perhaps most importantly of all, to forgive himself at last.

I know some people were annoyed by Caleb’s decision in the finale to spend the rest of his life teaching rather than continuing to adventure, but I see it as the natural conclusion to his whole arc and his own personal victory.

He looked Trent Ikithon in the eyes, a man who he’d spent years wanting to kill and run from in equal measure, stripped him of his power and his voice (and ultimately his ability to harm anyone else) and finally spared his life so he had to live with the indignity of his defeat for the rest of his miserable existence. You couldn’t have asked for a more damning rejection of everything he’d been brainwashed into believing as a child. His dismissal of Trent’s position in the Assembly played into that as well. He never really wanted power for the sake of it; he had no desire for politics, he just wanted his family back, and while he didn’t get the one he started with, he made a new one for himself in the end.

As Caduceus once very wisely said:

‘Pain doesn’t make people; it's love that makes people. The pain is inconsequential; it's love that saves them.’

Caleb gets to break the cycle of abuse and teach a new generation of mages the way he should have been, with kindness and respect, and I’m pretty sure he’d have introduced a handsome drow as a guest lecturer from time to time. 😉

Speaking of...

Essek described himself as selfish and as a coward, forever putting his own wants and desires first, yet over the course of his journey with the Nein we see his priorities change drastically.

Having friends gives him people to care about, something he’s never had before, and it changes his outlook on life completely. For me, the first time we really see this is when he joins them for dinner in the Xorhaus and stops levitating. It’s a subtle thing, but meaningful. He explains that it had become an expectation of him, a quirk he’s known for, and so to feel comfortable enough around the Nein to drop that pretence is quite bold I think.

Much later, when he chooses to destroy the mini beacon they discover in Aeor in order to give everyone a long rest before the final confrontation with Lucian, he’s essentially giving up everything he betrayed his people for, just to keep his friends safe. The existence and context of that single artefact could have had an earthshattering impact on the Dynasty’s entire culture, forcing them to reevaluate their entire belief system and attitude to the Luxon, something he’d wanted from the start, something he helped start a war for, but he offered it up as a sacrifice without a second thought.

I’d say that’s a pretty big morality shift, and I’m super interested to see if Matt reveals if his alignment changed in the post campaign Q&A. I have a feeling he set him up as a potential BBEG but the party was like ‘no, you can’t have him, he’s ours now’ and that was the end of that. 😂

I think it says so much about the other characters too, that they befriended this person they barely knew, and when he was revealed to have done such terrible things, their first reaction was to give him comfort and an opportunity to atone. Jester held his hand while he confessed, and afterwards, while they didn’t immediately forgive him, they saw the good in him and wanted him to be better, which ultimately feels like what the entire campaign was about, leaving places (and people) better than they found them. It’s obvious that he’s never really had many friends before and has therefore never had the opportunity to be emotionally open with anyone, so seeing him gradually warm up to the Nein and allow himself to soften around them was really lovely to watch.

(Obviously, from a realistic moral perspective, he still fucked up big time. He’s still a godsdamned war criminal and really should have been put on trial for what he did, but I think from a narrative and personal point of view, his redemption arc was far more satisfying, so I’m glad it happened the way it did. (And not to derail but the rest of the gang have done some pretty horrific stuff as well, though perhaps not quite on the same scale)

He has a few moments towards the end that I absolutely love because they show that beneath the guilt and anguish, there’s an incredibly sweet and sensitive soul in there, just wanting acceptance. His dry jokes which often don’t quite hit, (the ‘I will punish the bakery’ line is such an under-appreciated one 😂) his simple joy at learning to garden in the Blooming Grove, and realising that he’d never been asked what his favourite food was before was actually kind of heartbreaking, because it highlighted how lonely his life must have been until that time. There was a moment pretty early on I think when he cast disguise on the party and Jester asked if he could cast it again to change the look of her outfit a bit and while he seemed to find it amusing, he refused, not wanting to waste a spell on such a frivolous request. Cut to their time in Aeor where he burns a fly spell just so he and Caleb can flirtatiously swoop around each other for a couple of minutes, all the while trying to beat Lucian to the city.

His breakdown when Molly’s resurrection failed really cemented to me how much he’d grown as a character. He never met Molly, his only knowledge of him was secondhand, through the eyes of his friends, but seeing it fail just broke him because he knew how much it hurt them to go through it all over again.

His comment to Caleb about not admitting defeat and wishing he could do more did get me wondering at the time if he was going to try and do something crazy, perhaps sacrificing himself via the Temporal Dock to make amends or somehow forcing another reroll, but I’m glad he didn’t. The conversation following that with Fjord was one of my favourites- he shows him acceptance and belief in his potential for the future, something he’s lacked for a long time, and when Caleb bluntly affirms afterwards that he is indeed an official member of the Mighty Nein, it’s the start of the rest of his life, and something he’s exceptionally grateful for.

It all leads to that final moment in Aeor with Caleb, when, presented with the opportunity to alter time and undo everything, he chooses to accept his decisions and carry the weight of his sins for the rest of his long life. That’s...huge.

He’s essentially choosing to live the rest of his existence as a fugitive, forever on the run, with no guaranteed peace or safety. He chooses to spend his life making up for his deeds, rather than looking for an easy way out.

I think that may have had a big impact on why Caleb ultimately made the same decision, as if Essek had been up for altering his timeline I think he’d have struggled to resist it himself. The conversation they had earlier in Aeor about their priorities and resisting temptation really comes to mind as well.

Now, to the relationship.

It was subtle, and not as ‘in your face’ obvious as the other characters, but I’ve been watching and hoping for a long time and I must say, it feels good to be vindicated.

(And if you have any doubt, both Matt and Liam confirmed on Twitter that their post finale relationship was 100% romantic)

I’d been hoping that Shadowgast would be a canon endgame relationship for a while, so the finale, and the aforementioned T-Dock scene in particular had me quite literally shaking with emotion as I watched live. Here you have two men, both damaged and guilt-stricken in their own ways, who find in each other a kindred spirit and a path to redemption.

They’re both very guarded and closed off people, but Essek in particular has a definite shift in the last arc of the campaign especially when it came to his interactions with Caleb. At the start he was quite aloof and stoic, though charming, and they had an instant connection through their shared love of the arcane, (anyone who couldn’t see them making heart eyes at each other when Essek was describing the different types of magic he could teach Caleb was clearly blind) but by the end he was incredibly open to showing his vulnerabilities and that takes a lot, especially for someone whose primary focus was to stay in control of every aspect of his life. The ‘Caleb, I’m scared’ moment during the Trent fight in particular made my heart ache.

No, we didn’t get a dramatic declaration of love or a cinematic mid-battle kiss, but I’d argue that their relationship was just as, if not more intimate than any of the other main characters were. They understood each other in a way the others didn’t, their shared guilt, feelings of inadequacy and their obsession with magic forged a deep connection from the get-go. Neither of them are big fans of PDA I think, though Caleb is tactile as hell (forehead touches and kisses, oh man, I’m so weak for those 😩👌) and some of their most iconic moments have them putting themselves in harm’s way to protect the other. Essek shaking off his forced guilt trip immediately after the now infamous forehead touch in ep140 was beautifully poetic, as was using his fortune’s favour to pull Caleb out of the rubble moments before. Caleb trying to include him in his Sphere of Invulnerability in the finale and Essek staying close to him the whole fight despite being obviously terrified of Trent was the icing on the cake. It’s clear that they care for each other a great deal; whether by the finale they’d consider it love is up for debate, but we know that’s eventually where it ended up and honestly, I love that. I deeply appreciated the fact Matt and Liam both emphasised that they took their time with their relationship, letting each other heal in their own way before they took the next step. All too often in media, and real life too sadly, a romantic relationship is seen as some kind of quick fix, and that a lover will somehow complete you or make all your problems vanish. They knew this wasn’t the case here, and that made it all the better.

While I would have *loved* to have seen them together as a couple right to the very end, the change in their relationship felt right, if bittersweet. I doubt they ever stopped loving each other, and if anything, choosing to shift to a deep and lifelong friendship over a romance that would cause them both so much pain is one of the kindest things you could do for someone you love. After all, friendship isn’t a downgrade, just another way of experiencing that same love, and it wasn’t as though they broke up and never saw each other again, it was pretty strongly implied that they remained a major feature in each other’s lives, they just changed their label slightly. Caleb would hate to have forced Essek to watch him wither away, and although his eventual passing would hurt Essek regardless, incompatible lifespans being what they are, having a period of time to adjust to it, to give them a buffer between the inevitable heartbreak was actually really sweet.

Their romance was no accident, they knew going in that it had a time limit, that it wasn’t going to be forever for one of them, and the fact they did it anyway says so much. They began their adventure wholeheartedly believing that they were both, in their own way incapable of love, only to later find it with each other. Whether their relationship lasted for a couple of years or multiple decades is irrelevant, what matters is that while it did they had a happy and fulfilled life together.

I know some folk wanted Caleb to use the transmogrification spell on himself so he could live on with Essek as another elf, or make him human instead, but that would have been way out of character for both I think. If they could have backwards engineered one of the rejuvenation stations in Aeor and used it to extend Caleb’s life by a hundred years or so, so he’d have a similar lifespan to Veth, now, I could have seen him possibly doing that, so he could spend more time with his best friend too, but nothing further I think. He longed to be reunited with his parents too much to postpone death unnaturally like that.

That both Caleb and Essek ultimately chose to live with their mistakes and make peace with themselves was incredibly cathartic, and I couldn’t imagine it playing out any better.

The fact Matt has explicitly stated Essek is Demi too means so much to me personally because the latter is a label I’ve been identifying with a lot recently, and it’s so rare for aspec relationships to get any representation! It has honestly given me a lot to think about over the last few days, and I really appreciate it.

To conclude, here’s a bit of shameless self promotion. I wrote this after watching the finale and honestly feel like it sums up my feelings on the nature of their relationship pretty well.

‘A casual hand on a shoulder, a waist, a wrist; a gentle kiss placed on a forehead is common between them now, an intimacy born of trust and mutual affection. Over time it grows, like a fire born of seasoned timber; gradual and steady, no spluttering kindling that flares and sparks, but a slow burn, one which lasts.

Their love is embroidered into every aspect of their lives together. Acts of service, of comfort, of understanding.

Sometimes a kiss leads to more than a kiss, sometimes it doesn’t. Either way they are content.‘

So yeah, I love these two wizard boys so very much and I couldn’t be happier with the conclusion of their stories. ❤️

#Critical Role #Critical Role Spoilers #CR Spoilers #shadowgast #Essek thelyss #Caleb Widogast #C2ep141 #C2ep141 spoilers #critical role finale

[yoonsshadow]

ETERNAL - iv

➳ summary ; They have died so often that death has lost its meaning; hurt so regularly that pain has become inconsequential; lost so much that they hold each other to the light of the stars. They have nothing yet they have everything, as long as they have each other. And, after centuries, they now have her.

➳ pairing ; bts!ot7 x fem!reader

➳ genres ; The Old Guard au; fantasy, historical, action, romance, alternate universe

➳ themes ; angst, fluff, death

➳ warnings ; talk of death, ptsd/flashbacks, war zone, heavy violence, course language, panic attack

➳ word count ; 2k

➳ note ; Hello! I know that this chapter took a little longer to get out, and it is a little shorter than usual, but it’s because it takes a lot of time and research to make sure that I’m doing this story justice. That being said, I hope that you enjoy!! The journey for these eight have truly begun now, and boy, do they have a lot coming. :3

masterlist

For a while now, your life has been slipping between your fingers. Like a shadow passing through the night, every moment has melted through you, pooling at your feet until you’re slipping, falling, thrown to the ground. From the moment the first bullet was delivered through your skull, you have lost grip of your control; of the things you hold dearest to you.

Sitting here, surrounded by these seven men, that empty cavern in your chest aches just a little less. It hasn’t started to fill up yet⎯⎯might not for a very long while⎯⎯but the silence no longer echoes. 

“It still feels weird to think about,” you say, soft voice carrying through the room with ease. They are all listening so carefully that you cannot meet any of their eyes. “That I died, I mean. I’ve had time to rationalise it, but my whole life has been spent thinking one way⎯⎯believing in life and death, mortality, the fragility and preciousness of living⎯⎯but now I’ve been killed multiple times, died naturally a handful more, and so it feels as though the whole world has been skewed and I’m yet to find my balance.”

Your fingers fiddle together in your lap, eyes downcast to the empty soup bowl on the coffee table.

“The story of how I died the first time is kind of a long one. I can’t tell you about the final moments without explaining everything that led up to it, but there are a few years of history to go through. So, if you want me to condense it…”

“We have all the time in the world,” Namjoon assures, and it could be a joke, a satirical remark regarding your current situations, but instead he speaks with the utmost care, as if he is afraid of any wrong word, any misstep. He is telling you that they are patient, that they don’t mind waiting, that they will listen to every word you say. For you.

And it warms that hole in your chest enough for you to meet his eyes⎯⎯all of their eyes⎯⎯and offer a small smile. Then you nod to yourself. This is a story you need to tell, no matter how painful the memories are.

“Two-and-a-half years ago,” you begin, “the Special Warfare Command uncovered the elaborate smuggling operation of North Korean forces. Untraceable men⎯⎯assumed Black-Ops⎯⎯would enter South Korea through other countries using fake documentation. It’s unclear how long they stayed, months or years, but they would eventually kidnap vulnerable children and smuggle them to North Korea via Mongolia and China.

“Unfortunately, it took years to trace the movements of these men to a point where we knew what they were doing and how they were doing it. The SWC eventually concluded that North Korea were kidnapping and training future sleeper agents and spies, and avoiding suspicion by hiding in the Gobi Desert. They had an entire base of operations on a grey-zone of the border between Mongolia and China, and managed to leave no traces of their movements.”

You need to take a deep gulp of air at this point. Up until now, you have merely stated facts; regurgitated information as you have been told. However, you know that everything from this point on will become personal. You try to think back on your years of conditioning in the army.

“It was at this point that my team was requested for the operation. The 707th Special Mission Group has hundreds of personnel, all within two assault companies, one support company, and one all-female company. There are many missions in which female operators are a better fit, this one included, and out of the female company, my team was chosen.

“When I was promoted to Captain, and at such a young age... All I felt was excitement. Excitement for such an honour, for the experiences ahead, for being able to lead my very own team. The women on my team worked so well, too. We had many successful missions, small and big, and we were ready for this operation. We were ready for Operation Fawn.”

The air in your lungs stutters as you exhale, and you try to swallow the lump in your throat. You’ve avoided thoughts of the thirteen women who had become your friends, your family, but now you are submerged in the memories. Both joyous and tragic.

A few of the men around you look as if they want to move forward, to comfort you, but they also know that it isn’t their place to do so. Not yet.

“The plan was relatively straight-forward. We had found the location of the children, and so it was our job to silently infiltrate the site. Remove all hostiles, retrieve the missing kids, bring them back safely. It wasn’t unlike other missions we had completed before, so we were confident that we could execute it without fail.”

Pulse pumping loudly in your ears, heart beating violently in your chest, you begin to see flashes of that night, playing before your eyes without your permission.

“Get down!” A bullet whirs through the air where your lieutenant’s head had just been, close enough to be able to hear it cutting through the air. “Shit,” you mumble to yourself, peeking around the corner of the collapsed wall for the rest of your team, “how the fuck are there so many of them?”

“Captain.” A voice cuts through the chaos, the intercom in your ear crackling to life. “They’re still pouring in - West entrance - all armed. There shouldn’t be this many men.”

You land shots on three oncoming men, their bodies falling to the ground, but they are quickly replaced by more on their way. You have to do something; you can’t allow your team⎯⎯or the children⎯⎯to die tonight. 

While your lieutenant watches your back, you fiddle with the dial of your radio, changing to a different channel.

“Command, this is Dragon, do you copy?”

No response comes through, and you’re forced to move from the wall with your gun poised, firing shots at any unfamiliar figure you see.

“Command, this is Dragon, do you copy?!”

A grenade explodes a short distance away, shaking the ground and sending you stumbling.

“Command, this is Dragon, Operation Fawn has been compromised! I repeat, Operation Fawn has been compromised! Delta Team needs immediate backup, over a hundred hostiles, and counting!”

Either the commotion around you drowns out the voice in your ear, or you’ve yet again received no response. You are starting to get desperate.

“Jesus fuc⎯ we’re completely overwhelmed, Command! My team can only hold out for a little while longer, but these fuckers just keep pouring in! Something is wrong, there shouldn’t be this many of them, we can’t fucking⎯”

Somebody tackles you to the ground. Gunshots, shouts, dirt in your face, a hand on your throat. The man on top of you is heavy, but you’re able to roll him off of you and shoot him between the eyes.

The blood splatters across your goggles.

It’s all too much. There are men everywhere, and you can’t see any of your team members throughout the chaos. You can’t get through to your command centre. Everything that was supposed to be easy tonight has gone wrong. Something heavy, and dark⎯⎯something that feels a lot like doom and panic and we’re going to die⎯⎯lurks in your guts, but you can’t think about that right now. You have to find your girls, have to save these children, have to stay alive⎯

Your fist aches nearly as much as your thudding chest.

Images of death and violence fade away as you blink violently, flexing your fingers individually and then all together, mind still scrambled, still alert.

There are hands on your shoulders, solid and heavy and grounding, and a pair of soft eyes searching for yours. All eyes in the room are on you, but all you can focus on is Yoongi, who looks as if he knows, as if he understands.

And there is a fist-sized patch of red on his left cheekbone. God, your fist, his face, what have you done, oh god I’ve hurt him⎯

Cool air blows on the silent tears that stream down your cheeks, your bones trembling with adrenaline and fear and sorrow. He’s saying something, lips moving slowly, but the clouds in your head are muffling everything. His hands move to hold yours.

You recognise the movement of his lips as the words breathe, it’s okay, and you try your best to obey, but your throat has closed up, tight like the grip of that enemy soldier who had held you to the ground⎯

Yoongi brings one of your hands to his chest, pressing your fingers into him, and you faintly feel the thudding of a heartbeat against your palm. Then, he breathes in, slow and deep, and you follow.

In and out, one by one, Yoongi slowly guides you to breathe steadily once again, your chest growing less tight with each shaky gasp. The tears have stopped flowing, and your limbs have calmed into only a slight tremor, and the darkness in his eyes are captivating. You want to lean forward, let them swallow you whole, but you instead squeeze his hands in silent thanks.

“Let’s get you to bed,” he whispers, and you realise that your head has calmed down enough to take in your surroundings. All seven are watching you with a careful and guarded eye, but you find no pity. It brings you a sliver of relief.

Rather than replying, you merely nod your head and allow Yoongi to pull you up onto shaky legs. Exhaustion is already weighing you down, and all you want to do is escape your own mind.

They have been once before. You, asleep in the spare room, and them, huddled together on the lounges. They are worried about you, but they are also much more; the fear in your voice, the heartache in each memory, was familiar to them. As they watched you relive your trauma, they relived theirs as well.

“I’m sorry, I-” Namjoon’s words stutter out, unsure, unplanned, unlike the way he usually speaks. “This is my fault. I should’ve known- it was too early to- and maybe you wouldn’t have gotten hurt...”

“Hey, no.” Seokjin’s hands on Namjoon’s shoulders are as firm as his words, kind eyes seeking regretful ones. “Don’t blame yourself; this is nobody’s fault. She made her decision to tell us. Don’t take that away from her. And we all know that she couldn’t help that reflex. Yoongi’s been hit harder.”

“We didn’t even hear the rest of the story,” Jimin pouts, nibbling his lower lip between his teeth. “Like, how she died, how her team died, what happened to the mission.”

“We’ll have to be patient,” Yoongi sighs. His cheek is already blue and purple, and will probably be fully healed in an hour. “We know the fundamentals, anyway. A mission that was supposed to be clear-cut somehow got turned on its head. It cost her team’s lives.”

“How does something like that even happen?” Next to Jimin, Taehyung’s pout is not quite as full, but still full of the emotions he is trying to keep in. “It isn’t just her team that got hit, but the entire Special Warfare Command. This was a big operation, guys, so something like this should’ve been prevented.”

“Do you think…” Jeongguk is clutching a pillow close to his chest. “Do you think somebody from the inside betrayed them?” Six faces turn to look at him, shocked at the implication, shocked that it makes sense. “I mean, the information about the operation would have been top secret. North Korea has resources, sure, but they shouldn’t have known the when, where, and how of the mission. Somebody had to have turned.”

“Who would’ve done it?” Jimin’s question is not asking for an answer. He feels sick at the thought.

It is at this moment that Hoseok chooses to emerge from his deep silence. When he speaks, his voice is regretful. Knowing. “I think she knows exactly who did it.”

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tags: @leafyturtle​, @loveyoongles, @paint-music-with-me, @barbikatherine, @itsmorgo1604, @calling-dips-on-j-hope, @veronawrites, @applepie1000, @yoonchrisgullwrites, @ally22042000, @ireallylikefoodandyoutube, @blglmgk01​, @basicgukk, @softescapism​, @sinceritythatcouldntbedelivered​, @m1nt-3lla​, @hunnayesblog, @rosycheekb​, @hemmofluke​, @the-bisaster​ 

#bts #bts angst #bts fanfic #bts fic #bts fluff #bts ot7 #bts ot7 x reader #bts po #bts poly!au #bts poly au #bts reader insert #bts scenario #bts x reader #ot7 x reader #poly bts #poly bts x reader #namjoon x reader #seokjin x reader #yoongi x reader #hoseok x reader #jimin x reader #taehyung x reader #jungkook x reader #the old guard au #eternal

[candyopala]

Stuck in his ways, chapter 3

Chapter summary:  Y/N hit her head, will everything be okay? Obito struggles.

Words: 1.4k

AO3

Please reblog or leave a like if you enjoy <3

Shit, shit, shit! She hit her head, why did she pass out of nowhere? 

Obito knew he was not cut for babysitting jobs, but he would not have imagined that he would end up fucking it up so bad. Yeah, he was trying to get rid of the girl so that he could go back to his usual missions, but he had not planned anything like this. 

Ok, she still has a pulse at least, but her breathing is too slow. Classic case of chakra exhaustion. But did she even use that many jutsu? He only saw that one chakra punch, nothing else, not even a single clone or substitution jutsu. How can she be already exhausted? 

He tries his best to infuse his chakra into her, even if his medical jutsu is mediocre at best, he only recalls the basics that Ri-she taught him. 

Y/N looks peaceful, but this situation still sends chills up on Obito’s spine. He was supposed to take care of this girl, but he failed her, he failed someone again. Yet again, someone dies in his arms and this time he is actively guilty for it. Images of the rivers of blood of that night flash through his mind. 

His sharingan records Y/N’s face while she sleeps without his knowledge due to the immense stress this is causing him. He hyperventilates, he gets desperate and he struggles to calm back down. This is different from when a partner gets hurt in his usual missions: this is his fault. Why did he have to test her like that?  

As a shinobi he should be used to death surrounding him, it is the way of this world. A world that he promised to change when he saw his friend die, a world that he vowed to bring peace to when he, Kakashi and Minato killed Madara and Zetsu. And that was a promise he seeks to achieve by becoming the next Hokage… but what kind of Hokage fails to save his friends and subordinates? 

After doing what he can to stabilize Y/N, he picks her up on his lap. He is afraid of carrying her back to the village, since moving her body too much could cause a broken bone to perforate nearby organs and such. 

As a ninja, he knows he has to finish this mission, but as a person, he feels that something tells him to take care of this girl. Of course, she is rude, proud, bratty and inconsequential, he has only spent three hours beside her and both cannot stand each other, but he just feels… no… anyway, he just needs to make sure she does not get herself killed… if she even wakes up after this. 

Looking at the top of the trees, he sees a lonely bird flying aimlessly from branch to branch, no partner in sight. He closes his eye in anger. 

“Fuck… how long have I been out for?”

Glancing down Obito sees that Y/N has regained conscience and is even moving around a little bit. She seems confused by the close proximity between them, looking back and forward to his arm holding her and his face. 

Flustered and suddenly very self-conscious, Obito places her back on the ground, distancing his gaze from hers, embarrassed from having been so visibly worried. 

“For a couple of minutes. You hit your head though, so we have to make sure you don’t fall asleep again”

“Well, I’m a grown up gal, I can take care of myself, besides, you seem too worried for someone who was just dropkicking me minutes after we met” 

“Don’t give yourself too much credit; I’m just doing good on my mission. Are you feeling any pain?”

“Nope, good as new. I’m heading to my apartment, see ya crepp”

With this Y/N tries to get up, only to unbalance herself and fall back on her butt on the ground. Obito makes a show of rolling his only eye as visibly as possible in annoyance. He gets up himself and extends his hand to her to help her get up.

 Did I throw stones at some temple in another life to deserve this?

As if trying to check for people around, Y/N takes her time before accepting the Uchiha’s help. With a grunt, she is up, but she shows no capability of being able to sustain her own weight, so Obito puts her arm over his shoulders for balance.  

“Hold on tight”

 ~”~  

 If having to walk around the village with dirt all over her face, body and hair wasn’t enough, Y/N just had to be paraded around draped onto some dude. He did smell nice, even after that earlier scuffle they had. Yes, the scuffle! How could she forget? She caught the bells all right, but she passed out right after. He is certainly taking her to pack her things and kick her out of the leaf. 

“Are you… Am I getting kicked out?”

“What? No, I have no power to do that”

She almost falls on her back again as she begins to violently gesture at the Uchiha. Of course he was bluffing, why wouldn’t him? 

“You fucker! I knew it!”

“Calm down princess, we’ll talk after you get out of the hospital, stop making a fool out of yourself in the middle of the street, right?”

“Hospital? No fucking way sir! I want to go back to my apartment, and make a plan on how to torture you until the end of time-”

“Sure, sure, like you could actually make my life even worse” He says as he lets out a dry laugh

Y/N actually knows that she should go check that head injury, but it’s not like she would ever admit that to the Uchiha, so she just lets him guide her to the village hospital. Arriving there, Obito leaves her with the nurses that from beyond that point put her through a gigantic set of exams. 

If the tons of prodding in the process of joining the village weren’t enough, she now goes through the night taking CAT-scans and having sensors stuck in her head with some nasty jelly in them. She will never forgive Obito for this whole situation. Yeah, she should not have gone through with techniques she knew would be too extreme, but she just had to show to him what she was made of, after all, no one has the right to talk to her like that. 

As she ponders about her mean mentor, the nurse comes back with some bad news: she might have a concussion, so she must not sleep for 24 hours at least, just to make sure it doesn’t evolve into a coma or something of sorts. 

This is, again, all Obito’s fault.

Yeah, he’ll pay, for sure. But how?

Instantly, a small light turns on over her head. Staying up for that long would for sure be a challenge all by herself; she doesn’t even have her tv installed yet, for fucks sake. She should find herself a companion for the next hours, someone that can entertain her. What’s more entertaining than torturing an asshole? 

It must be at least three in the morning when Y/N reaches the Uchiha district. She has searched over ten house’s windows at this point, but no Mr. Creep in sight, that is, until she reaches her final destination. It’s a small but charming wooden house, clearly very old in age but very well taken care of. As she looks into a small window at the back she sees a man with his back turned and the infamous eyepatch bandana sitting over the bedside table. 

That’s it!

After carefully checking, she sees that the man lives alone. Good, he’s single. Wait, why is that good? To see that I’m not intruding some poor family’s house, sure! That’s all, ok? Anyway, Y/N opens the window slowly and climbs into the room, which is surprisingly tidy and clean. 

Obito sleeps soundly in the bed in the middle of the room, with his belly facing down and sprawled all over the numerous sheets that cover him. Quickly heading to the kitchen, Y/N grabs a saucer and a big spoon, banging both of them against each other as she waltz into the room again.

“Wake the fuck up, Obito Uchiha!” she screams as she bangs the pan and laughs hysterically. 

Her joy is cut short when she stumbles upon the following scenario: Obito jumps up from his bed, standing confused with sleeping wrinkles all over his left side and wearing only boxers.

“Huh…”   

#Obito #Obito Uchiha #obito x reader #obito x you #obito uchiha x y/n #obito uchiha x reader #naruto fanfiction

[unsaidmar]

Call.

a/n: hello peeps! this is a request! thank you for liking what i write, it means the world to me. love y'all. requests still open. 

wc: 1.5k hehe

warning: mentions of death, curse words, sad stuff.

pairing: spencer x bau! reader.

plot: For the first time, you’re not where he is. It drives you crazy. 

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

You considered yourself quite the resilient person. Emotions got to you but never incapacitated you. Danger was a given in the career path you had chosen and the prospect of it was something you were used to, but never like this. It was always your own life you were worried about, but the BAU had taken the grasp you had on your job and your reality and completely redifined it.

Being guarded with your emotions and affections was a defense mechanism you had developed thanks to your experience in law enforcement. People always got hurt and you had to move on from it, that’s just how it was. But the BAU was the one to break the mold.

Those people had been through a lot together, the good, the bad and the ugly. They had seen it all and done it all, and now you were a part of it. They took you in and accepted you like you hadn’t just joined the team and you let them. Soon enough, Rossi was walling you “kid” and kissing both your cheeks when he greeted you, Morgan was fist bumping you when you made stupid jokes and you were going out to dinner with Emily, JJ and Penelope. Not one of them hesitated to put their life on the line with or for you, and it shook your world.

All of a sudden it wasn’t just yourself you had to worry about, because every person walking into burning buildings and hostage situations with you was your family. You loved every one of them and losing them scared you a lot, enough to feel like your heart was beating out of your chest whenever they were in danger.

And still, you had to go and fall in love.

Spencer had woven himself into your life, your routine, your work life and eventually your heart. It felt like he was marking his territory before he knew he was doing it, something resembling a person moving into your home, but the things he left behind were more than a toothbrush or a book. He left his mark in little things you incorporated into your life and it slowly transformed the both of you into a collage of each other.

He started drinking soy milk when you convinced him it was not bad and that subjecting himself to the pain of being lactose intolerant and still consuming milk, wasn’t worth it. You stopped leaving your windows open at night when he freaked you out about stray cats taking residence in your couch and potential burglars getting in. And those absolutely inconsequential things were forever going to be a gift you had given each other, no matter what came out of your relationship, even if you went your separate ways. Which, you never did.

Three years into working at the BAU, and two into your relationship with Spencer, you got married. The both of you figured that the wait was not necessary because you knew very early on that that was it, you were it. Next thing you knew, your fourth wedding anniversary was coming up, and so were many other things.

After getting kidnapped and shot, you were never the same. You had come to terms with dying, you wanted it to happen so you didn’t have to deal with the inevitable trauma that came with surviving, but you weren’t that lucky. Everyone had been worried about you and the living ghost look you were sporting. It looked like you were re living the situation in your head every moment you were awake, and that was indeed the case. It haunted you when you were sleeping and it consumed you when you were awake, so Hotch made you take a break.

Stubbornness was your thing, so he took away your badge any other form of ID that could get you into the building, he didn’t answer your calls and only texted your work cellphone to ask you to stop asking him to reinstate you. Being alone with your thoughts was hell. Having your family out there risking their lives without you was even worse.

“Hey Spence, it’s me again… um... could you let me know if you’ve been getting my texts? It’s just that… you never not text me back and I’m getting worried. Is that too much? I’m probably being ridiculous. Anyways, call me back. Or text. Just let me know you’re okay. I love you.” You sighed and put your phone down for what felt like the twentieth time in the last half hour.

This had never been the case. You were never the worried spouse that had to rely on phone calls or texts to communicate or to even know your husband was alive. It made you empathize with Will, with Haley. It made you want to ask them for advice on not going crazy. Your mind was already going rouge.

I can’t be a widow. I can’t mourn the love of my life, how does anyone? What happens if I lose him? How foolish of me to have dismissed this when we got married. We’re FBI agents, for the love of God. We point guns and have them pointed back at us for a living. I’ll have to take my ring off. Do I keep it? I can’t look at it if he’s gone. Who picks out the dress for the funeral? If I have to do it, I’ll go insane. I can’t bury him; I can’t go watch them lower him to the ground. I will just cremate him and split his ashes so his mom has him too. His mom. That woman won’t be able to bear outliving her baby. God, please pick up the fucking phone.

You: Honey, please text me back!!! Have someone text me for you, idc.

You: Spence, charge your phone.

You: Why is Derek not texting me back either?

You: Are you angry at me?

You: I’d rather you tell me if you’re angry. Don’t ghost me when you’re on a case.

You: Spencer.

You: I’m calling Penny.

Three rings it took for Penelope to answer.

“Hi my sweet, beautiful, ____. How can I be of assistance to you at this indecent hour of the morning/night?” She chirped, her tone already relaxing you. She would be the first to know if something had gone wrong.

“Hi Penny, do you have any word on the team? I keep calling and texting Spencer and he hasn’t gotten back to me. It’s been like three hours.” You said, holding back the tears.

“Oh, sweet stuff. Last I heard, they were delivering the profile. They’re in Kansas and there was a tornado warning. The power is out. Maybe all of their phones ran out of battery.” She tried to reassure you, like always, already knowing what was happening in your head. “Is everything okay? Have you slept?”

“Not really. Spence stopped replying and I got anxious.”

“Don’t worry hun, bad news travel fast.”

“Yeah, yeah… you’re right. I should…”

Before you could finish your sentence, the door creaked open and you saw a defeated looking Spencer hang his jacket and take his shoes off trying to be quiet, assuming you were asleep. You felt the color come back to your face and you dropped the phone on the couch without even making sure you had ended the call.

“Oh, thank God.” You ran to him and aggressively hugged him. Much to your embarrassment, the tears you were trying so hard to hold back were now streaming down your face.

“Hey, hey…” He took in your appearance and instantly worried about you. “What happened? Is everything okay?”

“What the fuck happened to your phone? And everyone else’s for that matter!” You said, letting go of him and raising your voice without meaning to. Spencer knew you never yelled, so he was taken aback by your words.

“It died, ___, four hours ago, the power went out and the generator wasn’t working. Why are you screaming?” He rushed out.

“Because you never texted me back and I thought you were dead!” Your voice was a lot calmer now, much more frustrated and tired.

“Honey, I’m so sorry, everything happened so fast, I didn’t even think about my phone. I didn’t mean to make you angry; I promise.”

“I’m not angry, baby. At least not at you. I hate being here and not out there with you. I can’t sit around and wait for you to give me proof of life. it’s driving me insane and it has only happened once.” You groaned, choking back quiet sobs now. “I can’t lose you. I can’t be the last to find out.” You fell to the couch like your legs had stopped working.

Your husband was looking at you like he didn’t even think about that, like the realization had just hit him. You couldn’t blame him, neither of you were used to that dynamic of checking your phones because the one person you would want to update was always along for the ride.

“Baby, you’re not going to lose me. I’m so sorry, I promise I’ll care more about my phone. I didn’t mean to worry you.” He said, crouching to be eye to eye with you and taking your hands.

“No, no..I’m sorry. I’m being ridiculous, I went crazy. You shouldn’t have to do that…” You kissed his knuckles and slid down the couch to sit on the floor with him. All you wanted was to be near him. You put your arms around his neck and whispered. “I love you, I’m sorry I yelled at you. I was losing it. I’m not used to this feeling of not knowing where you are or if you’re okay, I felt helpless.”

“It’s okay hun, I get it, I love you too. We’re both new to this whole being-a part thing. If I’m honest, I don’t like it.” He pulled you to his lap so you were tangled up like a koala.

“I hate it. It 's the worst. I’m done with this break”

“Hotch is just looking out for you, he wanted to give you your space after the accident. You can talk to him and see how he feels about you coming back.” His reassuring words were already lightening the mood, and you were grateful he was fine. Once the adrenaline died down, the sleep you had been missing hit you like a ton of bricks. You stifled a yawn and planted a kiss on Spencer’s forehead.

“You’re tired. Let’s go to sleep.” He took notice of your droopy eyelids and went to stand up. “Have you been awake all this time?”

“Yeah, I couldn’t just go to bed.” You replied, removing yourself from his lap and taking his hand.

“Come on, let’s crash. I’m off tomorrow, we don’t have to wake up early.”

Oh, thank the lord.

“I’ll go to sleep, but I have one condition.” You said with your best attempt at a mischievous grin.

“What is it?” Spencer asked, knowing that tone and that face all too well.

“Get a stupid portable charger.”

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #criminal minds #criminal minds headcanons #spencer reid headcanon #spencer reid x yn #spencer reid blurb #cm

[orsuliya]

I feel like of everyone in the cast, Xie Wanru was dealt the worst deck. I honestly understood her bitchiness. She was used, abused, tormented, betrayed, and ultimately sacrificed. Thoughts?

What’s most tragic about Wanru is that from the very start nobody's fighting in her corner. She's utterly alone; the person that comes closest to being a bonafide ally is Awu... and at that point Awu understands nothing about Wanru's true plight and in fact exacerbates it by the fact of her very existence. See, there is not a single moment when Awu doesn't have somebody on her side. If I was Wanru, I'd be bitchy as well!

Let's look at what kind of support Wanru starts out with. There's her father, sure. Who presents her marriage as a done deal, not even bothering to dress it up in terms of noble sacrifice or sacred duty or anything that could help Wanru go to the altar with her head held high. Oh, and he hits her when she begs him to reconsider, tears in her eyes. Father of the year... he is not.

There's also every reason to suspect that he might have been less than helpful after Wanru's rape. His conversation with Daddy Emperor about this matter tells it all. He doesn't mention his daughter's pain and we know from Zitan that she tried to kill herself, so clearly she wasn't doing well, was she now. No, what bothers Papa Xie the most is that HE is feeling humiliated. Bully for you, you old bastard. What really pisses me off, however, is that he's more than ready to write Wanru off completely. He's not even demanding an imperial marriage as recompense! That was all Daddy Wang's idea; Papa Xie isn't very interested, despite it being the easiest way to restore Wanru's reputation. In fact, he proposes demoting Potato and installing Zitan as Crown Prince. Which tells us all about his priorities: Wanru and her future position are inconsequential in comparison to Xie domination. Now, Daddy Wang may use his children for power-grabbing, but there is no doubt whatsoever that he cares about his daughter. As for Jinruo... Since she could hardly tell anybody the true reason for retreating to Ci'an Temple, for any outsider, Wanru included, it looks like she separated from her husband solely in protest over marrying Awu off to Xiao Qi.

Compare that to Xie Guifei, Wanru's aunt for whom she will grieve and whom she will try to avenge. Wanru is very much not her priority. So much so that when Wanru betrays her intention of asking Xie Guifei to intercede with the Emperor about her future marriage to Xiao Qi, she is told that her aunt already knows, she consulted with the Emperor on the subject and it's all fine. Sure it is; Zitan is the one who matters and the only one on whose behalf Xie Guifei will use her influence. After the rape she consoles Wanru and takes her side... but. But she chooses her words very unfortunately, making it more about the Xie-Wang rivalry and less about Wanru herself.

Zitan? Right. He's so very concerned about his cousin's rape that he does more damage to Potato in Awu's name than in hers and then spends the night under Awu's windows. Wanru might not know about the latter, but she'd be bound to hear about the former sooner or later. And in a way both he and Awu seem to benefit from Wanru's rape, since Potato is no longer a bachelor and thus not an option for Princess Shangyang. For a time only, until Daddy Wang gets there with his poison, and it's not like they do it intentionally, but still, it must smart a lot. Not to mention that Zitan does technically try to run away with Awu, no matter how late he gets off his ass. A successful elopement would mean leaving Wanru - with her clan in shambles and in a very precarious position - utterly alone. In fact, guess who would be an excellent target for any ambitious family with daughters to pin the blame on, should Zitan actually manage to run away?

Awu tries, but she doesn't get it. She can't. She never will. And her childish naivety doesn't help, not when Wanru is forced to watch jealously as Awu gets what she herself wants/needs/lacks time after time, be it care, loyalty, protection and even a choice in regards to marrying Xiao Qi. Sure, it's not a great choice, but buying Zitan's life in exchange for three bows is a mutually beneficial deal, even if one made under duress. It's still more that Wanru got either time!

And that's only the start. From there on Wanru gets more and more reasons to feel bitter every day. Awu marries an unwanted husband? He kindly fucks off to the frontier, while Wanru is forced to live with her rapist day and night. Awu gets kidnapped? Zitan starts running around like a headless chicken and goes as far as to kneel before the Emperor's door... as if he had completely forgotten that Wangs are the enemy. And then Awu commits the worst offense of them all as it turns out she really lucked out on that husband whom Wanru had scorned. There is a reason why Wanru feels the need to lord her imperial status and proven fertility over Awu and to an extent I might even undestand why she feels the need to do so.

She may be an Empress, but she really has nobody in her corner except a weathervane of a husband who might turn any moment and the oh so faithful Nanny Sus. Zitan is not in her corner, he's never been. It's Wanru who has always been in his. Even her Xie relatives serve their own interests more than hers, instead of forming a united front, such as it may be.

Even Wanru's triumphs aren't triumphs at all. She gets pregnant? Instead of enjoying her newly-found status as putative mother to the heir, she gets whacked on the head with a power struggle courtesy of her mother-in-law. Miracle Baby is born? Her position theoretically strenghtens and yet greatly weakens at the same time, as Potato's leash starts slipping through her fingers. And that leash, that power she held over Crown Prince and then Emperor Potato was the only thing that made this marriage bearable in the first place.

And let us not speak of the senselessness of Wanru's death. Oh, it might have all been worth it... if only Potato didn't spit over her still warm body by announcing that it doesn't matter if Miracle Baby becomes the Emperor or not. Wasn't ensuring her son's succession the reason why Wanru had to die in the first place...?

Once upon a time I couldn't understand Wanru's fixation on Awu as opposed to, say, Daddy Wang or Turnip. These days I've become much more astute. Bitterness is a truly powerful motivator. And where bitterness hasn't yet started to form, fresh grief over one's father - no matter how shitty he might have been - will do the trick.

#ask and answer #the rebel princess #as I've always said #get Wanru married to an average noble and she's set for life #especially if she'd be able to rule the roost to an extent #living in the palace shielded only by Potato's good will is like sheltering from a storm under a newspaper #this cannot be healthy #nor conductive to anything but stress and spite

[ddarker-dreams]

Round Them Up II. Yan Giorno x Reader [COMM]

warnings: canon typical violence, drug mention, kidnapping, gaslighting, previous not sfw mention, and manipulation. word count: 3.4k. part I.

All things that fester in the dark will one day be brought into the light. 

Giorno’s unsure when he first heard this sentiment expressed. Maybe it was when he was passing by a mother scolding her child on the street, or from a missionary of the Church passing on their doctrine. This legalistic jargon never resonated with him. Why fear the judgement of a heavenly being that you didn’t believe to exist? As he makes his way through winding halls, this is the thought that plagues him the most. This concept of judgement. He can’t recall a time where the thoughts and opinions of others held a tangible weight. It’s inconsequential. Almost all others are inconsequential. What has mattered most to him is sticking to his ideals, his dream, not what onlookers may whisper behind closed doors. Yet now he can’t stand the thought of you thinking less of him.

Keen eyes stay focused on the butterfly in front of him. The butterflies wings flutter, gliding to the area you’re being held captive. You’re alive. Here, somewhere in this dilapidated building. Giorno’s familiar with the rhythm of your life energy, and is confident that his Stand sensed you. How beautiful a thing it is. It pulsates, like the strings of a harp being strummed, his chest swelling with adoration whenever he feels it. He keeps checking. Those who sought to hurt you are dropping like flies, Giorno noting that the life energy he felt upon arriving is diminishing. Courtesy of Mista, if he were to guess. Gold Experience Requiem has been primed for usage as well. 

He comes to a halt when the butterfly insists on a single set of doors. This must be the room you’re in. Giorno takes a deep breath, steadying himself, hearing hushed whispers coming from inside. That accident… undoubtedly, this group is from Northern Italy. The moment he opens these doors, there is but one thing that’ll be for certain. His Stand’s power is absolute. Already, unfortunate guards who he happened upon earlier, have sent to a hellish limbo of his making. A fate that they’ll never come to understand. Everyone who took part in this plan will meet a similar demise. 

What worries him most… is how you’ll look at him when it’s all said and done. How much information has Enzo’s men given you? Did you believe all that they said? There must be numerous questions plaguing your mind regardless, having had no idea what being involved with Giorno Giovanna truly meant. He knew there’d be a day where he could no longer hide the truth as he had for months now. This isn’t how it was supposed to be. It was going to be on his terms, an easy to digest version custom made for you. Wetting his lips, he pushes open the door, casting all reservations aside. When the time comes, he’ll know what to do. The proper words have always come to him, like whispers from the divine. 

You’re not sure how long you’ve been sitting here. 

Wherever this place is -- somewhere far away from Naples, is all you know -- has boarded up windows. From how empty your stomach is feeling, you can safely assume it’s around dinner time. You’ve never felt so sore, your wrists and ankles tied in an uncomfortable position. More information is what you need now. Listening to your surroundings has become second only to breathing. It’s at times difficult to pick through the accents you’re unfamiliar with, the terminology in use not making it easier. These people live in a world completely different from yours, and they speak of a Giorno Giovanna you’ve never heard of. 

The consistent story is that they want to spite him somehow. That this is an act of retribution. How did your precious GioGio earn the ire of these men, to the point of driving them to kidnap a civilian? He’s gotten mixed up with the wrong people. Is that all this is? Your throat feels tighter as time goes on, sweat perspiring on your skin, and chest heaving with every labored breath. The anxiety that’s been provoked within you refuses to release its vice-like grip. You want to be strong. In the car ride earlier, the man who spoke to you did so in a demeaning fashion. Dumbing down his words and treating you like a fool. Being weak here is not an option. 

So who do you place your hope in? The police? Your own strength? Giorno? There’s no way of being certain. From how tight the ropes are against your skin, squirming out of them is a hopeless endeavor. Not to mention the soldatos around you carry concealed weapons. They’ve been tracking your every movement in between chatting with the other men in the room. You don’t want to succumb to the pits of despair, desperately clinging to the possibility of getting out of this somehow. The injury you sustained from the previous escape attempt is making it even harder, the pain in your wrist ebbing and flowing. It’s likely broken or sprained. Pulling an escape off in a situation like this just seems impossible.

You hang your head down, eyes incapable of focusing on your lap in this dimly lit room. It’s difficult to believe that just this afternoon things had been so different. That you had been completely oblivious to the underbelly of society, blissfully thinking about your date for tonight. Whatever Giorno’s association with these men are, he’s surely noticed your absence, and must have informed the police by now. If he hasn’t picked up on it yet, your family or friends have had to. A shaky sigh leaves your lips, earning a pointed glare from the man next to you. He looks at you as if you’re nothing but a pest. 

“Stop moving so much, bischero,” he wrinkles his nose, glowering down at you. “Any more suspicious movement and I’ll tighten your restraints. Just sit there like you’re supposed to.”

Cheeks set ablaze, you nod your head, not trusting your voice to form the proper words. Never before have you felt such a stirring sense of hatred in your heart for another. You have done nothing to be treated like this, living your life as a good citizen. The thought of harming someone has never arisen in your mind until now, wanting nothing more than to prove these men wrong. That you’re not the weakling they so obviously believe you to be. You sweep over the area in the most inconspicuous way possible. Five men are all in the same room as you, two standing near the door and the other three by the chair you’re restrained to. The only way out of this room is through that set of doors. 

There is nothing you can do now. This is what you decide. No miracle will give you the strength necessary to get out of here. 

Every second passes by slower than the last, tension in the room thick enough to cut through with a knife. That’s when you notice something is different than your initial arrival. The casual banter between the men have ceased, their bodies noticeably tenser, despite what must be their superior ordering them to remain calm. When you listen closely, you hear a faint commotion outside. It’s a piercing sound that takes a moment to recognize. Is that… gunfire? It doesn’t sound like anything you’ve ever heard in the movies, the shots coming in sets of six. Your kidnappers draw their own weapons from inside their coats, readying themselves. 

The man who has been standing next to you goes to whisper in the ears of the others, who in turn secure different angles in the room. You don’t want to get your hopes up for nothing... but is it possible that law enforcement is coming to rescue you? Adrenaline pumps through your veins at the thought. The throbbing pain of your wrist is drowned out, your vigor restoring. Everyone present in this room -- including you -- is waiting for something. Someone. Whether it’s friend or foe is yet to be discovered. You’re on pins and needles, gaze locked onto the guarded door with bated breath.

Nothing happened like you envisioned it. 

The door, to the disbelief of the others, opens as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Amidst the brewing chaos, you spot an unmistakable flash of golden hair. You could recognize that sight anywhere. It belongs to someone you’ve grown to care for greatly, someone who you didn’t know as much as you thought you did. Still, relief floods into your heart, washing away the previous despair. It’s the sound of guns cocking that brings you back from this potential cloud nine. You’re still in danger. That means he’s in danger too.

Driven by emotion rather than logic, you yell out to him, hoping it might prevent a bloody fate. “Giorno! They have guns!”

Your desperate plea is too late. You know this, and still you pray that it might have any impact. The men in the room fire without holding anything back, all in the direction of the door, the loud noise causing your ears to ring like funeral bells. Though you’re still undecided on your feelings for all that Giorno has been involved with in secret, the thought of him bloodied and falling lifeless to the ground is too much to bear. There’s no way he can survive this onslaught of bullets. This is going to kill him. He’s going to die, trying to save you—

“[First].”

He’s in front of you. 

His face is so close, you can feel his warm breath against your tear stricken cheeks. You smell his musky cologne, feel his silky hair against his face, see the light in his emerald eyes. Giorno’s lips part, words leaving them, that you’re too dazed to pick up on. Blinking once, you look around your surroundings as he works to free you from your restraints. This has to be a dream, a final cruel prank before you enter the next life. 

“GioGio,” your voice croaks, tears stinging the corners of your eyes. “I don’t— I don’t understand, what is happening?”

All that you’re able to gather is that this is the room you’ve been in for hours. The earth tones of the wall, the crumbling ceiling, boarded up windows, and concrete floor are undeniably the same. There’s rustling behind you, your weakened limbs being freed and falling limp. You gasp as he touches your wounded wrist. There’s a stinging sensation, and then the pain alleviates. Testing out the formerly wounded appendage, you notice the bruises from before are gone. Your skin is a normal complexion, instead of the discolored bruises from before.

 It feels like your grip on reality is slipping through loose fingers. Pinching your side does nothing, as you don’t wake from a dream like you wish. This is reality. It’s as if the only people in the world are you and him. That doesn’t make sense, there were five other men here, literal seconds ago. How any of this is possible is beyond you. They were firing at Giorno, who is here in the flesh, not a single wound in sight. 

“I know you must have a lot of questions,” Giorno’s voice is soothing as it always has been. You still flinch when he speaks up, a mannerism that he doesn’t miss. “I’ll answer all of them to the best of my ability. For now, we need to get you somewhere safe. You can agree with that, right?” 

He’s picking and choosing his words with the utmost care. You can still notice this in your mentally exhausted state. There’s no point in arguing, you’ll feel sick should you remain here any longer. “Ah… yes.” 

“Can you walk?” Giorno’s giving you a once over. He must be inspecting you for further injury. You nod your head, standing up on shaky legs. The relief of being in Giorno’s presence is fleeting. You don’t want to dwell on it, not here, but the underlying anxiety he brings can’t be shaken. He’s standing by your side, composed as ever. You wonder how you actually know about him. Everyone in relationships is bound to have their own secrets, aspects of them they’re unwilling to share. This is on another level entirely. Being too close to him now doesn’t bring the sense of security it should, and you find yourself on guard.

He places a hand to your shaking side in what’s meant to be a soothing act. “There’s no reason to hide if you can’t.”

“I said I’m fine.” Your tone comes out harsher than you intended. Giorno pauses, looking into your eyes, as if thinking. Conceding to your wishes, he retracts his hand, and leads you to the door. The walk through the building is silent, neither of you making attempts to speak. There isn’t anyone around other than the two of you. Where are all the others you saw on the way here? It’s not that you care for the wellbeing of your kidnappers, but the mystery of their ambiguous fate stays on your mind. How did Giorno have the confidence to face an armed force by himself? There’s no way he’s operating on his own. Not that anything has made sense lately. 

The poorly insulated building allows for the occasional breeze to slip through the cracks in the walls. It takes your breath away, and you wrap your arms around yourself to ward off the cold. Giorno is quick to take notice, and sheds his blazer without asking. Warmth envelopes you as he places it over your shivering shoulders. It’s a gesture that would’ve sent your heart racing, but no longer feels right. You want to trust him, to believe that he’s the man you fell in love with. That’s why it hurts even more. To think that all this time, you were being deceived. As pressing as these concerns are, getting home is what takes top priority in your mind. The rest can wait for later. 

Walking out the same way you came in, you spot the line of cars that drove you here. All of them are eerily empty. There’s one new car present that you recognize as belonging to Giorno. He’s surprised you in the past by picking you up from work with this car, your coworkers always asking nosy questions about your mysterious lover. Now that you’re reflecting on it, maybe you should’ve been asking more questions too. The source of his wealth was an occasional topic -- that you unfortunately felt was too rude to keep asking about -- and he never gave clear answers. His charm blinded you, and led you into a false sense of security. 

You realize that you’re no longer alone with Giorno. There’s a man wearing an odd hat and an outfit with clashing patterns, and another with an equally strange hole covered ensemble. They straighten up their posture when you come into their sight, or more specifically, when Giorno does. From how Giorno’s body language remains neutral, they must be with him. You probably don’t even want to know their relation to one another. The one wearing a hat is brandishing a gun that’s hard to miss, a revolver to be exact. With what meager information you have, you can safely assume that was the source of gunshots you heard earlier. Now that your earlier bloodlust for your captors has faded, your stomach churns at the thought of what must’ve happened. The person you’re staring at notices your intent staring. He shifts his body to keep the weapon out of sight, not that it means anything now.

“Let’s get you back home.” With an arm around your lower back, he leads you to the parked car. Giorno opens the door for you to the backseat, and slides in after you. The partition is put up from whoever is driving for a false sense of privacy. For the second time today, you find yourself unwittingly in the backseat of a car, having more questions than answers. That has to be a new record. The engine purrs to life, and you’re on the road once more. 

Now that the opportunity to learn more about what the fuck just happened to you is here, you’re having difficulty figuring out where to start the interrogation. It doesn’t help that your anxiety has been given new life. Giorno, who you’ve always found a serene person, is the source of your newfound dread. At least he’s kind enough to let you gather your bearings. 

“Earlier, those... people,” you take a deep breath, hands shaking relentlessly. “The way that they were talking about you made it sound like you did something to them.”

You surprise yourself by gathering the strength to look him in the eyes. He returns your gaze with a similar intensity, inadvertently testing you to say what you’ve wanted to all along. “Giorno Giovanna… just who are you, exactly? And why should I even believe you?”

There’s no immediate response. Despite the physical closeness, you’ve never felt so far away from him. It reinstates the fear that, no matter how well you believe to know someone, they could always be lying. That the truth is what they want it to be. Giorno taking his time to respond makes him appear guilty before your eyes. 

“You’ve been through a series of traumatizing events. Before I explain anything, you should rest,” he glances down at his watch. “It’ll be a few hours before we get home.” 

So he is trying to avoid it. Pursing your lips together, you shoot him a displeased look. “No. Tell me now. I deserve that much after all I endured, don’t I?”

“You’re right. My apologies.”

Giorno leans back in the leather seats of the car and crosses his legs. It’s unfortunate how now of all times you’re reminded of memories shared here. The times the two of you would tumble into the back, becoming intimate with one another, exploring each other’s bodies with mutual trust. Now there is a frigidity in your interactions. You’ve been torn from your blissful ignorance.

“Those men were seeking revenge like you gathered,” he begins to explain. “I lead a coalition that prevents the sale of drugs on the streets. You saw yourself what levels they’re willing to stoop to, didn’t you? This was meant to be a last ditch effort. To use you as a bargaining chip to renegotiate the terms we established months ago, so they could flood the streets with drugs once more.” 

The words seem truthful enough, yet you still have your reservations. “You lead a coalition...? Is it like, a government position? I don’t understand that.” 

“Precisely. I can’t go too deep into it for that very reason, [First],” he places his hand over yours, and you let him. “Please, let me continue to protect you. Now that you’ve been involved with me... I’m afraid something like today could happen again.” 

It makes sense more sense than you care to admit. That doesn’t mean you want to accept it. What choice do you have? They struck in the middle of the day, at a public mall. Next time, you might not be so lucky as to have this outcome. You’re not sure if you could even sleep soundly at night after what you’ve gone through, knowing every moment might be your last. Your body feels heavy, and the blood drains from your face. Giorno came to you, saved you, how can you continue to doubt him? He put his life on the line for your sake. Who is to say those men earlier weren’t lying as a final act of cruelty? Bottom lip quivering, you squeeze his hand tightly, not that he seems to mind. 

“GioGio... I’m sorry. I’ve been awful to you,” you sniffle, wiping away at your tears. “I was scared... I didn’t know what to do, if they’d hurt me, god, if they’d kill me--” 

“I know, I know.” He beckons you to his chest and you gladly accept the offer. The expensive fabric rubs against your cheek, and you openly sob against him. Giorno takes a moment to steel himself, before wrapping his arms around you. He’s never been the best when it came to physical affection, you noticed it never came naturally to him. You can’t bring yourself to care any longer. The comfort and security of being here with him is too good to pass on. 

“Let’s get you home. I’ll take care of everything, so leave it all to me.” 

#giorno #Giorno Giovanna #giovanna giorno #giorno x reader #yandere giorno #giorno giovanna x reader #yandere giorno giovanna #yandere #yandere x reader #yandere scenario #jojo's bizarre adventures #JoJo's Bizzare Adventure #JJBA #jjba x reader #yandere jjba #yandere jjba x reader #yandere jojo x reader #yandere jojo's bizzare adventure #yandere jojo's bizarre adventure #yandere vento aureo #vento aureo x reader #vento aureo #jjba vento aureo #yandere golden wind #golden wind #golden wind x reader #commissions #my stuff #tw: drug mention #not sfw

[homosexualrodent]

I’m just watching this over an over again, and it breaks my heart.

I know he’s done some bad shit, like murdery stuff, but he was only a kid. This rant has been shared probably a million times before, and you’ve probably heard it, but Theo truly deserves better.

When I was nine, I was in the fourth fucking grade. I started playing soccer then and I remember that was when I was old enough to be part of this music program at school. Grade four was when I was allowed to be on the cross country team and the track and field team. The biggest problems in my life were that I was had petty drama and was getting grounded for spending too much time on the iPad. When Theo was around that age, before the dread doctors, he was probably getting excited about small stuff like that too. Life then was so inconsequential, so innocent and easy, and that was stolen from him before he could really live.

His young mind was corrupted and manipulated. He watched his sister drown and freeze to death, but the dread doctors are at fault for that. How could he have understood what was going on? He was easy prey. A weak, sick, vulnerable and lonely child with a naive mind. They promised him power and a pack, but they killed his family and stole any semblance of peace he may have had. They cut him open and they sewed him up like a puppet. They probably threw him around because in the end, he only mattered to them to an extent. Theo wasn’t one of the dread doctors, he was their pet. They fed him their scraps and treated him poorly, so he had to learn to protect himself and get his job done or he’d die. Some people really have the nerve to say Theo should’ve just stopped if he knew it was wrong, but if he stopped or ran, it wouldn’t matter how successful he was, he’d be tortured or killed. And maybe he couldn’t understand how wrong it was. When you spend half your life living with terrible people, your morality can get damaged because your need to survive trumps all else. When you grow up surrounded by violence and blood and torture and murder, you become desensitized to it. So even as a kid, Theo had been scarred by the cruelest part of the world; there was no way he was going to come out of that a truly good person.

A lot of people forget that while you can pretend you’re feeling an emotion, like fake a smile or force out tears, you can’t actually make yourself feel something. You can have something trigger an emotion, but you can’t fake chemosignals the way you can fake a laugh. When Stiles and Liam found Theo at Tara’s bridge, Liam smelled grief. When Theo shot Malia, Malia smelt regret, so Theo knows how to feel and he didn’t take all that much pride in the thinks he did.

I don’t think anyone deserves to go to that purgatory that Kira sent Theo to, but regardless, Theo found his way there. What matters is that when he came out, he was a changed person. He wasn’t a new person, because you can’t erase your past or forget all that trauma, but he felt guilty. He let Tara rip his heart out. He made the choice to sacrifice himself for Liam. He decided to stay in Beacon Hills. When he got kidnapped, he didn’t tell them anything about the pack even though he could have. He went back for Liam. He tried to take Mason’s pain and the he did take Gabe’s pain. Theo thought that Gabe, the guy who tried to kill all of them, deserved at least a painless death because Theo no doubt saw how his own life could have easily ended the same way. Gabe was an asshole, and he didn’t get a character arc, but he was still a victim and so was Theo.

And so taking me back to that gif of Theo, he’s laying on the backseat of his truck and pulling a probably too small blanket over his body. If you look at him, and I mean really look at him, you can see how terribly sad he looks. When was the last time Theo got a restful sleep in a real bed? When was the last time Theo slept somewhere safe? When’s the last time you think Theo wasn’t hungry? When’s the last time you think someone cared about Theo and hugged him? When’s the last time someone said ‘I love you’ or ‘you matter’ or ‘I care what happens’ to you to Theo?

Theo has been alone for so long. He’s been surviving, not living. He’s been fighting too hard for people to look at him and not see how far he’s come. Yes, Theo’s a murderer. But he’s fractured and traumatized and he’s only eighteen. He deserved more than to be casted off again by the pack. His development should have been acknowledged more on the show and he should’ve gotten at least a hug. We can write fanfiction all we want about how Theo got into the pack, or got with Liam, or moved into somewhere safe, but nothing like that really happened in the show. Maybe Theo’s still a benchwarmer, waiting for Scott’s beck and call. Maybe Theo’s living in the sewers again or still in his truck. Maybe Theo never gets what he deserved.

I’m not saying Theo has to be your favourite character, but you can’t look at a kid sleeping in his truck with that kind of anguish in his eyes and think he still deserves all of the pain he carries around.

All of the pack has been through something terrible, but Theo got some of the worst of it.

#this is the part where I say ‘IM ANGRY’ like spencer james #theo deserves better #theo needs a hug #don’t be a heartless shit #pun kinda intended #look at the pain in his fucking eyes and tell me he’s still a bad person #i dare you #and screw beacon hills police for catching a teenager sleeping in his truck at night and doing jack shit about it #sorry but fuck stiles for making that comment about Theo liking watching Tara die #the things i would do to tell this man that we love him and we care about what happens to him #I would cut off my tit to hug him #WERE SORRY THAT YOUVE BEEN HURT BY LIFE #THEO THERE ARE MILLIONS OF US THAT LOVE AND SEE YOU #thank you for listening to my ted talk #theo raeken #teen wolf #i’m starting to forget a lot of what I wrote so I don’t know what else to tag

[ashes-and-ashes]

Lightning and Marauders

Draco stares out of the window.

He’s still furious, with Harry and with Dumbledore and the entire fucking Order. He can feel it, rage coiling around his bones, the anger making him feel light-headed. He’d always had an explosive temper, the type that ended up with shattered glasses and holes in walls.

It didn’t work when his father attempted to beat it out of him, but then again, rarely anything worked. He learnt though, over the years, learnt to keep everything contained inside of him, because at least he didn’t cut anyone when he shattered.

With a sigh, Draco stares down at his arm, the ugly brand that couldn’t cover the scars on his wrist. He couldn’t even remember what the fight was about - something small, he was sure, something inconsequential and pathetic. Stress had blown it up, turned it into something so much bigger then it should have been, made him keep pushing, keep arguing until him and Harry were both screaming at each other from opposite sides of the kitchen table.

Of course, he had spat, anger making him feel like he was on fire. Of course you would say that. You’ve always had it easy, being the fucking savior.

Don’t you ever say that again, Harry replied, all hissed words and cold fury. Don’t you ever say that I had it easy. You’re the one on your Malfoy throne, all high and mighty -

You don’t know what they did to me.

What? Harry sneered. Bought you a broomstick and held your hand? Is it to your advantage to switch your side?

Fuck you.

Harry laughed. What did I expect? You’re the son of a Death Eater. Why did I ever think that we could trust you?

Draco had stormed off before he could say those damning words spinning around in the back of his head, echoing the cold words spoken by his father so long ago. You’ll never be enough. You’ve doomed us all.

He couldn’t though, couldn’t bring himself to say the words. It would destroy them, that already fragile bond he had with Harry, the small hope of something more. Even he wasn’t stupid enough to risk that.

Draco leans his head against the window, the glass cool against his cheek. The rain cast patterns over his face; he watches the shadows trace against his skin.

He doesn’t know where he is - some tower room in Grimmauld Place. The house was huge, larger then the Manor, all stone and dark wood and huge green drapes. There are tapestries all over the walls, symbols embroidered on them in heavy gold thread; he recognizes a few of them. Whom ever owned this house must have been rich - Charmed Marks were expensive and there were hundreds of them all over the walls.

He sighs, turning his attention back to the scene outside. His head pounds; he lets it drop back against the window frame.

“Done being all melodramatic?”

He can see the barest hint of a reflection in the window, all darkened shapes and blurred lines. He doesn’t bother to turn around though, just shrugs. “It’s my forté. I should go into acting.”

The person lets out a dry chuckle. “Aren’t you a spy? It’s close enough.”

Draco stiffens. “Who told you that?”

“You’re not the only Drama Queen here.”

Draco turns slightly in his seat, just so that he could see the figure standing by the door. He’s tall, hair down to his shoulders and covered with tattoos. There’s a casual sort of elegance to him, the type that Draco had spent most of his life trying to perfect, all careless arrogance and stunning grace.

Charcoal eyes met his; grey, he thinks, just like mine. Draco gets to his feet quickly, leaning back against the wall. He’s learnt that appearing casual made others lower their guard. The man’s quiet chuckle lets him know that his action had not been missed.

“God,” he says, giving him a small smirk. It’s the grin of a younger man, the ghost of something that had long died. “You remind me so much of - “

“Don’t,” Draco says, cutting him off. “Don’t say that I remind you of my father. Do you know how many times I’ve heard that? As if I wanted to be some egotistical fanatic - “

The man laughs. “No. I wasn’t going to say that. I get the sense that you aren’t fond of your father though. He was an asshole. A brilliant, conniving asshole but an asshole all the same.”

Draco looks up, startled. “You know him?”

“Doesn’t everyone? Everyone who knows about Death Eaters, that is.”

Draco flinches. “I - I’m not - “

“Like them? Family bonds can be hard to sever. Just take me for an instance.”

“What do you know?” Draco fires back. “Don’t pretend like you know anything about Pure Blood families. You don’t know what it’s like to be suffocated, to be forced into a mold that doesn’t fit you - “

The man throws back his head and laughs; bitter and amused. “Oh I don’t know, do I? I probably know better then anyone else here, I Draco.”

Draco turns away, willing the tears not to come. “Oh, really?”

The man smirks. “I’m Sirius,” he says. “Sirius Black.”

“Harry’s Godfather.”

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been known as anything but Traitor.”

Draco folds his arms across his chest. “I’m a Malfoy,” he says. “Your name was synonymous with Hero back at home.”

“Nice to know I’m still worshipped.” Sirius leans back against the wall. He’s covered in scars, hundreds of them; up his arms and wrapped around his fingers, disappearing under his shirt. Draco thinks of his own back, the smooth, pale skin and shudders. His father was careful - and even Voldemort’s Crucio’s didn’t leave any scars. He didn’t want to think about how bad the pain was to leave so many scars across Sirius’ flesh.

“What do you want?” Draco says, keeping his voice even. “I assume you don’t just want to chat.”

Sirius shrugs. “Harry. You had a fight with him.”

“Why don’t you check in with him?”

“I already did.”

“Did he tell you about how much of a manipulative, lying bastard I was?”

Sirius shakes his head. Draco stares at his forearms, the silver moon tattoos inked onto the skin. They seemed to shimmer, even in the dark room, the edges rippling and fading into the next shape. “He told me all about you, actually. How brave you were. How you’re only 17 and yet you’re spying for a side that will try and execute you if they win this war.”

“What do I have to lose?” Draco whispers. “There’s nothing left for me in this world. I might as well try and - “

“Make it better?”

“Yeah.”

Sirius smiles. “I was actually going to say, before you interrupted me earlier that you remind me a lot of myself. Back when I was younger. You have the same...complete disregard for yourself. Self-destructive tendencies, almost. Because who cares if you burn as long as you’re warming those you love?”

“I - “

Sirius fixes him with that piercing gaze, the one that saw into his soul and stripped him bare. “Jesus, you’re young. I fought in the first War, back when I was 19. I still have nightmares. To do that to innocent kids - I don’t - you’re so - “

“Young?” Draco’s voice was a near-breath. “I’ve already killed 8 people, Sirius. I’m a little too damned to be innocent, don’t you think?”

He stared at his hands, palms up, the light dancing off his fingertips. “I’ve tortured people and been tortured myself. Spying is nothing.”

“True.” Sirius’ voice is light. “But I never knew Lucius would lay a hand on his son.”

Draco’s breath hitched. “What?”

“Don’t what me. My mother was the one hurting me. I know those marks.”

Draco stares down at Sirius’ hands, the tiny scars that flecked his skin. “What are those?”

Sirius’ grin was savage, brutal and cutting and painful. “Crucio.”

“Crucio doesn’t leave marks.”

“When you use it enough it does.”

“I’ve never met someone who knows what it feels like. Besides Harry and myself.”

Sirius blanches at the sound of Harry’s name. “He’s been...”

“Yeah.”

“God.” Sirius drops his head in his hands. “12 years. 12 fucking years I’ll never get back. God, I missed so much.”

“He loves you,” Draco says quietly. “He adores you.”

Sirius looks up. “You love him.”

It wasn’t a question. Draco feels the blood drain from his face, his heart falling to the floor. He takes a deep breathes, holds it, waits until he knew his voice wouldn’t shake. “He’s one of my closest friends.”

Sirius studies him for a minute, then lets out a low whistle. “God, you are practically a carbon copy of me.”

“What do you mean?” Draco demands.

Sirius just studies him, his head tilted, those piercing eyes shredding him slowly apart. Draco just grit his teeth, met his gaze.

Finally, Sirius speaks. “I was in love with a boy,” he says, and Draco flinches. “For ages, actually. Since I was 12. He was my best friend.”

“How did you know?” Draco breathes. “That it was love?”

Sirius smiles. “You just know.”

“I don’t though.” Draco looks down, at his feet. “I always hear things, about how love makes you soft, makes you happy, lifts you up and turns you lighter. And I always think what bullshit. Because that’s not what I feel. Not at all.”

“It’s fire,” Sirius says quietly.

“God, it’s more then that. It’s consuming. It scares me, because I’m in a war, and if something happened to him...There’s nothing I wouldn’t do - I’ve switched sides for God’s sake. I’ve damned my soul because of him, I love him that much.”

Sirius just shrugs, head propped up against his han, and Draco thinks again that he looks very, very young. “The only monster made are ones that are in love.”

“And he doesn’t - I don’t even know if he loves me.”

Sirius laughs. “Oh Merlin. Harry most definitely does, Draco.”

“No - “

Sirius cuts him off. “Yes. He does.”

Draco looks down, at his feet. He can feel the weight of Sirius’ gaze against his back, burning into his soul. “Tell me about him,” he says.

Sirius closes his eyes. “I don’t know. He was...beautful. All full of light - the steady kind. A candle, compared to the raging flames inside of me - inside of both of us,” he adds. “He never thought he was good enough, but he was better then I ever could be.”

Draco nods. He thinks about Harry - his smiles, his eyes, the way his hair felt when Draco let his hands brush through. The harsh set of his mouth when he was concentrating, the way he laughs, all quicksilver and molten metal, the way Draco’s heart stopped every time they touched. He thinks about how he dropped everything - his family, his title, his home, how he was willing to die just to give Harry a chance and he wonders if he’ll ever have anything like this again.

“Do you regret it?” he asks. “Telling...telling whoever it was?”

Sirius’ holds Draco’s gaze.

“No,” he says, and Draco believes him.

#wolfstar #drarry #wolfstar angst #drarry angst #wolfstar fluff #drarry fluff #wolfstar fanfic #drarry fanfic #sirius black #draco malfoy #sirius black angst #draco malfoy angst #sirius black fluff #draco malfoy fluff #sirius black fanfic #draco malfoy fanfic #sirius x remus #draco x harry #harry potter #remus lupin

[1000generations]

Thank you for the tag @little-lightning-lavellan and @rosella-writes!

This is from a story in which Fen'Asha Lavellan, in a desperate attempt to stop Solas from destroying Thedas as we know it, transports him to another world. Our world.

It's been a WIP for... 6 years. 😅 There is like... 200,000+ words of this self-indulgent nonsense. It needs so much reworking it's daunting. lol

This scene is from Solas and Fen'Asha exploring McDonald's...

Fen’Asha put her lips to the straw. She wanted to taste what he was tasting, wanted to partake in his world. She was bold enough to walk the Fade, confront dragons, defeat Corypheus. Plus, she was used to tea.

”Vhenan?” asked Solas, reaching out for Fen’Asha as she began coughing.

She shivered slightly, the coughs still plaguing her throat. The sweetness was shocking, as was the cold. “Shit.”

A woman from the table next to her shot her a glare.

“What is it?” asked Solas.

“It is so strange,” said Fen’Asha. “I have never had tea like this before…”

“Yes,” he said. “Most curious.”

She tinkered with her straw, raising it up and down in the lid of her cup and finding that it made an interestingly musical noise. She shook her head.

“Many things in this world are not as they seem,” said Solas. He dabbed a fry in Fen’Asha’s Sweet and Sour Sauce and pondered it.

“What do you mean?”

“Your tea is not tea,” said Solas. “The People’s Courtis not court.”

She nodded, letting go of her musical straw.

“Yet many things are real,” said Solas. “The news depicts real events, albeit with a unique point of view.”

“What do you mean?” she asked, picking up a fry.

“It appears that there is always something at the root of a viewpoint,” he said. “Some kind of interest. For the most part, this is translucent and I presume most anyone could see through the many smokescreens. And yet, I am not so sure.”

“They seem happy enough,” said Fen’Asha.

“They are being influenced,” said Solas. “To what degree they allow it is the question. It seems clear they are involved in their own manipulation to some degree, as this world does not behave in a way that would be considered sympathetic to its own survival. They ruin large swaths of their habitats, they commit horrendous crimes against one another for trivial reasons…”

“That does not sound unlike Thedas. The Blight…”

“A worthy example,” said Solas. “Many were not willing to see the Blight as a threat. Others preferred the comfort of their ignorance and concocted many alternatives to actual events. Just like here.”

She nodded.

“That is why it is important to remain vigilant,” said Solas. “With so much dishonesty, it can be easy to go astray. And it can be easy to want to go astray, especially if reality is painful.”

“I have never opted for what was comfortable,” said Fen’Asha. “Clearly.”

Solas nodded. “This is certainly true. Our path to here could not have been easy.”

“Nothing about this has been easy,” she said. “It has taken a great deal of time to come to peace with everything that happened. And even now, I’m not even close to being there.”

“You are uncertain about me?”

She nodded.

“There were – there are – reasons for my reluctance. I could not and cannot reveal the entirety of my plans because you would try to stop me," He paused, considering her. "I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

She sighed. “I am sitting here in a restaurant with you. You want to destroy Thedas, our world, and I’m sipping some silly drink like nothing’s wrong with that. We had sex, shared a bed. We make small-talk. We go for walks, make plans for a future like we’re some stupid couple. Nothing about this makes sense and no, Sloane, nothing about this has been easy. It won’t ever be easy, Sloane.”

Solas made a face as a small child shrieked nearby. He turned to see the culprit racing away through a set of glass doors with an enraged adult chasing behind in a yellow coat.

“And yet what can I do?” she continued. “I’m here in this strange land, like you keep saying. I’m here with you whether I like it or not.”

“I see,” said Solas.

“You hold out hope that you’re going to get back to Thedas to finish what you started,” she said. “I hold out hope that I’ll be able to stop you from doing that. I can’t pretend that’s not happening.”

“I appreciate you speaking plainly, Vhenan.”

“I’m glad,” she said. “Because I have questions.”

“I am sure you do.”

“Why me?” she said.

“I don’t understand what you mean,” he said.

“You are older than Arlathan?”

He sighed.

“And you are thousands of years old,” she said. “So why me? Why did you love me? My life is a flash for you, an inconsequential blip. You have lived so long. I have lived for mere minutes in contrast. I am…a fly.”

“That is a crude analogy,” he said.

“And you’re Fen’Harel. My god. Why would I think you would love me? Knowing everything…”

“I was never a god,” said Solas. “But that was what you wanted, what you expected. Your heart was always destined to break if it became entangled with mine.”

“So?”

“So I had already broken your heart once as Solas,” he said. “I had no desire to do so again.”

“But that is my burden, my pain. The choice is not yours.”

“My duty would always tear us apart, Fen’Asha,” he said. “It was because of me that you could not hold the gift of immortality. If there is a Maker in this world or the others, surely the Maker is laughing at me.”

“I think the Maker is laughing at both of us,” she said.

“At least as Fen’Harel, I could be near you,” he said.

“But you could have said…”

“We are moving in circles,” Solas said. “I tried to reduce my feelings. I knew what we had would only lead to lathbora viran, but you called for me and I answered. Like I always will.”

“You can’t keep…”

“I was selfish then. I am selfish now,” he said. “As Solas, as Fen’Harel, as Sloane.”

She sighed.

“I had hoped to assuage any temptation,” he said. “But reality crashed through. Our reality. When I learned of the Qunari plot at the Exalted Council, I had to act. And now, my mistakes must be rectified. There is no other way.”

“There always is another way,” she said.

“There should never have been a Veil. My life…much of it…seems to be a series of mistakes.”

“You would take so much to fix your error? You would insist the rest of us pay the price for your compensation?”

“There are other things at stake,” said Solas. “It is not so simple. The lyrium. The Blight. It matters little now I am here.”

“Thank the Maker for small mercies.”

He looked at her and for a moment irritation seemed to flicker across his face. He amended it into a tentative grin, then looked away as his eyebrows lowered.

“I will always try to stop you,” she said.

“I know,” said Solas. “But Thedas must be left behind for the time being.”

She nodded.

“And my desire for you…”

“You will leave that behind, too,” she said.

“No,” he said. He reached across the table for her hands. “No.”

“It’s not a good idea,” she said.

“You have doubts?”

“Of course,” she said.

“Then I wish to rectify that,” he said.

“Do you have doubts about me?”

“Not for a moment.”

“You haven’t made this easy,” she said. “Little of this makes sense.” She looked at a fry.

“I know,” he said. “But love defies explanation.”

“My mother said it was a gift…”

“Yes,” said Solas. “A choice. The reasons I choose to love you are…I simply want to. As you wanted to love me at one time. It is desire.”

“Love is more than desire,” she said deliberately.

“But desire is at the core. You can remove the love from desire, but you cannot remove the desire from love.”

“You are wise, Sloane,” she said after a pause.

“Even wisdom has limits,” said Solas.

Fen’Asha agreed, sipped her iced tea. She was getting used to the awful sweetness, to the way the drink cut into the corners of her mouth and made her tongue feel rough.

“For all the desire I felt for you,” continued Solas, “I subjected you to cruelty because of my selfishness. I never should have persisted in my desires. I should have fled sooner.”

“That’s one thing you do not understand,” she said. “I wouldn’t have traded in any of my moments with you. Even the painful ones. Because they were moments with you.”

“You could’ve been with someone, grown old with someone, had a family…” he said.

“I do not share the same wishes,” said Fen’Asha. “My family was you. Sera. Dagna. The Inquisition.”

“You did not desire children?”

She shook her head.

“But Hightown…?”

“You saw me in Kirkwall?”

Solas nodded. “I saw you through the eyes of the children, saw your kindness at the orphanage. Saw your insurrection in the faces of the nobles as they cursed you for bringing such a place to Hightown in the first place.”

Fen’Asha felt a chill. She had used Varric’s gift to her in Kirkwall, a mansion in the grandiloquent neighbourhood of Hightown, as an orphanage for the disadvantaged. She’d hired staff and enticed the right nobles, but that didn’t mean everyone took to the idea well. She thought back to the children in Thedas, wondered how they were doing.

“Some of the children saw it as a palace, a fairytale unwinding beneath their feet,” continued Solas. “Others saw dark corners and sinister hallways, not yet able to shed the horrors of their pasts. But in all of them, you were beautiful, an angel, bright as the sun.”

“More members of my family.”

Solas smiled warmly. “You would make a wonderful mother.”

“In the minds of many,” she said. “But it is not my choice in this life.”

He looked down.

“I am happy, Solas,” she said. “I do not wish for the same things as others, that’s all. I don’t want to be pitied because I don’t desire a family of my own. I am a Red Jenny. I was the Inquisitor. I was…yours. I served my clan. For a young elf from nowhere, for a nomad…it has been an incredible life.”

“It has.”

“And you were a huge part of that,” said Fen’Asha. Her fries were cold. “You still are.”

“You may be but a shooting star in my universe, a fleeting moment,” said Solas. “But you have made a permanent impression.”

She warmed. She wanted to touch him, feel him near. She wanted to reach across the table, wanted to kiss him with the mothers and fathers and children of this Edmonton watching. She didn’t care where she was as long as she was with him. She knew he would be the end of her. She knew she would be the end of him. She knew it hardly mattered now. She knew it was a horrible idea.

“I will always cherish you, Vhenan,” said Solas. “I will always love you.”

She was in his arms on his side of the table. She was sitting on his lap and he was caressing her back. She was cradling his face under his hood, under his necessary subterfuge against the misunderstandings of this world. She was breathing as he touched her hair, felt through its tresses. She closed her eyes as she kissed him.

He held her tight.

“I love you, Vhenas,” she said. “Always. Anywhere.”

I have no one in particular to tag. But I love to see what people are working on in the fandom if they care to share. 😊

#Someday might actually put aside time to work on this fic properly idk #dragon age fanfiction WIP #wip wednesday #1000generations posts #maker only knows

[spicysoftsweet]

Why Not Her? (Illumi x Reader)

A/N: Buckle up, this is long as fuck and dramatic as HELL. Please read @hisokapegger‘s fic for the first part, and consider this the other perspective. If one of us is feeling up to it, we’re gonna write some more perspectives.

To the tune of Jolene by Dolly Parton here ~

Part one by @hisokapegger here

TW: pregnancy

---

To love is to trust.

You had done the unthinkable by choosing to love and to trust what to others was despicable. You had made the leap and been rewarded for it with the love of Illumi Zoldyck. 

Your relationship would be strong and lasting; you were sure of it. Prior to coming to the sprawling mansion he had grown up in, he had already paved a way for you after all. With enough convincing (or rather, over a year of quiet arguments and louder fights that you thankfully weren’t privy to), his parents had begrudgingly accepted the idea of you. 

And today was the day you would finally be presented as his fiancee.

He had chosen you yourself. There was nothing to fear, as long as he was with you. You reminded yourself of this as you held his hand while he led you into the manor.

You kept your smile on as you navigated through, following just a few steps behind but still linked. What you needed to do was look charming, even if you were afraid - first impressions were paramount to people as elitist as Illumi’s family. You had to channel grace, even if the butterflies in your stomach would barely settle the further you went.

And you did so well, exuding charm and inner peace to everyone you met - that is, until you met eyes with her. 

Illumi introduced the beautiful, sylphlike creature as one of his most trusted butlers. She smiled at the praise, and the moment you took in the soft features painted on pale skin with a hint of olive, something inside of you trembled for just a moment. 

“This is Kali. She’s been with me ever since I was a child,” he explained, with fondness. 

You nodded, trying to ease the thump in your heart, keeping your smile genuine. 

“It’s nice to meet you, Kali.”

You were being truthful. You sensed intrinsically she was sweet and kind, and you knew you would end up liking her the longer you spent time together. She would be your personal butler from then on, anyway. You decided to ignore the nagging sense of impending doom that knocked at your subconscious, shoving it into the deepest recesses of your mind.

As Illumi took you away to move on, you turned back to sneak a look at Kali once more.

And then you saw it; you wished you hadn’t seen it: her eyes shining with sadness for just for a split second before she noticed you and looked away.

----

As you had anticipated, you and Kali became fast friends. You knew Illumi loved you and that his feelings hadn’t changed by the way he spoke excitedly about your upcoming future together, took the time to fill up your quarters with the things you liked, and indulged you in soft kisses and touches when you were alone together.

But the thought that you were assuming a space that didn’t belong to you, and not in a way as innocuous as sitting in someone else’s seat, continued to linger in the back of your mind.

It festered every time Illumi came by to see you while you were exchanging stories with Kali when you failed to see a difference in the way he looked at you both. It reared its ugly head whenever she teased him in your presence, or whenever she gave you a tidbit about his favorite things. There was a twinkle to her eye whenever she spoke about him, and while you loved her, you started to hate it.

But jealousy was such an unbecoming emotion, wasn’t it?

Illumi loved you, it didn’t matter. It couldn’t matter.

---

“I want Kali to make one of the wedding cakes.” Illumi stated, voice as light and inconsequential as usual, as you sat side by side in one of the many gazebos on the field. 

“Oh?” You asked, looking up from the catalog of flower arrangements you were perusing, despite the fact that you knew his mother would override any decisions you made anyway (you had decided you would let her win the battle over flowers so that you could win the war, after all).

“There’s a recipe only she knows,” he continued. “It’s been my favorite since I was a kid. She’s aware and has agreed.”

“That sounds lovely, Illumi.”

It truly did, and that was the worst part.

---

Your wedding came and went, and it was every bit as beautiful as you imagined. You remained in Illumi’s arms after consummating your union, and somehow, shockingly, he fell asleep first. Or maybe he was just closing his eyes - yes, that was the more rational explanation. You snuggled closer into his neck, and wrapped your arms even tighter around him.

Still flushed, you whispered a breathy, “I love you.”

And to your terror, the little green monster that had spared you for the past few days came back in full force. 

But so does Kali! It screamed from the parts you thought you had locked away, and your heart started to race.

Illumi didn’t open his eyes, but he pressed his lips to your forehead in a small, quiet motion before pressing you even closer to him, likely sensing your unrest. 

What you needed to hear him say was those three words back.

But alas, those three words never came, and the little green monster grew just a little bit stronger that night.

---

You could have your choice of men, but I can never love again

He’s the only one for me, [Kali]

---

It didn’t take very long for you to become heavy with child, and for whatever reason, pregnancy was particularly hard on you. The fatigue, back pain and constant nausea would have been manageable if it weren’t the fact that your ankles swelling was nothing compared to the swelling in your face, and you were unsure if the stretch marks that coursed over your belly would ever fade. Just looking at yourself in the mirror some days would ruin your morning.

Kali remained lithe and beautiful as always, graciously by your side to help you with the most menial tasks. Taking your hand to help you get to the bathroom or to take a daily walk around the manor to prevent blood clots from sitting around, keeping you company while Illumi was away; you were in need of constant assistance, and she was always there for you.

She was an angel, and your best friend.

One evening as you ate dinner, just the two of you, you let out a sigh.

Kali smiled in response, attempting to reassure you. “Pregnancy seems difficult, but you wear it well,” she mused, pouring chamomile tea for the two of you to enjoy.

You gave out a dramatic snort as you took a sip. “I’ll never look the same again, and I’m pretty sure this whole story about a “pregnancy glow” is fake,” you huffed as you set the teacup down.

“But Illumi’s so happy, he talks about it all the time!” Kali exclaimed cheerfully, setting down her own cup. “Just yesterday, he was talking about baby names you had discussed, and settling on a few. It was quite funny to watch actually.”

A knot formed in your stomach. The last time you spoken to or seen Illumi was multiple days ago... 

“Was he home yesterday?” You blurted out, then were embarrassed to even have to ask your friend about your own husband’s whereabouts. 

She furrowed her brow as she looked at you in confusion. “Yeah, of course, he was just here for a couple of hours, but...”

He didn’t come see you? What she left unsaid was enough to set you on edge, but you couldn’t be mad at her, only at yourself. 

Who could love you anyway, the way you were now?

It took you a moment to get up on your own, but you had to stand and make your way from the table. Turning away from her so that she couldn’t see the bitter tears that were ready to fall from your face.

“__, are you alright?”

“Mmhmm,” You choked out and nodded, your voice regrettably higher than usual. You bit your lip.

“I think I’m going to bed early tonight.”

You could hear the chair shift back as she rose.

“Okay,” she said, in a soft, compassionate voice. You heard her light footsteps make their way to the door, pause for a moment, and finally the door closed shut behind you.

And at the sound of the closed door, as if on cue, your tears began to fall. 

---

Your smile is like a breath of spring

Your voice is soft like summer rain

And I cannot compete with you

[Kali]

---

You spent the rest of your pregnancy on bedrest, before producing a beautiful, dark-haired little girl. Skin to skin contact was brief before Illumi took the baby in his arms, inspected it, and with the smallest smile of pleasure, handed it to Kali.

You watched as Kali cooed at your new child, standing next to your still pleased-appearing husband, the picture of a perfect family. Even their features complemented each other; it was like a knife twisting in your chest. 

Kikyo gave you a quick look over before running over to them to pick up her new grandchild. For a split second, you wondered if you had imagined a look between pity and understanding, hidden beneath her visor. 

The nightmare of being overlooked.

---

And I can easily understand

How you could easily take my man

But you don't know what he means to me

[Kali]

---

It took you not too long after that to grow bitter. Maybe it was postpartum depression, maybe it was a year of feeling inadequate, maybe it was the fact that you knew your friend was more deserving than you. 

But either way, you withdrew. From Illumi, from Kali, from everyone. It wasn’t hard to do so. You did what you were there for. You’d produced a child to appease your husband and your grandparents. 

How you yearned for freedom...

The freedom that Kali had to love without the responsibility. If only you could switch places.

“___, please eat-”

“I’m not hungry,” you replied, before she could even finish. Kali pulled the plate of food back to her.

“Illumi is upset with me that you’re not eating.”

“Are you worried about Illumi or me?” You quipped, then covered your own mouth, shocked at what had come out.

“...”

Kali was speechless, but the look on her face betrayed a layer of guilt that you couldn’t tolerate. You were right. It was less about you than about Illumi.

You knew she cared about you too, and yet…

“I know you love him,” you choked out. Kali said nothing, her beautiful eyes still on you, as you began to cry. 

“I know you wish he had chosen you instead of me, and honestly, I wish he had.”

----

I had to have this talk with you

My happiness depends on you

And whatever you decide to do

[Kali]

---

The next morning, you decided you would seek some professional help. You didn’t know how much of this was depression vs. postpartum baby blues, but something had to be done. Kali did not deserve your anger at all.

You didn’t see Kali that morning. 

When you finally spoke up your concern of your whereabouts to Illumi, hoping not to avoid any trouble, his face was impassive as usual. 

“She asked if she could leave.”

The butlers didn’t just have the option to leave… Or did they?

“I didn’t know they could quit,” you questioned, suspiciously. 

“They usually can’t. But in this case, there was an exception.” He said. With that, he turned fully to face you, and pressed a soft kiss on your lips. It had been a long time since you’d kissed, since you’d withdrawn from him in your depression, and you missed it. But it felt wrong.

You withdrew again from his touch.

“What did she say? What was the exception?” You demanded to know.

“She told me she loved me, and that you knew the entire time,” he said, simply. Your stomach did a backflip.

“Normally the punishment is immediate death, but I know how much you care about her. And she was good to you.” He continued, taking your hands in his. You pulled away slowly, staring straight through him. He didn’t insist on it.

“Where is she now?”

“Off the manor, most likely.”

You started to walk towards the gate, and he held on to your arm.

“Where are you going?”

A panic started to rise in you.

“Bring her back! I was wrong, I was wrong, I was wrong!” Tears started to stream down your cheeks again, as the realization set in that such a petty feeling such as jealousy had managed to turn you into a villain. 

“She wanted to leave.”

“She loves you!” You protested.

“So?”

So? It was such an aggressively simple sentence. You looked up at him in shock, enough that it gave you pause.

“What do you mean so? Why me? Why not her when she’s perfect?”

“She’s not you.”

Your hand almost flew to his face from the sheer level of rage, the urge to defend her feelings coursing through you, but your palm stopped right at the side of his face. Instead, you sank to the floor, and sobbed for Kali, and for yourself. 

---

[Kali, Kali, Kali, Kali~]

I'm begging of you please don't take my man

#illumi x reader #illumi #song fic #response fic #hunter x hunter #angst #sadness #i'm sad #illumi zoldyck x reader #illumi zoldyck