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classic80sand90smovieloves2 · 3 years

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Helping Billy and Stu on their murder spree would include~

(Not my gif)(Requested by anonymous)

(This might not be exactly what you were expecting but I hope you enjoy it anyways! Sorry it took me longer than expected!)

- Wrong. That was the best way to describe your relationship with Billy and Stu: wrong, fucked up, and dangerous …but you couldn’t deny the fact that it was exciting.

- You were no saint. That was a fact you’d come to terms with a while ago. You were no saint but you certainly weren’t a killer; at least not when all of this started. No, back then, you were just a really, really bad girlfriend.

- Truth be told: you weren’t single when you’d gotten involved with the boys, though, to be fair, neither were they; not that that made things any better.

- You’d had a boyfriend, a boyfriend you’d once really cared about, but somewhere along the line, you’d begun to have problems and instead of resolving them, you’d both chosen to ignore them and resent each other instead. Which is probably why it was so easy for you to fall into another boys arms; especially when they were as charming as Billy was or as sweet as Stu was.

- You’d always had a bit of a crush on Billy. The two of you’d been acquaintances ever since freshman year and for a while you sort of thought that you and him might get together. But then he started dating Sidney and you got asked out by your boyfriend and you just sort of tried to put the idea out of your head.

- Unbeknownst to you, the idea never left Billy’s head and he found himself plotting all the ways that he could make you his; all while finding out that his partner in crime was seemingly just as interested in you as he was.

- Stu ended up playing a crucial role in your “arrangement”. The two of you found yourselves made into lab partners and thusly, you were invited over to his place after school and later given the perfect excuse to spend time with him; and/or Billy, without causing suspicion.

- The first few times you go over to the Macher place, nothing of value happens. You do exactly what you’re supposed to: work, study, joke around a little and get a bit more comfortable being in each other’s presences. It’s a few study sessions in that you get a curveball thrown at you.

- It’s late one evening, Stu’s parents are out and you’re both studying on his living room floor when all of a sudden the doorbell rings. Stu gets up to answer it and who else would it be but Billy.

- Stu pretends to act surprised and tells the boy that he forgot they were going to hang out and that he’s studying with you. Billy assures him that it’s alright before Stu tells him to wait a second and reappears in the room, saying that he thinks the two of you have studied enough and that Billy’s got some horror movies that the three of you can watch if you’d like to stay and chill. How could you possibly refuse?

- And so, your makeshift friendship with the boys begin; a friendship which very quickly leads into something more once Billy decides the time is right to make a move.

- You obviously don’t expect it the first time it happens but you find yourself wanting more the minute it’s over.

- Sure, sometimes the guilt will kick in when you see Tatum and Sidney or when your boyfriend is being particularly sweet, but it never seems to be enough to stop you from coming over whenever they ask or letting them in whenever they knock on your door.

- But the longer the three of you keep up your affair, the more things you start to notice.

- Billy isn’t stupid. Regardless of how he feels about you, he isn’t going to jeopardize his whole plan by making one wrong move and trusting someone he shouldn’t have. He’ll take his time analyzing you, picking apart your every move and reaction until he’s sure that you’re the one.

- You’ll start to pick up on little things about your boys that some might consider weird: all the horror movies and Billy’s knowledge in them, strange questions, indecipherable looks, things like that.

- As Billy comes closer to making up his mind, more of the mask will slip; though not enough to scare you off or make you think that anything’s really wrong. More odd inquiries, questionable sexual activities, and Billy testing your loyalty; oftentimes by asking you to cover for him or Stu to see how far you’ll go for them.

- You might be asking what I mean by “questionable sexual activities”, well, Billy has, on more than one occasion, demanded that you only watch whatever gory film he’s put on instead of looking at him as he pleasures you. He watches you closely, muttering lowly in your ear about the movie and talking dirty as you lock your eyes on the screen.

- When the boys first confess to you about the murders, you don’t believe them. You think it’s a bad joke but once you see just how serious they are, your smile drops and you say “you’re serious aren’t you?”.

- It definitely takes you a while to get used to the fact, but you find yourself opening up to the idea more and more as Billy explains their motive and butters you up with his charming words.

- Your involvement starts with little things: patching them up when they’re hurt, analyzing horror movies, giving them ideas or intel and telling them what won’t work.

- Stu likes to bump your shoulder or ruffle your hair and call you smart whenever you offer up good advice. Billy is much more subtle in his praise but his reactions are usually the ones that make you want to help them more and more.

- The blonde enthusiastically recounts stories of their slayings to you, jumping around the room and making a bunch of noises and hand movements while he does so.

- The first time you mention that you’d like to help them “...more”, both their faces break out into shit eating grins. They don’t immediately hand you a mask, knife, and mission but they do start to ask more of you.

- Helping them hide evidence, giving them alibis, waiting outside of their crime scenes for them and helping them lure people right into their traps all becomes second nature to you.

- Then comes your initiation.

- There’d always been some jealousy involved in your relationship; mainly on their parts. You had a boyfriend and they had girlfriends which meant all three of you had to; at some point, act all lovey dovey with your partners in front of the others, if only to keep up a façade.

- But, as obvious as it was that none of you particularly cared for your significant others, that didn’t stop Billy or Stu from absolutely hating your boyfriends guts. This hatred would eventually play a key role in solidifying your role in their lives.

- Your parents aren’t home and you’re in your bedroom with the boys, doing exactly what one would assume you’d be doing, except, unlike all the other times you’d done “this”, your bedroom door swung open and revealed a very unexpected visitor: your boyfriend.

- Maybe it was the pent up jealousy or the fear of his plan potentially being ruined or maybe it was a little bit of both but when the boy immediately began to just book it towards your front door, Billy followed after him.

- By the time you make it out into the hall, Stu has him held in place and Billy is turning to look at you, telling you to “come on” as they walk the boy into your kitchen.

- Once you get there, Billy pulls a knife from the block and walks up to you, telling you that you said you wanted to be a part of things and that now's your chance.

“Go on.” He says, nodding his head back towards the boy who Stu’s restraining and watching you closely as you slowly take the knife from his hands. Stu’s grinning excitedly as you approach him, cheering you on while Billy remains silent behind you.

- The blonde whoops and hollers as you cut into the boy, audibly expressing his pride in you, and when you turn to look back at Billy, he’s got a tiny little smile pulling at his lips, showing that you’ve just proven yourself and done exactly what he wanted.

- The brunette locks eyes with you before he walks up and wraps his arms around you, pulling you back against his chest and tilting your head down to look at the boy who’s currently bleeding out on your kitchen floor. “Would you look at that.” He says and you can hear the smile in his voice as he says it, his hand trailing up to grope at your chest as he stares down at the gory sight before you.

- There’s no going back after that. You’re now officially one of them and get your very own father death costume.

- It’s perfect really. More hands, more confusion for the police, more bloody sex.

- Billy gets turned on by the sight of blood and the adrenaline that he feels after a kill; and Stu has never been one to turn down sex, so don’t be surprised if you end up pressed against the floorboards of a victims house or thrown on one of their beds the minute the three of you get back to their house.

- You and Billy tend to make the plans while Stu just goes along with whatever you say.

- Helping them get Neil Prescott.

- Going along with Stu while Billy talks on the phone.

- The two of them both baby and yell at you. They tend to do most of the dirty work because they think you can’t handle it but at the same time they; namely Billy, will get angry if you mess anything up in the slightest. The brunette will yell or insult you because he’s a control freak and wants everything to go exactly as he planned.

- On the drive/walk home, you’ll stay quiet, wondering if maybe you’ve made a very severe mistake when deciding to be with the boys. But then Billy will grab your arm and pull you into a kiss, asking if you’re alright and apologizing so sweetly and for better or for worse, you’ll fall right back in again.

#stu macher imagine #stu macher headcanon #stu macher headcanons #poly billy and stu #billy loomis headcanon #billy loomis imagine #billy loomis headcanons #scream imagine #scream imagines #scream headcanons #scream headcanon #90s movie imagine #90s movie headcanons #90s movie imagines #90s movie headcanon #Slasher headcanon #slasher headcanons #slasher imagines

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deonideatta · 3 years

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@ohcoolnice @whyyoudo I couldn't get the concept of han seok and junwoo being two different people out of my head so on this vincenzo-less sunday I give you a loose rewrite of canon where jun woo is the third jang brother and han seok's twin!

They were born jang han seok and jang han sol, and han seok is the older twin. They were separated when they were very young, because of han seok and an incident which ended up with han sol in the hospital. It was supposed to be temporary, but one of the house staff took pity on the poor child and smuggled him away. His name was changed to jun woo and they didn't find him again until both him and han seok were adults

They grew up very differently, han seok under the jang family, tormenting han seo and becoming the unhinged, solitary figure we all know and hate, and jun woo in an adopted family somewhere across the country into the dorky, sweet intern we knew for a bit and loved

Both of them somehow ended up spending time in america, though neither knew and they never met. Han seok because his father sent him there and jun woo because he got a scholarship to go to university there

Very few people now know about han seok himself, much less his twin brother. Before han seok's chairman takeover, most people think han seo is the only jang child

Jun woo knows he has a twin brother, but he doesnt know who he is. He can't remember his name or his face, or those of his real family. When he receives an offer for a job at wusang, he takes it as a learning opportunity and accepts

The only one who has all the cards is han seok, and so when he hears that jun woo has become an intern at wusang he decides its time to play them

So he spends people to observe and record jun woo, and after things start heating up and chayenzo declares war on babel, he kidnaps and threatens him, and tells him that he has to let him cosplay as him so that he can scope out the increasing threat

This is not how jun woo had ever thought meeting his long lost twin brother would go. He tries to put up a fight, but han seok hits him in the stomach with the hockey stick he's wielding like some kind of ancient weapon so hard that he spits out blood, and that takes the fight out of him

Han seok crouches down in front of jun woo and stares him in the eye, and it's like looking into a mirror except his reflection is staring at him with chillingly blank eyes.

It's the same for han seok, except his reflection looks back with open terror. The feeling it gives him is unpleasant and han seok doesn't like seeing weakness like that on a face that could pass for his own. But if he wants to get what he wants, he can't harm his twin too much just yet

Visually they're identical, so han seok passes perfectly for jun woo. He doesn't get all his mannerisms right at first, but with practice basically no one can tell the difference unless they look hard enough to notice that han seok's eyes are always empty even when he's copying jun woo's biggest grin.

A part of han seok feels a flash of jealousy at the fact that his twin has had a pleasant and fulfilling life while he's had to live neglected in the shadows for so long, so he takes extra satisfaction in the way jun woo's face falls when he appears in front of him for the first time dressed in his work attire, indistinguishable from jun woo on the average week day, backpack and all.

To spite him even further, han seok mimics his cheery, enthusiastic way of speaking, smiling so widely that it's mocking, and embraces the glee that jun woo's downtrodden expression gives him

He does hate having to curl his hair to copy jun woo's usual hairstyle though

At this point han seo finds out he has a second older brother, because han seok wants him to be able to continue to act normal and not freak out if he sees him cosplaying as jun woo

This brother is identical to his other one but actually really nice to him and it's both incredible and completely terrifying. It takes han seo a while to warm up to jun woo because he looks so much like han seok, as well as for fear of han seok's reaction, but he gets there

Whenever they meet (usually bc of han seok) the two bond over their shared fear and hatred of han seok. There's twice the himbo power. Incredible

Jun woo had had no idea that he had a younger (half) brother, and his heart goes out to him for having to live under han seok's abuse for so long

So he makes an effort to get to know han seo when han seok isn't around to yell at them. Han seo appreciates this a lot, because jun woo is like han seok on his incredibly rare good days except much better and all the time

Being a veteran at Handling Han SeokTM, he gives jun woo tips on how to get on han seok's good side and avoid getting things thrown at you

Jun woo tells han seo that one day when they get free of han seok they should take a trip to disneyland. Han seo, who has never been to an amusement park before, makes him promise it

Han seok's babel boss reveal presentation goes more or less the same way, except it's also a twin reveal and choi myung hee and mr han have to deal with the fact that not only is their intern the babel chairman's twin brother, but they have also been switching places regularly

Meanwhile cha young, who is out there living her best anti big pharma life, thinks jun woo is acting weird. Some days he's super bubbly, almost too bubbly, and on other days he's more subdued, seemingly a bit on edge.

Biggest red flag comes when she, him and vincenzo eat spicy food together

The spicy food tolerance gene missed han seok altogether and endowed han seo and jun woo with its power

So though he doesn't protest when cha young orders the extremely spicy dish jun woo usually gets for him, han seok struggles to finish the food almost as much as vincenzo does

Cha young thinks that's really sus, but she keeps her questions to herself because there's really no explanation for it unless jun woo was replaced by a government clone or aliens. Or his secret identical twin. Hah, imagine

She files the thought away for later and they continue to dig into the man behind han seo and babel. They find out about han seok, but there's no remaining information about jun woo in the files because the jang family thought losing him was supremely embarrassing so they tried to make sure no one knew

Meanwhile han seok is super happy he's gained another protective shield. If babel gets into trouble he can force han seo to go to jail for him, and if he ever gets personally exposed he can make jun woo take the fall for him. Genius

For that purpose he makes sure no one except the babel quartet know about him and jun woo being twins

He finds that it's interesting living as jun woo though, people interact with him in a way they never do when he's han seok. Jun woo's neighbours say hello to him when he goes by, and the lady in the local convenience store makes small talk with him and asks how his new job is going. And cha young is an incredibly unusual person, han seok finds that he has some level of attraction to her, and enjoys her company

While han seo is a puppet, jun woo is a mask, a protective measure and a means to explore the world, and han seok mentally pats himself on the back for having such useful brothers

But he has to stop spending time pretending to be jun woo for now bc he knows his identity is at risk of being discovered by jipuragi squad as they hunt down the person who exposed vincenzo as a mafia member

So when vincenzo does find out that han seok is allegedly jun woo, and tells cha young, it actually isn't han seok she's sitting with when she receives the news

Naturally she doesn't know this, and she feels supremely betrayed

And when vincenzo breaks into 'han seok's' house, it's actually jun woo's house. Jun woo, who was not expecting the mafia to break into his house, is understandably scared. The kneeling gun scene goes down, except there is no bravado on jun woo's part and he's genuinely terrified

Vincenzo is arrested as planned, and jun woo meets cha young in the police station as she goes to help vincenzo

She's furious, and jun woo honestly denies that it was him who killed her father and the babel victims, unable to expose that it was han seok because he's scared of the consequences and because it sounds like such a ridiculous excuse

Poor guy gets the double slap intended for his twin brother

When han seok hears about it he laughs a lot. Jun woo is understandably angry about his reaction, but he is forced to seethe in silence

Nevertheless han seok decides to go into hiding (and forces jun woo to do the same somewhere else, hiring guards to make sure he doesn't leave) because even if chayenzo think jun woo is the babel chairman, they still have the same face

Unfortunately for han seok this means that vincenzo's spy squad see him going into his own safe house, and he gets to be the victim of the drugged water

After a few more near death scares courtesy of the local mafia man, choi myung hee suggests he reveal himself as chairman so he doesn't die at the hands of vincenzo unknown and like a loser. And so he does

At the expense of jun woo, whose identity has more or less been stolen now, and who is now indefinitely confined to the family property han seok had him hide in

The war begins all out, and jipuragi squad works hard at removing han seok's support circle, starting with daechang daily, then the anti-union activities

Han seo watches all this unfold and starts to wonder how he can get his better older brother free while taking down the other one

The answer comes to him when he sees chayenzo cover han seok with pigs blood. They're the only people who seemed to consistently be able to one up han seok, and he has only heard good things about cha young from jun woo, not to mention the fact that surely even han seok can't defeat a mafia member in the long run

So he asks mr han to help him meet vincenzo, and he tells him he has twin older brothers and asks for his help in betraying the bad one and saving the good one

Vincenzo thinks he's messing with him, and turns down han seo's request to be on the same side

But then jipuragi squad opens the guillotine file, and there below han seok's escapades in homicide and the details on han seo's suffering, is the shocking secret of the jang family, the existence of a 3rd jang brother, han seok's twin brother jang han sol

Cha young remembers how jun woo hadn't been able to eat spicy food that one time and suddenly everything makes sense

For his part vincenzo remembers what han seo had said and mentally kicks himself for thinking it was a lie

They puzzle over what this could mean and where han seok's twin brother could be now. Is the man who revealed himself as the babel chairman the real han seok? Are both of them evil? Is one being used by the other?

Cha young silently wonders which times jun woo had just been jun woo, and which times she had been eating lunch or joking with han seok the babel chairman and serial murderer

They decide they have to find the other jang twin in order to answer their questions

Problem is that he's been absent from work for the past 2 weeks, and when vincenzo breaks into his house, it looks like it hasn't been lived in for quite a while

The trail seems to lead nowhere, and they turn their attention back to tearing down babel, with the new knowledge sitting uncomfortably in the backs of their minds

And then han seo shows up at the jipuragi office in all his coffee wielding glory to plead his cooler older brother's case again

This time, to han seo's surprise, they listen to him patiently when he tells them about his older brothers. He makes sure to stress that the only one he wants to betray is han seok, and that jun woo has done nothing wrong

If the fact that they've read the part of the guillotine file that talked about what han seo had had to suffer under han seok makes it easier for them to believe him, he doesn't have to know that

The only way they can strike at han seok and simultaneously clear jun woo of suspicion is to reveal that they're twins

To do that they have to find jun woo. Han seo doesn't know where exactly he is, but he tells them that han seok would probably try and use jun woo as a shield should he ever be sent to jail

The guillotine file gives them what they need to force the prosecution to put han seok behind bars under fabricated charges. It wouldn't last long once actual investigation starts, but hopefully it will be enough

Han seok takes the bait, unknowingly, and shuttles jun woo off in his place. There's not much that irritates him as much as the thought of going to jail, and this is the perfect chance to test jun woo's loyalty. It also gives him a blind spot to operate, while his enemies think he's in jail. You can't dodge a hidden dagger and all that.

When the jipuragi squad watches the arrest of the babel chairman on the news, there's a nervous hunch to 'han seok's' shoulders, and the impassive smile he seems to be going for isn't quite right

Vincenzo and cha young go to visit him in jail

When they first see him, cha young immediately feels bad, despite herself. He looks like he hasn't slept well in ages, and his expression is far from his usual cheer, sober and sullen. This had better really be jun woo, she does not want to ever feel pity for jang han seok

It is jun woo, and he really hasn't slept well in ages, as reuniting with han seok and his violent tendencies has reawakened the memories from his childhood in the jang household that he had supressed, causing all kinds of nightmares

He doesn't look up as they enter and sit opposite him. Cha Young takes charge, and vincenzo lingers behind her, a solid and present support

When she speaks his head snaps up at the sound of her voice, before he seems to want to correct himself and looks away

When he looks at her again there are no traces of jun woo in his face, his expression haughty and unbothered

It's chillingly like the han seok they had sat across following the pig's blood incident, and cha young has to work hard to push down the flare of anger the expression causes

She decides not to beat around the bush. She presses the printed page of the jang han sol section of the guillotine file up against the glass, and watches as jun woo's eyes widen, the facade falling as quickly as he had donned it

Jun woo takes in the picture of the two identical little boys and has to squeeze his eyes shut at the wave of fear that hits him

In its wake is a small flare of hope. If they know he isn't han seok, maybe they can help him

Cha young watches as jun woo seems to deflate at the sight of the document, and now she's sure it isn't han seok, because she's never seen him allow himself to show any form of weakness

When jun woo looks up again, there is determination mixed in with the weariness in his eyes

A while later, cha young exhales shakily as they walk out, vincenzo's hand steady and comforting on her back. She's surprised at how relieved she is to know that the jun woo she had known had not been an elaborate set up, a con which had seen her at some of her lowest moments. Her heart goes out to jun woo, but there's an undeniable joy at the confirmation that her friend still exists, because it means he can be saved

The plan is simply to collect evidence of the fact that jun woo is not han seok. Best case scenario a video of them together, though a good photo will do as well. It would also work if they can somehow get footage of han seok out and about while jun woo is in jail

The first obvious course of action is to look for cctv footage. They hunt high and low through the cameras at babel, at wusang, and around han seok and jun woo's houses, but the searches are largely fruitless

With han seo's help, they locate the safehouses han seok likes to hide out in, and vincenzo sends men to snoop around each property. This ultimately pays off when, at the 3rd property, han seok is spotted standing by a window.

The second stage begins with Mr ahn's help, and they get a swat team to raid the house han seok is hiding out in.

Fully believing that everyone thinks you're in jail makes you sloppy, and han seok doesn't see it coming until the black vehicles are speeding down his driveway

He doesn't stop to take anything much, he grabs a hockey stick and he runs, wild and angry, out into the dark of the woods surrounding the house

Vincenzo watches him charge into the forest on the cctv footage retrieved from the house and smirks

The footage hits the news the next day. The headline is in large, bold letters, "Chairman Jang Han Seok spotted at holiday residence, despite prison sentence." The picture below the tagline serves as the final blow, side by side images of Han Seok sprinting away from the house, and an identical man sitting demurely in a jail cell.

As the story breaks, people begin to step forward, old employees of the jang household who had known and seen both han seok and han sol. There's nothing like good gossip to get people talking, and the shocking secret of the jang twins makes the rounds in record time

Jun woo's identity is rechecked, and he is set free

Cha young, vincenzo and han seo go to meet him when he gets out. Han seo tackles him in a hug, and cha young smacks him heartily on the back. Vincenzo doesn't react much but he does shoot jun woo a smile.

Han seok hasn't been seen in days, and jun woo is unbelievably happy to be himself again

It isn't over yet though, babel still needs to pay and han seok still needs to be found. Search parties comb through the woods around the house regularly, but there's still no sign of him. In the meantime, jipuragi prepares their final attack.

Han seo lets jun woo stay with him, and the house is fortified by multiple levels of guards

It's still mildly unsettling for han seo to have someone with han seok's face in his house, in his own safe space, but jun woo makes for a far better housemate than han seok ever was, and gradually he relaxes

For a few days, despite the tension of not knowing where your psychopath brother who probably really wants to kill you could be lurking, when there is a spare moment in the evening, han seo and jun woo catch up on years of lost brotherhood

Han seo tells him about his mother, and jun woo talks about his adopted family. Neither of them mention han seok, they skirt around his name like he doesn’t exist, like speaking their trauma aloud to someone who had been there too would make it too real to bear. Jun woo knows he had gotten the better end of the deal, he had been separated from han seok pretty early. Han seo had lost too many years of his life to their psychopath brother, and jun woo isn't sure he knows how to confront that, or how to comfort him. He hopes he can learn

Han seo wants to ask what exactly had happened to lead to jun woo being removed from the jang household and separated from han seok, but he doesnt dare. Maybe later, maybe when they aren't still worried about what han seok could do to them

Then the jipuragi squad files their lawsuit against babel. Han seok still hasn't been heard from, and they begin to wonder if he got lost in the woods. Maybe he fell of a cliff, or into a river

Either way, the trial goes spectacularly badly for babel, aided by the fact that vincenzo had threatened the unjust judge before the trial. The verdict is guilty, and it serves as a means to kick-start further investigation into previously dismissed babel trials

The day after the trial, han seok reappears

He was lost in the woods for a while, but he found his way out and laid low for a while plotting a way to get back at vincenzo and cha young for destroying his backup plans and destroying his family and company's reputation. He will also have to deal with his traitorous brothers.

It's a big blow, but it's not one he cannot recover from. All he has to do is get his revenge, terrify his brothers back into submission, and go back to his plans for his babel.

So he requests the kidnapping of cha young, and he gets his men to attack the guards at han seo's house and take her there, cornering his brothers. He strolls in when he gets word that everything is done, cocky and confident, twirling a gun between his fingers

He takes in the open fear on han seo's face, the frightened anger on jun woo's face, and the sneer on cha young's face, and he laughs. They are consistent to the very end, and he wouldn't have it any other way.

All that’s left is vincenzo, and a short while after a brief and taunt filled phone call he arrives, eyes wide and angry. Han seok does not waste time in pointing his gun at the mafia man. He stops where he is, still glaring at han seok, eyes darting regularly to cha young

Because he is never one to turn down some fun, in a bid to further anger vincenzo, han seok crouches down and points the gun to cha young's head. He watches at vincenzo's face twists with anger and worry, and he revels in it. Out of the corner of his eye he sees jun woo has moved in front of han seo, like he's protecting him, and han seok wants to laugh

He speaks to cha young in jun woo's voice to spite them both, mockingly sounding out his words in his twin's bright tone

But suddenly vincenzo drops to his knees to plead for cha young's life, and han seok grins in satisfaction. The satisfaction is shortlived, however, as something solid suddenly crashes into the back of his head

It dazes him enough that he lets go of cha young for a moment, and she takes the chance to headbutt him so hard that he drops the gun. Vincenzo pounces almost immediately, and aims a kick to han seok's head, knocking him out

The last thing he sees before everything fades to black is his spitting image standing a distance away, holding a dented art deco lamp.

When they are sure han seok has been knocked out for real, the relief that sweeps the room is palpable. Han seo slumps down and jun woo moves to check on him as vincenzo unties cha young

Jun woo moves to call the police, but vincenzo tells him not to.

Instead, he makes a call of his own, and soon two men enter and carry out the still unconscious han seok. Jun woo wants to ask where they’re taking him, but there’s a dark glint in vincenzo’s eyes that makes him swallow the question.

None of them see han seok again until he’s on the news. His body is found in a river near the family property he had first run away from, and the consensus seems to be that he fell in and drowned while lost in the woods

The whole matter has vincenzo written all over it, but no one is going to ask about it

Han seo and jun woo hold a funeral for him because it would be suspicious if they didn’t, but they work hard to make it as underwhelming as possible. When han seo cant stop shaking (whether it’s in weariness, relief, or anger at any traces of grief, jun woo can’t tell, and honestly neither can han seo) as they stand in front of the portrait of their deceased brother, jun woo silently rests a hand on his back.

After that is over with, they take a break to have a small ‘han seok is gone’ party, and then they both throw themselves into work

Han seo takes charge of babel, firing all of han seok’s people and working hard at cleaning up the stain of corruption he’d left behind. He works hard to transform the company’s reputation, and begins the process of compensating all the people who had been wronged by them in some shape or form

Jun woo leaves wusang and starts his own law firm. Han seo makes the company his first customer, and jun woo tries hard to run his firm without any traces of what made lawyers at wusang such monsters

Cha young and him have a friendly law firm rivalry going, much to vincenzo’s amusement

When they aren’t working, jun woo and han seo hang out a lot. Jun woo is determined to replace han seo’s memories of a terrible older brother with better ones with a more pleasant older brother. Han seo still struggles sometimes with seeing han seok in jun woo, but he’s more than happy to overwrite han seok’s image in his mind with jun woo’s

A few months after everything is stable again, they do take that trip to disneyland. The picture they take outside the park is framed on both their desks.

The next year, vincenzo and cha young get married, and han seo and jun woo attend the wedding. They bring expensive gifts, and jun woo cries like it’s his own family getting married. Cha young rolls her eyes at him, but she’s pleased to have him there

It will take a while to move on fully from the damage han seok caused, but they are all working hard at it. Because now han seok is gone for good, and everything is fine.

bonus

The Incident that led to han sol becoming jun woo happened when he and han seok were 6 and han seok, having decided that they had to see who was the superior twin, challenged him to a fight to the death

It was traumatic to the point that jun woo repressed all the memories of his childhood with han seok

Han seo once called jun woo hyung when speaking to han seok, and han seok got really angry and threw a lamp at him

Before vincenzo finishes off han seok, cha young slaps him six times to make up for the two slaps she mistakenly gave jun woo

After everything blows over, jun woo takes han seo with him the next time he goes to visit his adopted family. They dote on him like he's their family too, and han seo feels more loved than he has since he lost his mother. He says so to jun woo, and from then on he takes him along whenever he visits them

Cha young, jun woo and han seo meet up sometimes to eat spicy food, both because they like it but also to spite han seok’s memory just that little bit more

Because han seok died before he could find out about vincenzo’s mother, she’s alive and well and vincenzo visits her regularly

#the way tumblr blocked me from posting this dsfsd #3 failed attempts at posting and some rewriting later here it is #my attempt at dealing with no new vincenzo content by constructing elaborate alternate universes #anyway stan jun woo #han seok? i dont know him #vincenzo kdrama #tvn vincenzo #vincenzo fic #vincenzo fanfiction #vincenzo headcanons #imagine if we'd gotten this tho #the potential for misunderstandings #plus han seo getting a biological brother that is nice to him #immaculate #kdrama #might post this on ao3 #vincenzo #jang jun woo #jang han seok

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rapspud · 3 years

Text

Bittersweet

Bittersweet A/N: Decided to rewrite this one. Please enjoy.

Yoongi looked at your friends as he sneered at your prone form sprawled out on the ground, your fingers scrambling to find your glasses.

“Aw what’s the matter? The poor baby can't see?” He purred as he picked up your glasses and dangled them in front of your face before throwing them into the dumpster. “Have fun diving!” He cackles as he slides past your prone figure, cruelly stepping on your hand as he passes.

You could hear the snickers of his friends behind you. You watched as his best friend, Seokjin clapped Yoongi on the shoulder, and whispered, “Oi, I get the whole I hate “y/n” thing but seriously—that was a bit much don’t you think?”

Yoongi couldn’t believe what he was hearing, “She ratted us out! So I fixed it-and now she can’t see to snitch! And shouldn’t you be on my side? You’re in just as much trouble as I am!”

Seokjin could only look at Yoongi like he had a third head, “ Yeah I guess, but still...there is-” at Yoongi’s raised eyebrow he swallowed what he wanted to say, instead choosing to leave rather than to help Yoongi’s victim, “Hey I gotta go I’ll catch you later okay?”

Yoongi smiled and waved good-bye before walking away from the group. How could he possibly explain how much he hated Y/N? No one here knew the truth about your families-how he had to share a home with you, your family serving his. He had no respite from you. Yeah, Y/N deserved everything she got, he thought as he got into his car. Plus it's not like you wouldn’t rat him out when you got home about what happened. This time as he drove past you and saw you hunched in on yourself, he couldn’t help but feel a twinge of guilt as he saw you clutching your injured hand, staring resolute at the dumpster, knowing full well that you would go in after the glasses. After all, he knew how hard your mother worked to buy them for you, he knew how you worked 2 jobs and also kept track of your younger brothers. Deep down, he really hoped that maybe this time you would finally explode and tell everyone about all the horrid acts he committed against you.

Except that you never did tell on him.

In fact, you avoid Yoongi like the plague. After finally scrambling into the dumpster and reclaiming your glasses, you clambored back out, hand still screaming in pain. As you stand there wiping the garbage from the lenses and picking off random refuse from your clothes you honestly don’t think you can sink any lower than this. You swipe grimey hands at your cheeks as hot tears run down them, thankful that you are alone. And as you walk away you begin to make plans. You couldn’t keep doing this. And with renewed energy you begin walking home, not didn’t looking back choosing instead to forge ahead, putting one foot in front of another until finally you were in your mid=twenties, and had your own little place. You were happy with your life. But you should have known. All good things must come to an end eventually. You hadn’t thought about him in years, attending school, graduating, opening up a bakery with your best friend. Essentially you were hiding, but not really.

And then by some ill stroke of luck, he found you.

You awaken to the blaring of your alarm with a groan. Was it really 8 am? The flashing numbers of your clock inform you that it was in fact 8:59. Shit you were late. Cursing your snooze butten, you scrambled out of your bed and grabbed the cleanest clothes you could find off the floor and stumble as you attempt a whole new balancing act: pulling up your pants while holding a hot cup of coffee and a piece of toast dangling precariously from your teeth. As you run down the street towards the bus, slinging your backpack over your shoulder while you scramble to tuck your shirt in you promptly run into a solid wall and fall on your ass. Your hair is covering your face as you look up at what you had plowed into, an apology already leaving your mouth when you got to the face. “Um…hi, uh…sorry about that.”

“Y/N. From YHSN?”

“Yes?” you become wary, no one around here really knows you as you chose to keep to yourself…“Do I know you?”

The grin that spread across the man’s face could be described as nothing less than cruel and vicious. “Yeah, Y/N L/N right? I am here to inform you that you have 24 hours to vacate the premises. Good luck.” He stated before unceremoniously dropping an envelope onto your lap and turning on her heel to leave you in a stunned heap on the floor.

What the hell had just happened? Maybe you were still dreaming?

You were dazed for a moment as your brain tried to compute the absolute absurdity of what had just happened and then you were on your feet chasing the man, yelling at him to stop but he just kept on walking.

Finally catching up to the man, you grab her arm, “What the fuck man?” you yell, “this is illegal as hell! Thirty days is the minimum!” You shove the notice back at the man, hitting him in her (very solid) chest hard.

“Y/n, Y/n, I see you're still full of venom huh? It’s completely legal actually-you see I” he leaned forward, “own the building now. And to my delight, what do I learn? I find out that Y/N L/N happens to be a tenant! Guess how happy I was to finally find you again after all these years and then get to have you vacate your home.” he laughs as you gape at him like a fish.

“Min fucking Yoongi, I do not have time for your petty ass childish bullshit! ” you hers, voice laced with venom.

“Aw kitten you remembered! I am truly honored! But alas I cant stay and chit-chat, and well, neither can you. Tata chica!” With that he jerks her arm from your grasp, sending you back to the ground in shock for the second time that morning, before climbing into an expensive black car and driving away.

You scream curses to the sky, because after 8 peaceful years, the man you had spent so long running from and then finally forgetting, had found you. But of course, the sky only decides to rain. And as you trudge back home to call into work, (because seriously fuck this day) you can’t help but wonder how everything came to this moment. After a shower and change of clothes, you fall into your bed, allowing yourself one moment of respite before you begin to tackle this new problem, closing your eyes.

You were back there again, trapped both in a small body and the cave that haunts you as you watch helplessly at the rising water. Your tiny voice is raised, tinted with fear, “I told you we shouldn’t come here! My mama said-“

The boy next to you cut you off, “Crying ain’t gonna fix it, I will save us”

“You can't even swim,” You yell, unable to remain calm.

“I AM GONNA SAVE US!” the small boy shouted, “so don’t cry Y/N.” He gave you a small smile, one that made you feel slightly safer and he took hold of your hand. “Follow me and don’t let go no matter what.”

“Okay,” you say, for some reason feeling braver after placing your faith along with your hand into the boy’s hand. He said he would, so of course he would save both of you. After all, he was your best friend and you don’t pick losers.

It was a lot harder though, when all was said and done. Yes, the two of you made it out of the cave alive, but not without nearly drowning, and you had slipped and injured your ankle along the way. Luckily, you did make it out, and while the two of you spent a cold wet night huddled together on the beach, you were alive. In the morning, you were rescued further as the search teams found. And while your mother had you wrapped up in her warmth and was crying and thanking the people over and over that had saved you, the same welcoming was not happening to the young boy. You could hear screaming as a woman in a fine dress and her husband yelled at the boy, your tiny hero, before there was a loud smack. You watch as the boy falls, hand clenched to her face, tears streaming down her face as her mother continues to land hard blows upon her body until she is dragged away. You cried out for you friend and as the two of you met eyes, for the first time you saw hatred reflected back at you. That was the day Min Yoongi stopped being your friend and became your tormentor.

He followed you everywhere, taunting you, breaking your things, and ultimately breaking you. Your mother finally quit working for her house the day he’d thrown your glasses into the garbage and you had come home, broken glasses in hand, face streaked with tears and reeking of garbage -you had finally confessed what had happened, what all had been happening. You had moved away, your mom working several jobs and then as well as yourself working, then you working to pay your way through chef school and finally moving out into your own place. And all of it had just been destroyed because he found you.

You sigh looking up at your ceiling letting your anger consume you as you curse Min Yoongi to a lifetime of diarrhea. And an itchy butt. And you hoped her eyebrows fell out, just for good measure.

You look around your apartment one last time before closing the door with finality. this asshole, you think to yourself. “Just wait” you say as you look down at the address your brother had just texted you.

An hour later you stand before a gated house and ring the doorbell. And ring it. And ring it. And continue ringing it (after all it was nearly 6 am, and as you had learned that morning, if you want to ruin someone's day, do it first thing in the morning) until a sleepy figure stumbles outside and smacks your hand away. You take this opportunity to dart inside the gate and into the house carrying your things with you.

“What the hell do you think you're doing?” Yoongi yells at you from outside, beginning to stomp back to her front door. You could only grin as you take in the pajama bottoms and robe, while you stand there like a goddamn Amazonian queen, “You took my home. this is payback.” and then you dialed the police, “Yes? Officer? There’s a half naked man on my lawn, please send help! I’m so scared”

You couldn’t help the grin that covers your face as you smile at Yoongi, “Good luck asshole.” You say sweetly, before slamming the door in her face. Nothing had ever sounded so sweet as the sound of the lock turning over, followed a second later by desperate pounding at the door. And Yoongi could only pound on the door until the cops showed up and he explained that this was, in fact, her home, as well as that the intruder was actually you. The officers had asked him if he wanted you arrested and for once he let it go, telling them that you were having a lovers quarrel and apologizing that they had to come out over something so silly. As the cops pulled away, he went to the back of the house and slammed the sliding glass door open only to find the house seemingly empty. As he walked from room to room he couldn’t help but get angrier and angrier. But when he found you passed out on her bed, he paused, somehow her anger dissipating instantly. He stood there, looking at your sleeping body and wondered if you would ever know her real feelings for you. If he would ever be able to tell you. And the real question: could you forgive him? He knew it was asking a lot, but he could only hope. He sat and thought about how to express to you the things he needed to say. He wondered how exactly did one explain how guilty he felt about how he treated you, how he didn’t really understand why he went out of her way to make your life miserable back then…and then you had left him. How, when you left he realized just how broken he was inside. When he bought the building he couldn’t believe her luck when he saw your name as one of the tenants, but her old ways came back hard and for some ungodly childish reason he couldn’t control himself. That he should have been apologizing that morning and telling you how thankful he was that it had also brought you back to him. He guessed that it was far too late for him to ever have your forgiveness and he couldn’t help the smile that played on her mouth as he approached the bed. He reached out a hand to smooth back some hair that covered your face when you wherpered, “Yoongi...” he stilled, “…I’m sorry” you mumbled. What could you possibly be sorry for? He couldn’t help it, but it made him angry that you would apologize to him after everything he’d done and especially while in such a vulnerable state that the next thing he knew he was grabbing the blanket and ripping it away from your curled form. It’s momentum sends you over the edge of the bed to land in a heap on the floor. You sit up cursing her very existence,

“What the hell Y/N?!” He yells right back, while you could only manage to stare up at him from where you sat on the floor. But this time you weren’t having any of her bullshit. You jump up and get in her face “ What the hell? What do YOU mean what the hell? Who the hell buys a building solely to evict one person?! Are you that rich? Do you hate me that much?”

Yoongi yelled back, “Hell yeah I do!“

"You have issues, Min Yoongi! I did nothing to you except be born! Do you know how hard I worked to forget what you did to me? And you come just back,” you pause, swallowing thickly, you would not cry. Not here. Not now, “But not anymore! I won't let you break me again Yoongi. I am worth so much more than that!”

Exhausted, you move to push around him but he grabs your wrists instead and pins you against the wall.

“Let me go you asshole!” you yell at him fighting back for once in your life, all while trying to hide your face and the tears that were no longer just threatening to spill over. “Can't you just hate me from a distance? I’m sorry your mom was a horrid cunt to you! I’m sorry, okay! But please, just let me go! Leave me alone” And then her hands were gone, and you were free. You couldn’t help it, you looked up and stared him in the eyes, for once determined to make him see how he wrecked you.

Yoongi could only stare at you, watching as the tears fell, tears once again caused by him, and then he heard the five words that ripped open her wounds, words he knew he deserved, said in a voice so broken he didn’t know where he should start to even attempt to repair it.

“I hate you Min Yoongi.“

He couldn’t stand it, he knew he deserved them but he just couldn’t stand there and just accept them. Accepting those words would be like giving up, and giving up probably the only pure thing he still had in her life. Had. And so he moved, not thinking about consequences, only a desire to cleanse those words from the air around him. He grabs you again, pushing you against the wall, capturing your face in one hand, forcing you to meet her eyes, while he brushes your hair away with the other, "Good. Never forget it.”

And then he crashes her mouth against yours.

You didn’t know how what was happening was happening and some stupid part of you was excited to have him pressed against you, mouth was moving against yours and then you were responding and for some reason it felt so good–like coming home. It was like your body suddenly was against everything you wanted-you found yourself wrapping your arms around her neck and pulling him closer, deepening the kiss, a giggle bubbling up when you nipped at her lip and he groaned. and then you both were tearing at each other's clothes in desperation. And then the world stops making sense. You and Min Yoongi, enemy of the state #1 were having sex. And it was good. It felt so right, like you two had been made to fit each other only. When it was over he lay behind you, placing gentle kisses along your neck and down your collar bone. The last thing you remember before falling asleep in your enemy’s arms was Yoongi gently wherpering a muffled “I’m sorry” into your ear over and over.

When you wake, you are surprised to find an arm wrapped around your waist and you freeze as the memories of the night before come rushing back and you begin to mentally beat yourself up as you carefully slide out of the bed and grab your clothes, making a mad dash out of the house, dressing yourself along the way.

No way had you slept with Yoongi and enjoyed it. You were an idiot of the highest order. You slept with the man who wanted you homeless because he hated you.

You let out a deep sigh as you did a very new special walk of shame to your job, where your boss, Mandi greeted you by yelling, “Oi ! What cat pissed in your cheerios?”

Causing the other workers to laugh until you pinned them with your patented Crazy-eye ™, at which point they scurried away except for that moron Seokjin who slung his arm around your shoulders jovially, “So why is my favorite girl doing the walk of shame?”

You glare and shrug his arm off, “None of your business.”

“Dude its obs-you’re like a whole 4 hours late-and you are never late. So what happened? Anyone I know?”

“You’ll just call me an idiot if I tell you.”

“I swear on cake I won't.”

You raise an eyebrow before saying a name you never thought you’d say just to see him eat his words. “Min Yoongi.”

“Shut the front door! You’re an idiot”

“The cake is ashamed of you and asks that you keep your distance.” You say as you move to the back rooms to put away your belongings.

Not giving up, Seokjin follows you, even going so far as to hand you your apron, “Seriously? Didn’t he like-”

“Terrorize me to the point of moving? Then find me years later and evict me? Yep.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

“You okay?” Seokjin asked worriedly, For the shit talking between the two of you, you smile to know he does really care.

“I have to be.”

“Did you at least use a condom?” He asks.

“Oh my god.”

“You really are an idiot. But don’t worry…you know I’ve got your back right? Well, we’ve got your back.”

You could only stare at Seokjin as your mind whirls through the consequences of last night, “It should be fine right?” you ask.

“Sure, cupcake. Keep telling yourself that”

There is a ding from the door and you see your brother Jungkook shuffles in with your other brother Namjoon, and giving Seokjin a look that clearly says “Keep your mouth shut if you want to live” you take a deep breath and head behind the counter to wash your hands, greeting them as you go.

“COFFEE. COFFEE NOW.” Namjoon grunts demandingly, taking a seat and burying her head in her hands, while Jungkook adds a half-hearted “Please…and a raspberry jelly for me.”

“Rough night?” You ask as you pour the two men coffee and grab Jungkook her donut and slide it in front of them.

Jungkook grins, “Nah, Joon thought he could out drink me. He thought wrong.”

“Shhhhhhhhh!! You’re so loud,” hersed Namjoon, shoving a hand at Jungkook’s face and missing entirely.

You grin and speak extra loud, “Shouldn’t you know by now to let the kids drink and you go home and sleep?”

Namjoon just glares at you, “I have a gun.”

“I aint scared of you.”

The shop bursts into laughter as Namjoon buries her head in her arms on the counter, “Why do you hate me so much?” He whines.

“Mom likes you more, and I’m a petty bitch.”

Jungkook grins, “But she likes me most!”

Both you and Namjoon glare at him, “Shut up!”

Yoongi wakes up to an empty bed and he frowns, crawling out of bed and pulling on her boxers. He wanders around the house looking for you, hoping that you haven't run away and when he can’t find you, her heart sinks. Was he that awful that you would still run away from him even after what you had shared? And worse, what if he had gone too far this time?

He makes her way back to her room and grabs her phone, calling her secretary.

“Yo.” Answered Hoseok.

“Really that’s how you answer the phone? You do know that I am your boss right?”

“Debatable today.”

Yoongi rolls her eyes, “Anyways, I need you to find someone…”

“Well you know Imma need a little more…”

“Y/N. You remember her right?”

“You mean the girl you tortured in school because you didn’t have the balls to tell her how you lurrrrrrrved her.”

“I see you wish to die today.”

“No, not today. So you wish for me to find your wayward love?”

“Yeah.”

“Mandi’s shop.” Hoseok cheerfully replied, as if this should be common knowledge.

“Oh yeah, great idea bring me some coffee please?”

“No, you idiot, Y/N works there. She is actually her partner” Hosoek irritatingly says matter of factly.

“The hell?! Why do you know this but I don’t?”

“Dude, seriously? You do know they were friends growing up and just because you made her run away by being a complete ass doesn’t mean they stopped being friends.”

“My best friend and my sister have been lying to me.”

“It’s not lying when you never asked. But Yoongi…you should let her go. It’s been a long time and I know you had feelings but with how you treated her–“

"She was here.” Yoongi grunted, running a hand over her face as he stood in her closet trying to think of what to wear. What says “I come in peace”? Maybe he could get Hoseok to dress up as Spock and talk to Y/N before he does.

“What? And you’re alive?”

“Yeah. We…um…she was gone this morning,” Yoongi sits down on her bed, running a hand through her hair.

"Oh…” and as realization hits, Hoseok intones sagely,” ...oh my god you’re fucking moron.”

“You know I can fire you.”

“Please bitch, I know all your deepest darkest secrets you ain’t gonna fire me.”

“Just…shit…what should I do?” Yoongi asks, finally letting go of her big bad boss act.

“Dude, I don’t know. You slept with her…maybe you should just…”

“I um…fucked up more than that…” He thinks about how you had felt, how he had felt...how absolutely perfect it had been for just one night, A flicker of fear strums through her heart at the thought that this was not salvageable at all.

“No. no way. Our friendship is over.” Hoseok cracks from the other side of the phone.

“Just help me okay?”

There was a long pause before he heard a heavy sigh, “Fine, but no games. She has a good thing going on and you-”

“I swear it's different this time!” Yoongi pleads.

“Whatever. I should warn you though.”

“Warn me about what?”

“Her brothers.”

“Namjoon and Jungkook? We were old friends, what about them?”

“You were old friends until they found out how you treated her. And bonus points-they are both cops now. Partners even, so you should probably pray for your soul.”

With a groan, Yoongi finally gets up and begins to get dressed putting Hoseok on speakerphone. “I’m so dead.”

“Yep,” affirms Hoseok, “So does that mean I can have your stuff?”

Rolling her eyes and thinking he really needs a new assistant, Yoongi growls out“See you at the office.” only to hear Hoseok laughing before he hangs up the phone.

Yoongi finishes getting dressed, and running a hand over her face as he contemplates this new information. You’d been right under her nose the entire time and everyone had kept it a secret. He guessed he deserved it though, he was a complete and utter ass to you. He also guesses it’s time to make it up to you and hopefully, you would forgive him and let him into your heart, where he belonged. After all, you’d always been in his.

2 months later

Yoongi stands outside her (former) sister’s shop watching as you serve your customers, and realizes sadly that it was the first time in a long time that he’d really ever seen you smile. He wanted that smile for himself and himself alone, but he wasn’t sure how to get it. When he had remodeled your former apartment, expanding it through the two vacant units on either side of you, you just got mad at him for evicting you, when he was just redoing the apartment and you claimed it was far too large for you by yourself now. But that was the point wasn't it? He was hoping that somehow you would just...come back to him on your own and he wouldn’t really have to put any work in. Yoongi realizes then that he is an absolute dumbass.

After all, nothing he’d done so far had managed to make you smile at him or hell just give him the time of day and he was beyond frustrated. Couldn’t you see how hard he was trying for you?

Mandi pokes her head out of the shop interrupting his train of thought,

“What the hell are you doing here?” she snaps at him.

“Wow, do you greet all your customers like this?”

“Yoongi. Listen. Whatever it this is about now isn’t–”

Realization hits for the second time that morning, “Were you ever going to tell me?”

Mandi pauses, looking him up and down, “There’s nothing to tell if you already know.”

He could almost feel the metaphorical walls slamming down around him as Mandi went on guard. “Mandi!”

“No. Not about ther.”

“I’ve known for almost a month.”

“Then you should go know somewhere else.” Mandi stepped outside, becoming a most effective blockade. If someone was to ever wage war against his sister, his money, hell, his entire fortune would be on Mandi.

“Listen, you’re my brother and I love you and I know you know what you did wrong, and really it's sweet you want to make amends but …Yoongi, sometimes things…”

“I slept with her.”

“Do you want a trophy?” Mandi snapped, her fists clenched, before she shook her head, “you have five seconds or I’m opening ther door and I’m calling her brothers out here.”

“We didn’t use protection.”

“Well then I guess today you die you little fucking weasel.”

“I love her.”

That’s when he remembered his sister’s left hook and then the lights went out.

Mandi stomps into the store grabbing you by the arm and dragging you upstairs ignoring your protests, shoving you into the bedroom and giving you a look reserved for her son’s Taehyung and Jimin when they are acting up. “Stay.”

Mandi goes back downstairs and motions Namjoon and Kookie over, “Listen, I know you hate Min Yoongi with like the passion of 7 fiery suns but I need you to hold that rage in and help me get his ass inside.”

Namjoon was already up and out the door at the sound of Min Yoongi’s name, and seconds later was dragging a barely conscious Yoongi in by the collar. While Kookie held open the door, Namjoon made sure Yoongi purposely whacked his head on the door frame and when Mandi winced he gave her a look that clearly said “sorry not sorry” before dropping Yoongi on the shop floor like the sorry sack of shit he thought he was.

“I’m sorry folks,” Mandi announces, “due to my crazy family, the shop will be closing early.”

The patrons all scrambled out of the shop while Jungkook handcuffed Yoongi to a chair and dumped a cup of ice water on him.

Yoongi jerked back, fully awake now and met by 3 pairs of eyes. 3 very angry pairs of eyes. He shook his head and tried to move but found himself handcuffed to the chair and he gives Mandi a look that says “Really?”

“Kook uncuff him. Seriously. And you and Joon leave.”

“No.”

“Did I stutter?”

“Okay, but we get dibs if you decide to kill him.” Jungkook, grumbles as he undoes the handcuffs.

“I’m not going to kill him. Today.”

“Fine.”

Jungkook finishes unlocking the cuffs and Yoongi immediately rubs at his wrists and watches warily as Jungkook and Namjoon leaves the shop, rolling his eyes when Jungkook gives him the international sign for “I’m watching you” while Joon drew his thumb across his neck. They were dramatic as fuck, but then again he might just be dramatically fucked.

Mandi pulls up a chair and sits across from Yoongi and stares at him for several long moments until Yoongi breaks the silence, “Just say it.”

“Why?”

“It just happened like that.”

“Bullshit.”

Yoongi sighed, “I’ve grown up since then. I no longer want to pull her hair.”

“Clearly. And you didn’t just pull her hair, you did a lot worse.”

“Shouldn’t you be on my side?”

“I am fucking Switzerland.”

Yoongi couldn’t help the anger that swelled up and choked him, “Clearly not. You knew where she was all these years and you never said anything. This is why you never let me come to the shop then? You knew I was looking for her, that I wanted-”

“Of course,” interrupted Mandi.

“Why?”

“Because you are an idiot who doesn’t know how to communicate. Look at what happened--when you did find her, your first action was to take her home. Who fucking does that shit?”

“You’re right, I was. I was cruel and spiteful. Keyword: was.”

“Bullshit. Taking away her home wasn’t because you were being spiteful. You wanted what she had. That’s called envy. She left because she wanted to live, and the only way she could was to leave. You made it like this. I almost lost my friend. So of course I kept it a secret.” Mandi sighed, rubbing her hand over her face. “Look I know. I know what y

our mom and dad did. How they treated us. We were mere points on a checklist of creating a picture perfect family. But you had no right-”

“I was stupid. You think I don’t know? That I don’t regret it? I love her. I always have.”

“Actions-”

“Speak louder than words I know. I’m trying to fix that now!”

Mandi closes her eyes, debating her next few words "Can I trust you? That’s the-“ ”

“Yes. I swear I'll spend my life…”

“Doing what?” You interrupt, “Sorry, since you seem to be discussing me I couldn’t stay put,” you say to Mandi. “Yoongi I don’t want your money and if you are worried because we didn’t…,” you swallow before continuing with a brave face, “....I’ll be fine. but you really have to stop sending me presents. I don’t want them. Can’t you just stay…”

“Y/N I’m sorry. I was an ass.”

“Still an ass.” Mandi interrupts, “Look, you two clearly need to talk this out so I’m out. Come on Seokjin, let’s go see a movie.”

With that Seokjin and Mandi beat a hasty retreat leaving the two of you alone.

“Your jaw is swelling.” You say after noticing the blossoming bruise that marred his handsome face. Handsome? What the hell were you even thinking?

“Mandi hit me.”

“Why?”

“I told her what happened. She’s very protective of you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Y/N…that night…I shouldn’t have that.”

“I let you. It wasn’t just you alone.”

“Please, just listen. I’m sorry. For everything. And I’m sorry for not saying that when we met again. It's just…”

“It's just..what?” You questioned, meeting his eyes.

“I don’t know. When I look at you I want you. You are so good and pure and you deserve the world. I wanted you to myself but I was scared…”

“Scared of?”

“You.”

“Me?” You scoff at the idea of anyone being afraid of you.

“Yeah,” Yoongi stood and walked over to you. “You had everything even though you had nothing. Brothers who worshiped you, a mother who did everything for you…what if I ruined that? What if my mother-”

“How would you ruin that?” You ask, finding patience from who knows where.

“I was messed up…and the older I got the worse…things got worse. You saw, you can’t pretend you didn’t. I took out my suffering on you because nothing good could possibly exist and you were just hiding your real nature. But you never retaliated. You kept reaching out to me over and over again. ”

“But I did retaliate.”

“By locking me out of my house after I took yours? Not really. I mean…I deserve far worse,” chucked Yoongi. He wanted so badly to touch you, to pull you into his arms and just...feel you.

You stare at Yoongi. This broken version of Yoongi with tears in his eyes. Could you trust him? You wanted to give him a chance.

“Let’s….go on a date.”

Yoongi’s eyes widened, “What?”

“You like me right?”

“Well–I mean–I did when I was—I do”

“Take me on a date, final offer going in one–two..”

“Fine! I’ll take you on a damn date,” Yoongi smiles.

“No fancy shit tho. $100 limit.”

“I’ll take you on the best damn date of your life!”

“Good.”

Yoongi didn’t know why he was being snippy now, but as he left the shop he couldn’t help but do a little cheer when he got into his car. Hoseok rolled his eyes and politely ignored him.

Yoongi stood at the door of your apartment, and for the first time in his life he hesitated, hand poised to ring the doorbell, and then you swung open the door and suddenly the world stopped. You looked amazing. Your hair was curled, makeup accenting your eyes perfectly, wearing black skinny slacks, a hound’s-tooth patterned sweater over a white button down and pink heels. He took in the perfection that was you and thought, “She was made for me.”

And the fear was gone as he smiled at you and he took your hand, interlacing his fingers with yours, “Are you ready to go?”

“Yeah let me grab my purse,” you say as you try to let go of his hand to grab the bag on the chair beside your front door but he wouldn’t let go. You couldn’t help the blush that blossomed over your cheeks as he stepped inside and grabbed the bag for you and waited for you to lock up so you both could leave.

He pulled you along, never letting go, until he reached his car and opened the door. It was only enough time for him to run around and get the car moving before he was locking fingers with you again.

“What’s up with you?” You smirk.

“Just…making up for lost time.”

“What?”

“I just…I should have been doing this for years now.”

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes, “So…are you always this cheesy?”

Yoongi’s eyes went wide, “I mean…I’m not…no…,” Yoongi stuttered and then stopped, “I guess I am cheesy it's just…I can tell you I’m sorry but…”

“Actions speak louder than words?”

“I see you have met my sister,” he joked softly, “And we’re here.”

“A movie? Really?”

“I always had wished to take you…”

Yoongi’s eyes stared into yours, “Yoongi…” you say timidly.

“Yeah?”

“I’m not her anymore you know? I grew up…you grew up…let’s leave it behind us and start fresh yeah?”

“What do you mean?”

You stick your hand out, “Hi, my name is Y/N. It’s nice to meet you.”

Yoongi stared at you you’d suddenly sprouted a third eye on your nose before awkwardly taking your hand and shaking it, “Min Yoongi…the pleasure is all mine.”

You can’t help but laugh at his stunned expression, not knowing he was just in shock from receiving your smile. To him, your smile in that moment could have powered a thousand suns.

Yoongi was quiet but still took your hand and you entered the theater with a smile on your face, happy that things were getting better, that you could almost believe you had your first love back.

2 hours later.

“Yoongi, why are you pouting?” You ask as you take his hand.

“Look no matter how I look at it, it's just not fair.”

“What’s not?”

“Mandi. Seokjin. They have spent years with you…years that should have been with me.”

“I thought we were moving forward.”

“But.”

You sighed. “Look. You want to know the truth?”

Yoongi stopped and stared at you, “yes.”

“Okay then.” You face him, “You crushed me in every way possible. You were my world. I followed you everywhere. I trusted you, and you were always there and then you weren’t. The night we got stuck in the cave I gave you my faith—but it also is and was the moment I gave my whole heart to you, willingly, without any doubt. And the next day when we were found…you stomped on it. And you continued to stomp on it. I cried so many tears everyday because I hoped that one day my hero would come back. But he never did. He became a villain.” You couldn’t help the tears that fell down your cheeks, “And even through all that I still…” you sighed. “I can't do this Yoongi. I can't. I’m sorry, I was wrong to try.” You turned on your heel and ran away, ignoring him yelling after you, you just ran until you couldn’t hear him anymore.

And then you found the alcohol.

You sat at the outside bar drinking as you thought about the past two months. All the things you had done with Yoongi , and how disgusted you were with yourself for letting your old feelings come back so easily. You knew it wasn’t the right choice, but it was the one you wanted. You had decided to drown yourself in alcohol, and you were on your third bottle when the object of your conflicting emotions, sat down across from you.

“Y/N.”

“Mmm?”

“What are you doing?”

“Drinking!” Your giggle turns to a frown when you hear the heavy sigh come across from you, “Are you judging me? It’s not nice to judge you know! “

“Why are you drinking Y/N?”

“Because,” you leaned forward, whispering conspiratively, “I’ve been bad.”

“Bad? How so?”

You sigh dreamily, a wistful smile playing upon your lips, “There’s this guy…”

“There always is.”

“Shhh! This is my story!” You shout.

“Sorry.”

“Where was I?”

“Something about a guy…”

“SHHHHHH! So rude interrupting me! Anyways…I’m supposed to hate him but…” you thump your chest hard as tears prick your eyes, “But…”

“But what?”

“I can't…I remember him before…and the him that I remember…he’s still there…and all the warning alarms are going off and I’m so scared to love him but I…I think…”

“You think?”

You lay your head on the table, mumbling, “Think it’s too late…think I love him. Think it has always been too late for me. Even after all the bullshit…you see…he’s still here” You thump your chest hard and sigh as you feel the tears slide down your cheek to land on the table, “ I love him and I don’t want to…I didn’t mean too…”

“Mean to what?”

“To love him, but…”

“You do.”

“Yeah” you whisper softly.

“Yoongi…” you can feel the man smile, you don’t know how you know but you do, “why do I have to love you?”

“You love me?” He asks, the hope wrapped in fear in his voice twisting your heart even more than all the past crap that had happened. You wanted to let it go. You wanted to love him. You can only nod your head as your eyes slide close, and you struggle against the darkness when you hear him whisper, “I love you too Y/N…I’m just scared…I’m not good enough…I was such an ass…and I know you said to let it go…but God Y/N…I should have treated you like a princess…because the truth is…”

Those words cause you to sit up, eyes squinting hard as you try to make out his face, “Yoongi?”

“Yeah?”

You lean forward and his face comes into focus, a smile spreads on your face and you lean forward to press your lips to his, softly at first, and then he responds, a hand sliding up your arm to cup your neck as you express to him what you can’t say in words. This was so much better than petty arguments and revenge pranks.

You pull away, breathing heavy as you rest your forehead against his, “Yoongi,” you whimper, keeping your eyes firmly on the buttons of his shirt, scared to look up, scared to see the fear in his eyes. Does he not know? “Can I…can I be yours?“ You ask in a voice so quiet it is almost lost in the noise of the world that surrounds you.

"Can you forgive me?” The pain in his voice was sharp. “I forgive you.” You whisper into his mouth as you make promises with your lips.

He pulls away for a moment, and you lock eyes finally. “Then believe me when I say, I was always yours, and you were always mine.”

“I was?”

The amount of disbelief in your voice causes Yoongi to tear up as he pulls you into his arms, “Kitten?”

“Yeah,” you say as you rest your head into the crook of his neck, breathing in his scent.

This time it was his turn to ask, “Am I yours?”

“You always were Yoongi. I was just waiting for you to remember where home was.”

Yoongi places the softest of kisses on each of your eyelids, and then he kisses away your tears and finally his mouth was on yours, and the kiss was full of yearning. “Y/N.”

“Yes?” You ask, sad he had pulled away.

“Don’t leave me again…I love you too.”

“Okay.”

#bts scenarios #yoongi scenarios #min yoongi scenarios #bts enemies to lovers #bts smut

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cienie-isengardu · 3 years

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axelzp replied to “The Bad Batch”:

I think most people take issue with Omega and TBB due to concerns over whitewashing. Also, what do you have against the explanation of the biochips? Personally, I always thought it fit Palpatine's controlling nature better than the idea of clones just getting a command from some random guy in a hood, telling them to kill the Jedi.

First off, I apologize it took me so long to answer. I tried to explain my reasoning in a short and coherent way as possible, but apparently the years of frustration about this issue needed more space to be properly addressed. So, in advance, sorry for text length.

From all TCW changes done to star wars, the chip-in-brain is one of my top 3 reasons to dislike the whole TV show, despite many of its good moments. I understand why authors chose this sub-plot that allows them to separate the visibly individual "good" clones (thus making them more likeable for the audience / marketing) from the “bad” that kill the Jedi but frankly, I find it a cheap and kinda problematic excuse. Clones were victims regardless of which version people will accept but I really despite the idea that Jedi were their beloved generals and commanders - so beloved that clones actually had nightmares about killing them waaay before Palpatine ultimately won which undermines the whole point of Order 66.

Jedi could never expect clones to shoot them in the back because they were used to their unquestioned obedience from the start of war. It was common knowledge, repeatedly mentioned in sources like “Jedi Trial” that clones were “bred to war, bred to discipline, bred to obey without question the orders of the powers that paid for their services”. Clones were made that way by genetic manipulations and years of intensive training; an indoctrination that makes clone troopers believe they have obey, no matter what cost.

Some sources, like Clone Wars Adventures’ “Orders” outright show us the mindset of clones:

and We’ve got nothing but each other ad our orders.

Because of that worldbuilding, I prefer Legends take on clone obedience and the Jedi approach to the problem than what TCW created. I talked about it more here, but the general sense is that I feel cheated by the idea of chips that turn people into some “programmed” machines because in such way, TCW erased the Jedi & Republic part in abuse & enslavement of clone troopers, while at the same time giving an unrealistic idea that Jedi were so liked / respected when most of clones did not have any special bond with them. And this is less about if Jedi were good military leaders or not and more that as generals/commanders they didn’t interact that much with common troopers. Because the chain of command doesn’t work like that. I’m willing to buy the close(r) bond between Anakin & 501st because frankly Darth Vader himself from the start was built as someone with better relationships with common troopers / “normal” officers than with most of the high ranking officers presented on screen. I’m pretty sure some other Jedi were caring and liking clones (and vice versa) but it is impossible for generals to know and be so close to all of their troopers.

Above everything else, Legends created an interesting situation in which the Jedi Council / Order knew clones would follow orders no matter if those were right or not and were aware how dangerous it could be yet they still didn’t do anything about it, because the obedience of clones were beneficial for them. Jedi not only took for granted their obedience, they mistook it for respect.

Which really speaks a lot about Jedi's own moral failing and/or lack of understanding the difference between those two terms.

In the Legends sources, there was no need for chips, really, when from the start Kaminoans tinkered with clone genome, created the effective system of “proper” education to mold clones into obedient soldiers and Republic wasn’t really interested to undo the damage done by such indoctrination.

Before TCW brought the chips and “nightmares haunting clones” there were officially established Contingency Orders for the Grand Army of the Republic: Order Initiation, Orders 1 Through 150. A guideline for unexpected and/or critical situations, so the Great Army of Republic [GAR] would know how to proceed - especially when troopers were given contradictory orders. The orders (also known as Clone Protocols) weren’t secret and there is a big chance that Jedi knew it, if someone bothered to learn the manual. The whole formula of Order 66 was described as:

"In the event of Jedi officers acting against the interests of the Republic, and after receiving specific orders verified as coming directly from the Supreme Commander (Chancellor), GAR commanders will remove those officers by lethal force, and command of the GAR will revert to the Supreme Commander (Chancellor) until a new command structure is established."

And here how the scene played in the RotS novelisation:

That concealed compartment held a secure comlink, which was frequency-locked to a channel reserved for the commander in chief.

Kenobi nodded and spoke to his mount, and the great beast overleapt the clone commander on its way down into the battle.

Cody withdrew the comlink from his armor and triggered it.

A holoscan appeared on the palm of his gauntlet: a hooded man.

"It is time," the holoscan said. "Execute Order Sixty-Six."

Cody responded as he had been trained since before he'd even awakened in his creche-school. "It will be done, my lord."

The holoscan vanished. Cody stuck the comlink back into its concealed recess and frowned down toward where Kenobi rode his dragonmount into selflessly heroic battle.

Cody was a clone. He would execute the order faithfully, without hesitation or regret. But he was also human enough to mutter glumly, "Would it have been too much to ask for the order to have come through before I gave him back the bloody lightsaber. . . ?"

The order is given once. Its wave-front spreads to clone commanders on Kashyyyk and Felucia, Mygeeto and Tellanroaeg and every battlefront, every military installation, every hospital and rehab center and spaceport cantina in the galaxy.

So there is really no “random hooded guy” calling clones to kill Jedi but Chancellor himself using an appropriately secured military channel with confirmation of his identity to issue a legal order in a critical situation (an opportunity created by the Jedi Council themselves who went into the Senate building to kill Palpatine). So why the clones shouldn’t listen, when the order came directly from the Supreme Commander of the Great Army of the Republic?

Of course, the movie (and novel based on it) alone has this weird addition like “yes my Lord'', what I personally consider as the cinematic way to show the switch from Chancellor Palpatine to Emperor Darth Sidious. Still, I’m willing to give some benefit of doubt about the modification made by Kaminoans and if Order 66 could trigger anything hidden in clone subconscious. But even if there was something, it didn’t erase their personalities or changed the way clones behaved like it happened in The Clone Wars and The Bad Batch.

One way or another, the Order 66 worked out because clones “have no malice, no hatred, not the slightest ill intent that might give warning. They are only following orders”. Which I guess comes down to how clone troopers were presented - or maybe rather how they were seen by other characters in the Legends. As more detached, combat pragmatic, toned down, to some degree isolated from the outside world, less individual. Regardless of what Jedi or Republic citizens thought about clones, it did not make them any less human beings.

And here comes the paradox of The Clone Wars. The TV show made great effort to humanize clones by presenting them as very individual, outstanding people which in itself is a great thing. The names, the tattos, the different paintings of armours, visible variety of behaviour. All great to make the audience see clones as human beings, to get emotionally invested into them, because the more likeable clones were the better for marketing the story (and the cynical part of me thinks it really comes down to making money, isn’t it?)

But this effort became also the trap and the inhibitor chips is the excuse to make such loved, caring and brave characters into the detached clones gunning down the Jedi in Revenge of the Sith.

The things that irks me a lot about this situation is the feeling like fans started care for clones because they were made into different type of characters than what they were (similar like Anakin’s movie characterization was thrown out of the window, to make him more suitable for fans who wanted the badass typical male hero instead of introverted, conflicted and traumatized young man). The clones get the visible individuality to make them the heroes we should root for, but then there is the “magical” switch that will cut down their heroic deeds because now they are “bad” and stormtroopers can’t have any personality. Which is just… frustrating.

Don’t get me wrong, I adore how clone troopers get more visible individuality (even if sometimes if felt too exaggerated), but the “not standing out from the group” was something that kept clones alive on Kamino and I can see why it was used as coping mechanism (the safe option) during the war. I regret that The Clone Wars didn’t show the transition from AotC nameless troopers into such individuals and how much it happened thanks to Jedi, what may help to build the feeling of supposed strong bond between Jedi and troopers. Because frankly, when we met TCW!clones, they already have names, different colors and marks on armor plates and helmets and for all we know, they could create their own “culture” without Jedi influence.

The final part of why I hate the chip-in-brain sub-plot is how it changed clones. Because even if that was a means to force clones into killing Jedi & ensure that Order 66 will be carried on no matter what, it shouldn’t change them into bullies toward their own brothers. But now in The Bad Batch, the clones don’t speak between themselves, are aggressive toward others and generally act like assholes for no real reason. And yeah, I get this may be a cinematic metaphor for a change from “good” republic soldiers into “bad” imperial stormtroopers and most likely something along the way “Republic/Jedi gave you individuality, Empire takes that away” but frankly, Republic did not give anything to clones. It did not acknowledge their human right, didn’t have any plan for their future, didn’t pay for their service or more expensive medical treatment for that matter, did not teach them they could - should - make their own choices.

Now clones are cheering for the Empire because inhibitor chips! They are assholes, because inhibitor chips! They shoot their *beloved* Jedi generals because of the chips!

And in a way, I get this resolution, the chips make it clear clones were victims. But even without them, they were victims from the start. Except now clones are “programmed” while in Legends the senate (a power paying for their life) officially and legally renamed Republic into Empire and clones were glad for still having a purpose in life. The war ended (thus their usefulness), but they were still needed - still wanted - instead of being put down or closed at Kamino or whatever. I can see why the uncertainty of the future made clones cheering up for the Empire. And frankly, I personally prefer them not caring for the political change (because why should they? It never was their job to *judge* the rightness of their superiors) instead of being “programmed” like some droids and playing the role of fodder to kill for the “good guys”.

Dunno, if I explained properly my issue with inhibitor chips, it just feels to me as not really convincing and a too risky concept in the bigger picture of the things and the fact that Jedi just like that ignored this suspicion matter of Tup and Fives and biochips doesn’t help either. Like I said, I understand why the chips were introduced to the story, as the excuse in the change of clone troopers’ behaviour but at the end of day, Legends worldbuilding will always make more sense to me. I don’t need overly done differentiation of clones to care for them as an individual human beings (and it kinda seems to me like that, clones suddenly became fan favorite when every looks or act differently but not when the AotC literally presented them as an army created to blindly obey Jedi/Republic) and I don’t blame them for sticking with Empire because what better option they had, considering their upbringing and the pathological system in which they lived all their life?

Dunno, I’m biased and may just have allergy to TCW in general.

As for Omega, I’m not really surprised about this concern, especially after seeing TBB’s version of padawan Kanan (that if not for A) some basic knowledge about his backstory and B) Depa Billaba calling him by name, I would probably never have figured out who he was supposed to be). But for Omega alone, I don’t mind her look, because I’m used to Legends!Jango’s biological family in which his mother and sister were both blond haired women and frankly, some “defective” clones (including Rex?) apparently could be blond too, so it seems like Jango’s genome has a recessive gene somewhere for that color of hair. I try to hold my judgment about Omega and her appearance until the full backstory will be revealed because there is still a chance that Fett’s DNA was mixed with someone else's (still I hope Omega is not force sensitive…). I mean, Hunter has heightened senses while Wrecker has almost supernatural strength and both traits seem to be not really human, so who knows what Kaminoans really did with them.

I understand people’s emotional response to Disney’s approach to characters and their visual look, especially since it isn’t the first screw up in New Canon (the models for characters in general and New Mandalorians especially). I’m totally okay with people’s criticism of that matter and demanding from Disney more diversity and respecting the already established ethnicity of certain groups. I’m aware I may not be sensitive enough to that matter as some other people (even more with barely watching TV shows to have any current and up-to-date comparison to trends in cartoons) and I’m pretty sure more qualified / invested fans already wrote or will be writing soon great metas about that. But the thing that irks me is hearing people saying that Omega *can’t* be Jango’s clone - I don’t like this sort of exclusion based on someone’s look alone. She may not look like Fett or other (male) clones but it is not something Omega chose for herself and does not erase her connection to the rest of the Bad Batch. Being angry at Disney/creators for her look is a different matter I don’t have any problem with.

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xoxo-ren-xoxo · 3 years

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Tommy’s (and Tubbo’s) Character /rp /dSMP

This is a bit of a rant so like be warned. I have nothing against any CCs mentioned in this, this is all roleplay, lighthearted, and just a bit of fun analysis. Mostly this is a ramble about how I see certain people analysing Tommy’s character on tumblr and twt, and why I think they’re wrong. This isn’t directed at anyone specific, just a trend I’ve been seeing that kinda irks me. I don’t dislike the fandom, just a few ‘takes’ have been really weird for me.

TW for everything below: analysing the effects of trauma, abuse, manipulation, gaslighting, and lack of therapy.

I’m not really liking how victim-blamey everyone is getting currently in the dSMP, both in fandom and canon. In canon with certain characters but especially in fan analysis posts and especially about Tommy and Tubbo. People legitimately celebrating that Tommy might start ‘apologising’ for his actions more and 'growing as a person' somehow don’t realise that hes been made this way through a tonne of negative reinforcement. abuse, and gaslighting. And people blaming Tubbo for actions he had no choice in, rather than the actions he did choose.

Currently, as I see it, Tommy is so scared that anyone would find a reason to be pissed off at him that his fighting spirit has been completely crushed. He was exiled and abused when he should have been helped and given an understanding figure to guide him and teach him how to deal with things non-violently. In everyone’s eyes, the problem was that Tommy was creating violence with no real reason, acting recklessly and commiting crimes. Tubbo, having made him a part of his cabinet, knew that this would only harm the country. So instead of talking to him reasonably, he got angry, put him on trial, and punished him with the logbook (humiliating him by making him report back to Fundy, which he obviously hated). Tommy’s actions were, of course, bad, but did he deserve everyone ganging up on him? No. Especially when Tubbo was supposed to be in his corner, helping him out like he always said he would (”It’s me and you vs Dream” etc). This is the first betrayal of trust from Tommy’s POV. He doesn’t understand what he did wrong to its full extent, and no one can explain it to him.

However, Tubbo was under a lot of pressure from Dream and George, and he’s a literal child President, so his ‘safety over friendship’ actions are understandable. I don’t believe Tubbo is solely to blame for anything he’s done in season 2, but it can’t all be excused. If you are to blame Tommy for his recklessness, you have to blame Tubbo, at least partially, for his disregard for Tommy’s feelings and mental state. There were other ways to go about the entire thing, including the trial, which was just horrible to watch, and agreeing to give Dream the disc, something Tommy gave him in pure confidence that it would be safe with Tubbo. Yikes moment.

At that time, Tubbo knew a lot of things about Tommy. In fact, he probably knew the most about Tommy out of anyone on the server. He knew the discs were incredibly important and a comfort item for Tommy. He knew Tommy had trauma from being exiled in the past. He knew Tommy was abused, or at least manipulated by Wilbur, in addition to growing up in war. Wilbur once told Tommy to stop being reckless, and Tommy listened, changing his attitude because he looked up to Wilbur so much. Then Wilbur said ‘let’s be the bad guys’ and stopped trying to mentor Tommy. There’s a conflict here, because Tommy was told by Wilbur that he wasn’t good enough to be President (links to the idea of ‘not being strong enough’) but he knows that Wilbur was a bad person. But Tommy is never given the chance to reconsile his feelings surrounding Wilbur, both because of Ghostbur and because of the conflict he starts with George. So he is harbouring a mixture of emotions about his mentor and brother, not understanding how to untangle the ‘real Tommy’ from the manipulated boy he became.

What was going through his head when he stole from George and griefed him? Perhaps the thought that he needed to show he was still the same old Tommy. Maybe the need to ‘prove himself’ as a strong person? It could have just been an outlet for his trauma. He’s grown up in a world where everyone is either a friend or an enemy. George isn’t a friend. How was he supposed to know that hurting him was bad?

Tubbo was pressured into the actions he took against Tommy, but he was pressured far too easily. There is no moment where Tubbo turns to Tommy and makes sure he’s okay, he views him as ‘selfish’ and overdramatic, and sees his actions that way. This makes sense from Tubbo’s POV, he’s struggling to be President in ways that Wilbur *knew* he would, but in Tommy’s eyes this is the worst betrayal he’s ever known. The moment Tubbo (rightfully, but poorly executed) defies Tommy’s plan to hire Technoblade (ahem, seeing Techno as a weapon again) and exiles Tommy is the moment their friendship shatters. They’re two people who don’t understand each other anymore. Two people who are technically in the right, but only hurt each other.

What Tommy needed was a therapist, instead he had Dream, who put out the fire of rebellion that made him so strong, and Techno, who was trying to help but doing it in the wrong way.

People see tommy's change post-exile as a good thing because he's not as rebellious anymore and he’s thinking things through a lot before he does them, but they will soon realise that his rebellion was one of his best traits and the fact that no one saw it as anything but a problem really shows. He now second-guesses himself so much and is so scared of being wrong that everything seems too difficult and too dangerous. Every trait can have a positive and negative side. Tommy's defiant nature would have made him the perfect negotiator with a little practise. In fact, he had plenty of good ideas before he was exiled (using spirit against Dream, though it didnt work in the end, for example). The negative side of this was recklessness and the desire to cause problems on purpose, but what he needed was a friend (looking at you Tubbo) who understood that hes been through several wars, was manipulated by Wilbur, and hasnt known a time of peace where everyone who wasnt on his side was out to kill him. Now that ‘fight’ is gone he's just become easier to manipulate.

He may be getting better (see: telling Dream to go fuck himself) but there hasn't been any long-term growth because he was never told what kind of rebellion was good and what was bad. He was just told it was all bad. By Dream (and by Tubbo). Who he doesn't trust. So he's just going to revert back to his old ways because no one told him what was bad in a way that didn't make him feel like everyone was against him. Dream is the enemy (though Tommy’s feelings towards him are complicated, they make his brain go all ‘flippy floppy’) and Dream told him that rebellion was bad, so rebellion must be good always, right?

And then there's Techno. Techno did nothing wrong except for when he did. Techno is 100% right except for when he isn’t. He doesn't understand Tommy because Tommy was never fully open about what Dream had done and how it affected him. That's not Tommys fault though, because who the fuck openly talks about their trauma? So neither of them are to blame for pretty much anything up until the confrontation at the community house.

However, Techno's methods and ideology were not what Tommy needed. He was thrown from one extreme to another over and over again, from complete subservience to total rebellion. Neither of these inforce good attitudes in Tommy. One, as stated before, makes it so that he will regain his negative traits again. The other reinforces those violent traits as good, just like Wilbur did. The only difference is that Techno had good intentions, he wasnt trying to use Tommy, which is why he feels so used when Tommy 'betrays' him (Techno doesnt realise that he himself betrayed Tommy by teaming with Dream, he sees it more as a transaction than a personal thing). Techno feels so hurt by Tommy ‘viewing him as a weapon’ that he goes on with his no-mercy attack, completely dropping Tommy at his lowest point.

Tommy says he doesn't want to be like everyone he's hated. In fact, he say's he is 'worse' than all the villains. This is very obviously untrue, though he was clearly going down a dangerous path with Techno's influence (see: bullying Fundy, spawning wither, kidnapping Connor, and saying that the discs are more important than Tubbo, more on that later). He's not a villain but who exactly has said he's not a villain. Dream? Techno? Neither of them can be trusted in his eyes. They say he's a good guy, Wilbur wanted to be the bad guy, who's right? He doesn't know. He has a crisis of morality.

And? Some people want to point at that and say 'aha! Character development! He's finally realising his actions have a negative affect on others!' OH GOD NO??? He's a *child* who thinks that he is worse than his abuser. Does that sound like positive character growth to you?

Lastly, the discs. We know theyre a comfort item blahblahblah. He hates himself for valuing them more than he values Tubbo. He's literally innocent in this. He’s been horribly manipulated by Dream to believe that the discs are worth anything. Theyre really not worth anything if they are being used as tools rather than, yknow, discs. My poor boy. He doesnt trust people, so what can he trust? The discs. But then he says it out loud and realises he misses Tubbo and he wants to be with his best friend again and and and WAHHHH. This also isnt really character growth its just fucking sad leave me alone.

Anyways what the fuck guys. @ Niki and Jack what the fuck. Yeah we get it it’s miscommunication but wtf. Kinda worried that the actual lore will make Niki and Jack’s hatred of Tommy justified in some way and take on a big victim-blamey vibe, but I’m hoping that everyone is smart enough to not do that. I cannot praise Tommy enough for how he’s portrayed his character. I’m currently hoping that he himself understands the true complexity of it all. I’m sure he does.

Mostly though im actually pissed off at all the people praising tommy's character for 'maturing' when hes literally just got trauma. Nice one, tumblr and twt users. Thanks. Great job. He hasnt 'learnt his lesson', he’s traumatised. What the fuck.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk, leave your responses in the reblogs and comments.

#dreamsmp #dream smp #character analysis #dreamsmp analysis #analysis #critical #tommyinnit #tubbo #dream #technoblade #wilbur soot #tw trauma #tw abuse #tw gaslighting #tw manipulation

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calliecat93 · 3 years

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ST: TNG S6 Watchthrough Episodes 14-17

Face of the Enemy: Troi has been kidnapped and forced to look/pose as a Romulan officer. Why? The one responsible isn’t saying, but to say that she’s unhappy would be an understatement. As it turns out, Troi was abducted by a part of the resistance from Unification and they need a Starfleet officer in case their current plan goes south. They even mention Spock… IDK if I can see him approving of an abduction but maybe they just forgot to mention that he disapproved that part… then again I guess it makes logical sense. Eh, whatever. So… this is by far the best Troi episode that they’ve done thus far. She was kidnapped yes, but she is NOT playing the damsel-in-distress. She’s not victimized. She’s not sexualized. She’s not forced into a poorly conceived romance or undergoes anything gross/f*cked up. She has to act the part of a cold-hearted authoritarian among a ship of Romulans and she is freakin’ badass. Especially when she decides that she’s had enough going and thoroughly tells off her kidnapper N’Vek and that he will listen to her. 100% perfection. They even managed to make her empathic abilities useful. Did putting her in the uniform cause this? Did they get it out of their systems in Man of the People? IDK but I am all for it! It was also an awesome look into the Romulans and the going-ons on their ship, something we haven’t really gotten since TOS’ Balance of Terror, and all the Romulans are done very well. N’Vek kidnapped Troi but he did it for his cause and is a great morally grey character, and the female Romulan Commander Toreth is an excellent antagonist. Plus it’s nice to see more of the resistance and to see them within the Romulan ranks. It was an excellent episode and I freakin’ loved it~! Thank you show for giving Troi the badass episode that she deserves (even if it was this late in the show's run), now keep it up! 5/5.

Tapestry: Two Q episodes this season? Hell yes~! So… Picard dies. Welp. Q decides to take this to give Picard an offer: go back in time and undo his greatest regret, the incident that caused his artificial heart that he told Wesley about in Samaritan Snare. Back when he was a hot-blooded rebel who got himself into a fight that got him stabbed in the heart. In doing so, he now has a chance to correct all the wrongs and settle all he regrets in his life since that day. So up to this point, Q’s episodes since Q Who, while still entertaining and interesting, had been more light-hearted. Q still came off as an all-powerful being (Deja Q aside which him not being was the plot point), but his antics had been more comedic or light-hearted in comparison. In this episode, he’s acting like a trickster as per usual, but again more with the purpose to teach Picard a lesson. Why isn’t made very clear aside from maybe he just likes Picard (take that however way you’d like), but it’s nice to see this version of Q again while still utterly stealing the show. Picard got to undo the event… but would it have really turned out any better had it not happened? Would not making mistakes, having regrets, and making all the supposed ‘right’ choices when he should have had truly made a better impact in his present? That’s the funny thing about life, it’s easy to look back and go ‘if I had done this one thing differently, it would have been better’ and te desire to correct it is very powerful. But with mistakes comes the ability to learn. To grow. To mature. You’ll always have guilt and regrets, but you have to accept that this is what you chose and go about your life. Picard is a man full of thrown-away opportunities, pain, and so much more… but it also caused him to become a strong leader, intelligent, a risk-taker, and even with all his faults become a better person in his present day. Now obviously he doesn’t actually die, but he sure as Hell learned the lesson. The life he would have lead would have been unsatisfying, his old regrets replaced with new ones, and been unfulfilling for a man like himself. Now he can truly value the one that he has and the people in it. This was a fantastic episode. It’s crazy how Picard went from one of my least favorites to now one of my absolute favorites. His development and growth from a strict, aloof authoritarian to a much more reasonable father-like figure and much more humbled man and the captain has been excellent, and this episode just helps further that. The only real complaint is there’s not much time devoted to showing how his crew ended up without him, but that’s minor and doesn’t take anything away at all. Very well done~! 5/5.

Birthright: Okay, guess we got a second two-parter… and apparently it crosses over with DS9. Didn’t see that coming. But alrighty, I’m game~!

Part One: So the crew is on Deep Space 9 to assist in repairs of some incident involving the Bajorans and the Cardassians that I guess I’ll find out about when I get to the show. While there Worf is approached by an alien who informs him that his dead father? He may not be dead after all, having been kept in a Romulan prison. Worf doesn’t take it well. He ain’t the only one having daddy issues. While working with DS9‘s CMO Dr. Bashir, Data gets knocked out has a vision of Dr. Soong (a much younger one than in Brothers). Normally Data can’t dream so he’s pretty taken aback by this. So as a first part, this was pretty good. It sets up Worf’s plot well with him deciding to break into the Romulan camp to find out the truth and rescue the Klingons there. Data’s plot is overall nice. He’s never dreamed before so him trying to track down why is very understandable, especiallya after Picard suggests that he quit going through facts and try a more creative outlet to get his answers. So what happened? As it turns out Dr. Soong made it so that when Data reached a certain cognitive point, he would obtaint he ability to dream and he made an AI version of himself to talk to him. I guess he would have explained this to him in Brothers had Lore not shown up/had he not died. It was a really touching moment. Soong’s still not exactly the most ideal parent, but his AI copy seemed legit proud of how far Data’s come. Is it out of ego, legit parental pride, or both? That’s up for you to decide. As this is my first look at Bashir… so far I don’t have too manys torng opinions. he seems to act more liek a Science Officer or Engineer han a CMO, but he is cute and so far liekabe. He’s curious about Data, but doesn’t dehumanize him like Maddox in The Measure of a Man did, if anything he notes Data’s more human-like elements like being able to grow hair than any of the nuts and bolts. He seems pretty well liked from what I’ve seen int he fandom, so I’ll see how that holds when I reach DS9 but I like him so far. I do have some issues, but that more impacts the Overall so I’ll save it for there. So we end with Worf discovering his father’s true fate… and he’s informed by the Klingons there that he’s never leaving the camp. Welp. How will Worf get out of this one in Part 2? We shall see. 4/5.

Part Two: So what the heck is going on? Well, Worf’s father is infact dead, but there were captured Klingons. As they weren’t able to die with honor nor could they return home as it would dishonor their families (Klingons prefer death to capture), they chose to remain in the camp and live out the rest of their lives there. So now Worf is among multiple Klingons, the vast majority of which know nothing about their heritage, culture, and customs and had it outright demonized. To them, the lives they have are the norm and they have no desire to change it. Worf may have been out of touch with Klingons due to being raised on Earth, but at least he can explore it and get in touch with it. The ones in the camp? They can’t do that. They’re essentially in a gilded cage. Yeah, there's the argument that they achieved peace between Klingons and Romulans… by imprisoning said Klingons and demonizing their culture to them with the older Klingons allowing it. Though it seems it’s also because of broken spirits and the dishonor they’d have faced otherwise which is worst than death to them. There’s even one girl, Ba’el, who is half Klingon, half-Romulan… and despite what gets said I don’t get the sense that her parents' union was a fully consensual one. This was pretty good. Worf has found a group that like him were out of touch with their heritage, and he is now able to educate them and guide them. With all that’s happened and his struggle to be a true Klingon and find his way, this was really nice to have. He’s still clinging onto his hatred of Romulans and this episode isn’t going to help it dissipate, but at least it was addressed and Ba’el being upset at being judged due to how she was born was very much justified. Heaven knows that the themes here are still very much relevant in today’s time. Worf’s guidance pays off in the end and at last, they can be free. The younger Klingons have a rough road likely ahead of them since we know that Klingon society isn’t exactly the easiest to get through, but at least they have a chance at freedom. It was a very strong Worf episode and it was great to see~. 4/5.

Overall: Okay, so overall… it’s pretty uneasy. The Worf parts are good.. As I said, it was nice to see him in a position to give guidance to a group even more out of touch than he is. It was very wel done. The issues are mainly with Part One. We have this plot where they go to DS9… and we are barely there. We have Dr. Bashir… and only him. None of the other characters. We don't even see O’Brien despite him having transferred to DS9 at this point. Maybe the actors were busy sot they could only pick one but it kinda makes doing a crossover cheap. Bashir doesn’t even get a lot to do, you could write him out and very little would change. On the upside this means that viewers who haven’t watched DS9 won’t be confused nor would DS9 be required viewing, but it also kind of defeats the purpose of bringing DS9 in. It’s essentially just window dressing. Data’s plot, while nice, is completely dropped in Part Two. It feels like they were required to do a two-parter, didn’t have enough of the Worf plot to fill it out, and came up with the Data dream plot and using DS9 to fill it out. The crew also don’t really do anything in either part. As such, aside from getting Worf into the place he needs to be, Part One feels irrelevant. As such, I can’t give it a perfect rating. It was still good, but as a two-parter Part One bogs it down, but still allows for Part Two to happen. Overall, pretty good. 4/5.

#st watchthrough

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innenofutari · 4 years

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On Goro Akechi’s morals and forgiveness (character analysis, but also just a very rambly post)

Akechi is… a very interesting character, I have no doubt about this. Also my favorite of course, if you hadn’t figured that out yet by this giant text you’re about to read (sorry). I have a lot I want to talk about in regards to him since he is so intriguing and we actually don’t have that much info about how his thought process works so it leaves a lot of room for speculation.

In any case, in this meta in specific I’m going to be talking about Akechi’s...morality(?), forgiveness and his relationship with regret. I’m not sure if that’s the best word to define this but I’ll roll with it for now. I’ll try to be fair and talk about things as I personally see them, it’s totally fine if you don’t share my views! Now, onto the actual meta.

Starting off, as people are obviously aware, Akechi is a morally gray character, a darker shade of, but he’s a sympathetic and tragic character nonetheless. That much is undeniable, he was written to be sympathetic, even if I’d argue Atlus did a pretty poor job of it in Vanilla (he was still my favorite ever since then though lol) but he’s reached his true potential in Royal, which makes me immensely happy to see. I get so unbelievably happy whenever I see people saying Royal changed their perception of him and started to like him more! But even then, there are a lot of people who just can’t forgive him for what he did, and that’s only natural. I personally think that, if you don’t try to sympathize with Akechi and truly, truly try to understand his mind and history, you’re doing him a huge disservice. But, forgiveness is something that everyone is free to think and decide if he deserves it or not. In Akechi’s case, I feel like forgiveness is something much more personal to the player, and this shows between the Phantom Thieves too.

There is a visual novel I hold very close to my heart called Umineko no Naku Koro Ni (which I’ll be quoting relentlessly throughout this entire post) that illustrates what I think better than I could put into words, so I’ll be quoting that scene with a few tweaks for better context:

“You said you understood the culprit’s motive.”

“...Yes.”

“Is that motive… a satisfying explanation for why they’d [commit murder]?!”

“Who knows. That’s for you to decide. Even if I say it’s satisfying, that doesn’t mean it will satisfy you. …You have to decide that for yourself.”

I really like this. It reminds me a lot of Akechi’s situation. I firmly believe that this has no “objective”, “most correct” answer to, just your personal feelings, which are the most important. I, as a player, do forgive Akechi, I want him to have a happy ending, another chance at life, manage to live happily with Akira and have some fun for once. That’s what “forgiveness” means to me in this situation, but while some people may empathize with Akechi, they still can’t forgive him. They think he should stay forever in jail or die since he cannot be redeemed in any way in their eyes. Where do I wanna go with this endless blabbering you ask, and I respond, I just want to try and see Akechi’s actions through two different lenses.

Well, I personally don’t like downplaying the crimes he committed and dumbing it down to “he was being manipulated” because, even if this is not false, it is not entirely correct either. Akechi is so fun to speculate about because he’s a character who is always clashing against himself in various ways as if he was in a constant state of internal turmoil, and this is not very different.

Akechi himself made the choice to go to Shido. It is extremely unlikely that he didn’t know he was going to be using his new powers for murder. He may have been very young, but despite the fact that he was a child forced to mature prematurely, he knew exactly which type of person Shido was. When he walked into that deal he was aware of the consequences and had fully made peace with the fact that he’d be taking another person’s life. Now, I’m not saying that Shido never manipulated him because he did, but not with that particular choice.

This alone tells plenty about Akechi’s morals. I believe that Akechi indeed has some level of empathy for other people, but I sincerely doubt he feels especially bad about the Okumura-like people he had to kill. He might feel bad for the family of the victims or just feel nauseated with himself, however, he doesn’t regret a thing. As if he had grown numb to it. ...Until a certain point, that is, but I’ll talk about that later.

I would also like to elaborate further on Akechi’s continuous conflict with himself, and this particular piece of Maruki’s confidant immediately reminded me of this:

He’s talking about Akira here, but isn’t it interesting to note that Akechi’s internalized and externalized realities are, in contrast to Akira’s, the farthest they could possibly be from each other? His sense of justice, childlike desire to be loved and seen as a hero, in contrast to the cold-blooded murderer he had become? It’s like there are two people fighting it out inside of Akechi’s brain (lol) which must cause him a lot of distress. I don’t believe that Robin Hood is a ruse or that his Detective Prince façade is entirely fake. The way I see it, they are his ideal, which he strayed so far away from he lost grasp of who he himself is.

In my opinion, Akechi has never cared about fame the slightest bit, he used all of that as an opportunity to act out the person he wished he was, just and virtuous, while still being the feral murderer and bloodstained person he is today. These are two integral parts of him that he has never known how to reconcile. It’s interesting to note that in the third semester he was the one who since the beginning advocated firmly to return to the harsh reality but he had spent the entire game living in the comforting “detective prince” dream he made for himself until the engine room scene happened.

With the third semester context, the engine room becomes so interesting because that scene is akin to Sumire finding out she’s not Kasumi. It’s a cold bucket of water thrown straight to Akechi’s face and telling him to wake up from this lie he made to comfort himself and face reality: he is no hero. Despite the fact that he is, too, a victim, he is simultaneously a murderer who perpetuated with the cycle of his father’s aggressions and he cannot escape that fact. Worse, he was being manipulated all along and his revenge plan and arguably his only reason to live AND justification for his actions was completely crushed.

Once again, this Umineko scene illustrates what I think Akechi’s situation up until that point was like:

Akechi rationalized every awful, inexcusable thing he did as, “It’s for my revenge’s sake” and ran with it. He was incredibly blinded by his hate and ignored the weight of the consequences of his actions up until that point where everything came crashing down right in front of his eyes. There is no excuse and no justification for that.

However, Akechi was also abused himself. There is no excuse for what he did, but is getting back at the person who took everything from him so reprehensible a thought? Is wanting justice against someone who essentially ruined your life not understandable? Many people like to say “cool motive still murder” or things of the like, but I’m asking you again to put yourself in his shoes.

Yet AGAIN with a Umineko screencap:

I played this the other day and one of the first things I thought of was Akechi. A lot of people draw parallels between Akechi and Adachi, but that’s just so damn wrong and make me lose my hair so much and become completely bald because that couldn’t be farther from the truth and I’m gently asking you to reconsider. In the pic above, Adachi would fit the “homicidal maniac” mentioned to a T, and while Akechi is by absolutely no means free of guilt and much less a stellar person, his crimes were moved completely by his heart.

For the people who use his choice to become Shido’s hitman to say Akechi does not deserve any kind of forgiveness and that he’s a murderous maniac, I ask you to at least think of what state of mind he was at that moment. Think very hard about it, imagine how completely bleak life must have looked like then, to the point that he risked everything on murder.

This is nothing more than my speculation, but I believe Akechi’s thought process at that moment was something along the lines of, “I have nothing to lose since my (current) life is completely meaningless". It was as if he had reached such a numb state he chose to forgo all his morals and humanity in pursuit of at least one thing that would give his life meaning, that being his hate for Shido, which I also think was the only emotion he ever truly understood well ever since his mom passed.

Since Akechi is all about conflicting emotions though, I would also like to remind you how vulnerable Akechi really is to any kind of affection. His “childlikeness” that Robin Hood represents was, by all accounts, still there. Akechi has a desperate need to be loved while simultaneously putting up walls and wearing masks, making it extremely difficult to have any kind of meaningful relationship. This is something that Shido thoroughly takes advantage of, too.

That’s also why one of his lines to Akira hit so much harder for me, following this reasoning. “If only we had met a few years earlier,” expresses many emotions at once. If Akechi had known something other than misery and hatred during that period of his life he would not have latched so thoroughly to that revenge plan. Akechi simply had nothing to lose, since he had nothing at all.

I mentioned earlier that Akechi doesn’t regret a thing, which I still think it’s true. Before he had met Akira, he truly did not regret a thing, but meeting Akira caused him a lot of strife because not only Akira is a person whose whole existence flaunts everything Akechi could have had if he hadn’t fallen into fate’s trap, but Akechi also experiences happiness through his connection with Akira. Hanging out and talking to him truly makes him happy, and it’s something more genuine than he’s ever known. Yet, it’s too late, because his choices were already set in stone and he had already pulled the trigger with no way to take any of the bullets back.

That’s why Akechi is so confusing, so controversial and sometimes uncomfortable to think about. There is no clear line between good or bad, he just is something in the middle. Akechi is both a person who ruined a lot of people’s lives with no regard whatsoever to the consequences but also a victim rebelling and retaliating against the person who took everything from him and made his life a living hell. That’s why it’s so hard for not only some players to form opinions about him but also downright uncomfortable for the Phantom Thieves to think about. There is no objectively best answer for what he deserves. It just doesn’t exist. Should he spend the rest of his life in jail, or dead, because his crimes were inexcusable? Or should he be given another chance at life to learn to be happy? It’s entirely subjective, and that’s why he’s so great to think or discuss about.

Aaand that’s it, I’m grateful you read so far, hope I didn’t piss anyone off, also not gonna pretend this wasn’t very self indulgent because of the amount of times I quoted Umineko in it. Anyways, thank you!

SIDE NOTE: I didn’t write this recently, it had been sitting on my drafts for some months now and I found it again today and decided to just release it into the wild because why not? I think this was meant to be much longer than it is and to elaborate more eloquently on a lot of points I brought up (like the PT with Akechi) but alas, I lost the train of thought and so it Perished.

#goro akechi #meta #p5r spoilers #persona 5 #p5 #persona 5 royal #character analysis #long post

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not-playable-character · 3 years

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New Beginnings CH.1

Its the Mirlena fic boiz! or at least chapter 1. Hope you enjoy!

AO3 link : https://archiveofourown.org/works/32607286/chapters/80885854

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“And finally, this is where you will be working.” Chris gestured towards a laboratory door before stopping Elena with a hand on her shoulder, “If anything goes wrong, please don’t hesitate to contact me. Even if you just feel like you can’t handle working with her, I will pull you out and assign you somewhere else.”

Elena nods with a small smile feeling a small amount of comfort from his words. The duo then make their way into the lab with Chris leading. The room, while not small, was not spacious, it was enough for two people to work comfortably at the chemical hoods lining the left wall and the island type counters in the middle of the room. Miranda doesn’t react to them entering the room, intensely focused on her current work. Chris waits for her to come to a stopping point before announcing their presence by clearing his throat. Miranda jumped slightly at the noise before turning towards them.

“Agent Redfield, I told you that I didn’t need an assistant. I appreciate the gesture, but you know that I am not what you would call popular around here.” Miranda said as she continued working.

“I know you said that, but I feel like you need help. This is too much work for one person alone, and I need someone closer to keep an eye on what you do.” Chris explained to her in a matter of fact manner.

Miranda sighed and fully gave her attention to Chris and Elena, “Ahh I see what you mean. A pleasure to officially meet you Ms. Lupu. Please call me Miranda or Dr. Cel Tradat , I prefer Miranda, but I understand if that makes you uncomfortable.” She stuck her hand out to Elena.

Elena takes her hand shaking it, “I’m surprised you know who I am Mo-uh Miranda. I was just a villager.” Miranda winces at Elena’s slip up but ignores it.

“I took pride in knowing all of the people in my- ugh- the villages. Sadly, it was for less than wholesome matters. The mycete wanted to keep a record for every possible host though the small presence of my mind wanted to remember all of the victims of my experiments. So, yes, I know who you are, I know pretty much everything about you. Which sounds very creepy now that I say it aloud.” Miranda says blushing a bit. Elena giggles at her awkwardness welcoming the break in tension between them.

“Well, I won’t ask about the specifics you know. I’m excited to get to know the real you and not the goddess. Though I’m going to apologize in advance if I slip up and get a bit cultish.” She says keeping the mood light.

Chris clears his throat again interrupting the two women, “I’m glad you two are getting along so well, but I need to get going. Elena you are to stay here and just observe for today, you can get started with training tomorrow. Miranda, you can finish up what you were doing and take an early day.” Both women nodded and Chris left to go back to his work. The awkward air returned around the women. Miranda stood in front of her workstation as if she were waiting for permission to continue.

“Oh, uh, don’t mind me. I’ll keep out of your way. Oh! I forgot to mention earlier but please call me Elena.” Elena said finding a chair and moving it to a corner so she could observe. Miranda simply nodded and continued her work.

After setting everything up to settle over night Miranda decided to end her day, “Did Agent Redfield give you the full tour?” She asked washing her hands and removing her lab coat putting it in her designated lab laundry bin.

Elena shook her head, “His er…tour, if you would like to call it that, was pretty limited. He mostly just pointed out what each room was while on the way here. He seemed to be in a hurry, I don’t blame him, but this place is still like a maze to me.”

Miranda rubbed her forehead in irritation, “Please tell me he at least told you where you would be staying.”

Elena flinched at her tone, “Yes, he said I would be sleeping with you.”

Miranda immediately felt guilty at making Elena flinch, “How presumptuous of him, I’m not the type to put out for strangers.” She joked trying to lighten the mood.

The strange sentence confused Elena for a second before she realized Miranda was joking with her, Elena laughed, “I never took you for a joker.”

Miranda smiled softly at her, “I normally am not, I felt bad about scaring you and wanted to lighten the mood. You should know that you don’t have to be afraid of me, I am monitored at all times through this collar. If I act aggressively the watcher on duty will shock me into submission.”

Elena was shocked, “That seems so cruel! What if you are just defending yourself or if the watcher decides to have a grudge against you?”

Miranda placed a hand on Elena’s shoulder to calm her down, “It is a necessary evil for everyone’s safety. Now let’s get on with a proper tour, please stay close to me I don’t want you getting lost.”

Miranda’s tour was much more in depth than Chris’. She showed Elena every important room for their work and what they would be used for, after that they explored the relaxation and general use rooms, finally they stopped at the cafeteria to get dinner before going to their room. Elena was introduced as a new research assistant to the few employees that regarded Miranda with less hatred and just wary indifference. Most of them enjoyed her presence, many warned her about her new ‘boss’, and some decided she was just as bad as Miranda. After dinner, they finally retired to their shared room. Miranda seemed hesitant to open the door.

“I wish that Chris had told me in advance that you would be staying with me. The room is a bit of a mess, I never imagined anyone would be staying with me.” Miranda said softly with a blush.

Elena chuckled at her, “First jokes now a mess, you really are subverting all my expectations of you today.” Miranda grimaced at her. “Oh, come on, it can’t be that bad.” Elena said pushing past Miranda and into the room. The room was in fact that bad, papers were thrown all around the room with seemingly no rhyme or reason.

Elena gaped at the mess, “Okay then, ummm, I mean it’s bad, but I’m sure the both of us can get this picked up in no time.” Elena moved out of the doorway to assess the situation and for Miranda to explain what everything is and how it should be organized.

Getting over her initial embarrassment, Miranda got to work explain her system of organization to Elena and working together to put her notes in her filing cabinet. After about an hour and a half, they finished cleaning up and got ready for bed. Sleep didn’t come easy for either of them, both uneasy at the prospect of sharing a room due to the issues caused by their traumas.

Soon both of them fell into a fitful sleep. Elena began to shift and whimper, waking Miranda. She knew the nightmares well, she faced her own every night. She got out of bed and moved to crouch next to Elena’s bed. She watched her for a few seconds worried that waking the other woman up would be worse than leaving her to her dreams, deciding to risk scaring the woman, she shook Elena awake. Elena did startle when she awoke.

“Shh, shh, you’re okay, it was just a dream.” Miranda whispered soothingly, caressing the other woman’s face. Elena calmed quickly due to Miranda’s actions.

“Thank you, I’m sorry I woke you up. You need your rest after a busy day.” Elena whispered back taking Mirada’s hand.

Miranda shook her head, “No, it’s okay. I have trouble sleeping anyway. I’ll let you get back to bed, please wake me if you need anything.” She stood up and turned to return to her bed before Elena grabbed the bottom hem of her shirt.

Elena began to blush, “Could you stay with me tonight? I’m afraid I won’t sleep without someone with me.”

Miranda smiled softly at her honest confession, “Of course, maybe we’ll both sleep better with a partner.” Elena slid towards the wall allowing Miranda to climb into bed. The women kept their distance from each other as best they could in the small bed. They both began giggling at their awkwardness, after they calmed down they allowed themselves to be closer to each other and drifted off into sleep.

Cel Tradat means The betrayed one in romanian

#resident evil #resident evil 8 #resident evil village #mother miranda #elena lupu #elena x miranda #mirlena

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daughterofanarcissistwoman · 4 years

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Being the children of a narcissistic parent, when did you realise something was wrong with them, and came to the conclusion that you must leave their environment?

Answer from:

https://www.quora.com/Being-the-children-of-a-narcissistic-parent-when-did-you-realise-something-was-wrong-with-them-and-came-to-the-conclusion-that-you-must-leave-their-environment/answer/Christina-Looney-5?ch=10&share=e14c4345&srid=C7yPi

~ It was seeing the relationships my friends had with their own mothers that I knew my relationship with my mother was abnormal. Everyday when my sister and I got off the school bus, we were anxious as to what kind of mood we were coming home to. Sometimes the mere sight of us seemed to annoy her. We were constantly on eggshells. When we were finished doing our daily chores (including yard work), which was a lot for our ages when you had a parent at home all day without kids in the house, we would hide in our rooms or be outside until it got dark.

~ If I gave her hugs and kisses, I was always quickly dismissed. If I accomplished anything good, she’d blow me off to my face but brag about it to everyone on the phone. Any trivial thing we did wrong, we were berated for.. This was not “discipline” as we were made to believe, this was hatred. You could see the hatred in her face and hear it in her voice while she was yelling at us...

~ I was told as a child that her own mother tried to get her to have an abortion while pregnant with me. I never understood the point of her telling me this. To thank her for giving me life? To owe her for all her struggles to have me?

~ The things she would say to us were horrible, her words broke down any self-esteem we had.

~ One day I’d be the “good daughter” and my sister would be the scapegoat and in the blink of an eye, our roles would reverse.

~ If she made me cry, I was told I was over sensitive and needed to “toughen up”.

~ In public, everything looked fine but in private it was tense and uncomfortable all the time waiting for the next thing that would set her off.

~ Any time we’d have an opportunity to succeed, we were held back in some way. If we succeeded despite her, we were belittled for it or told we were conceited or acting like we were too good for something.

~ My sister and I had no right to privacy. Any journal, diary or letter we ever had was read. Anything we confided to her about was blabbed about to her friends or family members and used against us later on and thrown in our faces. Even as adults, we were both assigned journaling from our therapists as part of our therapy and self expression, my mother went through our adult things, betrayed any trust and read our therapy journals. The only things that concerned her about them, not surprisingly, were the entries about our relationships with her. She played the victim with that one hard-core! Our deepest thoughts and feelings were completely discarded and invalidated.

~ My sister moved out at 17 and I moved out as soon as I turned 18 and graduated high school a semester early. We couldn’t get out fast enough. We weren’t prepared at all for adulthood and we weren’t prepared for success at all, no aspirations or means for college or trade schools. We had to start from scratch, entirely on our own.

~ Neither of my parents believed that I had what it took to handle (military basic training) but after growing up under their roof, it wasn’t anything I hadn’t already been through except no one hit me in basic training.

~ While the physical abuse has stopped, the verbal and emotional abuse has not. She tries to pit my sister and I against each other constantly. When I finally stood up for myself and told her I didn’t appreciate being bad mouthed by her and that her toxic games needed to stop, I was called ungrateful and disrespectful and told to stay away from her.

~ I still cannot for the life of me figure out what it is I’m supposed to be grateful to her for. I’m grateful for existing but if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have any awareness of that. Am I supposed to be grateful that she’s drained me financially on more than one occasion, has never paid me back once and expects more? That she lies to me and about me? That I have done (up until now) everything she’s ever demanded or expected of me and it’s never good enough? That I know I will never have the relationship and love I have always begged, needed and hoped for from her? You’d think she’d have a clear view of what not to do when her relationship with her own mother is strikingly similar.

~ I have gone no contact, finally because I need to take care of myself (mentally and emotionally) and my own family. My husband has been on the outside looking in on this and he sees the manipulation before I do. He put his foot down last year and told me it was about time I focus on myself. Once I did that and didn’t drop everything to rescue my mother from a new drama or crisis, the majority of which is brought on by herself, the guilt trips became extreme. She was texting my daughter behind my back from my fathers phone, she must really think I’m stupid. She drug me through the mud to anyone who’d listen, including my sister. She flat out lied to my sister about things I have said or done. I sent my sister screenshots of messages between my mother and I to show her both sides that my mother conveniently lied about or excluded to make herself look like the victim when she’s really the instigator. Why would any mother drive wedges between her own daughters and their father? To control the information and remain the center of attention?

~ I have never found a reason to beat (my daughter) or hit her and I cannot even fathom doing so.

~ It took (my sister and I) 39 and 41 years to understand that we have a right to our feelings and the right to protect ourselves, even if it’s from our own mother.

~ I apologize that this is so long but getting it all out, no holds barred is cathartic. I would’ve done this anonymously but why should I? To deny myself the right to own my feelings and memories? To protect the possibility of her not finding out I wrote this after she’s already gone through my most private thoughts and feelings and used them against me? I can’t care about that anymore. What I do care about is overcoming this for myself and also offering the chance for someone to see this and identify the similarities. I care about someone reading this and hopefully understanding that it’s not their fault and never was. I care about the teenager/adult reading this and hoping they decide to put the razor blade down because they’re worthy of love, even if it’s just them loving themselves. There’s a someone reading this who believes it will never end. Remember “what you allow is what will continue”. You might be the “bad son” or “bad daughter” for walking away but in their eyes haven’t you always been the bad guy? I won’t ever say family isn’t important, it is, but only up until the point when it’s damaging you beyond repair and hurting you all the time.

~ No contact for me is just a protective measure to not subject myself to the bullshit anymore. It’s not a way to “punish” or abandon my parent. There’s a sad past, a difficult life that brought this out in her but she also has to take responsibility for her actions and if she never does (which is most likely), I won’t be caught in the middle and blamed for why she’s so unhappy anymore. Parenting is both a responsibility and a sacrifice, but parents shouldn’t resent their kids because of that. I’m not angry for the material things I wasn’t given as a child/teenager, I’m angry for the encouragement and tangible opportunities that were intentionally taken away from me out of spite. There are many which I did not list because this is long enough. I’ve done everything a “good” daughter could possibly do. I’ve stayed by her side when she was sick, I’m the one that made the weekend drive to her house when she’s only been to my home maybe five times, I’ve given more money than I can count at the expense of my own family, I’ve loved her regardless of her cruelty and betrayal, I’ve sided with her in every family disagreement (there are countless and I’m left wondering what the real truth is) without question even if she was flat out wrong. I don’t, nor have I ever, deserved the way she has treated me. Besides, I’m too damn old to be so naive, passive and gullible. Also, I can’t bear to listen to her convenient, religious hyperbole when she has never practiced what she preaches. Her on again off again religion suddenly appears when she’s wrong and called out on it.

#daughter of a narcissist mother #narcissistic abuse #covert narcissist #emotional abuse #verbal abuse #psychological abuse #toxic mother #dysfunctional mother #abusive mother #scapegoat child #healing from trauma #trauma bonding #child abuse #childhood trauma #developmental trauma #domestic abuse

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3starsquinn · 4 years

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Let’s Get Down to Business || Alain & Orion

Timing: Current

Parties: Alain ( @carbrakes-and-stakes ) & Rio

Content Warning: Abuse mentions

Summary: Rio is desperate for some answers and Alain is willing to provide. Until they get interrupted. Rude.

Orion didn’t know what he was about to walk into. When he messaged Alain, it had been in a more emotionally fragile state than he had cared to admit. There had been so much going on this week. Between the love potion and his run in with Athena. But even with all of that drama, he still couldn’t get that troll out of his head. Couldn’t stop thinking about how Rio had stopped that troll from ever doing anything again. He had taken that life. Justified or not, Rio couldn’t shake the guilt. And he needed to talk to someone that understood what that felt like.

When Orion found Alain, he was thankful that the man was alone and not currently tousling with a vampire. He offered a small wave as soon as the two spotted each other and continued his sulk across the abandoned pilot to close the gap between them. “Hey” he added once he had finally joined up with him. “I don’t know what I’m doing here.” That was true. In his rush of emotions, maybe Rio had an idea what he wanted to say in the back of his mind as he was furiously typing the message out to him. But standing here with Alain face to face, any semblance of a clear thought Rio once had all but washed from his mind. “I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Alain was dusting his sword clean when he heard Orion approach. Lost in his thoughts, he had not been paying much attention to his surroundings, figuring that if undead rose, he would feel them before he could see them anyway. He was not sure what it was Orion wanted, but if he had agreed to meet him here, in the middle of the night, it had to be important. Sitting on the front steps of a now clean mausoleum, the hunter watched Orion approach and waved back. “Hey,” he replied, scooting to the side so that the kid could sit down too, if he wanted.

The kid looked completely lost, however, and Alain, since he had no idea what this meeting was about, found himself with both his eyebrows raised, puzzled. “That’s okay,” Orion spoke again and he could feel his heart sink in his chest. How was he supposed to help someone who felt lost when he himself had no idea where he was headed either? “Sit down. Tell me what happened, I’m sure you’ll remember why you’re here.”

Orion followed Alain’s instructions, taking a seat next to him. He sat quietly for a long moment, still trying to figure out exactly what he wanted to say or how he wanted to say it. Why was this so hard? If there was anybody that should know how Rio felt it was a hunter that showed some sense of apprehension for the job too. Rio couldn’t think of Alain without thinking of the first conversation they had ever had in his garage. Maybe Alain was still doing the job, maybe he even thought it was necessary. But there was something about him that made Rio think that he sometimes wondered what could have been. “I don’t know how you do it.” Because of course Rio knew why he was here. He just didn’t know why he had to do this right now, “I got attacked in the woods a few weeks ago. There were these trolls and they tried to kill Kaden and I. And it was going to kill me and I-” He pulled his knees up on the step with him and hugged them, “I killed it. And I can’t stop thinking about it. How do you train yourself to take a life?”

Alain remained quiet the whole time Orion was speaking. He put down the sword, the rag, and crossing his arms, he leaned back against the step behind to listen to the boy. “Kaden must have already told you that it was either you or him,” it felt like this was the kind of justification most hunters gave to justify many things, him included, but it was a justification that truly made sense when speaking of creatures that behaved like wild animals. “A normal person wouldn’t have made it out alive, maybe you saved a bunch of people,” and maybe a bunch of others died before Orion took care of that beast. He could have said this too, but he felt like it would not really cheer him up.

Then came the question of How. “You and I were both trained since we were in what.. 1st grade? Earlier?” But this was not what made you a killer. You were trained, sure, but a killer. Accidents aside, killers had a purpose, something to fulfil, and in hunters’ case, it was an idea : the sense of duty. “You don’t train, you are told to, and usually, it begins by killing things that look nothing like people,” in his case, it had been spawns. The human looking vampires came later, once spawns had become a habit, some sort of routine. “Most people assume that I like doing this,” it was not entirely false, otherwise, Alain wouldn’t be here, but it was his sense of duty that always brought him back here, not his hatred for vampires.

Orion nodded. “He did.” And he had, along with anyone else that heard about what happened. It was an easy defense, one that should have helped Rio feel better. Logically, he knew it was true. It had been self defense. The troll fully intended on killing Rio and then Kaden if nothing had been done. The troll had said it themselves. But Rio still couldn’t help but think that the reasoning left a sour taste in his mouth. Like something had been missing. “It’s just- I replay it over and over again in my head. I could have done something differently, right? Why were they violent to us in the first place? Did they know what we were?” Did they deserve it? Rio almost asked the question but decided against it, “What if I could have said something differently. Or anything. Why did it have to end that way?” He wiped at his eyes. He had done so much crying recently he was surprised he had any tears left. But it was just as embarrassing now as it always was. He wished he could switch it all off. Although, Rio hadn’t considered Alain’s second point. If the trolls were so quick to kill Kaden and Rio, would other people fall victim to them just as quickly? Ones that wouldn’t survive being thrown against a tree or crushed under the grip of a rocky giant? “I don’t know. Maybe. That’s why I hate this. I can’t even see the full picture. How am I supposed to decide something as important as taking a life when I can’t even see every angle?” Orion was a patient person. He never liked acting before thinking through every scenario his mind would allow him. It was why Athena would complain whenever the two played chess. He always took too long to move, examining all of his options before finally pushing a piece forward.

“Yeah. I mean, Not sure if mine could be considered training or not.” Orion had been rebelling in his own way since childhood. Maybe he wasn’t as loud or as confrontational as Athena could be, but he had learned his own tricks to annoy his parents. And he could do it without ever raising a fist or even speaking. Alain was right. From a young age, the two were first introduced to the more monstrous side. Fed stories that would have made any normal kid cower beneath their sheets. It wasn’t until the two got older that they slowly started to get introduced to the more human side of their victims. “I don’t think you like doing this.” Rio offered. He wished he knew for sure. But as it was, he didn’t know much about Alain’s hunting habits at all. Besides that he was resigned to the same sense of duty that most hunters seemed to be. “I think you do it when you feel like you have to. But that doesn’t mean you get any joy from it.” Maybe Rio was wrong. Off base. He hoped that he wasn’t. “My sister killed a Fae right in front of me the other day,” Rio began. “I don’t know what it was. To me, it just looked like a cat. I think she did it to get under my skin. How could someone do something like that? She likes it. It scares me.”

“I don’t know Orion,” Alain turned his head to look at him. With a heavy breath, he reached out to put his hand on the boy’s opposite shoulder, so that he would look at him, and also know at the same time that it was okay if he wanted to cry. “No one can see the full picture,” he assured him. God knew that Alain had tried, but no matter how much planning any hunter did, nothing usually went exactly as planned. Feral beasts were too unpredictable. Usually the human looking ones were a lot easier, or at least that’s how it felt to him. “I try to think of the bigger picture instead,” he explained, always looking him in the eyes. “It’s like I said, you can’t know what would have happened if someone else had ran into that troll,” and he highly doubted that those made a difference between hunters and regular folks. “This is what I always think of, and it sometimes kept me up at night,” he frowned. “What if I didn’t get them all? What if one got away and attacked someone? Someone’s mom, a child, an elder?” This was why he did this at least one out of two nights. Sometimes, he could go back home having not seen one single vampire, and on nights like that one, get rid of an entire nest of them.

“I must agree with you on that one, you’re the most lanky hunter I’ve ever seen,” laughing under his breath, Alain let go of his shoulder and took out his coffee thermos, pouring himself a cup. “I’m glad that you think that,” he smiled a moment before he took a long sip of the hot beverage. “Joy comes from knowing you got people rid of something that wouldn’t have hesitated to hurt them, feed on them, turn them, or kill them,” with vampires, you never knew. Some had their own little army of spawns, which they created by biting party goers or people walking back home after their night shift, and God did it feed his hatred for them. “What did she think she would achieve by that? I mean, it was most certainly not a cat, but clearly that thing did not attack first,” he cleared his throat. His lack of knowledge on fae was showing, but clearly, Athena had fucked up here. “I’m sorry. You know,” he paused, sighing. “You always will have a choice, but when it comes to things you cannot reason with, I’d say just do your job. It’s not easy. I know I wasn’t fond of it either then, but you get used to it. And that does not mean you’ll suddenly want to kill all the beasts you see.” Another sigh. “This is what I would do, if I were you. Not hunt, but rather get rid of threats when you happen to cross paths with one.”

No one can see the full picture. So how come anybody killed? Why did people take a life when they can’t see the full extent of how it will affect things? Orion winced when Alain’s hand grabbed onto his shoulder. Even living around friends that did the same thing, Rio still wasn't used to the nonviolent physical touch. Still cowered away from it. But knowing that this had not been meant as an attack, Rio settled into it, relaxing beneath it and eventually looking up at Alain. This time, when the tears streamed down his face he didn’t immediately wipe them away. “The bigger picture” Rio nodded to himself. He didn’t know if he believed it, but he at least understood the idea behind it. Kaden and Rio left the rest of the trolls. Sure, they had sworn their vengeance on the two of them. But were other people going to be in danger because of the actions of the two of them? The thought made him sick to his stomach. “I don’t want anything to get hurt because of me. Human or otherwise. I’m not cut out for this life, Alain. I never have been.”

Despite the serious tone the two had for the night, Orion appreciated the break for humor and he found himself chuckling through the tears and grinning. “Ha ha. Very funny.” Rio crossed his arms to feign pouting. As if being called small or lanky was something new that truly offended him. “That makes sense. I like helping people. All people.” Supernatural people included. At least Alain seemed just as taken aback by Athena’s actions as Rio had been. “I don’t know. I can’t tell if she’s just that brainwashed by my parents. Or if she genuinely wanted to hurt me. She’s mad at me. Angry that I left the house. I think she wanted me to feel her pain.” It was just a guess, but he was pretty positive he was close. “I like that idea. I just… I don’t know how to do it. I don’t want to feel like I’ve felt these past few weeks. I can’t stop thinking about that troll. I hate it.”

“I know, you have told me this before,” Alain wasn’t sure what to say to this except that few were cut for this, and that most hunters did this because they felt that they had to. Was this going to help Rio with his moral dilemma? Probably not. This was all confusing. Alain wished he had the answers, but clearly, it was not the case. Although over the years, he did gain some wisdom and the decisions he made now weren’t the ones he made back when he was a teenager or a young adult.

“Thank you,” with a smirk, he raised his cup of coffee as if to toast on this, and took another gulp. “I know, you are a good person, pure of heart. Those are rare,” and Alain genuinely believed that him not being a hunting hunter was actually a big loss for the rest of them. Hunters could use someone like Orion, who was willing to see what it’s like to be on the other end of the weapon. It was naive to think all creatures deserved his kindness however, and Alain really wanted Orion to finally accept that some things didn’t have many goals in life other than to sleep, eat humans, and sleep again. “I don’t know. I think you should speak to her, maybe not in person, but… see what she has to say about this. I doubt her explanations can excuse what she did, because that was cruel to you, but at least you’ll know why,” having cut all connection, all contact with both his sisters, Alain sometimes had regrets, he wondered if Orion would follow that path. Even though they were different, he could see some similarities here and there. “You know how to do it, you just don’t want to do it,” tossing the last drops of coffee in his cup, he screwed it back onto the thermos. “It’ll pass. This much I can actually promise you. And I don’t make promises I can’t keep,” he breathed through his nose, amused. “I’ll show you my notebooks, if you want. So you can see all the things I’ve seen,” maybe it would help him picture what hunting was really like when you did it for others.

People told Orion that a lot. That he was a good person. That he was innocent. Rio didn’t feel pure of heart. He felt complicit to the evil things that his family did. He felt like a murderer. Most of the time, he felt like a fraud. Someone that was desperately trying to do good deeds to make up for the bad he had been a part of. “I know you’re right, but I really don’t want to” Rio groaned. The last thing he wanted to do was talk to her. But Alain was right, obviously. Even if it meant learning the truth and cutting the ties. He needed to know. Eventually. For now, he needed the space. Rio wasn’t sure he wanted to ever learn how to do it. Or get over these feelings of guilt. As soon as he did, would he turn into the exact monster that his parents had spent their lives trying to create? But regardless, Alain had the best intentions. He truly wanted what was best for Rio. That was something he couldn’t say about the adult figures in his life growing up. “Thank you. Seriously. I don’t know who else to talk to about this stuff. I-“ he perked up at the idea of reading Alain’s notebooks, “Really? Like really really? That’d be so cool. Let’s do it.”

Before Orion had the chance to move, a sound off in the trees beyond the steps caught Rio’s attention. His body stiffened immediately, freezing in place as Rio tried to pick up on any other sounds with his hearing. When he heard another cracking sound off in the woods, Rio jumped into his feet. “Something’s in the woods.” He stared at the trees. It was dark, but Rio’s vision didn’t mind the darkness. He stood until he saw a flash through the trees and he jumped back, almost tripping into Alain. It wasn’t until the first thing broke through the clearing of the woods that Rio could finally make out what it was. “It’s a spawn.”

“..” Alain couldn’t exactly project his own regrets on Orion, and if the young man prefered not to speak to his sister, Alain was not going to argue with that. He had given him his advice and now, it was up to Orion to either follow it or not. The boy seemed a lot more excited by the idea to have a look at the older hunter’s notebooks. He heard that he thanked him, but his attention went toward something else. Something was nearby, he could feel it. His hand reached out to grab the sword on the ground.

Orion had been just as quick to notice, and that did not go unnoticed. Even if the boy wanted to deny his hunter heritage, he would never be able to get rid of his instincts. “The woods, huh?” Obviously, he was hearing things Alain couldn’t, and Alain was glad he could count on his cat like vision to catch a glimpse of whatever was lurking in the woods. Damn fucking spawns. “It is a spawn, or well… spawns. They aren’t lonely creatures, unfortunately,” Orion had a few options. Either help Alain with those, or watch the hunter get rid of all these foul beasts. “Time to choose if you want to help or not. Look into my bag, you’ll find weapons,” he motioned toward the mausoleum, where he had left his things.

If the number of spawns was not critical, help was never negligeable, and it felt like a good occasion for Orion to see that not all things deserved to live, and that sometimes, saving them was putting them to rest.

Time to choose if you want to help or not. Orion had not wanted to have to make a choice that quickly. He eyed the bag that Alain had pointed towards. “Oh god, oh god, oh god” Rio scurried up the steps and towards the bag. The swords, daggers and stakes were all sharp to the touch, and dangerous in the hands of someone like Rio. He was a liability, more likely to end up stabbing himself than being any help against spawns. He chose the least dangerous weapon he could find, an average wooden stake, and hopped back down the steps, stopping just feet behind Alain.

He was the vampire expert, so of course he had been right when he said that they traveled together. Orion should have picked up on it. That the noises out in the woods were created by multiple creatures, not just one. Now, a few jumped back and forth between the trees while others were already in the clearing and heading towards the two of them. Rio didn’t deal with vampires. Not that he dealt with much of anything, but vampires and the undead were his lousiest subjects. Rio studied them, maybe seven or eight total but it was hard to keep track from the way that bounced around, weaving between each other. Rio couldn’t move. His knees were shaking and threatening to give out completely. He was just going to slow Alain down. Risk him getting hurt trying to protect him. This was all a big mistake. “I don’t- Don’t get hurt protecting me, please.”

“It’s fine,” Alain did not need someone panicking in his back, and he would not wait for him to get his shit together either. The first spawn spotted by Orion reduced to dust, the hunter moved toward the second, keeping them from approaching the boy. “Orion, you have to trust that you can do it. I wouldn’t ask you this if I didn’t think you could do it,” technically, he had no idea if Orion could do it, but one thing was sure, if he told him that he couldn’t, Orion would never try and that would be a damn shame. Obviously, he would never be an excellent hunter, but if he could help keep humans safe at his own scale, it would be enough.

“Look around, don’t let them get in your back,” Alain trusted that if Orion listened to simple advice like that, he would be okay tonight. And if he wasn’t completely repulsed by all of this, maybe the hunter could actually offer to train him, eventually.

“Orion, I’m going to be fine either way,” Alain did not want to force him to do anything, but rather push him to make a decision. In the end, hesitating was what could get you killed, and maybe this would be what he would have to first teach Orion.

A spawn lunging for the hunter’s throat, Alain held up his sword, shoving it through its body. Falling to the ground, he pushed the spawn off of him, but before he could get up, another one was coming for him. Fuck.

Alain wasn’t forcing this on Orion. There was a choice to be made. One that Rio would have to make for himself. It was so radically different from anything that Rio had been used to growing up that he felt a bit dizzy from the freedom. His parents never acted like there was a choice. In the woods… well maybe Kaden and everyone else had been right. Maybe there really hadn’t been a choice that night. That no matter what he did or said, those trolls were going to attack the two of them and Rio’s only choices were to fight back or get killed. Tonight, Alain was giving him an out. That freedom was liberating, but also crippling. Because now Rio actually had to choose.

Orion was pretty sure that he wouldn’t be able to do it. He was convinced that he would just be a distraction, and when the moment came he would hesitate and not be able to make the kill. Even if these things were clearly not human. They didn’t have the thoughts or feelings that people did. They truly were just creatures led by bloodlust and instinct. Rio felt his grip on the stake loosen, his resolution wavering. A spawn lunged at Alain and the two tumbled on the ground. Rio twitched but didn’t move. Seconds later, a sword went through the creature and Alain shoved it off of him. Rio breathed with relief but his grip tightened when another one came up fast, running for Alain who hadn’t yet gotten back to his feet. “Alain!” this time, Rio ran without thinking. He headed straight for Alain, close enough that the spawn was ready to attack before Rio dived into him.

Orion and the creature rolled once hitting the ground, both fighting for the upper hand. Unsurprisingly, it was the spawn that ended up on top. It clawed at him, scratching and tearing at his hoodie and catching on his skin more than once. It’s fangs were bared and aiming for Rio, Rio using all of his strength to keep the thing away from him. Rio’s legs flailed out from under the creature, trying to get some footing to get the upper hand. He had been training with Adam. He should be able to do this. But he was losing the battle against this spawn. Finally, he pulled a leg free, lifting it around to wrap around the spawn and pull it to the side and off of him. He pressed down, using his leg to pin the spawn and fumbled for the stake he had dropped in the struggle. With all the chaos, Rio didn’t have time to think about that choice he was so enamored with earlier. He swung the stake around and plunged it into the creature, dust exploding from it almost immediately. And suddenly the struggle was gone. Rio sat there on the ground and breathed heavily. He dropped the stake and stared at the pile of dust. Though he didn’t have much time to dwell on what he had just done, considering another spawn tackled him from behind.

Alain had just started to accept that Orion had taken his decision, that he would not come and help him, when the exact opposite happened. While he had a few things to say on the boy’s technique, now was probably not a good time. Besides, spawns were not the kind to wait politely for their turn to jump at hunters’ throats. It was hard to keep an eye on Orion and at the same time take care of them. Clearly, this short moment had been enough for the experimented hunter to have exactly what he had warned Orion about, happen to him.

The claws dug deep in Alain’s shoulder, in his side, and he had to drop his weapon to grab the vampire with both his hands, and throw it to the ground. A stake to the heart later, the hunter was glancing once again at Orion. It seemed like the boy had taken his decision and had thoughts about it, but now was not exactly the time for hesitation. And so Alain saw the spawn rushing toward the young boy. Ineluctable.

“Orion,” Alain warned, too late. Now getting rid of something that had the higher ground was a whole different kind of job, and with yet another spawn coming for him, Alain hoped Orion would have the will, the strength to get rid of it, in the meanwhile, the hunter would try to get rid of the few spawns left, as he wasn’t sure a 3rd spawn was something Orion could survive tonight.

Orion’s body was pressed against the ground, the spawn on top of him and it’s claws digging into his back. The pain was sharp, the panic even stronger since he couldn’t move. He wiggled against the creature’s weight but only managed to crawl out slightly before the claws dug in further. He cried out a bit at that one, the sudden increase in pain taking him by surprise. Rio could hear the creature’s snarls, saliva dripping from its mouth and down on the back of Rio’s head, dripping down his neck. He was close, probably about to bite. Purely on instinct, Rio threw his left elbow back, connecting with the creature’s face and causing it to screech in defiance. It perked up, it’s hold on Rio loosening just enough that Rio could shove himself out from under the creature to break free. The claws had not completely dislodged, and scraped across his back on the way out, tearing at his clothes and ripping at his skin.

The first thing Orion did once he got back to his feet was find Alain. He was fighting off more Spawn, still going strong. He must have taken down so many already while Rio had barely managed to stab one. And now, Rio was left weaponless against the current spawn. He could see the stake, abandoned across the field. The spawn blocked Rio’s path. Reaching it would be next to impossible, especially with the damage the creature had already done to Rio. He had three options here, run for Alain and hope that he could save the day. Try to fake out the spawn and get to his stake. And with the creature stirring and looking particularly unhappy, Rio didn’t have much time left. He went with option three, darting off in the opposite direction towards the tree line of the woods. The spawn was fast, hot on Rio’s trail and swiping out towards him. The claw caught on Rio’s leg at one point, almost knocking Rio over. Instead, his palms caught against the grass and he pushed himself back into his run. He all but collided with the tree when he finally got to the woods. He dug his fingers into it, finding a weak spot and ripping off a section of the bark. It wasn’t much, but it was still wood.

There was something utterly terrifying about not knowing how Orion was doing. All the slayer had to know what was happening, is sounds. He heard the boy cry, then the creature protest. There was no way of knowing what happened. The spawns rushing at him made it impossible for him to check on the boy, and Alain was starting to regret putting him in this situation. Maybe he should have locked him up in the mausoleum instead.

Each cloud of dust felt like counting down to when he’d be able to check on Orion. 3, 2, 1 spawn left. Orion’s spawn. Alain was not the kind to panic, but he couldn’t put the feeling in his chest on anything other than this. And so, the few seconds during which he searched for the boy and the spawn stretched into eternity to him. “Fuck.”

Maybe it would have been better to let him handle the spawn on his own, but considering what he had heard just seconds ago, he was not going to take a chance, and so he rushed to the woods, catching up with the pair. “Oh putain,” grabbing the beast from the back, the slayer threw it to the ground. His stake found the heart and they were all gone. But their trouble? Alain was mostly fine, safe for a few scratches, but Orion?

Carefully, because he’d seen how he had reacted to the hand on his shoulder earlier, the hunter approached the young man. “Let me have a look, please,” the claws had torn both fabric and flesh, exposing skin, scarred skin. How? Orion did not … fight. “How did you… When?” They looked quite old, and Alain was growing confused, and horrified.

Orion hadn’t noticed that he had been shaking until Alain crept behind the creature and took it down, staking it and finally leaving the open field empty aside from the two hunters. Suddenly, Rio couldn’t hold onto the piece of tree bark any longer. It slipped through his trembling fingers, cracking into smaller pieces against the ground. Rio followed soon after, resting against the tree next to him and sliding down it until he was resting on his knees. The pain from his injuries were nothing more than a dull pain in the back of his brain. Everything felt numbed, a humming taking the forefront of Rio’s attention as he tried to process the fear. Those spawns had been terrifying. He had seen them in pictures, read about them on multiple occasions. He couldn’t imagine being attacked by one of those with no knowledge of the supernatural. The idea was nightmare inducing. Even with the experience Rio had grown up with, he still wasn’t sure he’d sleep much tonight.

Orion was vaguely aware that Alain had started to creep closer towards him, muttering a French curse word. Rio stopped himself from calling out the language, just as he had done with Kaden once before. Rio twitched as he got closer. Because he knew what was visible, what was coming. The injuries from today had been rough, but surface level. A quick cleanse and bandaging session and they would be healed in a few days. But Alain didn’t mean those injuries. The spawn’s claws had done more than tear at his skin. They had stripped away the only defense Rio had. Now, he had no choice but to sit here, completely exposed. “It’s nothing....” Rio tried, feeling his body slump even further in defeat. His body was still shaking, his voice joining in on the instability. “It’s from training and stuff. They’re all old anyways.”

Having knelt down to get on his level, Alain fell silent watching Orion. He tried to think, to think and think again, but he could not think of one thing to tell Orion that could have solved anything. Sitting on the dry leaves, the hunter was not sure whether to avoid or search for the other hunter’s eyes. He felt bad for making him help, for asking this of him when he knew so little about his past, his experiences. It was time for Alain to take a decision however, his turn.

“I’m so sorry,” he spoke softly.

His heart had sunk in his chest. It seemed to be doing that a lot lately. Maybe it would bury so deep that the hunter would finally stop feeling, who knew? Now did Alain want to stop feeling? Sure it would have been easier, but feelings were what made him human, not a monster. The answer was easily found. “Orion, you told me that you had found ways to skip training,” from the way he fought, you could tell that this had not been a lie. That thing about his injuries, however, felt like bullshit. “Now skip the bullshit. What happened.”

If Orion wanted to hear terrible stories from long ago, Alain would be happy to provide, but right now, he was worried for the young hunter, and he was not going to let him get back to wherever his home was like that. “You know what, you can tell me this once you’re all patched up,” there was no need to talk about this in the middle of a cemetery. It wouldn’t be long before the wind would start to carry ashes their way. “You can get up, kid?”

More people had learned about the scars than Orion had ever wanted. Some by accident, some on purpose. Orion hated seeing their initial reactions. The initial confusing followed by the horrified understanding. The pity. Rio had spent so much of his life in fear of people seeing them. “I couldn’t always skip the trainings” Rio shrugged. That was the core of the scars, wasn’t it? Battle wounds from the trainings his parents had forced him and his sister to endure. Punishments if he didn’t participate. In some ways, skipping the trainings proved to be more harmful than brawling with his twin in the first place.

Alain didn’t force the story out of him. At least not yet. His priority seemed to be the fresh wounds on Orion’s skin. “Yeah, yeah. I’m fine.” Rio wasn’t, but physically he could move. On shaky legs, Rio used the tree to pull him back to his feet, and fell slightly behind Alain as the two walked. He fiddled with the torn sleeves of his hoodie absentmindedly, distracting himself from the pain in his calf and the pit in his stomach. “Do you have an extra shirt I could borrow?” Rio asked, acknowledging that both the hoodie and shirt he had on underneath would be too damaged and blood stained to salvage. At this point, Rio supposed that it didn’t matter if Alain only had a short sleeve to offer. He had already seen the scars. Was there anything left to hide?

“You got all of those only from training?” Alain had trained as a child, but he did not recall having this many scars then. Even after years and years of hunting, he probably did not have as many. The thought made his blood curdle. His parents might have been the way they were, as far as possible from loving, or caring, they at least understood that you did not learn anything through pain and suffering. Obviously, they would have been happy if Alain had ever decided to drop out of hunting, but the hunter’s desire to fit in had always been strong, and to this day, he had yet to find people who made him feel like he belonged. Nic and Kaden did that, in a way, Evelyn did too, in another, and in yet another way, Orion made him feel less lonely, even though their struggle was different. And so, the tone he had used could only tell one thing : he did not believe that training could do that. Not the kind of training he had, at least.

“I’ll give you mine,” it would probably be a lot too large for the boy, but that did not matter much right now. The hunter in his undershirt, handed the plaid shirt to Orion and went to gather his things, kicking at a pile of ash on his way to the mausoleum. Fucking pest. “I’ll get you home, okay? Give you that reading I promised you earlier, and if you want to talk about this, we can talk about this. If you don’t want to, that’s fine. Just know that I can help.”

Orion shrugged at Alain’s question. How else was he supposed to answer that? They both knew the answer. At least, Rio was fairly certain that Alain knew what the both of them were avoiding saying. He grabbed the shirt that Alain shrugged off and handed to him. “Thank you.” Rio held onto the flannel for dear life, using it as an anchor to keep himself from going into full panic mode. “I’ll uh- I don’t want to get blood all over it. So maybe I should like, wait until I can get the wounds washed off.” He didn’t want to ruin Alain’s flannel. From what Rio could tell, he seemed to really like his flannels.

“Seriously? I can still read your books?” Even with the pain Orion was in and the panic he felt, Rio couldn’t help but perk up at the thought of getting a look at Alain’s notes. Vampires weren’t exactly Rio’s specialty, and what he did know about them he wasn’t sure applied to all different types. Learning about the differences would help him decide. “I- Thanks for helping me. I don’t mind talking about it.”

Alain looked over at Orion and shook his head. “I am very well versed in getting blood from clothes. That should be part of hunter training,” he remarked, smiling at the kid a little. There was no need to be grim and sad the whole way back to his place. “Now you put that shirt on and you stop being silly. I’m not afraid to use elbow grease to get stains out,” he explained.

Orion’s reaction to being offered books to read drew a laugh out of the hunter. “That was both incredibly endearing and scary,” Alain admitted. That kid was really committed to gathering knowledge, much like Alain was with fulfilling his duty. “Alright, then why don’t you tell me what you want to tell me.”

#wickedswriting #c: alain #chatzy: alain #chatzy #lets get down to business #abuse mention tw

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pernatius · 3 years

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Lost in Space Part 5: Ch 2

Ch 1

Summary: An unnamed Space Explorer must come to terms with the fate of the universe resting in her hands.

Part 1: ch 1, ch 2, ch 3, ch 4, ch 5

Part 4: ch 1, ch 2, ch 3, ch 4, ch 5

————————

As much angst as I now have, I can admit when I’m wrong. At least I hope I am as my teeth rip into the flesh of whatever chicken-tasting alien it came from. I was hesitant right from the moment the old woman asked me to take a seat. I dragged my feet to the chair right across from hers. While her chair and the very one I’m sitting on could perfectly fit her my chair could barely hold me. I couldn’t reach for the food that sat between us or I’d find myself getting a mouthful of dust and cobwebs rather than the cooking that’s caused my walls to crack. A good two inches of my butt’s edges rested in the air. So, other than having to deal with the awkwardness created by the lack of words between either of us I had to deal with the awkwardness made by trying to keep myself balanced on this tiny chair not intended for Licata’s people too. I mean I could easily turn back into a human. I would have a more comfortable time if I did. I mean I think I know how to change back, but I also think I had a better advantage staying like this. Easily, I could reach the little, elderly alien if she were to try anything other than handing me slices of her cooking.

If you were either Ashely or Mikrovos you may have lectured me about taking a bite into some stranger’s cooking because that very stranger may have either poisoned or did some other awful thing to it, but trust me I smelt and poked it plenty before that very stranger swallowed down her share of the very same source mine came from. Even though those two probably would’ve assumed I let my impulses be at my forefront I still wish they were here. I wish I heard their voices even if it meant another petty argument would start between the two. Mikrovos could’ve taken over Ashley’s space with his elbows and Ashley would ask him to be more mindful of his space, but he’d take offense to it and tell her that she’s the one in his space. If Saamuki was here too then she’d ask the same of Mikrovos, but he’d comply without any sour remark. Ashley would roll her eyes and I’d comfort her. Now if Skeema was here then the argument’s conclusion would juxtapose to looking at Skeema, eyeing him to eat quieter. Imagining this, I realize how much we acted like a family. That and along with how cramped it would’ve been, causes my reflection on the meat’s sauce to redden.

“It’s good to finally see you happy, dearie,” the host of this lunch commented.

I ignored her because I realized how much I miss all of them. My hands grip the tablecloth and they shake. It took me a while to notice her hands on top of mine. When I do, I stop shaking and look up to meet her gentle smile. “S1Y,” I hiccup before continuing, “he’s dead because of me. They’re all dead because of me.”

Again, it took me a while to notice her touch. My eyes widened, realizing she wrapped her arms around me. Her hug is warm. It’s because of this I can’t help but hug back and cry into her shoulder.

I’m embarrassed. I make sure to avoid her gaze and that my hand is covering my blush. It was quiet. Clearly, she was waiting for me to speak. So, I start the conversation, “Why must I still act like a child?”

“Dearie, there is no shame in crying.”

Continuing to mumble between my fingers, “There is when it means crying in front of people I don’t know. This is the second time that it’s happened today.”

“Showing the world you have feelings is not childish. We all cry and sometimes we have to do it in front of others we wouldn’t usually find ourselves crying in front of.”

“But the problem is every time I do it I make it seem like I’m the victim when I’m the one that created the problem.”

“We are all victims of something or someone, dearie. However, it’s how you deal with this that matters. We can either continue the path of pity or set ourselves on the course of acceptance.”

“You want me to just accept they’re dead?”

“No.” I look at her before she continues. “What I’m trying to say is that to stop victimizing ourselves we need to accept that we are not perfect. We all make mistakes, some of which we regret throughout the rest of our lives. I have made my fair share. However, what makes my situation different from yours is that I chose to sit around and wait. Because of it, I no longer have time. But you do, dearie.”

“But how do you know? How do you know it’s not too late for me?”

“Because you’re young. The young let their pain get the better of them.”

“Why me, though? Why does all of this have to happen to me?”

“Because you represent what the universe has lacked, strength.” On the other side of the doorway’s curtains, the floorboards creaked. I didn’t hesitate to get out my gun and stand up, but the old woman places her hand on the gun’s barrel before I can head towards the cause of the noise. “This is a fight you don’t need to play out. Focus on your safety rather than mine.” Placing her hand on my cheek, she has my head lower, and our foreheads touch. With the vision of Saamuki’s watery eyes seemingly staring straight at me as she hugs herself on her bed, I stumble backward. It felt like my soul was ripped out of my body, flung through space at such a speed it caused me to now become nauseous, and then abruptly thrown back into my body. Touching my pounding head, I now know how to get to her. Removing me from my rising questions, is her telling me, “My name is Ojos.”

I don’t get the chance to react because when she places her hand on my chest I’m teleported outside her home in the pouring rain, which kills my crown’s fire. Facing the crowd now fitted with umbrellas, who didn’t take any notice of my sudden appearance before them, I turned around towards her home. It was too quiet. I feel my hand sweat and grip slip on the gun because of it. My heart drops. Then, in the middle of my anxiousness, a white-cloaked figure who has their hood covering their face steps out. Merely looking at them causes a shiver to run up my spine. So, I don’t hesitate to turn around and dash away. I push passed people as best I could, getting a few foul mouths and them pushing right back at me. Heart racing, I ignore and push them back harder. I don’t know how wide the distance between me and that figure is, but I could feel them just inches away from me. I can feel their hand reaching towards me. The hairs on the back of my neck stick up as the rain pelts down on me. Eventually, I make it out of the highly densely populated area and find myself on the city’s edge. Foot stepping onto the bridge, it slips on a puddle. I grumble my hatred for rain, but more precisely puddles. As I get back up, in the corner of my vision I see the figure a few feet behind me. So, I once again used whatever strength I had and forced the ache of my body to subside. I don’t even stop until I’m inside the ship. Hands pressing down on Saamuki’s chair, I look out the window and see the figure unfazed by all the running I made it go through. They’re once again eerily a few feet away but this time I’m able to see a featureless mask covering their face. No lips. No nose. And most importantly no eyes. They, without the need to stop me, remain standing there. The only movement they make while in that spot is their head following the ship as I fly it out of there.

Panting and staring out at space, I cough and smile because of how my body still has yet to adjust to my tendency of finding myself needing to run. Wiping away the mix of sweat and rain from my forehead as the chair beneath me absorbs my soaked self, I try to come to terms with all the things piling up. Turning my head, so that I’m facing my nonphysical companion, I ask as if I didn’t already conclude, “Was that a Watcher?”

“Let’s focus on getting to Saamuki first,” they reminded me.

I’ve been on this planet three times already, but it still feels foreign. It feels cold. It feels like something Saamuki would hate. Hours have passed since my landing. The sky is now dark. It now reveals the place I’ve grown to fear. Shaking my head, I move towards what’s basically Saamuki’s prison.

It takes some time for me to find the secret door as I tried not to think about what I was walking across. Obviously, I don’t have Mikrovos. Because of that, I made a snarky remark towards what Ojos claimed I represented. Drained both emotionally and physically, I scratch, throw my fists, and hit my forehead onto the hidden door. I go on to think about what the others would do. Skeema, if he didn’t memorize the schematics of the building already, would use his robotic half to find another way.

That being said, it has me to say out loud, “I’m really stupid, aren’t I?”

There’s no way anyone would know unless the universe wanted to test me once again by having this disguise revert me to my human form. Still, my heart squeezed in my chest. The feeling that it would suddenly burst and have my blood seep out of every hole it could find increased immensely with the man that broke Mikrovos’ heart. “It’s a pleasure, Talten,” Cabelo greeted me with a bow. Passerby looked at me. A few whispered to the person beside them. One took out what I guessed was a phone and took a picture of me. I heard them proceed to type on it soon after. “Now I don’t mean to be offensive. Believe me I am willing to be educated, but don’t Taltens prefer isolation on Vecta? What’s one doing all the way out here?”

I wasn’t expecting those types of questions. How could I have? Actually, I wasn’t expecting any questions at all because I didn’t plan any of this out. I expected this to be easy. Just in and out. That, like always, proves to be my flaw. Thankfully, my inner self makes their appearance. They hold my hand. Not actually, of course not, but I still get the sentiment. So, I answer calmly with, “I sought a better future for myself as I realized my previous feelings towards my homeworld and the beliefs of its people are flawed.”

“Ah, yes. Taltens are traditional, so to speak. I hope my business can insight and by doing so satisfy what you are looking for. Do you have a room already in mind?”

It felt weird being in this room, especially in this position. I, like the first time, bit my lip and tried to relax by watching the various alien fish swim below my feet. Twiddling my thumbs, I gulp. I’m not scared about the whole part about stopping her before I cheat on Ashley with her. The part I am scared of is the aftermath of me telling her who I am. The part I am scared of is seeing her face when she realizes I broke her promise. That I failed her.

“I am honored that a Talten has asked for my services.” Her dress accentuated her figure. It’s nearly skintight, causing creases to form around her breasts and waist. Again, she swayed her hips from side to side. This causes the sleeves of her dress to slip and show more of her cleavage. Placing her hand on my cheek and upper thigh, which the latter is sliding up towards my crotch, I gulp for the second time. “Use me however you please,” she whispered as she placed my hand on her right breast and leaned towards my chest.

Before it can proceed, “Saamuki, wait, it’s me. Mikrovos’ friend.” Immediately she wraps her arms around me.

#200 #lost in space #writers #creative writing #writers on tumblr #My writing #writeblr #spilled ink #ficiton #scifi #wlw #fantasy

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lilahelynora · 4 years

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My Emotions | tw ptsd and other stuff mentioned

Everything in me right now hurts so so much. I’m about to go to sleep, it’s 27 till 4am; and I’m crying.

I feel invalidated about who I am and even on what I should believe in. I’m a victim of defamation but I can’t afford to legally take action against it. Everything inside me hurts, I try everyday to be my best self, to put my foot forward and push aside the crap I’ve been through before.

I try to support everyone and I do. I support everyone of every nature, because I don’t have a heart to be malicious or discriminatory and everyone no matter who they are or how they were brought up, deserves to have a life full of hope and love and support and so much more, everyone matters.

I have always put others before me. It may not seem like I do, but I do. I am very very sensitive in person, I feel a lot and sometimes I don’t know if it’s normal for me to feel as much as I do, but I do.

For me all of this emotional pain started because I found out about a breakup before anyone else did and since I was still a minor at that time, and very immature. I ran with it and tried to convince everyone to see what I saw that was right in front of me.

The other day, this week. I was medically diagnosed with PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), growing up I believed personally that only people who have been through the worst things imaginable developed PTSD. That there was no possible way someone like me could develop it. I didn’t feel comfortable with my own self diagnosis, I made last year because I didn’t want to use a condition like that so carelessly.

But lone and behold I have been diagnosed by a specialist with it and after the defamation that was made against me and spread everywhere through a google pdf file made 8-9 days before my birthday and then virtually distributed everywhere on my birthday, I have fallen to my knees in agony.

I cried so hard on my birthday, that my birthday this year would have to be one of the most upsetting and worst birthdays I’ve had in my life, right above my 16th birthday.

People to this day online don’t believe that I am legitimately me, even after I sent them a censored out photo of my driver’s license because they believe the defamated pdf file over me. They don’t have remorse or guilt over how they see me, because they don’t know me. They don’t want to try to know me and that hurts in a whole different way.

Nobody sees me as a victim because they choose to believe a group of people’s bad experiences online with someone they are forever going to think was me, when it wasn’t. They don’t care how much I “cry” or anything, because to them and others, I’m no better than a speck of dirt under ones shoe.

I still call upon the Angels, God, Jesus Christ, Archangel Michael, the Holy Spirit, Mother Mary and my Spirit Guides (whom I hope to meet one day) to watch out for me. To guide me through this chapter in my life and to keep me out of harm’s way and to watch over me and help me heal inside. I know my spiritual being is littered with scars and bumps and bruises. I know the child inside of me is hiding in a corner with her head between her legs, crying her eyes out because growing up, everyone told her that her life was going to be full of wonder and hope and all of her wildest dreams would come true, but it’s yet to happen. She’s scared of what she’s seeing her older self is currently going through.

She feels the pain inside. Like a knife to a pad of foam or someone getting lemon juice into a fresh paper cut. I want the pain I feel inside to go away. I want to know and feel true and undeniable happiness for the first time in my life, to be able to wake up in the morning and be grateful to be able to wake up and live a new and fresh day.

I went to New York this year back in February, I was originally supposed to go for New Years; but I contracted Influenza Type B and couldn’t go. The airline luckily gave me two weeks for the same price of my original one week, when I rescheduled. Anyways, I was excited and had every reason to be. It was my first time in a whole new place, it was like another world to me. I never wanted to leave. Within those two weeks, I fell in love with the way I felt in that city.

I felt free. Sure the pending adult responsibilities I had were still there, but I felt free. I felt like I had hope for my future. When I went to the 9/11 memorial, I had to hold back tears because of the amount of energy I felt there (I don’t know how some people know that they’re an empath. But I feel like I am one, with how I can feel emotions and energy shifts and stuff).

Because of the defamation I experienced with the pdf virtually published and thriving just a few weeks prior to my trip. I still put on a brave face for my aunt that I was visiting and pushed through the little excursions I had. I didn’t even cry around my family members after it came out on my birthday, because of the fear of them finding out about my media platforms and them asking questions, I didn’t have proper answers too.

It wasn’t until my newly discovered cousin (my aunt’s daughter) went to her therapist appointment while I was staying with them, that I broke down in the waiting room in front of my aunt (and drew a few unwanted eyes on me) because I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to go back to the same old lifestyle I had back home. Because back home, I was back to working at a place I didn’t feel safe in, I had my own family issues that I couldn’t ventilate with anyone due to not having registered yet with a therapist and more things.

I was scolded and reprimanded when I got home because my aunt told everyone about me breaking down and messily exposing some family issues, I was struggling with back home. Not gonna lie, I saw it coming. It was the first time with my aunt that I only just met and I sort of blew it in a way by getting emotional. Which I can also recall breaking down on the subway a day before I had to fly back and some guy gave me a few bucks and told me his own story of hitting rock bottom and while I wasn’t in a way at rock bottom, I was still seen by others as a young millennial who’s going through a big ass hurdle in their life and felt like the world was just caving in on them... and that there was still hope for me. I’ll never forget that memory.

I try, like I said, I try to be my best self. To be a good girl in society’s eyes. I’ve personally still never been kissed yet, or experienced forms of intimacy, or been to a party, or snuck out of the house, or held a disciplinary record at school (though I did have detention one time in middle school for not paying attention in math class), or smoked, or drank (unless the Smirnoff Malt Peach Bellini’s with a 0.5% Alc content count), or did anything with any serious consequences. I never had an overly zealous lifestyle like everyone else apparently has had.

Like my parents separated when I was around four, got legally divorced when I was roughly twelve or thirteen. My father gave up on me after I turned fifteen. Him as well as my grandmother (his mother) filled my head full of lies about my mother, so I grew up with a strong unnecessary hatred towards her and I’ve been told that when he was supposed to be “watching me”, when I was little, all he did was sleep and didn’t do anything. So I practically up and raised myself, which is my only defence when I made the self diagnosis last year of having PTSD.

And now at 4:58am, I’m laying in my pitch dark bedroom lit only by a small scent defuser plug-in from bath and body works, with an empty sent bottle that’s yet to be changed and having Birds by Imagine Dragons off of my “cloudy hues” playlist (made to listen during my depression episodes) on Spotify playing softly through my google home speaker that Spotify gave me as a gift last year for being a premium member, just thinking about what will happen next after the sun rises.

I’m exhausted. Physically and emotionally, I am stressed chronically and it’s valid. Like I’ve said repetitively throughout this long ass post, I’ve been medically diagnosed with PTSD. So I have chronic and traumatic stress and my anxiety isn’t getting any better and I know no matter what I do, no one will believe me. Because who would believe one person’s truth against five personal accusations inside one defamated pdf file with “screenshots”?

It’s one of those “fuck it” moments in life you know? Where you have to just throw your arms up and let them fall back to your sides in that dramatic clap and hope that in time, people eventually stop caring and paying attention. I know I’ll never make it in the acting industry as I’ve hoped to one day pursue because of that defamated pdf file. If anything I might still be able to be a writer or a photographer, I enjoy writing therapeutically (hence why this post is as long as it is).

I just... when the time comes for someone to “fall in love with me” (hell my reputation is already tattered like a flag, so if I do meet Dylan and he does naturally fall for me which is a slim 50/50 of even happening), regardless of whatever life throws in the way. I would like them to accept me as a whole, flaws and all.

That means to understand my upbringing, my emotional background and health history and anything else. If they can’t handle that information, then that says it all. I don’t want to be someone’s notch on their belt, I don’t want to throw myself at someone’s shoes just to get stomped on and thrown away. I want to mean something to someone, anyone. I want someone to say with all their heart and soul, “you matter to me, I love you even if you struggle with loving yourself. I accept you because you have been through your own personal hell growing up and no matter what, I will always be there for you because you matter in this world just like everyone else does” that’s what I want.

I have high and probably slightly deluded expectations, and I’m sorry for that but that’s me. That’s who I am as a person and if I have kids, I will never ever let them know how and what I went through because I am not one to corrupt the innocent. To change one’s image for their own game. I will teach them all about the wonders of the world and if god and the universe allow me to travel with them, I’ll take them all over the world and let them learn about everyone and their cultures and their stories. I’ll fill their hearts and minds with kindness and love for I have not one once in me, that’s capable of damaging them with the horrific truths we’ve all have lived and are living.

I would even teach them about every belief in the world and let them make their own choice and decisions with the proper respect and knowledge on what they choose to believe in. Everyone knows why there’s wars in the world, if it isn’t for fossil fuels (which I’ll also teach them about so they learn to love and care for the planet instead of destroying it).

My feelings are valid, and I am allowed to express them in a negative and/or positive way. I have been silenced all my life and I’m tired of that. I want this post to be the ONLY time, I ever have to say anything about that file that’s spread about me at the beginning of this year and for people to actually understand me and not mock me for once, just because they’re scared of how others will see them.

I never ONCE did any of those things that are in that pdf file that is said, I have done.

I don’t care if you want to personally burn me at the metaphorical stake or put my head on a spike, because you decided and chose with your whole little ass heart to believe what someone else said and is saying about someone they have never EVER met in person or even gotten to know instead of actually asking that person yourself if they did any of those things.

All this post is in the eyes of the ones who have defamated me, is a fleck of dust on their phone screens, that they’ll probably drag me over with their sum total of 5,000 or so followers who’s half total is probable bots and are all possibly deactivating one by one as you’re reading this.

It sucks what I’ve felt inside and I truly don’t want to continue to go through this.

And for anyone on Twitter that stumbles across this post, I would never stoop as low as you all have to get Dylan’s attention because you’re bored. I understand and respect Dylan’s boundaries and the “joke” you all tried to trend with a hashtag is sickening. That was not a joke and never will be applicable as a joke. Dylan has a life outside of the internet, he’s about to be 29 years old and doesn’t need a bunch of people on Twitter vindicating when he should post or come online or even babying him. He’s a grown adult. Treat him like one. Yes you’re a fan, but that’s not an excuse or defence for any negative actions on that platform.

It’s 5:30 now so I’m going to sleep, reblog this, share it anywhere if you want. I don’t care anymore. I am officially done with the bullshit. That pdf file that has been shared countless times on end is a form of defamation, no matter whatever shit screenshots or accusations are in it. It will always be a form of defamation, maybe only in my eyes even, but still. It is what it is and so it is. This is my defence and I want to officially be in peace or at least have someone or anyone feel for me in some way or another. It’s all I want. Because this post out of EVERY post I have done in the past. Is the last “explanation” post I am ever doing.

I hope everyone has a nice day - morning - etc. I love you all so much, even if you hate me or believed that post and I pray nothing but good light and graces come to your life as it has yet to arrive in mine.

All my love, Lillie 🥀

#personal #ptsd tw #me #SUPER long post #rant #emotional #insomnia #im sorry

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ryder-s-block · 4 years

Text

Jaig Eyes (Ch 57)

Jaig Eyes (57/?)

Summary:

Kida, a former slave who now thrives as a bounty hunter, finds herself sucked into the war she advised Jango Fett against. Now that she’s involved, she has to finally mourn the loss of Jango, seeing his face in the clones that man the GAR. What happens when she allows herself to get attached to one, not for his resemblance to her former mentor, but for his heart?

————————-

Chapter Fifty-Seven: Hunted

“Ahsoka, it’s time to go.” I heard Kalifa rousing the padawan, my head lifting immediately. I was used to sleeping light, even more so than Ahsoka was. She spent much of her life in the Temple, safe from harm.

Mine was spent with a sharpened piece of metal under my pillow, clenched in tiny hands.

“What’s happened?” Ahsoka asked as she sat up. I adjusted my armor as I stood, brushing away the dirt and leaves stuck on it.

“The sun’s almost up,” the youngling explained, “Which means we clear out.”

Ahsoka rose with us, following the younglings to the edge of the cave. “Where do you go?”

“We keep moving and keep those disgusting hunters from picking up our scent.”

The padawan and I exchanged a glance. “That’s your plan?” Ahsoka scoffed.

Kalifa turned on us, giving us glares. “If you really are a padawan, you would know that there’s wisdom in experience. We’ve been here longer,” she bit, but I could tell she meant well with her firmness. “You will learn if you listen, and only….” she glanced at me, “If you listen.”

I frowned, but Ahsoka seemed to accept the terms for now, so I didn’t give a fuss. We moved swiftly through the twisting vines of the forest canopy, the lithe bodies of the Jedi making it easy for them to maneuver. I could have gone without the slight reflectiveness of my armor. But….knowing the Trandoshan leader wanted it made me keep it on.

What could I say? I had pride issues.

By the time I felt we were far enough away from the camp to throw off the scent trail, Kalifa ducked quickly, waving her hand at us behind her. “Get down.” She crawled forward a bit, peering over the edge of the curling branches we were perched on. “Someone’s coming.”

We all crawled to her side to see two figures below us--one of which I recognized. “Those two came in with us,” Ahsoka whispered, noticing the male she’d talked to back on the transport. “We should help them.”

She and I both shifted forward, but were stopped by the youngling arms on us. “No,” Kalifa insisted quietly, “It’s too late.” Ahsoka and I frowned at each other, but said nothing as we looked down at the victims we couldn’t save.

The male who’d explained we’d been kidnapped was gunned down first, the blast coming from somewhere to our right. We all leaned backwards, searching frantically through the canopy to find the source of the laughing hunter.

“Look at her run,” the Trandoshan laughed as the second victim ran for her life. He followed her with a rapid spray of shots.

Ahsoka stood beside me, determined to help. Kalifa stopped her with a hand to her shoulder and a desperate shake of her head. Jinx gave me a look as if he expected me to jump up, too. I shook my head at him, looking back to watch the poor female be hunted.

I was a hunter myself. I knew when prey was cornered.

“It’s your shot,” the Trandoshan said to his companion. “Take her out.” She was dead a moment later, her body falling lifelessly to the forest floor.

Kalifa and the younglings parted quickly, this being a common occurrence in what they’d come to call their normal life. Ahsoka was still staring at the Trandoshan’s prey, anger in her eyes. I squeezed her shoulder gently, bringing her focus back to us so she could follow the group. She gave me a determined look with her cerulean eyes, making me smile only gently. I knew what was coming.

“We could have stopped them,” she declared finally, when we were a safe distance away and higher in the trees.

Kalifa turned, looking weary. “No, Ahsoka. We’re not saviors here. Here, we are survivors.” She continued in her climb, the group following in silence as she muttered to herself. “If they had spotted us, we’d be dead now.”

“We’ll never get out of here if we just keep hiding,” the Togruta insisted. “We have to act.” I crossed my arms as the younglings sat before Ahsoka to rest. I agreed with her, but I also understood the fatigue that came with surviving on your own with no hope of being saved.

Jinx laughed darkly; it wasn’t long….only a gentle huff of breath….but it showed great sadness. “There were other Padawans here that once thought as you do now,” he sighed.

“Alright,” Ahsoka chirped, perking up slightly. “Where are they?”

There was a rush of anger from Kalifa, sadness blooming from the two boys. “They all died, didn’t they?” I asked quietly, feeling their grief. Kalifa stood angrily, crossing her arms as she looked away.

“Just because they failed doesn’t mean we will,” Ahsoka pushed, her leadership showing through.

It was O-mer’s turn to speak. “You don’t understand,” he said, “It’s not that we don’t want to fight. We’re younglings. They have every advantage.”

I frowned, looking over their hopeless faces. And then in my peripheral, I saw Ahsoka hop away. “Wh-” Kalifa stuttered, rushing after the padawan. “Get back here!”

“I can’t do that,” Ahsoka responded smoothly at the edge of a dipping branch. “My master would never forgive me for running and hiding in a situation like this.” She was right, of course. I knew Skywalker. He would be fighting as hard as she wanted to in order to escape.

“Don’t overestimate your abilities,” Kalifa insisted, her voice desperate. I could feel her fear.

Ahsoka glanced over her shoulder, looking over the group. I gave her a nod with a small smile. She knew I’d catch up. “I’m not,” she said finally before sliding down the branch easily.

“Ahsoka, don’t!” Kalifa cried, to no avail. I didn’t move as they all watched her go, the young Togruta disappearing into the forest. “What will she do?” That was directed at me.

I shrugged as nonchalantly as I could. “Knowing Ahsoka? Probably to go find herself a Trandoshan hunter to fight.”

“Another padawan lost to this island,” Jinx sighed, shaking his head sadly.

I arched my brow, popping my hip. “You’re wrong, you know,” I said to O-mer, earning their attention with surprise. “Being a youngling isn’t a disadvantage. It’s an asset.” I walked forward, displaying my armor. It was lacking the usual gadgets, of course, but they got the point. “The Jedi have been feared and respected by many for ages. The Mandalorians even developed specific techniques to fight them.” I scanned my hard gaze over all of them, putting on my bounty hunter scowl. “And that includes Younglings. These hunters have skills you don’t, sure. Training you don’t.” I stopped, looking in the direction Ahsoka had run off in. “But you have training and abilities that they couldn’t even imagine. I never met a Jedi that gave up. So if you all want to be more than just younglings one day,” I looked them over with a scowl, “Maybe you should try acting like Jedi.”

I leapt off my branch, landing deftly on one a few meters below before racing after my friend. Knowing her, she had already found herself a Trandoshan and was trying to fight him right now. But….also knowing Trandoshans, I knew she’d be having one hell of a fight right now.

As I ran, I recalled the story Cody had told me so long ago, about his own fight with a Trandoshan. Cody was a refined warrior who had the drop on the Trandoshan and Rex with him…..and he still almost died.

I picked up my pace a bit.

When I emerged, I saw Ahsoka fighting hand to hand against a Trandoshan. She was wrapped around his back, doing her best to choke him out. He was too strong, though, throwing her away and heading for his gun.

I pounced from the branches above as the hunter dove for his weapon. Planting my heel into his head as I fell. He careened away from the blaster as I landed, my knees bending to cushion the impact.

Ahsoka got up as I charged the Trandoshan, forcing him backwards towards her with a series of kicks and sharp jabs--Jango had trained me to fight large targets, considering I was a young human female and there were a lot of creatures much bigger than me out there. The padawan came up behind him, kicking out his knee and doing her best to try and choke him out again.

Claws dragged across my beskar, scraping loudly before falling off the edge and into my skin. I grit my teeth, doing my best not to cry out and alert nearby hunters. The Trandoshan threw his head back, slamming into Ahsoka’s nose and throwing her backwards. He dragged my forward by where his claws clamped around my beskar and into my flesh, holding me in the air before him.

“It seems I get the Mandalorian and the Jedi,” he hissed in my face.

And I became aware of another presence. One emulating with determination and anger. Darkness surrounded Kalifa as she approached with her fellow younglings, lifting her hand. The Force clamped around the Trandoshan’s neck, the creature releasing me as he was yanked into the air.

I collapsed to the ground, hissing through my teeth at the throbbing in my right forearm. “Kalifa!” I heard Ahsoka cry as she ran to my side. The Trandoshan was still suspended in the air, the youngling’s Force grip on his throat slowly killing him. I nodded at Ahsoka to tell her I was okay so she could run to the girl’s side, smoothing her hand over Kalifa’s to relax it. “Don’t kill him out of hatred,” the Togrtuta advised, wise beyond her years. “It’s not the Jedi way.”

The Trandoshan fell beside me as I finally found my feet, cradling my wound to my chest. Sure, they were Jedi and had their Code….but I still wanted to kill this shabuir. The creature threw back his head, letting out a loud, screeching call.

I kicked out, silencing him with a heel to the jaw. Still, he swatted me aside easily. Jinx and O-mer tried next, but were thrown away easily. Thankfully, I was familiar with some of the training the younglings received, since I’d spent time with Ahsoka. I knew the formation they would make around the Trandoshan, so I joined in, corralling him in. Jinx and O-mer teamed up again, this time taking my advice and using the abilities they have over the Trandoshan.

Together, the shove him with the Force, launching him into the base of a tree. He slumped forward, unconscious, his tongue sliding out past his sharp teeth.

“The others will be coming,” Kalifa announced worriedly. We bolted. A part of me wanted to take the Trandoshan will us, in order to question him. I had my ways, after all. But getting a mostly unconscious lizard creature all the way back to our cave without getting caught? Especially after he sent out a distress call?

Not a chance.

Thankfully, I saw Ahsoka scoop up his blaster as we ran, though I doubted it would help. “I’m glad you all decided to come along,” I huffed as we ran, leaping through the branches as the sun danced lower into the sky.

“If we hadn’t,” Jinx said back to me over his shoulder, “You’d both likely be dead.” I wanted to retort that he was wrong….but I wasn’t sure if he was. Sure, the act Ahsoka and I had put on was with the intent to inspire the younglings into action. That had worked, but maybe not as smoothly as we’d hoped.

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

That night, we crowded around a fire inside the youngling’s cave. I sat near the edge, looking out at the hunting grounds under the moonlight. I was hidden, knowing Trandoshans could be night hunting somewhere still. But I didn’t like being cooped up in the cave with the incredibly negative younglings.

“I don’t understand,” Ahsoka expressed from inside as she examined the blaster she’d taken from the Trandoshan. “Why won’t this thing work?” I watched her from my place near the entrance.

My mind mulled over possibilities. A DNA encoding modification that only allowed their species to fire them? Or maybe they had them all rigged to a particular activation sequence.

Jinx answered for me from where he sat in his makeshift bunk. “The Trandoshans deactivate the blasters if we take them,” he explained, frustrated. “That is why none of us have any.” I certainly didn’t appreciate his snark, but said nothing as I watched three birds nestling on single branch that led to our hideaway. Ahsoka threw the useless blaster behind her, pushing her knuckles against her forehead in frustration.

“It’s been a long time since the Trandoshans captured another padawan and brought them here,” Kalifa expressed from across the fire.

Ahsoka crossed her arms, scoffing. “Thanks.”

“I didn’t mean it as an insult,” the youngling insisted, “I meant it as a sign, a mistake...on their part. Ahsoka, your energy. Your strength. It’s what we’ve been lacking.” Kalifa rose with excitement as I finally shifted further into the cave, drawing closer to the fire as the night grew colder. “And that they brought a Mandalorian warrior who happens to be on our side at the same time?” Kalifa continued as she paced around the fire. She seemed like she was on a roll, so I elected not to interrupt to say I wasn’t actually a Mando. Even though my snarky side desperately wanted to. “We were beginning to lose hope and forgot who we are.”

Jinx leapt down beside his fellow younglings as they looked across the fire at the dirtied padawan. “And who are you?” Ahsoka asked.

The group of younglings puffed their chests, straightening their backs. “We are Jedi,” Kalifa announced, Ahsoka rising with a smile.

“About time,” I said from where I leaned a bit outside the group, giving them each a smirk. They returned it, thankfully, already catching on to my humor style. “So,” I continued, looking around the group. “What’s our strategy?”

“What do you suggest?” Jinx asked Ahsoka.

“Well, what about a base?” my friend responded immediately, obviously forming a plan of her own inside her mind. “I mean, they must have a compound or something, right?”

Kalifa shrugged slightly. “Not that we’ve ever seen.”

“So where do they come from?” Ahsoka asked.

“Well, we don’t know,” Kalifa said, “We’ve only witnessed them hunting and in their hover pods.”

Ahsoka turned from the younglings, looking at me as she thought through her plan. “If we’re going to go on the offensive, we’ll need to find out where they live.”

“Those pods aren’t made for long distance,” I chimed in, earning their attention. “Wherever their base is, it can’t be too far.”

“Could it be off-island?” Jinx asked, sounding like he was being genuine, rather than snarky. Finally.

I chewed my lip while thinking, mulling over the parts of the island I’d seen already. “From what I’ve seen so far, probably not. They are pretty short range, meant for a lot of still hovering rather than constant movement. I haven’t seen any other islands on the horizon, so any other land base is probably too far.”

Ahsoka nodded, bedding down. “We’ll start covering ground tomorrow.” I couldn’t help but smile at her tone, watching the younglings obey without question, crawling into their own places to sleep. Her master would be proud if he were here. Then again, if he were here, he’d be trying to lead everyone and we’d never see her shine.

I laid down, eyes scanning over our little group of survivors. I wasn’t sure what it was, but I was a magnet for trouble. Maybe it was my Sith heritage? Or the Force trying to screw with me?

Or just really terrible luck.

My beskar was starting to make me sore where it pressed against my skin when I slept, but I didn’t take it off. I knew the rule. You don’t take off your armor until you’re safe and don’t need it anymore to protect you.

I was anything but safe here.

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

The Force trembled with darkness, the room flickering with orange and red light. For a moment, my heart leapt to my throat, my nerves aflame as I wondered if I was back in Darth Bane’s tomb. My worry lessened only slightly when I heard the growling of Trandoshan’s and the slamming of fists on tables.

“Dar! Dar! Dar! Dar! They chanted, endlessly.

I knew the name. He was the leader’s son. The one hunting Ahsoka. I turned in my vision, willing it to clear. My stomach turned when I saw the trophies that decorated the hunter’s walls. Full Wookie pelts. A stuffed Gundark. Skulls of every creature imaginable, many I knew to be sentient.

The Trandoshans were still chanting while I focused on them, watching Dar approach his father’s throne-like seat through the flames of their fire. The leader stood from his seat, decorated with the pelt of a Wampa, grasping Dar’s face in his massive claw. He threw back his head, letting out a long screech. The others joined in happily, drunk on their lust for blood.

I turned my head suddenly, feeling the Force ripple, to see Ahsoka’s horrified face. She was gone in a moment and I knew she had awoken from the vision we were apparently sharing. I stayed a moment longer, willing the Force to keep me in place. Watching the Trandoshans cry out their excitement for murder, my eyes caugh something shiny sitting on the armrest of the leader’s chair.

My lightsaber.

Looking up at the leader as he continued the ritual for his son’s hunt, I again recognized how grateful I was that I wasn’t a Jedi. I had no moral code to follow but my own. And right now, my moral coded wanted to murder this shabuir.

So I decided I’d do what I could in order to accomplish that.

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

“We’ve already covered the beach area and most of the briar on this side of the bay,” Jinx lamented as we paused for a moment to rest. I was grateful for it. The climate was worn here and despite my armor being lightweight, it was still metal and long-sleeve. I was hot.

Ahsoka surprised them with a small laugh, but I only smiled, knowing what she’d say. “If it was easy to find, you guys would have found it before we got here.”

“True enough,” Jinx allowed, chuckling back.

Still, something still made no sense to me. If they’d lived there for so long, how had they never found anything? Surely they would have at least stumbled on some sign.

“Maybe we should try more inland?” Ahsoka asked the group as I crossed my arms, thinking.

“There’s a lot more Trandoshans than just the ones we see here,” I reasoned aloud, silencing the group. No one responded, knowing I’d continue on my own. “There has to be more hunting grounds. So do they really hunker down on the island?”

“What are you suggesting?” Kalifa asked, unsure. “I thought you said their crafts can’t travel far.”

“Guys,” O-mer interrupted from where he lounged against the tree. “She’s right. We’re looking in the wrong place.” He pointed skyward, our heads craning to see a massive ship emerging from the clouds. “That’s their fortress.”

The Force rippled in warning, little dots coming off the fortress like bugs out of a hive. “Yeah,” I grumbled, shifting nervously. “A fortress that is raining hunters that want out skins.”

“Split up,” Kalifa cried, the group dividing.

I raced to my right, glancing sideways to see Ahsoka and Kalifa disappear in the other direction. Ducking behind the nearest tree, I watched as the leader and his son, Dar, raced after Ahsoka in their hover ship. I moved to follow, but leapt backwards as a spray of blaster bolts riddled the ground.

“Kida,” O-mer yelled as he passed me with his fellow youngling. “Come on!” I turned and ran after them, the second hovercraft on our tails. We ducked below a series of low hanging branches, Jinx leading us into a clearing.

The hovercraft engine hummed as it dipped the hunters in front of us, blocking our path. The Trandoshan at the helm grinned.

“Move!” I managed to spit before diving sideways to avoid the spray of the machine gun mounted on the hovercraft. O-mer and Jinx broke out to either side, so I went straight under the craft, scaling the trees and vines that climbed into the air behind it. The Trandoshan was focused on the boys, allowing me to get above him in the trees.

“O-mer,” I heard Jinx call from below. “This way!”

The hovercraft moved to follow the boys just as I got into position. I grit my teeth, maneuvering my way through the canopy with tiring legs. After a long day of searching the island--which I now knew was fruitless and I was pissed off about it--my muscles were shot. I needed rest. And a meal.

And maybe a shot of rum.

But I pursued, doing my best to keep my focus on the task again and not with the Force signature of Ahsoka that was fading as she ran the opposite way. I stopped at some point during my pursuit, panting as I tried to catch my breath. The day had been long, the sun already beginning to dip towards the horizon, glancing off the atmosphere of Trandosha. I knelt to look down at the ground below, sensing that the boys were resting somewhere ahead. As I watched the Trandoshan hunter below kneel and sniff at a puddle of something blue. It was blood. Twi-lek blood.

The Trandoshan had their scent.

It let out a wild howl as it hopped back into its hovercraft, cutting off any possibility of my surprising him now. I leapt after him as he pursued the younglings. He had them cornered, the boys searching around desperately for an escape. I lunged from the branches above, falling down to land deftly on the back of the hoverpod. The Trandoshan snarled as he turned, but I struck out hard with my leg as I jumped up and over him to land on the opposite bar.

The hunter swung wildly, catching me with the back of his hand and sending me flying off the hovercraft. My side slammed into a branch, my arms aching as I tried to catch myself, but failed. Slinking like a Lothcat down a few branches, I finally found my feet, finding the barrel of the Trandoshan’s gun pointed at my eyes.

“Osik,” I cussed under my breath, thankful I saved the younglings but wishing dearly that I wasn’t about to die for my good deed. I bolted, choosing flight over fight. The blasts pelted the ground behind me, chasing me like terribly aggressive rain.

Two bolts caught me, one in the left thigh and the other in the chest. Thankfully, it was in the beskar.

That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt when it felt like I took a series of punches from a speeder, the skin at the edges burning slightly beneath my blacks as the heat resonated from the blasts. I grit my teeth, trying not to cry out as I stumbled and fell under the hit of the shots, falling down a few more branches to land heavily on the hard ground.

Well, this sucked.

I turned on the ground, panting hard through the pain of being shot, hitting the ground, being electrocuted a few nights prior, and the rather unhealed, poorly wrapped gash on my right forearm. Man, this was a tough mission for me, huh?

I fought the urge to roll my eyes in the face of death as the Trandoshan chuckled with a guttural growl. “The boss wanted your armor for his wall, but I’m your beskar will be making a fine addition to mine instead.”

He was about to take the shot when Jinx appeared from the trees to the Trandoshan’s side, leaping onto the hovercraft and kicking the barrel of the machine gun aside. O-mer appeared beside me, helping me up.

“Are you okay?” he asked, his brows crinkling when I winced as I stood.

I nodded, breathing through the pain as Jinx wrestled with the Trandoshan. I turned to see the Twi’lek thrown our way, landing beside us. “Time to go,” I announced as we all ran together, rushing through the vines.

Still, as long as we ran, there never seemed to be an end to the Trandoshan hunter’s determination to murder us. “This isn’t working,” O-mer panted as he pounced past me on a branch. “We need to lose him.”

“No,” I huffed back, earning confused looks. “We need to stop him.” We ducked behind a thick twist of vines and branches, struggling to catch our breath in the setting sunlight. The Trandoshan hovercraft moved slowly through the trees in the distance. “He has your scent,” I commented, nodding to the cut on Jinx’s shoulder. “He’s not going to stop and he’ll lead all the others to us.”

“I can’t go back to the hideout,” Jinx realized, keeping his voice down as he watched the hunter sniff the air. “I’m doomed.”

“Their fortress is in the sky,” I muttered, ginning. “We can’t outrun him,” I allowed, “But we can fight him. Three against one is something we can handle, especially if we surround him. Maybe we can even get his hovercraft.”

They nodded, Jinx glancing me over as we shifted in our hiding place to stay out of sight a moment longer. “Are you alright to take the front approach? Your armor--”

“I agree,” I cut him off, holding up my hand. I had the best armor. It only made sense for me to approach the most dangerous way as I had the highest chance of success. “Let’s do this.”

The split from my side without another word, Jinx heading downwind to try and keep his scent as far from the Trandoshan’s seeking nose as possible. I waited a moment to let them make some ground through the trees before rushing out. I ran headfirst at the Trandoshan, seeing his sharp-toothed smile as he leveled his weapon at me.

Diving behind the first cover I could, I waited as he rained fire over where I was hiding. I kept my head down, waiting until I heard the blaster fire stop, Jinx and O-mer obviously engaging the hunter. I charged out, having to leap over O-mer’s soaring body when the Trandoshan threw him like a projectile.

The Force helped me leap to the front of the hovercraft, glaring at the Trandoshan that had Jinx’s head between his claws. He growled at me, his throat clicking. I gave him my best bounty hunter scowl before hurtling the front bar and planting my foot into his teeth. Jinx dropped beside me, falling into the controls. The hovercraft careened, all of us reaching for whatever we could. The craft slammed sideways into a series of branches, one of the engines blowing to make us spin even faster.

“Jump,” I cried, but a claw clamped over my ankle, holding me back. The Trandoshan growled as he tried to pull me backwards. Fingers wrapped tightly around the bar, I twisted in the air as we spun, kicking out with my other foot to no avail.

Jinx appeared beside me. I’d told him to jump and I had half a mind to yell at him for not listening. Then again, I was grateful for him as he helped release me from the clawed prison. We jumped together, the Force propelling us away as the hovercraft crashed, exploding in a blossom of light and sound.

I wiped the dirt from my face as Jinx and I righted ourselves, O-mer rushing to our sides. The hovercraft burned amongst some of the trees, the smoke billowing up like a signal. “Thanks for the help,” I offered, groaning slightly as I rose. I used the new height to peer into the flames, seeing a Trandoshan claw among the wreckage. “Looks like your scent is officially lost,” I said to Jinx.

“Maybe,” O-mer allowed, “But we need to go. Every hunter near on the island will have seen that explosion.

“Or the smoke,” I agreed. “It’s time to go.”

We hurried off after I brushed off their insistence to tend to my wounds first. I knew my limits. My pain could be managed until tonight when it would be safe to take off my armor and look at the damage. I knew, as we ran, that so long as we stayed under the radar, we’d be safe for the rest of the day.

Still, while we hoped collectively to meet Ahsoka and Kalifa at the hideout tonight….I felt a darkness swirl in the Force while we ran. “I’ll kill you!” I heard a familiar voice snarl through the Force, nearly making me stumble as I flinched mid-step. “You killed my son! I’ll kill you!”

I brushed off the concerns of the younglings, glancing at the sky to see the sun was continuing to dip towards the horizon. Ahsoka was out there somewhere. The boys brushed past me as I paused to look over the island, the smoke from our little battle billowing in the distance.

“Kida?” O-mer asked, his face looking drawn beneath all the mud. “Are you coming?” It was weird how they had started to let me lead. Maybe it was because they were used to following Kalifa.

The thought of her sent a ripple of darkness over me, making me turn back to the horizon with worry. “Of course,” I said, sliding down the small branch to catch up with the younglings. I didn’t know for sure, so I said nothing….but I had a feeling Kalifa wouldn’t be coming back to the cave that night.

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

MANDO’A

Shabuir-- motherfucker

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

Author’s Note:

I apologize if there was any confusion with the last chapter. It is not missing anything. “Pillow Talk Part Two” is a reference to Chapter 22, “Pillow Talk,” in which Rex and Kida have their first discussion sharing a bed on Cut’s farm. As some of you have likely guessed at this point, this will be a reoccurring thing every once in a while. Whenever they have a cute or important conversation before or after sleep via pillow talk, which will be some of their only time alone considering the war.

Again, sorry about confusion. As always, likes/reviews/reposts/comments/shares are always appreciated and encouraged!

-Ryder

#fanfiction #fanfic #Clone Troopers #The Clone Wars #Clone Wars #clones #Daughter of Jango fic #Ahsoka Tano #Anakin Skywalker #obi-wan #rex x oc #captain rex x oc #captain rex x reader #captain rex #rex #star wars oc #oc star wars #star wars #star wars the clone wars

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piratewithvigor · 4 years

Text

Love Break My Heart: Chapter 4 (Finale)

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Summary: A half-life relationship is disintegrating at the seams. Neither of them is good for the other, but after 14 years together, they don’t know how to be with each other anymore.

Word Count: 1938

A/N: This is a prize story written for @slashscowboyboots that I’ve had a fantastic time blitz-writing over the last handful of days. This chapter is a little more violent and depressing than the other three and with everything going on in the world, I recommend putting off reading it if you’re not in a proper mental state for it.

We finished recording the albums a few days ago. All that remains is the little nitty-gritty details that Axl usually takes care of. We’ll say it’s a band effort, but the ideas that get put into play are his and the hired professionals he works with. Things like album art, track listings and the little bits of writing that’ll be included. All the details will be as much of a surprise to me as they will be to whoever buys it. I hope to Christ no one books me for an interview to ask about any of them. I won’t have answers. Luckily, with Axl around, that risk runs low.

I’m driving the both of us back to the house from a photoshoot a few miles north of the city. The endless drive for perfection was just as present there as during recording, meaning it’s nearly dawn already. The shoot was only supposed to be a few hours. Nothing more strenuous than having to sit in the makeup chair for a few minutes and then sit on an amp or something with my guitar while they told me to look at a spot on the floor in the distance. Something about wanting to play up my aloof personality, whatever the fuck that means. If I had driven up alone, I could have been home as soon as the group photos and my solo photos were done. But I decided to be a caring dumbass and drive Axl up as well. Which meant he had to sit in on everyone’s solo photos and insist on more takes than Stanley Kubrick.

I haven’t said anything during the drive yet, but I’ve been thinking the entire time. The little box in my jacket pocket feels like it’s been getting heavier the entire time. At some point this evening, I intended to give it to Axl, but evening became morning without me noticing and now we’re alone on a gloomy highway before the rest of the world has woken up. One would think it would be the perfect time to give him the box, and it would be, if he was quiet as well. With his mind on it the entire time, Axl hasn’t stopped talking since we left the studio.

He’s talking about the shoot, kicking himself over how he allowed it to end, with photos different than the ones he was envisioning. At some point, he starts talking about the layout he’s got in mind. How to make the albums distinct, yet clearly meant to be together. I wish I can say I’m listening. After the previous few hours, all I want to do is be in my bed, asleep, and I’m resenting him for keeping me from it.

He suddenly goes quiet and it takes me a moment to realise he’s asked me a question. And another moment to realise that I haven’t been paying attention to a word he’s said. I’m back in third grade and faced with a math problem I don’t know the answer to. So I take the same escape route.

“Sorry, what?”

Axl sighs and looks out of the passenger side window, leaning back with his foot on the dash.

“Forget it. I’m wasting my fucking breath here.”

“I just got distracted. What did you say?”

“What do you care? You’ve resented every part of making this album.”

“Can you blame me, control freak?” The words slip out from under my breath. I hadn’t actually meant to say them, but if they came out, it means I did think them. I can feel Axl’s eyes boring into the side of my skull and my knuckles turn white from my tightening grip on the wheel.

“Sorry, one more time in my good ear?” Axl asks, venom dripping from every syllable. “You know, the one you didn’t blow out with your shitty playing?”

I have to remind myself that this isn’t the time to pick a fight. Too many people end up dead because of a fight behind the wheel that ends up with the car wrapped around a tree. I can hardly feel my fingers anymore, I’m gripping the wheel so hard.

“Fuck off.” It’s all I can whisper to keep my cool. We’ll be back at the house soon and we can punch each others’ lights out there.

“That’s what I thought, you little bitch,” Axl sneers, turning back towards the window.

“Don’t call me that.”

“As control freak, I can do whatever the fuck I want.”

I pull over to the side of the road and park, turning off the engine and leaving us in dead silence. It’s too early for birds to be awake yet and too late in the evening for any of the nocturnal animals to still be making noise. We’re completely alone.

“Get out.” I’ve got one hand in my pocket containing the box and the other in my pocket with my old handgun. A leftover from our struggling dealer days that my paranoia still won’t let me leave behind whenever I go anywhere. I haven’t shot it in years. Axl, to his credit, does as he’s told. I wait until I hear the passenger door slam before I get out as well. He’s leaning onto the hood, fingers clasped together as he stares me down.

“There’s something I don’t get about you,” he says, eyes blazing with a hatred I haven’t seen in over a decade.

“And what’s that?”

“Why you paint yourself as the victim every goddamn day.”

“Because I’m living with a bipolar lunatic who would rather destroy everything than not get his way.”

“And that’s so much harder than living with a junkie loser who hasn’t cared about anything since he made it big, let alone cared about me.” This is new. Of all the things I expected him to pick a fight over, it wasn’t this.

“What the fuck makes you say that?”

Axl straightens up as he shrugs, not an ounce of kidding in his expression. He starts walking towards me and instinct has me clutch the gun in my pocket.

“Dunno. Maybe it’s because ever since you first shot up, I’ve been the one picking up the slack. I made sure you didn’t starve because you were too fucked up to eat for weeks. I kept this band going while the rest of you enjoyed what my work got you. I watched you try to kill yourself slowly for years, you junkie fuck!” He’s close enough to grab me by the jacket and pull me towards him. “And never once did you show me the same love back.”

My laughter is hollow as I shove away his hands. “Every bruise you gave me… that was love to you?” It’s my turn to advance on him with what a professional would probably call hysteria. I call it ‘fucking done’. “The beatings? Were they done in love too? Almost breaking my jaw with a lamp? Was that love? Get off your high fucking horse.”

He’s stunned silent and I get a flash of satisfaction. But only a flash; the silence doesn’t last longer than that.

“Don’t act like you’re a saint here. You’re not the only one who gets stuff thrown at him. You just have shit aim when you’re drunk.”

“Or maybe I’m trying to miss because I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Don’t want to hurt me? Someone alert the presses, because this is breaking fucking news!” Our voices are getting louder and they’re starting to echo, but I’m way too pissed off to care.

“Maybe I love you too, ever think of that?”

“And your version of love is so much better than mine.” Axl’s face softens a moment and he starts doing a petulant chick voice. It’s jarring, to say the least. “Ooh, I’m Izzy Stradlin, flawless prince of perfection, and I purposely miss throwing furniture at my boyfriend because I love him.” The switch back throws me off just as much. “Grow the fuck up, Izzy.”

Before I know it, the gun in my pocket is out and it’s being aimed at Axl. The other hand still in my pocket is shaking, but the one out is steady as stone. I can almost hear our hearts beating in the dead silence. Axl has his hands up in quiet surrender. He’s about to say something before I cut him off.

“Don’t. Just don’t. Don’t say anything for a second. Just stay fucking quiet,” I murmur, taking a step towards him. He doesn’t move a muscle.

“Fourteen years ago, I thought I loved you. I was so certain after our first kiss, that I never doubted it for a second. Even when you were hitting me, I was sure I loved you. Axl, I was so fucking sure for so long that I loved you that I never questioned that what we have isn’t love. It’s mutual tolerance at best. Hatred at the worst. Axl, I hate you. I hate you so much that my heart hurts right now thinking about it.”

I didn’t realise that my eyes were getting moist until the tear reached my neck. It let me realise that Axl was crying as well. The greens in his eyes were gone, leaving behind nothing except stormy grey with watery red surrounding them. He’s shaking hard. Be it with fear or anger, I don’t know, and I sure as fuck don’t care. There was a time in my life when I would have softened and felt like shit at causing him to look like that, but right now, I don’t care. I can’t imagine caring.

I pull my other hand out of my pocket and Axl flinches. “My final contribution,” I murmur, holding the box out to him. He takes it and pulls out the tape inside. My chickenscratch handwriting labels it with the title. I retrace a little and correct myself. “My final, imperfect, contribution. Do with it what you will.”

“What do you mean final?” He finally asks, turning the tape over in his hands.

“This is my resignation. I’m quitting. I’m done with you and with this band.”

“And what are you going to do?”

“I’ll keep doing what I love, and I’m going to do it without your fucking nagging in my ear every goddamn day of my life.” I chuckle lowly, my laughter breathy and wild. “I wasted half my fucking life on you. Half of it, you son of a bitch. I’m never getting it back, thanks to you.”

Axl takes a step towards me and I straighten my arm, aiming my gun directly between his eyes.

“Stay back. Stay back or I swear to God, I will shoot you.”

“So fucking do it.”

“Yeah, cause you’d let yourself die with a bullet wound on that pretty face of yours.”

“So we’ve decided you won’t shoot me in the face. What are you going to do?”

“Walk home. Not to our house. Keep whatever you want that’s there. I don’t care about any of it.”

Axl nods solemnly and looks back down at the tape in his hands. “You do that.”

I lower my gun and toss him the keys as I begin to walk away.

“Izzy, one more thing.”

I turn around and pause for a moment. I don’t know why I did it when I knew that I wasn’t going to be going back to him.

“I never want to see you again. I never want to hear from you again. On my life, I would rather slit my own throat than hear your name ever again.”

“The feeling is mutual.”

#Writing #Love Break My Heart #GNR #Classic Rock #Axl Rose #Izzy Stradlin #Izal #Fanfiction

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