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oumaheroes · 3 years

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Afterlife

Word Count: 2229

Names:

Alba- Scotland

Cymru- Wales

Albion- England

Ériu- Ireland

Set in the same world as ‘Wind Walk’

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‘What happens when we die?’

Alba paused, halfway through carving a gouge in a block of wood to look over at Albion where he was stood by the fire, face turned to the flames. He had his back to Alba, a roughly spun blanket draped over his shoulders which was made from thick, undyed wool that scratched but did the job. Cymru was getting the hang of making them now, able to weave in a few patterns if he had the time and the colours, but it was haphazard work and nothing fancy at all. They were sometimes able to trade for nicer ones, ones with intricate designs of knots and swirls, charms woven into the fabric to dance across borders and seams, but food was more important, usually. Things they couldn’t catch or pick from the land, like bread.

Mama had never really praised overly nice things, or stressed their importance beyond a passing aesthetic appreciation, and so none of them were too concerned that their everyday clothes were dull and shapeless. Their nicer things Alba kept in a bag at all times near his person- golden armlets and bracelets folded in the plaid of their family woven by Mama herself to show them as children of the earth, Gods amongst men. Rich colours and bold patterns that Cymru eyed with greedy wonder.

Alba saved these for when they visited their people, the scatterings of them spread across the island that bore them. He was thankful that he and his siblings didn’t really grow.

‘What do you mean?’

Albion hesitated, mouth pressing into a tight line before opening again to speak, ‘When we die. Because people…’ Albion shifted, casting a quick glance back to him before turning once again to the fire, ‘humans don’t come back, do they?’

Alba, gave up on whittling anything further and sat up straighter, left hand holding what would one day be a bowl resting on his knee, ‘No, they don’t.’

He looked about their camp from his spot on the floor, back pressed again the trunk of a large tree they’d pitched their shelter against. Despite it being night Cymru was off somewhere, away on one of his walks that sometimes took him for days and there was no telling when he’d be back. This time Alba wasn’t too sure what had caused him to need space, the air was calm and friendly amongst them all, but Cymru had grown silent and still regardless and Alba had followed him with watchful eyes until he had taken himself away, seeing him retreat to the West where he could feel him linger on the edge of his perception.

He was the one that usually had these conversations, the ones where there wasn’t a clear answer, or a kind answer. Cymru could mould the truth into something palatable, something easy to understand and swallow without it becoming a lie. These sorts of conversations were not Alba’s strength- he did not like things for which there was no answer, or no easy answer, and so either worked at them silently until there was one, or ignored it. Not all things needed to be understood or reasoned with, some things just were and it was easier in the end to accept that.

But Alba had a feeling that Albion was leading to one of those sorts of questions and he was going to have to be the one to answer it.

‘But we do come back,’ Albion continued on. He said it as a statement; the tone was unquestioning but also unsure and Alba cracked his knuckles on one hand with his thumb as he tried to read between what Albion was saying and what he might be leading up to.

‘Yes, we do.’

An unspoken ‘sometimes’ fell flat and awkward between them. Mama hadn’t come back.

Albion looked down at the ground and rolled a stone underneath his foot. He was barefoot, again, because he refused to stay in shoes for very long if he could help it, and he balanced the pebble under the ball of his foot, round and around.

‘What is it?’ Alba knew this had come out rougher than he had intended by the way Albion’s shoulders twitched, a sudden self-conscious jolt that made Alba click his tongue in regret and try again. He was still getting used to this, ‘What are you thinking about?’

Alba watch the curve of Albion’s brow furrow into a frown, light from the flames silhouetting him and making him appear older and unknown, ‘Do we turn human? When we die? Is that why Mama…’ he trailed off, no words needed.

‘No, we don’t,’ he said it confidently but really, Alba knew as much as anyone did. Which is to say, he knew nothing concrete at all. None of them truly knew what happened to Mama, although her disappearance was as sure and real to him as much as his own hand was. Mama wasn’t missing or elsewhere, she was gone. He felt it as a truth deep within him, somewhere ancient formed long before his time. No matter what Alba didn’t know, he knew this all too well, ‘we stay as we are. We fade, when our time comes.’

He could see that this reply brought more questions than it did answers and thought of a way to try and fill the gaps, ‘humans die from age or sickness, or injury. We die from other things.’

Albion turned around to face him fully, ‘Like what?’

‘By the Gods, what is it with you today? Why so many questions?’

Albion scowled and lightly kicked the pebble he was worrying away from the fire. It rolled somewhere to Alba’s left, landing by the roots of a small shrub. They both watched its progress, ‘doesn’t matter.’

Damn it. ‘Don’t be huffy, why’re you asking all of a sudden?’

Albion shifted his weight from one foot to the other and tensed under the blanket, pulling it tighter around him and huddling in on himself. He ducked his head to stare somewhere off and down, ‘You’ll laugh.’

‘No, I won’t,’ Alba was slightly offended, although it couldn’t say for sure that it was unwarranted. Maybe there had been times when he’d read his youngest brother wrong. Albion was often prickly and capricious and it was difficult to tell how he was truly feeling, hard to know whether he was hiding another truth under thorns.

Alba also wasn’t used to talking with him in such a way yet. Before Mama died, he could be a brother: tease Albion whenever he said something stupid, or fell over, or messed up. But now Alba had to be something more, had suddenly found himself thrust in a role he didn’t ask for and the shape of caregiver hung too large on him. He was trying to fill a space of parent for everyone but all he himself really wanted was for someone else to come and do it for him, for Mama to come back and fill it perfectly.

It was hard to know where to tread on a path you’ve never gone down before, especially one made by someone else.

Albion still looked unsure and as much as a large part of Alba was tempted to let it go, to take the easy option that was presented to him and move on with the evening, another, more stubborn, part wanted to prove Albion, and maybe himself, wrong, ‘I promise I won’t laugh. Now will you just spit it out?’

Albion remained staring somewhere at the ground between them, ‘what if-,’ he cut off, swallowing, ‘what if you die?’

There was a beat of silence in which a flurry of emotions coiled in Alba’s chest, ‘I will die. We all die.’

Albion pursed his lips tight together and blinked a few times in succession- too quick, ‘But I don’t- I don’t want you to.’

Alba’s throat felt thick suddenly, ‘Hey, come here.’

Albion refused to move, still studiously looking down at the ground and locked stubbornly in place, so Alba half stood to reach out and grab hold of the blanket and tug him closer. Albion stumbled at first, unwilling to allow himself to let go easily, but another tug had him near enough for Alba to wrap him in arms, falling back down into a sit with him. Once there, all pretence was dropped and Albion lifted his arms to curl them around Alba’s neck, chin coming to hook over his shoulder.

Alba shifted him to settle more comfortably on his lap, legs around his waist and blanket forgotten on the floor, and rubbed his back, holding him tight with his other arm. Albion’s hands gripped Alba’s tunic in a tight bunch, tugging it awkwardly askew around his back. They stayed there for a few moments, mostly silent and unmoving apart from the odd jolting repressed sob from Albion who still refused to give in completely.

After he’d calmed down, shaky breaths softening into regular breathing, Alba reached up to cup the back of his head and lightly ruffle his hair, ‘I’m not going anywhere any time soon.’

Albion sniffled and released one hold of Alba’s clothes to rub at his eyes, ‘How do you know?’

‘Because I do.’

Albion dropped his hand to once again grabbed hold of his tunic but looser, tugging and pulling at the fabric in a half-hearted distraction, and huffed, ‘That’s a stupid answer.’

Alba prodded him in the side, smiling when Albion twitched in surprise, ‘It’s the truth. I think Mama knew; we knew as well, didn’t we.’

Albion hmm’d, unwilling to agree. Alba knew he had noticed though, as small as he was. He had never fussed or questioned when she’d wandered away and left them, had never tried to follow her on her journeys alone. He had known, as they all had, that she was disappearing into time and a place no one could follow.

‘We are our people. We watch them and speak for them- we remember them,’ Alba shifted him and rested his cheek on the crown of Albion’s head, speaking into his hair, ‘when our people change, sometimes we can’t change with them. I think that’s what happened to Mama.’

Albion stayed silent. Alba could feel him thinking, sense him turning this over in his head to search for holes.

‘What brought this on?’ Alba tried again, gently. He felt Albion swallow against his shoulder.

‘Things feel more different now. Cymru goes away and sometimes I can’t feel where he goes. Ériu feels the most different and-‘ he paused for a moment, thinking, ‘humans feel different. Some I can’t feel them at all, I know they’re not mine now. So, I thought… what if…’

Alba raised his head and shrugged his shoulder for Albion to move off. He leant back, heavy in his lap, and Alba caught him by the chin to keep him from looking away, ‘Just because we’re growing apart now, doesn’t mean we’re going away,’ he smoothed a thumb under Albion’s eye before resting his hand on his neck, steady, ‘we’ll be different but we’ll still be here. You’ll know when it’s my time to go.’

Albion’s eyes slid to stare at Alba’s shoulder so he tapped him under the chin to get him to look back, ‘Alright? You’ll know.’

Albion gave a small nod, ‘yeah, okay.’

Alba eyed him critically, searching for anything lingering that he still wasn’t saying. Finding nothing and feeling satisfied that Albion had taken in what he’d said, Alba gave a moan and rubbed theatrically at his thighs, ‘Good, now get off- you’re heavy.’

Albion scowled, ‘No I’m not!’

‘By Gods you are, I can’t feel my legs.’

Albion shoved at his shoulder but stood, moving off to the side, ‘Maybe your legs are just weak.’

‘Maybe it’s all those raspberries you keep filching when you think I’m not looking.’

Albion coloured, ‘No it’s not!’

‘Must be, I did think you were looking rounder,’

Alba prodded Albion in the stomach and he scowled, swatting his hand away, ‘I’m not round!’

‘Well, you certainly ain’t a feather. Here,’ Alba picked up his block of wood and his carving knife and held them out to him, ‘help me work on this. It can be for you to carry the berries in rather than stuffing them in your shirt and staining everything.’

‘I don’t do that,’ Albion huffed but took the wood and tool anyway, sitting down next to him. Alba picked up the blanket and shook it out to shake off the dirt before draping it back around his shoulders.

‘Do you think I can’t tell? Stop grousing and hollow me out a hole, we can smooth it later.’

‘What are you going to do?’ Albion began to carve in the centre, widening the impressions Alba had made earlier.

Alba fished in his pocket for his hunting knife, ‘I’ll sharpen this and then go and check the rabbit traps.’

He leant behind him and around the tree for his travel bag, pulling it closer and rummaging about inside it for his whetstone.

‘Thanks.’

Albion’s voice was small and quiet- Alba probably wouldn’t have heard it if he hadn’t still been so alert to noise from him.

He prodded his brother on the arm with his knee and turned to carry on digging through his bag, ‘of course.’

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AN:

Another mini story that will be fleshed out for AO3 one day. Can you tell I’m procrastinating updating my other WIPs? Because I am and I am a cretin.

This is very self-indulgent with no historical accuracy or research whatsoever- please forgive me. If I go digging for historical truth, I fall into a rabbit hole and that is very difficult to peel myself out of.

Thanks for reading!

#my writing #hetalia #aph #hws #hws england #hws scotland #aph england #aph scotland #arthur kirkland #hetalia fanfiction #hetalia fic #hetalia fanfic #help i am a mess for sibling relationships #hws uk bros #hws brit bros #aph brit bros

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saikagerights · 3 years

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Lay Me Down to Rest - Entry for Day of MirSan 2021

Hello there! And welcome to my first Inuyasha fanfiction, as apart of the @dayofmirsan event.

I initially was planning to be an observer of the event, but sudden inspiration struck at 1am during my nightly routine of falling asleep to Inuyasha. Rewatching the Monkey Sprite episode is interesting for many reasons. For one, there was an unhealthy amount of filler added into the anime adaptation of this story-line, which gave hit-or-miss comedy. But the most important thing is that Miroku and Sango are mostly unaccounted for in this story-line, which gives shippers like me an opportunity to write some “off-screen development” for them. And though the anime does give us an idea, I’m afraid that Miroku’s indifference and frustrated edge in the scene feels a bit off, so I decided to add a bit of a bit of context. Consider this a bit of a fusion between the anime in manga, though the scene is based off of the anime. Also I was very liberal with my use of English/Japanese dub terminology. I watched the anime in English, but switched over to the manga to replace the Final Act, so it’s a bit inconsistent.

I’ve been observing this fandom from afar ever since I started getting into Inuyasha back in December, and though I wanted to try and engage with it, it seemed very daunting given this fandom’s age and organization. But I’m very grateful that I was given the chance to participate in this event, and lucky that inspiration struck me at the right time. I’ve really been looking forward to seeing the works that come out of this event, and I hope you enjoy my contribution.

And thanks for the mods for allowing me to share my work with you fellow fans

InuYasha and it’s properties are owned by creator Rumiko Takahashi and Sunrise

Read on AO3

Sango tailed the monk as he led their investigation. The villagers they had asked so far had no knowledge of the wicked demon, only of the pestering monkeys that were ravaging their fields. Her companion simply nodded, thanking them for their time and promising that the Inugami would save their village. They soon found themselves at the outskirts of the village on an empty patch of land outside the forest, save for one tall tree. Sango found his behavior during their search to be strange, especially as he now paused at the tree, leaving his Shakujo leaning against its trunk.

Was he just as stumped as she was? Would this reprieve be a chance for them to rethink their approach?

“Why have we stopped here, Miroku?” She questioned. “Aren’t we supposed to search for Naraku’s whereabouts?”

Her befuddlement heightened as he laid his body to rest in the grass underneath the shade of the tree with a sigh, both hands pillowing his head. His intentions then became clear at the sight of his eyelids slipping shut.

“How might we do that when we have neither Inuyasha’s nose or Kagome’s detection?” His tone reflected his relaxed poise. “I merely said that so that Inuyasha would be more inclined to help those villagers.”

Her head tilted downward towards the monk’s resting face. “I understand wanting to help, but do you honestly think that Inuyasha dealing with those monkeys will get us any closer to finding him?

“Not particularly.” He punctuated the off-handed remark with a yawn, overstating his disinterest. “But enough of that... Why don’t you join me here?”

She stood awestruck at his bold request. He lays there while their friends were helping this poor village and now he asks her to do the same? If Inuyahsa were to find out, he’d surely have more pressing things to worry about than the food security of the village.

“I don’t think it would be wise, considering your flippant lies.”

The man remained still, no sign of concern disrupting his posture.

“If you changed back into your battle attire before our return, they’d never suspect a thing.” He ignored her statement, a peaceful smile casually appearing on his face. She instantly recognized this move. He was fully convinced he would get his way, the sleazy crook. “Besides, I’m sure sleep has been as kind to you as it has been to me as of late.”

Although it was usually hard to detect amongst his manner of speaking, the monk’s sarcasm was not missed by the slayer. She knew very well that Naraku’s sudden disappearance had their whole group on edge, including herself. And while sleep had become its own battle, the desperate investigations of their enemy have left her distracted from everything else. Sleep meant the rest needed to fight again, but it also meant time alone with one’s most intimate thoughts. What always plagued her mind nowadays were things she’d rather not willingly engage. Finding Naraku should be her biggest concern now, but she indulged her companion despite what she would consider was her better judgement.

The monk had a particular talent for steering her away from rationality.

“Knowing your pervy ways, I’m sure you’d try and sneak a peek at me”

The monk could’ve never noticed the sneer on her face behind his still-closed eyes. The same smile was plastered on his face as well, despite her accusation. He really did enjoy giving her grief, didn’t he...

“Trust me, my dear. I have no intention of moving from this spot for a while. Or at least until Inuyasha comes for my head.”

“Then I guess you wouldn’t mind if I left Kilala here to guard this spot until I returned.”

He chuckled at that. “I don’t mind at all. I’m sure she’d love to watch me lie here, right Kilala?”

Sango looked to the nekomata, who merely chuffed in response. She was wary of Kilala’s strange trust in the monk at times, but she was sure that the demon would keep an eye on him in case he tried something funny.

Miroku took this as the perfect time to reveal his indigo eyes to her.

“Please, my intentions are more honorable than what they seem, believe me.”

There it was, that gentle voice of his used to convince her of his authenticity. The same breathy tones that sent her heart racing and her stomach in somersaults. She knew Miroku was confident in his charms, but she also liked to think that he was fully aware of this game they played. She only came to grips with it recently, but there was something going on.

They’d fight, they’d talk it through, and just when she thought he would try to make a move, that damn hand of his would find the wrong place to caress. Or it would be when she found herself grieving once more, and he could comfort her with his words alone. How did he always know what to say that made everything clear and could heal every fiber of her being, but also had a hand that never failed to do the exact opposite? He was a truly frustrating man, but he was the only one she ever considered more than just that.

But did he really know? That was a puzzle Sango couldn’t solve. It wasn’t as if anything meaningful resulted from these escapades. Afterwards, they would act as if nothing happened, and he would return to his typical flirtatious ways with any woman that entered his line of sight. So Sango liked to think that Miroku fully knew that he was toying with her feelings. That way it made it easier to lower her expectations and resent them despite Kagome’s not-so-subtle prodding.

When she became abruptly aware that her eyes had been locked on him for too long, she made her hasty retreat, hoping he didn’t catch her bright red flush in the shade of the tree.

“This man will be the death of me,” she softly cursed herself as soon as she knew she left his earshot.

_______________________________________________________________

Upon her return to their little “spot,” she was greeted by an alert Miroku. His body was now fully upright and turned towards her approaching form.

“You’ve accepted my invitation, I see”

“I thought you were trying to sleep”

“I still am, but I’d figured it would help if I got a quick glimpse of your beauty before-hand.”

She rolled her eyes at his shameless attempt. “You really are troublesome, you know that?”

“You wound me, dear Sango!” He unceremoniously flopped back into his previous position, his left hand patting the spot next to him. “You are free to lie beside me if you wish.”

Without the need for consideration, she silently opted to sit against Kilala’s curled form, stretching her legs in front of her. He managed to convince her to relax alongside him, but she had no intention of allowing herself to get too comfortable around him in the likely case the monk’s wandering hands wandered once more. He sighed audibly at her decision, but allowed his eyes to close again without any further word. He could act like a child all he wanted, but she would not budge.

She watched the man for a while, observing his state of rest. She could tell as much that he hadn’t fallen asleep just yet by all of his idle noises and the way he kept trying to steal a glance in her direction.

“Can’t sleep?”

She hadn’t even tried to close her eyes just yet, as she was still trying to grasp their current situation. Why was he so insistent on sleeping if he was just going to try and stare at her the entire afternoon? Why did he lie to Inuyasha in the first place if this was how they would spend their time? With all these questions moving around in her head, she might as well ask for the most basic of them.

“Miroku? Why do you lie and steal as casually as you do? I always thought that monks were pure-hearted.”

“What a wonderful question!” He exclaimed. With such enthusiasm, she was almost afraid of the answer she would soon receive from him. “I’ve been traveling on my own for so long, and it’s quite difficult to acquire wealth in such unfortunate times. I wish to give aid to those in need, but I also believe that it never hurts to help yourself as well.” He settled for an even tone and let his eyes slip open once more.

“And you are right, It is true that holy-people such as myself are meant to be free of sin. But, I was born tainted by the hole that resides in my hand.” His voice tapered off at his pause, the newfound silence growing thick with each passing moment. His sound returned to him, soft and low, as if it were only meant for his ears alone.

“It doesn’t matter how much I devote myself to my faith to any idol or deity. My curse is hell-bent on deciding my fate....”

But we are trying to stop Naraku! To free you from the Kazaana. You can always change your path after that! She immediately contested, perhaps a little too loudly, but she didn’t care. How dare he speak so little of himself and avoid her gaze as he did it?! She refused to accept his belittling statements.

“It is very hard for me to see a future for myself at this time, I’m afraid…” He brought his head up to look at her. A flash of fear ran through his eyes before he looked down once more. “I’m sorry… I shouldn’t speak like that.”

He’s afraid…

And he had every right to be.

“Please don’t apologize.”

He never showed it in front of their group, but behind that calm and smooth exterior remained a man trembling under the weight of his own mortality. He was a man after all, and men were never to show what made them most vulnerable. But with how much he gives to help others, it feels unfair for him to just allow himself to suffer inside as he did.

If they understood each other as well as he liked to claim, then she knew he hated the restless feeling they had knowing nothing of where their wicked nemesis resided, surely plotting something to exploit the fears he caused within their hearts. Knowing that her poor brother remained in that demon’s grasp sickened her to her core, and sitting around with no leads made it hard to lay dormant as they did now.

“I get it. I am just as frustrated as you… About Kohaku-”

“-You don’t need to go any further” He interrupted her thoughts, I didn’t mean to remind you of your pain like that.”

“Miroku-”

“-Please,” he sharply cut in once more, hoarseness settling into his throat. He must’ve noticed it as well, as he cleared his throat soon after. “let’s just try to find rest while we still can.”

He squeezed his eyes shut, clearly trying to force unconsciousness upon himself. Sango relented, trying to relax her body, idly stroking Kilala as she watched the man slowly succumb to rest. It was surreal to see him struggle like this when it seemed like meditation was second nature to him. She decided on trying for sleep once his breathing evened out and all the remaining tension left his face.

________________________________________________________________

Miroku wasn’t sure how long he had been asleep, but he could tell from the shadows before him had grown considerably when his eyes peered open. He turned his head to see Sango now curled up against Kilala, her face all but buried in her demon companion’s fur. He slowly rose to his feet, slightly stretching as he made an intake of his surroundings. It looked as if the sun would soon begin it’s retreat from the sky. The monk knew the rest was necessary, but he definitely didn’t look forward to another predictively sleepless night.

One more glance at Sango’s sleeping form was enough to convince him to approach her, neglecting his Shakujo to silence his movements. He knew, probably better than anybody, of the threat imposed by the slayer’s attuned senses. He also knew the danger of being caught if she awoke to his gawking. Unfortunately it was a risk he was willing for one small fleeting moment to stare at her.

What an idiot he had been for making her sympathize with his life. Even worse that it reminded her of her own grief. He was happy to indulge her curiosity, but when he looked up at her, he turned cowardly at what he saw. It wasn’t fear, or sadness over his grim fate. It was the very same fire that lit behind her eyes in battle.

She was prepared to fight for him, it seemed…

He dare not think that she would go any farther for that. He was not worth her death. In fact, nothing was worth her death. The honor of her clan was at stake, and her life was essential in carrying on their legacy. One measly itinerant monk with a fated death should be worthless in her eyes, even if he wanted nothing more than to keep her alive.

Even if he wanted more than anything to see a future with her.

He turned away from her, returning to his spot in a now seated position. The monk had half a mind to wake the woman, but decided against it. Every waking moment for her was its own battle, after all. She needed all the rest she could get. And he’d gladly wait for her until that battle resumed, and fight with her at every step.

And if dying for her now meant he could spend the next life by her side, then he would welcome death with open arms.

“I hope this woman is the death of me,” he softly wished before all else melted away to his own meditation.

______________________________________________________________

Yeah I realized I took some liberties here with how Miroku and Sango’s relationship was at this point. This episode takes place after the Temptress of the Mist and Demon-Head castle, but far behind Mt. Hakurei, so what was going on with them hadn’t really become a “pattern” just yet. And Miroku had just comforted her in her grieving state for the first time right before that. Sango wasn’t deep enough to say he was her reason for living, so that’s why I kept her on the fence and didn’t have her feel too disappointed, because that’s what came after Mt Hakurei.

I’m a sucker for long winded perspective changes, especially here with all the parallels I draw between them. Some of my best lines were written here, especially the ending line. My GOD. I swear, I wrote that and everything made sense. I said “yes” over and over again, it was so good.

Also can you tell whose voice I’m talking about when describing Miroku’s? The answer is Koji Tsujitani. I always knew about Tsujitani’s delivery that makes Miroku sound truly “fake” but I noticed rather recently how he would add so much breath, especially in serious scenes. On the other hand, Kirby Morrow played the character down and deep in his throat, which isn’t bad when talking about his overall performance, but I decided to favor Tsujitani’s performance in this instance.

(I’m a classically trained singer and a music education major, so I’m a nut for analyzing voice acting. I have respect for both of these men may they rest in peace.)

Thanks again for the opportunity, and I hope to write more for this series.

-Saikage

#inuyasha #mirsan #mirsan day #dayofmirsan2021 #Miroku #Sango

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phonecallwithsatan · 3 years

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Letter

a.n.: SURPRISE another new character that does not fit with my profile photo. This is for my very dear friend who enjoys a certain Sarah Paulson. To anyone new reading this, welcome! To those coming back, nice to meet again.

Reader and Mildred Ratched live a secret life in Lucia, California. All is well, truly, until reader walks in on something she did not expect. Angst central. 3.8k

★

“Go home, baby. Don’t worry about us. It’s fine.” Your partner of three years, almost four, was severely under the weather and looking even paler in the cyan outfit your shared job required as uniform.

You and Mildred were tucked away in a hallway where you could talk in confinement away from all the other patients and staff. You took a hand to her forehead and noticed how warm it was. You slipped the hand to her cheek and held it there, hers going up and holding it softly, sinking her head a bit into your palm.

“Call me a cab. You can take the Ford home.” Mildred heard some footsteps coming from down the hall and she quickly let go of your hand after kissing you ever so lightly as to not smear her red color on your black lipstick. You said goodbye and let go of your partner, walking away first with your white heels clicking on the linoleum floor with every step you took away. You hated these heels with a passion but it was part of the uniform. The black heels you adored were stashed away in the teal Ford you and Mildred shared.

You smoothed out your dress while you were still walking and did not turn around when you heard Mildred walking after you a few steps behind. You were deeply in love but you still kept the relationship a secret from your coworkers.

Once you got up to reception you located the phone and dialed the cab number. While it was ringing, you went up to your neck and touched the necklace Mildred gave you for your birthday a few months ago. You fidgeted around with the little heart that hung around your neck with a photo of you two inside of it.

The attendant picked up after six rings.

“Hi there, a cab at Lucia State Hospital, please.” You looked up and saw Mildred walk behind the desk by you and you smiled.

“Alright, I have a driver headed there now.” She ended abruptly.

You turned with the heels on your shoes to face Mildred.

“They said it would come shortly.” You tried reaching for her hand but she pulled back quickly. You had forgotten that no one knew.

“Thank you, y/n.” Her quiet voice barely made it over to you and she could tell you were disappointed in the lack of physical touch. Seeing this, she decided to push your necklace back into your collar. Mildred looked to the side almost to pretend to be looking for the cab you had ordered her but you knew she was just checking for people around.

You were tired of hiding, truly. But there was nothing you could really do. Besides it all, however, you were lucky just to have her. You turned to look at her point of direction and you saw the cab roll-up.

“I’ll see you later, M.” You turned back around and gave her purse over to take home. She opened up her purse and gave you the key for the Ford.

“Do you have money on you?” She nodded and you sent her off, looking over the desk as she walked away with confidence in her step even though she was hiding her own life away from the people she ate lunch next to.

The doors opened and you decided to get back to work. Only six more hours.

★

Eight o’clock rolled around and you were ready to head home after saying goodbye to all your coworkers. You hadn’t heard from Mildred through a phone call so you decided to surprise her with flowers, just because.

You took the keys out of your purse and you walked to the car. As you reached it, you popped the trunk open and took out your beloved shiny black heels. You sat down in the trunk and slipped the white ones off, throwing them worthlessly and carelessly behind you. You snorted to yourself and decided to leave them there until tomorrow’s shift. You pushed your feet in one by one after closing either clasp on them and you closed the trunk when you were done.

Luckily, you knew how to drive well in heels too.

The engine powered up and you headed for the store that was closest to you and Mildred’s home. You were frequent there since you took the liberty to do most of the shopping for the house.

You loved this store because of its broad selection of arrangements, ranging from daisies to carnations, hydrangeas available any time of year, and iris’ that brightened up your home.

The Ford was parked close and you walked in headed straight to the florals. You were mesmerized by the selection as you ran your hands through some of the flowers, holding your purse close to you and your lips pursed slightly as you made your selection.

“Are we shopping for anyone in specific today, Miss?” You turned and saw the attendant come closer to you.

You heard Mildred’s voice in your head saying that ‘it’s a small town, don’t,’ and you decided to throw a white lie.

“My best friend. She isn’t feeling well.” You watched as the attendant unsubtly scanned your face. Her eyes flickered from your bold lipstick up to your piercing eyes, switching back and forth until you couldn’t handle it anymore. You cleared your throat and she finally responded.

“How about some tulips? White, maybe? Or you might like something… bolder.” You cocked your head to the side at that comment and you took a step closer to the attendant.

“Maybe you could get me twelve stems of those red roses back there.” You turned a bit and pointed at a bouquet of roses behind the lady. She strained her neck to look and as she did her brows were furrowed.

She began to walk towards them and she spoke once again. “Best friend, you say? Aren’t these a bit too much?” She took them out of their temporary holding space and you withheld yourself from snapping.

Her back was still turned towards you as she wrapped them up for you. As she was, you took a twenty out of your wallet.

As she turned around you noticed her still staring at you in a very unsophisticated manner considering she was a sixty-year-old woman working at a market for four dollars an hour.

She handed you the roses and you pushed the twenty on the table beside you. “Keep the change, ma’am.”

You turned slowly enough the see the look on her face and you smiled to yourself as you walked to your car with the roses in hand. Mildred loved red.

You placed them on the passenger’s seat and began the short commute home. You fiddled with the radio in the dark and you came home within minutes. As you were pulling into the driveway, you noticed a car you didn’t recognize. Maybe one of the neighbors was having guests over and they had decided to park on your side of the lawn. Strange, you thought.

You switched over from drive to park and you turned the key to the left. Your home was dimly lit, even at 8:30 when you two would normally have dinner or read together. Instead of lit up windows that faced the street you were greeted with two out of the three being dark.

You took the flowers and purse from the seat and you locked the car before opening the door of your home. You yelled out for Mildred who could have been anywhere in the house. A different black pair of kitten heels greeted you at the front door instead. Those were not yours and they definitely did not belong to Mildred.

“Mildred, baby? I’m home!” You yelled once more while kicking lightly at the shoes. Placing your purse down on the kitchen table, you followed the light down the hallway that was peeking out from the crack inbetween door and carpet.

“M?” This call was quieter. It was surreal and realizing as to what was happening around you. It was barely above a whisper. The roses were still clutched in your hands as you reached for the gold door handle.

There was music playing from a stereo you had bought for the house. It was the first purchase you had made under this roof, and your lover was using it for someone else.

Infront of you laid Mildred and an unknown person in your bed. They were too busy to notice you walk in on their space. It seemed like that was how they prayed, in a shared bed that was no longer.

“Mildred, you deceiving wrench, you-” They turned around and almost like a movie deferred away from each other like two negatives. Her red lipstick was smeared all over the stranger’s face which even trailed down to her body. The sheets barely reached over her and a migraine began to form when you saw red trail down her neck to torso. Your hand flew to your mouth and your hand unconsciously gripped the flowers with a grip that was only familiar when you had to grab a patient.

“Y/n, hold on,” Mildred tried to explain but you moved faster and threw the flowers against the wall. Tears were becoming and you looked at the two that were still somehow entangled.

The flowers flew apart from their wrapping and landed in different positions on the floor. You were screaming at this point.

Your own lover. Your partner. Your lady. Your wife, even. This was your best friend, the person who hung up your jackets and the person who read outloud to you when your voice was gone. That same person didn’t even bother to change the sheets.

“You,” reached down and took the locket in your hands before tearing it off and walking over to them. “You, skank,” you shoved the necklace in the stranger’s face from inches away, “get the fuck out.”

She didn’t budge.

“Now!” You screamed and you heard Mildred yell back. The stranger got up, naked and covered in red. You turned your eyes away.

“Don’t talk to Gwen that way, y/n-” she wasn’t able to finish her sentence because you slapped her. Hard and across the face. So hard that she turned to the right to stare at Gwen.

“I didn’t know Gwen was so close to you, Mildred.” You turned to Miss Gwen and you were almost unable to hold yourself back from attacking her.

“Gwen, get the fuck out before I figure out who’s ring that is.” The ring you were mentioning was on her left hand and was obviously not from Mildred. As much as you hated and despised her soul at the moment, she would never buy a ring like that one.

Gwen was practically sprinting at this point with clothes in hand. Funny enough, she was clinging onto the locket Mildred had given you.

“Y/n, hold on, please-” you interrupted her.

“Can’t you say anything else, M?” You closed your eyes the minute you called her by her nickname. Mildred was up from the bed and was frantic to cover her self up with the white sheets you two had slept and loved in.

You stared at her. You waited for an answer. But nothing came out. Just prolonged staring and smeared lipstick coated your eyes.

You walked up to her once more. You waited and waited, but nothing. She tried reaching for your hand but you repeated your earlier move and hit her once more.

“Don’t you dare, Mildred. Don’t you dare and try to justify anything you have done.” Your finger was pointed towards her.

You walked out of the room and slammed he door. You heard it open but you ignored it as you were halfway down the wall.

“Y/n, baby-”

“Do not.” You spoke clearly and commanding. You reached the closet that held some coats and you grabbed a few. You moved down and felt her presence float around you.

You grabbed your purse and some shoes. You were not staying here tonight.

She grabbed your arm and you turned to look at the cheater who had accompanied your walk.

You two just stared at each other and her grip tightened. You shook your arm to let it loose but she would not budge.

You let your eyebrows relax and you mouth untighten. Her eyes stared deep into yours but you could just tell that there was nothing left between you two. Nothing could repair this. You shook it once more and didn’t break eye contact until she let go.

You slammed the closet door before walking out and you opened the door. Mildred followed.

She was saying something but it’s hard to register when the rage blows through your nose and ears.

You walked over to the car which you two shared and you threw your belongings in the back seat and the hopping in the front. You locked the doors before Mildred could get to you. You watched her through the window as she pleaded for you. You turned the key to the right and put the car in reverse. She ran to the back and held on to the trunk of the car. You could see her in the rear view mirror and she was not giving up without a fight.

Unknowing of what to do, you decided to scare her instead. Still in reverse, you pressed the break and the gas at the same time to rev the engine a bit and create a sound that would startle her. It worked, and she jumped to the side after you did that maneuver. Now that she was gone, you were able to safely back up.

Your tires squealed as you exited the driveway and you watched her sit in silence. The sheets had turned to brown shreds and all you could do is stare in amusement.

There was nothing left as you continued down the road with your headlights shining bright and your rearview mirror regretfull.

★

You had been driving all night from Lucia only to end up in a motel somewhere in Nevada.

You had gotten a decent nights, or days, rest and contemplated where you could end up staying for the rest of, well, life at this point. Luckily you had some cousins in Colorado. You were just hopeful that your now borrowed Ford would get you there with no problems.

The room was alright as far as the hotel clerk would know and you were able to pay and leave.

The blue Ford was waiting for you patiently and it was ready to keep moving. You hopped in and searched for some sunglasses in the glove compartment. You were sort of just digging blindly.

Instead, you found a letter. You took it out and saw your name written on it in the one and only Mildred’s cursive handwriting. Your neatly applied black lips tightened a bit and you closed the glove compartment after successfully finding a pair of cat eye shades.

You spun around the folded letter a bit and you contemplated what to do. It definitley was not placed after yesterdays events, but not before. How long was this sitting here?

You decided to open it besides it all.

Ripping it open, the letter inside read as following:

Y/n,

Four years with you have been passionate, lustful, insightful, glorious, and most of all, beautiful. Maybe it was the eyes, or perhaps the words, but you’ve found a way to tie me down and I wouldn’t leave even if I was forced to. You could shun me, and I would still love you. You could spit, kick, loathe, hit, and run me over, and I would still come back.

I had always thought that settling down with someone would mean protruding coprimises and mandatory family dinners, but you changed that, y/n. You’ve changed my perception of love and desire. The moment you walked into Lucia, I knew I had to have you.

I understand how difficult it can be to hide what we have but I want to change that. I don’t want to resist holding your hand when we walk past our neighbors and I don’t want to lie and say I’m living with my friend from High School. I promise you this isn’t forever, just temporary. Believe me, I will do everything to change that.

I want to give you this not because I have to, but because I want to. I can’t stand deceiving you so please believe me when I say that these words come from the heart and soul. Understand that, please.

I never knew I could care for someone this much.

You’re my once in a lifetime; you’re the one, y/n.

Always with love, yours truly,

Mildred Ratched.

The inconsistent words made you laugh to yourself.

You took the paper and crumpled it in your hands. Your windows were already rolled down and you threw it out the passengers side. It rolled around a bit but eventually settled.

Placing the car in reverse, you backed out of your spot. You took your sunglasses and pushed them up a bit before placing the car in drive and running over the letter.

#mildred ratched #mildred x y/n #mildred #ratched #ratched netflix #mildred ratched x reader #ratched fanfiction #mildred ratched fanfic

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katherinewilliams221b · 3 years

Text

For A Greater Good 18/18

not my gif

He Who Must Not Be Named

Summary: Kate Williams, young healer and member of the Order, joins Durmstrang’s staff at Dumbledore’s request. Her mission? Find a Death Eater and survive long enough to tell the story. Set in 1996.

Pairing: Charlie Weasley x ofc/mc

Masterlist

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4] [Part 5]

[Part 6] [Part 7] [Part 8] [Part 9] [Part 10]

[Part 11] [Part 12] [Part 13] [Part 14]

[Part 15] [Part 16] [Part 17]

A/N: bold lines are from the book Harry Potter and The Order of The Phoenix

Severus Snape emerged from the shadows to stand in front of his ally.

“I was starting to think you wouldn’t come, Severus.” The voice of Albus Dumbledore was, as expected, steady and confident. “Do you have it?”

Snape approached him, eying the room with suspicion. It was the first time he had stepped inside Dumbledore’s hiding place, but despite he trusted the man, a chill ran down his spine. Keeping a stoic expression, he reached inside his robes and handed him a rolled piece of parchment.

“She had it with her. As you said.”

Dumbledore unrolled the document and nodded slowly. Another name wrote itself with the others.

“It is vital that Cornelius sees Voldemort first. After that, I will personally make sure that this information reaches the aurors.” The bearded man walked to the end of the room; the dim light of a candle outlined Fawkes’ silhouette.

“My name appears on that list.” Snape watched Dumbledore’s hand halt in the air. He turned around and with challenging eyes, he stared at him as he unrolled the parchment again. Turning his gaze back to the paper, Dumbledore pursed his lips together as if he was going to whistle and with a light blow, the name ‘Severus Snape’ left the paper in the form of black ashes.

He looked up at the potions teacher from up his glasses. Snape nodded.

“What happened to Yankelevich?”

“She will be brought to Nurmergard” The phoenix moved so his master could slide the parchment under him. “Attempted murder, at least.”

“I don’t understand why you sent Williams. Yankelevich wasn’t an immediate threat and Alastor could have done it faster and more efficiently.”

Dumbledore turned and put his hands behind his back. “You underestimate her. She’s learnt fast, and listened to your instructions, didn’t she? You were busy training Harry to notice, of course, but her occlumency skills have improved enormously, and she’s been practising how to communicate with Mr Weasley.”

“You said she would, yes…”

“Well, she refused using her patronus to communicate, and she needed to be away from him to practise.” He opened his mouth to say something else, but he reconsider it. At Snape’s piercing stare, he kept going, “Astrid knew someone was up to no good and needed a favour, however,” he pointed at Fawkes’ nest “that was my goal.”

He walked to the nearest chair and sat down, grabbing a goblet from the table. Before sipping, he caught how Snape’s jaw tensed. “Besides, Alastor’s never run freely around a castle, breaking rules and finding places he is not supposed to enter. She has.”

“How did she know how to find it?”

“I said her skills had improved, not that they were better than mine. I might have… given her a small guidance.” He raised his hand up to his temple’s level and brushed his index and thumb together. “ I was certain that Karkarov knew about the existence of the room. It was the most logical place to hide it.”

“Where is he now?” demanded Snape.

Dumbledore looked at his partner with amused eyes, but corrected his demeanour quickly. “I have no idea. I mistakenly believed he would be in the forest. I sent a letter to Katherine in hopes she would meet him there. Turns out, he is smarter than I thought.”

“It won’t be long until He finds out Karkarov’s writing that.” Snape pointed at Fawkes’s nest, and the bird chirped unhappily.

“I know.” He tsked and took a sip from his beverage, “But it was his choice.”

“What are you going to do until then?”

“We’ll wait. That spell is not easy to perform. We’ll let him write as much as he can.” They fell silent for a long while, lost in their thoughts, until Dumbledore spoke again.

“When?”

“Tomorrow. He wants the prophecy.”

“Of course. Of course…” he stood up and crossed his hands in front of him and searched in his companion’s black eyes. Snape reached inside his sleeve and took out a small vial with a silver liquid in it. He handed it to Dumbledore, who read the tag ‘K. Williams. Durmstrang’.

“She will not remember the names.”

With one last nod, Albus Dumbledore observed how his confidant dissolved in the air.

Katherine Williams awoke for the second time in the same Grimmauld Place’s cold room. She let the sun rays hit her eyelids and savoured the memory of Charlie’s firm body against her own.

When she reached behind her, only cold sheets wished her a good morning.

Promise me something. Promise me you’ll wake me up to say goodbye.

She stared at the pillow next to her and sighed. To be fair, he didn’t make such a promise. He didn’t say anything at all.

Putting her disappointment aside, she prepared herself for one of the most exhausting whirlwinds one could face: the loving care of Molly Weasley.

Sitting up with her back against the headboard, she stretched her neck to the side and had to do a double take at the nightstand.

A pink flower with orange undertones sat beside a piece of paper that was folded in half. Her stomach flipped, and she considered forgiving him for leaving.

A snapdragon for the strongest of flowers.

I hope this wasn’t a one-time thing. Owl me.

“Oh, shut up!” Kate whispered, but a chuckle escaped her mouth, anyway.

Movement on the other side of the door startled her, and she hid the note under the pillow before quickly hiding herself behind the covers.

The doorknob turned, and Mrs Weasley entered the room.

“Oh, thank Godric you are alright!” Molly was by her side in four long strides and cradled Kate’s head in her hands. “How are you feeling? Charles told me you woke up last night. You look pale. Did you rest?”

“Yes, Mrs Weasley, I’m fine. My head is spinning a little, though.”

“Of course, of course, let me see that arm.”

Internally complaining, Kate let her put the cream on her arm and tend the bruises of her neck. She didn’t have the courage to tell her that wouldn’t make the scar disappear. When she finished, Molly nodded with a satisfied smile and proceeded to pick up the clothes that were scattered on the floor. Kate held her breath during the entire the process.

“This boy... tsk... taught him better than this! At least he could have brought his clothes with him…” Kate wasn’t sure if she was oblivious or if she was giving them a green card because they weren’t at The Burrow. In any case, she felt the need to take Charlie off the hook.

“I’m sorry, that’s my fault, Charlie let me use his clothes after I showered and when I went to sleep... they were bothering me.” That wasn’t exactly a lie. She gestured her neck to point at her bruises and then remembered that maybe there were ones more recent, that she did not want to explain. Charlie had never left a mark on her, but that night he felt a tad possessive and she wasn’t sure he could be trusted.

Although Molly hadn’t commented on them while she was applying the cream, the younger witch rested her hand there, trying to appear casual. Just in case.

“Ah, don’t worry, dear.” Molly waved her free hand nonchalantly and went to pick her cloak from the floor. While putting on the robe that Charlie had left at the end of the bed, Kate remembered that she technically stole the uniform band.

“Oh, this is warm! What a nice coat!” She waved the magically warmed piece of clothing, admiring it, and something the size of a matchbox flew across the room in doing so. “Oh! I’m so sorry, I always check the pockets and now look at this!” She murmured something under her breath and went to pick up the mysterious object, but Kate interrupted her.

“I’ll get it, don’t worry.”

“Very well, then. I made you some breakfast, but it’s already cold, Charlie made me swear I would let you sleep in!” She laughed and when she was crossing the threshold, she added, “Arthur got your trunk, it’s downs… ah!”

Mr Weasley appeared from behind her with a smile on his face and his hands on her waist.

“Oh, not you too, Arthur, I have enough with your sons apparating everywhere…”

His husband ignored her with a laugh and entered the room, her trunk following him in the air.

“Special delivery!” He roared.

“Thank you so much, Mr Weasley.” He approached Kate, and after hugging her shoulders with an arm, he kissed the top of her head. “You scared us the other day, eh?” He squeezed her. “But, let’s thank Godric you are safe and sound! I must go to work now, if you’ll excuse me…”

“I’m fine, really. We healers recover quickly. Tonks filled me in, and I’m feeling alright.”

“Alright, then. I’ll let you change.” Molly placed a hand on her own cheek for a moment and left the room without another word.

The moment Mrs Weasley closed the door behind her, Kate spooned around and crawled down the wooden desk to retrieve the small object.

Placing it on her palm, she murmured ‘engorgio’, making the tiny leather journal grow to its original size.

Letters, maps, notes, names, drawings, and a full research on how to magically cross plant species were contained in that notebook. The past six months were portrayed in those pieces of paper, and their value was incalculable.

Looking up, she faced one of the obscure paintings that belonged to the Black family. Kate stared at a woman standing on a bridge in what appeared to be a forest, and a question formed in her mind. She needed to go to St. Mungo’s.

Convincing Molly that she could go alone to the hospital was harder than the mission she just came from. After a diluted Invigoration Draught and some help from Lupin, she managed to step out of Grimmauld Place.

She didn’t feel ready to apparate, and she doubted she would ever be, so she enjoyed her walk through the streets of the city. With the muggle money that Lupin gave her, she jumped on the first underground station she saw and followed his directions.

She got comfortable on an empty seat and observed the people on the train car. When she saw a couple getting handsy in a corner, a wave of sadness washed over her, and had to look away.

She missed Charlie terribly. The night before was too desperate and rushed, she didn’t have time to savour the moment. She didn’t even ask him about his mission with the giants, about his dragons, or about how he felt all that time alone at home. Being on a mission kept her head occupied for most of the time, but now, with nothing to do, she anticipated some time of loneliness.

She brought her hand to her chest, and her heart ached even more when she couldn’t find the necklace that Charlie had gifted her many years before. No. Stop it. You’ll get answers and study your notes and then... and then you will have to explain to Dumbledore you lost an important document that could have saved lives. Brilliant.

Soft clapping noises brought her back to reality. A woman in front of her was struggling to hold an excited baby on her lap. Kate observed the child and smiled when his little finger touched her mother’s nose. The baby turned his head and stared at Kate for a while before raising his arm to wave at her. She chuckled and returned the greeting, her trip improving slightly and temporarily.

Walking through St Mungo’s doors had a mixed effect of nostalgia and excitement. She had spent many hours in that hospital studying, training, and learning, and all of a sudden, she was fresh out of Hogwarts again, with all the emotions that implied. Taking a deep breath, she walked through the corridor and started searching for her first mentor and boss, Madame Louise.

She scanned the faces of the healers that were working, rapidly treating the patients like frantic ants recollecting their food.

“Williams?” Kate turned at the deep voice calling her and recognised the robust middle-aged woman in front of her. “What brings you here? I thought you were working in Romania?”

“Hello, Madame Louise, yes, well I was… working there. But I’m here as a patient today.”

Madame Louise frowned and looked at Kate up and down before giving a curt nod.

“Wait on that bed.” She said before turning and walking away.

Kate sat as directed and stared at the beautiful glass stained windows of the place.

“I request you let me go right now! This is nonsense.” She could recognise that firm voice anywhere. To her right Professor McGonagall was lying on one of the beds and arguing with a boy that Kate figured he was wishing he hadn’t been born.

She walked towards them and put a hand on the boy’s shoulder. “I’ll take it from here, thank you.”

“Who are you? You are not a healer; Madame Louise will hear about this.”

“Mister, this young woman knows more than you, do us all a favour and go with your mother.” Intervened McGonagall.

“I heard Jared O’Leary was looking for you.” The boy shifted in his place and nodded nervously before leaving them alone.

“Professor, what happened?” Kate’s healer mode activated and started scanning McGonagall for injuries and signals of distress.

“Oh, Williams, a lot is been happening this past year. I can imagine you’ve been informed?”

“Vaguely. I arrived two days ago from…”

“I know.”

Kate grabbed the file at the foot of the bed and read the report on McGonagall’s state.

“Four stunning spells to the chest?” She looked up and asked with her eyes, but her professor wasn’t in a mood for a talk.

“Williams, I must get out of here and go back to Hogwarts. I’m afraid it’s going to be too late by the time they let me go.”

“Professor, you could faint just by… too late for what?”

“Williams!” Madame Louise motioned her to come closer. Kate hesitated, but followed the mediwizard to a quieter space. “What happens to be the problem?”

“I’ve been poisoned two days ago.”

“In that case you should have come earlier, don’t you think?”

“There’s been… complications. I wanted to ask you if it’s possible to poison someone without using a vial or a potion or, I don’t know, food or drinks.”

The woman hummed and crossed her arms in front of her. “That’s rather strange.”

“Is this…” Kate moved the collar of the shirt to the side, revealing the red marks that hadn’t disappeared yet. “… a possible way?”

Louise grabbed the glasses that were hanging by a chain around her neck and placed them on the tip of her nose to inspect the injuries.

“The poison could have been injected with some kind of needle, but the shape of these marks means claws or… nails.”

She took her glasses off and waved them while talking. “I imagine it is possible, but you must have a very twisted mind to carry around poison in your nails. Also, you need to be very careful, a bad placement of the poison can cause yourself to get ill. In what kind of troubles are you getting into, Williams?”

“It’s a story for another day.”

“Madame Louise, I can’t find Jared O’Leary…” The boy that was treating McGonagall appeared from behind Kate.

“What are you talking about? Go back to work! Naturally, you can’t find him. He doesn’t work here anymore!”

“But she…”

“Is every patient cured, Mr Boyle?” Kate slid away from the conversation to where Professor McGonagall was resting.

“I suddenly feel tired…”

Kate nodded and checked that the potions on her nightstand were filled and in order. A hand grabbed her wrist, and she turned to look at McGonagall.

“Katherine. You must find Potter. Something terrible is about to happen.”

Kate frowned and got closer to her former professor’s face.

“The Ministry. Try the Ministry,” she whispered.

Kate didn’t think twice. She ran all she could to the underground station, receiving some odd glances from the surrounding people.

When she arrived at the Ministry stop, she could sense the commotion even from the muggles that were passing by.

“A gas leak.” She heard while climbing up the mechanic stairs. Some people complained at her rudeness, but she couldn’t stop and apologise at the moment.

“There’s the press. Those vultures. It was probably a problem with plumbing. Look! The water reached the first floor!” A man said.

Kate tried to walk among the curious souls that were conglomerated around the building and recognised the protection bubble that was forming around it. She slid under it with ease.

“But I heard an explosion! I’m telling you!” a woman said to a journalist.

She tried to enter the building, but what seemed to be an auror stopped her.

“Let me in! I’m a healer!”

The man remained stoic and grabbed her arm.

“Identification?”

“I… I don’t have it right now but…”

“You can’t go in, Miss” She tried to get rid of him and she almost succeeded, but when the doors to the Ministry opened, she stopped the struggle. Four aurors walked out the building protecting several figures that walked behind them. She tried to reach them, but the security guard grabbed her again.

“You are the cursed girl! Daily Prophet here! Are you involved in the accident? How do you think your father will react to this? How do you think this is connected to your brother?”

“I’m not…” dumbfounded by the flash of a camera, she tried to escape from the journalists.

“Miss Williams! Miss Williams! What can you tell us about the person who died?”

She couldn’t hear anything, see anything, someone pushed her, and she felt another flash of a camera. Her head was spinning.

Cornelius Fudge stepped out of the building and pointed his wand at his neck. He cleared his throat and all the attention was directed at him.

“It is with great regret that I must confirm that the wizard styling himself Lord… well, you know who I mean… is alive and among us again.”

[Epilogue]

Tag List:

@eldritchscreech

@meteora-fc

@cazreadsstuff

@the-navistar-carol

@am-i-space

#charlie weasley #charlie weasley x mc #charlie weasley x ofc #charlie weasley fanfiction #charlie weasley/mc #charlie weasley/ofc #durmstrang #kate williams #hphm #hphm fanfiction

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chocolate-parfait · 4 years

Note

Hello! Can I get a headcanon where MC(they/them) gets a little lonely so they climb a tree in the middle of the night to get to Comte/Mozart/Napoleon's room window. How would the boys react?

THIS TOOK SO LONG IM SO SORRY!!! +they're more scenarios than headcanons I hope you dont mind ;-; (I also hope you dont mind the amount of cheesiness i put into this lmao)

(+Trees shouldn't stay at a arm's length from houses because they can cause big problems in case of storms or things like that,, let's pretend for the sake of the story that they don't and that's why they're so near the windows)

Comte

Mama Comte was just chilling in his armchair, drinking a glass of red wine while letting his thoughts chase each other in endless circles, vivid images of past memories dancing behind his closed eyelids. More often than he liked to admit, he'd find himself in these exact circumstances, and that night was certainly no different. It was probably way past midnight when the still silence that hovered in the room was interrupted by a small whisper, followed by another and another one again. Attracted by the curious sound the pureblood got up from his sit and walked to the window, opening it with one swift gesture

"Comte, here!"

After his dark pupils focused on a silhouette that was undeniably yours, a rare look of shock and disbelief crept upon his features. Despite having risked falling to the ground like a sack of potatoes multiple times while climbing all the way to one of the highest branches of the tree, the man's expression made the effort more than worth the danger

Before he could ask you what in the world you were doing perched on a tree branch in front of his room at such a late hour, you eagerly told him why, words leaving your mouth in a single breath

"I-i couldn't fall asleep and thought of you and then I had this sudden urge to see you but I didn't know if you were awake so I climbed this tree to see if your light was on and then-"

As his caramel eyes softened and a warm smile appeared on his lips, Comte asked for you to stay still, and mere seconds after the last syllable reached your ears, you heard the fluttering of his coat that was now right in front of your widened eyes

Had he???just???jumped from his window????to land?????on a tree branch????next to you??? MC: why though? Comte: why not- MC: BUT why th- Comte: why not.

Giggling at your reaction while securing you against his chest, something was extremely clear in his eyes. Since you came all the way up there just to see him, it would have been a terrible waste to just send you away, right? And you knew he wouldn't have taken a no as an answer

"Hold on tight, ma chérie. We wouldn't want you falling down, now would we?"

Taking advantage of the position you were both in and with the excuse of possibly falling down, you contentedly snuggled in the crook of his neck; soft, expensive fabric caressing your cheek while his perfume rubbed on you, sure to remain there for at least a week

Comte on the other hand didn't complain nor move away, watching as your hair moved under the moonlight, softly swayed by the wind

Maybe spending a night in someone's company was a better alternative than staying alone, after all

Mozart

Mozart hadn't realized it had gotten that late until he finally closed the fall board of his piano, looking out of the window to see the stars and a full moon shining gently over the dim lit marble pavement of the music room

Almost one year ago on a night with the same moon, you walked out of Comte's door, looking as confused and scared as a little fawn. Since then you worked hard all over the mansion doing all kind of tasks, and though he'd have loathed the idea before, you two ended up getting incredibly close. Only lately he had started noticing many weird little behaviors that were slowly becoming a part of his routine; the way he had now stopped putting off having breakfast to play the piano in order to see you sooner, how his guts seemed to writhe whenever he saw you smiling at someone else, and as if it wasn't already enough, he found his thirst for blood more and more insatiable

Knowing what that meant but still fearing the answer, he tore himself away from the disheartening path his thoughts were taking, finally snapping back to reality. When he did so, a gleam coming from the tree near the window caught his attention. The closer he got, the more he seemed to distinguish your moonlit form standing in the foliage. Was he hallucinating now? Were his mind and heart so full of thoughts of you to the point of imagining your figure in the weirdest of places?

Before he could realize that you were in fact right outside his window, you called out to him, causing the poor man to flinch in surprise. Despite the harsh scolding that followed your appearance, just seeing his face was enough to ease the stingy feeling that was keeping your heart in a tight embrace. Seeing the bittersweet look in your eyes, Mozart couldn't stop his voice and gaze from softening considerably. But how could he not? Over the past months he had subconsciously started to consider you the one closest to his heart, and you were, more than he was ready to admit, his worst weakness

Sighing to himself as he reached past the parted glass panels to brush some leaves off your hair, he asked you "So, what are you doing here at this ungodly hour of the night?"

Amethyst spheres focusing on your expression, you told him the whole truth, not that you could easily make up a lie, seeing the position you were in. "I know you don't like it when people come into the music room, so this was the easiest way..." As if he had the strength and willpower to get angry at you, he thought. "A-anyways I-...I just wanted to see you, that's all."

Oh Gott, if only you could hear the way his blood pace sped up its tempo at the sound of those words, though you probably could see the way his usually pale cheeks were now flushed in a lovely shade of red. He, too, missed you, and now that the constant feeling of longing had met a correspondent in your gaze, it reached its bursting point

Not bothering to ask you permission to, he roughly grasped your wrist and pulled you away with superhuman strength from the offshoot you were sitting on. You were now on sill of the window, facing him and just inches from his doll-like face. Glancing up at him you found a pair of violet eyes staring back at you with the intensity and strength of a storm. Had he always been this bold? Had his irises always been this full of raw passion? Had his body always been this warm?

Your heart was thumping so loud in your ears that it was as if you were standing in the middle of an orchestra, senses all focused on him and only him. All the times were you hoped to be held like this by him came crashing onto your mind all at once, the fiercest blush born from the slow realization of how those fantasies were finally reality blooming on your cheeks

The tight grip he kept on your hips told you he had no intention to let go of you soon, but who would be so foolish to not take advantage of the situation?

That night, after months and months of anonymous, mutual feelings, you and the pianist were able to manifest the most breathtaking of emotions through the words that you'd have kept hearing for a lifetime, the touches and caresses that would have been the same for the years to come, moved by never changing feelings to express an everlasting love; but you were sure, you were oh so sure, that none of them would have ever been enough

Napoleon

Unlike any other day, Napoleon wasn't tired at all, rather, he felt quite restless instead. That morning you had accompanied him and Isaac in their usual "street lessons" to the children of the city, and ever since then, a whole storm of butterflies had been freely running around his stomach. Each time your laughter ringed in his ears, each time your eyes twinkled with amusement, each time a smile as bright as the sun graced your lips, his heart couldn't help but leap with one of the greatest joys known to man: love. He wasn't an innocent boy who couldn't tell an emotion from the other, and he knew that this was a love like no other

Twisting and retwisting his thoughts in the attempt of getting to know about all the facets and implications this new feeling brought him, Napoleon let his feet carry him around the garden, similar to a lovestruck hero from a Shakespearean play tormenting himself over his beloved

He was so immersed in the meanders of his mind, that he barely heard you exclaiming his name in surprise. Barely, that is. As his brain registered your presence, his eyes and heart danced in search of you until they landed on the lowest arm of the pine tree near his window.

He looked at you and you looked at him, the soft sound of crickets the only melody filling the background. You could clearly see the way le Monsieur de Wahaha's shoulders shook in an attempt to keep in the raging fits of laughter that would have been surely let out soon enough. The same way, despite tears of amusement fogging his vision, Napoleon was extremely aware of the embarrassment creeping up your features

"Nunuche" he managed to say in between his strangled fits, "what in- pftt- what are you doing there-"

"I just wanted to thank you for today so I had been searching for you- S-stop laughing at me, you moron! I'm trying to be serious here!!" How could he take someone who was perched on a tree in the middle of the night seriously? You truly were a silly one

With arms opened wide, he walked over the pine trunk and with a tender but still lightly shaking tone that was exclusive for your ears only, he said "Come! I'll definitely catch you, mon amour"

You just stared at him in silence with the widest eyes your head could muster without popping them out of their orbits. You were just a couple meters from the ground, sure, but was he truly this confident in catching you? And did he just call you "my love"?? There was a LOT to unpack for your brain, but the man had no intention of letting you idle by with your thoughts for long, challenging you with his vivid emerald eyes as if to say "what, you don't trust me?"

The fearless Napoleon had this habit of infusing in others a courage so strong, that even the most impossible action seemed achievable; and that, with a bit of adrenaline caused by how quick the silent night escalated when the Nightmare of Europe stepped into the scene, made you follow his command. And you jumped.

The rustling of leaves above your head, a strong pair of arms around your torso, a silent breathing interrupted by a low chuckle that could've melted all the glaciers in the world. His smell, his warmth, his voice, they were all so close and yet so distant, just like his heart. He wasn't yours and you had no right to claim him as so, but being with him was all you needed and wanted the most

"What are you thinking about?" He asked with a curious look, still holding you between his arms. As much as you wanted to answer him, no words were forming in your mind that was so full of him and so empty at the same time. All the boldness from the jump had dissipated in the air the same way one would puff out air from his lungs in the night sky

But when words fail us, actions find their way through our minds. Slipping a pair of arms behind his neck, you snuggled against his chest and whispered "Let's stay like this, just for a little longer, please"

He couldn't help but comply; your wish was his command and he, the Emperor of France, was your slave

#my writing #ikevamp scenarios #ikevamp headcanons #ikevamp imagines #ikemen vampire #ikevamp comte #ikevamp mozart #ikevamp napoleon #comte de saint germain #wolfgang amadeus mozart #napoleon bonaparte

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dragonrajafanfiction · 3 years

Text

Tokyo Love Story (Part 1) Ruri Kazama

Oh boy... I got a lot riding on this one. *sweats*

@rurifangirl by request.

Even after climbing up out of the elevator shaft, your long night wasn’t over. The police raid, the one that prompted Hydra to move all their files in the first place, was about to begin and every able-bodied operative was running around trying to clean up the signs of the battle in the mural hall and the signs of the deadpools’ reign of destruction, including the bodies left behind.

Exhausted, hiding in an equipment room, you slept, propped up between Caesar and Chu Zihang. You couldn’t lay down. The act of lying down was too painful. Out of the three, you had suffered the greatest injury. You had fought the deadpool in the basement, only to climb from the bottom of the elevator shaft to find another battle. You’d reached the limit of your endurance, so Caesar and Chu Zihang offered their shoulders and kept watch. Your mind relaxes despite still being in the midst of the enemy and you quietly slip into oblivion, feeling safer than you had in a very long time.

But you were forced to lie down eventually. Caesar found an unwatched police car and carefully lifted you into the trunk, then they climbed in themselves and shut it. The police car left the Genji Heavy Industries building. The Hydra may be powerful, but at this time when their headquarters had come under such a devastating attack, they were not inclined to search police cars. That was how you finally escaped.

Every bump in the road sent lightning through your nerves. If it weren’t for your lost voice, you doubt you could have kept quiet. But just in case, you take your hair and bite it between your teeth.

“Your back is already partially healed.” Chu Zihang’s voice is audible, but you can’t see him because your eyes are firmly shut.

“I noticed that, but I wasn’t going to say anything about you in front of that humanoid dragon.” Caesar was saying. “You slept for three days and healed from a grievous gunshot wound that nearly took your life. He healed from a stab through the belly in an hour and now… even with your wounds cauterized, they’re closed up a little more every time I look at them.”

“MC, the Lenin, the strange port, the so-called Hydras and the Devil Clan… they’re all pieces painting a single picture.” Zihang stated. “The way he described the so-called Ghosts, it sounded a lot like you. You’re the same Hybrid Species, but you’re more likely to become deadpool. It was good that we weren’t captured by the Hydras. They would definitely have killed you. As a Ghost.”

Caesar hissed in fury. “The whole Hydra organization will burn before I let them touch you!”

To think that at one time you actually felt like you could fit in more with Hydra than Cassell. You had followed after Chisei in battle, admiring his strength against deadpool. But if Chisei had known anything about you, he would have slain you in that elevator. Realizing how much danger you were in made you sigh.

Your heart sinks. You had been hoping to talk to Chisei about what he might know about you and find out what more similarities you might have with him. But now, that date over sake would be an impossibility. Caesar was right. The world really is bullshit.

Your eyes flutter open again. “Caesar. I almost forgot to tell you something…”

“Save it. It’s too hard for you to speak right now, and I can barely hear you over the sound of the car. Take this time to recover.”

Sneaking out of the police lot wasn’t difficult. It was raining hard and that concealed your silhouettes. The heavy droplets soaked your clothes and the blood that was caked on them. Chu Zihang is carrying you now, sprinting down the flooded streets of Tokyo. You leave behind a trail of deadpool blood that mixes with the rainwater in black inky streaks and runs into the gutters and down into the storm drains.

The sun was coming up. If you were caught out here, Kaguya might find out where you were hiding, Hydra would rush in to trap you, and you would die.

Caesar slammed open the door to the Takamagahara. It swung on its hinge and banged into the wall. The morning light swept through the city at that moment to illuminate their entrance. Caesar and Chu Zihang held the door, panting, wet shirts clinging to their bodies, drops of water falling from the tips of their hair.

"Yo, everyone is still awake? Good business in the store last night?" Caesar waved his hand in greeting. He looked from the light into the dark interior of the lobby and couldn't see very well, only that the dance floor was full of people. But you had buried your face in Chu Zihang’s chest to hide from cameras and had no trouble with light-blindness.

In a glance, you take in the scene. So much is going on. The women you had helped Caesar take pictures of in the VIP private suite of the Takamagahara are standing in a semicircle. Their arms are over their ample chests or their hands are on their hips. They were all glaring, and the target of their ire was Whale.

Whale, this man that seemed like such a powerful tycoon when you met him, that was bold enough to keep harboring you despite being illegal immigrants, had been reduced to a groveling servant before them, kneeling on the floor, surrounded by scattered paper money. The bills were quite large, but no one moved to touch them.

Fujiwara, the former Sumo star and the man you described as the biggest Seal on the Shore of Baikal, was standing between them and Whale, but his appearance was not that of someone who was going to try to defend Whale. It was the appearance of the shield bearer who happily takes the sword strike for his King and gives him the chance to escape!

Even though the Takamagahara should be closing, all the performers are crowded into the space, motionless in a bow, eyes downcast. You recognize your official suitors in the MC Romance competition among them.

Armani frowns deeply at you. Now that he was in the light of day, you can see that he’s the classic cold and stern type of handsome male character, someone with high standards of food, drink and clothing. Even now he was wearing a slick suit that was hardly wrinkled from the night’s activity. But despite this current figure, he had been wearing something far more revealing to meet you and you saw his belly button ring.

Chance snorts and tries not to laugh, covering his mouth with one hand before schooling his face into a sorrowful look. He was dressed the same with his chain and his sleeveless open puffy coat. You notice his henna tattoos go all the way up his arm in a twisting serpentine pattern.

Diamond, the sexy cowboy, just looks at you in astonishment. He was the one who had been the most forward and confident in his win. Now he realized that after you had refused to give him a star-heart ticket, you went out with other boys! This had never happened to him in his entire life!

But it was Calypso, the one who had handed you the closed rose bud, who spoke, pointing at Chu Zihang and Caesar. “What are you doing with her? You’re not competing!”

Everyone turns to look at you. Caesar’s eyes finally adjusted to the low light of the lobby and you see his face go taut and his eyes widened. “Shit!” He squeaked!

The humpback whale looked horrified and said, "You can't come back and speak that way to the guests!”

Chu Zihang touched Caesar's back with his elbow as he scooted over to hide behind him.

Caesar immediately understood and walked up to the women with an elegant salute, "How did you sleep last night? You look much better!"

"The guests drank too much and fell asleep. We went out for a bite to eat." Chu Zihang stammered. His Japanese was horrible. After all, he could make money with just his face and his sullen attitude so there was little need to work on pronunciation when all he had to do was mumble.

Whale is staring with eyes as big as dinner plates at Chu Zihang who was still carrying the travel bag with his sword inside. The bag was soaking wet and the blood mixed with water pooled on the floor where you stood. It looked like he’d hidden a severed head in there! Chu Zihang’s eyes shifted to his bag and then looked back up. “The Main Character was injured in the Earthquake so we had to take her and others to the hospital.”

It was a stupid story. It would have been better to keep his silence! Who knew Chu Zihang could stammer out a dumb line like that? It was about Lu Mingfei level of dumb. But Chu Zihang owned it, glaring hard with the cold stare of a killer. If he couldn’t make them believe his lie, he could at least stop them from asking any questions.

Whale’s lips trembled. "I don't believe it! Can’t you make up a more logical lie about finding a dead cat or dog hit by a car in the street. So you brought it back to bury it because you like small animals?”

"Ah! Right, Ukyou! Are you okay?" A large woman stepped around the sumo wrestler. If Fujiwara was the King of the Seals, this had to be the Queen. Her dress strained at the seams to contain her and she was like a giant egg testing the weight limits of her tiny heels. Her lips were smeared with gaudy red lipstick and she fluttered her gold powdered eyes at Chu Zihang.

But Chu Zihang’s reaction was telling. The way he tensed up, held you tighter and his eyes got wide, shocked you.

"Who is the roadside nobody you rescued? Maybe he's a yakuza? Maybe it's some other bad guy or something that could….”

You turn and look at the woman, still carried in Chu Zihang’s arms. The woman’s face went pale and then paler, about as pale as the faces of the deadpool. Her mouth dropped open like a deadpool too only she didn’t have the rows of teeth to display. Her whole body started to shake and her hands went over her mouth.

Then her hands balled into fists, her eyes narrowed and her head dropped as if she were going to charge you. She let out a scream that sent chills up your spine. It wasn’t any words, just a primordial screech. Her face flushed red to her hairline. When she finally found the words, she bellowed, “Who the fuck is that?!”

She lumbered forward, eyes blazing with rage. “Get your hands off my Ukyou! You Bitch! You Bitch!” She swung her purse and missed you by inches, but her aim was good. She missed you because Chu Zihang had turned his body to shield you and the purse cracked hard against his jaw. Unbeknownst to both of you, she had filled her purse with bottles of champagne. Her plan was to take these bottles as a ‘fine’ for the insult of what happened to her last night. But at the sight of you, they became a weapon.

The sound of those bottles smashing against Chu Zihang’s head was audible to all and if there was any doubt as to the sheer force of her anger, her Prada bag turned dark and started to drip and the hall filled with the smell of champagne.

You look at him in disbelief.

Chu Zihang didn’t move, but his eyes were wild. A small red bead of blood formed at the corner of his mouth and that turned into a thin red line down his chin. The pressure of his fingertips against your skin told you that this blow really hurt.

She hurt him. That thought rings like a bell that sounds deep in your stomach and turns it.

The woman looks shocked for a moment. She didn't mean to strike him. He was hit because he protected you. "Why are you protecting her? I'm your client! Asshole! Do you know who I am? How dare you! How dare you take what I’ve paid good money for and give it to this hussy! You’re nothing but trash! No different from a dog! We spend good money so you can please us! And when I buy something it’s mine! Do you understand? Do you speak English? MINE!" Her face is inches from his. She reaches out with one hand to try to yank you out of his grip.

The woman suddenly stopped as though frozen in time. Her voice was cut off and she started to tremble. People couldn't see around her, they only saw your stare. It was like the empty and frozen stare of a shark, but you were smiling, a sort of strange disbelieving smile. You tilt your head in a curious gesture.

They couldn’t see that bronze dagger you’d slipped under the folds of her neck. If this woman so much as swallowed, the ripple of her throat would be enough to cut her.

But the combination of empty eyes and surprised grin was far more frightening. It was the look of someone who snapped. The bronze claw in your hand was enough to pierce the flesh of Rank-A deadpool. With only a little pressure you could sever her head!

You were hungry, exhausted and in pain. But even if you had been perfectly fine, you weren't going to sit by and let this woman abuse him. He had fought all night with you, nearly died for you and then carried you here. This precious person who had rushed into the fire, who had patted your shoulder to comfort you. She treated him like an object, like a slave right in front of you.

Despite the ice of grief breaking around your frigid heart, giving you a glimpse of the possibility of happiness, you were still trained to kill and you’d killed for less… much less… than what she’d just done.

Caesar slowly turned his back, "I hate to see two women fight ...... so I can only turn around."

“My career is finished…” Whale softly moaned.

"Excuse me, is this Takamagahara? Ruri Kazama has taken the liberty of coming to visit for the Romance Contest." Someone knocked gently on the door.

You, along with everyone else in the room, looked over at the door in surprise.

The door was open. A handsome man with a boyish face stood in the mild sunlight, wearing a white shirt and black suit, with fresh straight black hair in a ponytail, holding a bunch of budding tulips.

The man was a little embarrassed by everyone's stares. He bowed deeply and offered his business card with both hands. “Please forgive my tardiness.”

"Master Kazama ...... Ruri?" Someone said in a reverent voice.

Master? You turn and look at where the reverent voice was coming from, but the entire hall was silent and no one spoke again. Chance was standing in mute astonishment. Armani’s sharp black eyes were wide.

Your knife lowers from the fat woman’s neck and you squint at this newcomer, wondering why this man was held in such high regard. He was nothing like the muscle bound flirts who had been jostling for your favor before. His manner was more like a shy school boy. As far as his appearance was concerned, you could be forgiven for mistaking him for a svelte young woman.

Fujiwara sprinted over, took the pure white business card. He held it high above his head as he took it back and placed it in the hands of the Whale.

"It's really Master Kazama at the door." Whale straightened his bow tie and stepped out to welcome him. "Today is a glorious day for Takamagahara." The Whale bowed deeply.

"I've heard a lot about you, too, Senior Whale. Yoroshiku Hajimemashite." Ruri Kazama returned the bow.

You reach up and gently wipe the blood from Chu Zihang’s face. “You okay?” Your voice is still gone, but he’s close enough to hear. When he nods, you ask, “Who is that?”

“There is a ranking in the Male Escort Association, and Ruri Kazama is the number one on this ranking for six consecutive years.”

“So what you’re saying is…” You rasp. “He’s like… Time Magazine Hottest guy?”

Chu Zihang shakes his head. “This ranking is not based on beauty nor popularity, but on the principle of art. Those selected are considered Master Ikemen. Ruri Kazama is a legend. They say he exists only for love. If he continues to keep this legend maintained for ten years, then he has the hope to become the god of the male escort world and will have a shrine built for him to receive offerings.”

You snort, disguising it as a sneeze, covering your face with your hand. “I’m almost sorry I asked.”

But Chu Zihang doesn’t seem to share your humor. “The fact that he has joined this contest raises your status as well.”

When you look back, the wind blew the hem of his coat, and Ruri Kazama stood in the sunlight with a slight smile. Although he behaved like the one shy kid from high school, you can’t deny his beauty. It shines like water: light and natural, but at the same time, reflected the sun’s infinite luster.

Ruri Kazama bowed deeply to Caesar, "It's BasaraKing, isn't it? This is a man who is as spontaneous as a Gundam."

He bowed again to Chu Zihang, "This one, if I'm not wrong, is Ukyo Sensei, said to be the image of a swordsman, but acts like a gentleman."

Then he looks at you. At first glance, those eyes looked clear and soft. But the longer you looked, they looked like two deep pools, the water of which was transparent. When you looked into their depths, however, they were pitch black, bottomless, and frigid.

#Dragon Raja

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banditthewriter · 4 years

Text

Eye of the Hurricane - Charles Vane -5

Again, forgot to post this, but here we have it, the end. As I mentioned, I lost steam with this fic. There was gonna be smut and some introspection, but instead we have this. It’s a shorter part, but hopefully it’s worth it in the end.

Thanks for reading.

*gif not mine*

Enjoy!

------

Charles had given you the freedom to roam around the fortress and, the night before notwithstanding, you hadn’t had an issue. A lot of the rooms seemed unoccupied. You stayed away from anywhere you could see or hear the men. Mostly you just wandered a few halls that were connected to areas you already explored.

Finding your way back up to the part that overlooked the bay was easier than you had expected. No one was up there so you were blissfully alone and in the open.

There was a bit of a breeze that helped with the heat from the sun that bore down on the island. You closed your eyes to enjoy the sounds of nature mixed with the distant sounds of the people on the beach.

A chair sat near one of battlements, able to sit there and look down while still protected. A surge of something like confidence—most likely recklessness—rose inside of you as you stared at the stones.

The shoes you wore were ones that had been in your trunk. They were smoother on the bottom, less worn and therefore had less grip. You thought about toeing them off but you couldn’t afford to somehow lose another pair of shoes.

Carefully you stepped onto the chair. It supported your weight easily, but you’d rather not have an accident so you quickly stretched your leg out to step up on the opening of the battlement.

Next was your other foot until you stood completely on the stone of the fortress. There was a raised section on either side of you that you braced your hands on for balance.

It was a far drop. Much farther than you’d anticipated. The sight made you a little dizzy but you stayed where you were.

It wasn’t that you wanted to jump. It hadn’t even crossed your mind. This wasn’t about an escape. At least, not in the literal sense.

So long of being locked away—first on a ship and then in the fortress—you just longed for freedom. It was like taking a walk on the beach the night before your ship left Norfolk. You weren’t running away, you were just taking control of one small aspect, doing one thing that you wanted to do.

From here, you could see so far in all directions. It was scary and new and probably stupid, but it made you feel alive in a way you hadn’t felt in so long. Maybe ever.

“Try not to fall,” you heard from behind you, the appearance of someone else startling you but not making you jump too much.

You glanced over your shoulder at Charles as he stared up at you from a mere foot or so away. His hands were tucked into his belt, every inch of him looking calm and relaxed. Except for his eyes. Those were narrowed on your form as you hovered precariously on the edge of the battlement.

“I didn’t plan on falling,” you admitted as you looked back out at the water. “Would you try to catch me if I did?”

He was silent behind you so you turned to look over your shoulder again. When you met his eyes, you knew what his answer would be before he said it.

“Yes, I would,” he said easily.

You started to turn away, not wanting him to see the beginning of the smile that his words put on your face. As you turned your body, your never before worn shoe slipped on the stone.

There was nothing in front of you as you started to tilt forward. An arm went around your waist and quickly tugged you backwards. At first there was nothing behind you and then you felt your back land against a solid chest, the arm around your waist joined by a second to catch you. Your feet skidded against the stone floor of the overlook, those damn shoes coming off from the impact.

Your heart was thudding loudly in your chest, blood pounding in your ears as you realized how close that had been. A terrified laugh bubbled up in your throat as you turned around to meet Charles’s gaze.

The moment your eyes met his, the laugh melted away. He was staring at you with an intensity that made your mouth go dry and your hands get damp with sweat. He was so close, just a few inches away. And was it just your imagination or was he leaning in closer to you?

He was. You felt the briefest brush of his lips against yours, a tantalizing tease that made you start to lean in towards him as well.

Then you were reminded of the blonde from the night before. With a wince you pulled away, your hand going up to press against his chest.

He murmured your name but didn’t take what you’d been so close to offering. Instead he just stared at you, a question in his eyes.

Why had you pulled away? Why indeed.

“It’s bad enough that you’re the man who kidnapped me,” you began, your voice quivering as you spoke, “but that you would kiss me after what you did last night? With Eleanor.”

Those eyes were somehow both expressive and inscrutable. Or perhaps you just didn’t want to read the confusion in his eyes, because you could hear it in his voice.

“With Eleanor?”

You were able to put a little distance between the two of you although it didn’t escape your notice that his hands simply went from being around you to resting on your waist. It wasn’t enough for your head to be completely unfogged, but it was enough that you were able to put your thoughts to words.

“Yes, with Eleanor. After you had me dragged from your room like the prisoner I am, I know that you met with her. I saw the two of you afterwards,” you explained when it seemed like he wasn’t understanding what you were saying. “I saw that her clothes were… out of sorts.”

He raised an eyebrow at that. His hands didn’t leave your waist but you didn’t think you imagined that he seemed to squeeze you a bit once you had spoken.

“You think I fucked Eleanor last night and then kissed you today?”

Besides his rather crude term, that was exactly what you thought. You hadn’t been aware that it was up for debate. At your curt nod, you noticed the beginning of a grin on his lips.

“She did try to take her clothes off, but I told her not to bother. The reason she wanted to fuck wasn’t about interest or love or even just wanting to take the edge off. She wanted to distract me, to use me to get what she wanted. I wasn’t going to oblige.”

You thought about that for a moment. It was true that the two of them had seemed to be very angry with each other when they walked by your door. Was it possible that what he was saying was true?

The look in his eyes made your heart speed up a bit. You didn’t think he’d lie to you, for whatever that was worth. He’d been honest with you so far, hadn’t he?

The hand that you still had pressed against his chest eased up just a little, your fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt so that you could pull him slightly closer. You wished you could be more bold, but even that little move made your heart feel like it was going to beat out of your chest.

That’s alright though. Charles must have read the acceptance on your face before he used that grip on your waist to pull you closer, his grin the last thing you saw before his mouth was pressed to yours fully.

Kissing Charles Vane was a lot like standing on the edge of the battlements. Only this would be an even worse fall.

------

You traced your fingers around the brand on Charles’s chest gently, a caress more than anything. He peered down at you with one eye, the corner of his mouth quirking upwards as he did. His arm wrapped around your bare waist and tugged you a little closer to him.

“Don’t start something you can’t finish,” he playfully warned as he leaned in to nip at your bottom lip.

As much as you would love to roll over and let him have you again—and you would love it, very much so—you couldn’t help the questions that swam in your head. Questions you knew you needed to ask now before you lost the courage.

Or before you were successfully distracted by his seduction techniques.

“What happens next?” You looked up and caught the playful glint in Charles’s eye. You rolled your eyes before you clarified, “The men you sent to give the ransom note to my parents will be back soon. What happens if they agree to pay?”

His hand went up until he could cup your cheek, angling your face to look at him.

“You can go if you want. I won’t keep you prisoner here.”

You covered his hand with yours, propping yourself up onto your other elbow so that you could look down at him beneath you.

“And what if I don’t want to go?”

His hand tugged you forward a bit. When you gave in to him, all he did was pull you down for a kiss.

“Do you want to stay here in Nassau or,” he added in a low voice as his trailed his lips over your cheek and to your ear to whisper, “do you want to stay here with me?”

You gasped but the noise was stolen away from you as he surged up to kiss you once more, rolling the two of you until you were on your back and he was on top of you, fitting between your legs like he lived there.

“Both,” you finally admitted when he pulled back long enough to let you catch your breath.

“The sea is a dangerous place,” he said as he stared down at you, his face unreadable. It was a bit of a non-sequitur until he spoke again. “Perhaps the men never make it back to Nassau. Or perhaps the ship you’re to return on is lost at sea. There’s a lot that can happen in the distance between Nassau and Norfolk.”

That was it. As simple as that, you could disappear into a new life. Here on Nassau you wouldn’t have to worry about what your parents would consider proper or how your brother would do better than you. You wouldn’t have to worry about being forced to marry a man you didn’t know, didn’t love. You could have freedom here.

It was like everything else fell away. You ignored the heat from the fireplace that raged beside you. You ignored the sound of Nassau and the water that could barely be heard through the window. You ignored the ache between your legs from the last few hours with Charles.

Everything fell away besides the man above you. His eyes were heavy lidded as he stared down at you, but crystal clear. He knew what he was offering.

He had made a name for himself here in Nassau and out there in the world. Captain Charles Vane, infamous pirate.

And here he was offering you a part of that. A part of him. Maybe you would never sail the seas with him as a pirate, but you could be there for him to come home to. His woman, his safe harbor. If his goal was to make Nassau something new, something bigger than it was, you could be at his side.

With nothing to lose, you leaned up to capture his lips. It was a kiss meant to consume and by god it did. You let it consume you, let him engulf you with the heat and the strength of him. You wanted it as much as he did.

As the world returned to a roar in your ears, you ignored it in favor of focusing on the man on top of you. You had learned that you had the strength and fire to take on the world if it came to that. Charles would be your secret weapon if needed, but you had made the decision for yourself.

Your life, your real life, started now.

Thanks for reading! Sorry it’s not very long.

#charles vane #charles vane x reader #charles vane imagine #charles vane fanfic #black sails imagine #my writing #eye of the hurricane

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aliciameade · 4 years

Text

“Beach Babes”

Author: aliciameade Rating: E Pairing: Beca/Chloe Summary: A little smut on the beach.

This one goes out to @eulersfeverdream for their generous donation to the @ppfandomdrive! Thank you for your support!

Also on AO3

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“Can you pass me another black cherry?”

Chloe smiles at the way Beca nudges her with her elbow before they lean opposite directions: Beca to toss her empty can into the bag with the other half-dozen or so they’ve collected and Chloe to fish another White Claw from the ice of their cooler, then decides to grab another for herself since she’s almost finished with the tangerine-flavored spiked seltzer wedged into the sand by her feet.

They lean back into each other at the same time, Beca’s hand ready for the can Chloe passes to her. They set up their beach post along an old felled tree trunk on the beach, using it as a windbreak and a makeshift chair to rest against. They’d made a day of it packing a cooler with drinks and snacks and a beach bag with a few games to play in the sand, just the two of them.

Officially, they’re three months into their romantic relationship. Unofficially, they’re several years into it, but it wasn’t until a particularly vulnerable and bold moment of Beca’s that she confessed how she felt about Chloe and found out the feelings were reciprocated.

They’ve since learned their physical chemistry is a force to be reckoned with; Chloe still teases Beca about her begging for “a day off” because her tongue was so tired that it ached like doing too many reps at the gym.

The day off simply resulted in Chloe making Beca come half a dozen times before riding Beca’s fingers to her own climax.

As Chloe snuggles into her side on the blanket next to their small campfire on the beach, Beca thinks it a wonder the sun’s gone down but neither of them has yet today.

Her pun makes her sniff in laughter.

“What?” Chloe asks, lifting her head off Beca’s shoulder so she can look at her.

Beca glances at her, then cranes her neck back so she can look at her without going cross-eyed. “Nothing.”

“You laughed.” Chloe’s soft smile starts to grow. “What are you thinking about?” Her eyes light up. “Was it dirty?”

Beca rolls her eyes and she knows she’s blushing, but hopes it’s not obvious in the glow of the campfire. “Chloe!”

Chloe’s brows arch with interest. “That’s not a ‘no.’”

Beca feels Chloe’s fingers walking up her thigh from her knee. Her fingers are cold and wet from holding her drink which has been set aside. Beca is still in her bikini from the day but she’d pulled a hoodie over her head to cut the chill from the breeze. “I know.”

“You know it’s not a ‘no’?”

“No,” Beca says with a smile, just to be annoying but her moment of confidence falters when Chloe’s fingertips graze between her legs over the thin material of her bathing suit briefs. Her curse word is caught up in a gasp and she hates the proud look that forms on Chloe’s face at her reaction.

“Tell me,” Chloe says as she turns her wrist to fit her fingers comfortably between Beca’s thighs that shift automatically to give her more room, blunt nails lightly dragging up and down the still-damp-from-the-ocean material. If Chloe keeps it up, it will be damp for a different reason.

Beca manages to just bite her lip and shake her head; she knows it will just challenge Chloe to try harder to get her to confess and it works when fingertips suddenly press hard against her clit.

“I said, tell me.” Chloe’s voice is low and her eyes are dark. Gone is the pride and amusement from seconds ago, now replaced with lust, darkened by the shadows cast by the fire.

Beca can’t help the shiver that runs up her back and she shoves her can of seltzer into the sand before she does something embarrassing like drop it. “Or what?” she finally says when Chloe’s intense eyes drop to her lips, breaking the invisible hold she’s had on Beca.

Chloe’s fingers abruptly disappear, her hand moving to rest on Beca’s thigh. She doesn’t respond; that alone is her answer.

She considers ending it then and there by refusing to give in and answer; it would probably annoy Chloe to the point of taking Beca anyway just to prove something to herself. Beca knows that now, either way, she’s going to be the one to come away the winner and it’s just a matter of what Chloe’s mood will be.

She also considers their surroundings, eyes only leaving Chloe’s face to quickly survey the area around them. With the sun now down, most of the day’s beachgoers were long gone. A few small fires dotted the coast, but all were far enough away that she could scarcely make out the silhouettes of the people around them, voices little more than indecipherable chatter and laughter that carries on the wind in fits and starts.

She meets Chloe’s eyes again to find her waiting—staring—expectantly. “I’d thought about how the sun went down but neither of us went down.”

Chloe’s controlled, fake-stern face breaks into a fit of giggles. “I knew it was dirty.”

Beca’s about to reply but Chloe interrupts.

“I think we should change that.”

“Okay,” Beca says with an eager nod as Chloe’s lips capture hers. They’re tender but demanding and Beca knows their little moment of teasing affected Chloe just as it had Beca. She pulls Chloe closer by the back of her neck as Chloe’s tongue slips into her mouth with practiced ease and Beca moans against the kiss as fingers reappear between her legs, this time pressing firm circles against her clit.

Beca’s taking mental stock of what she knows is around them—cans, beach bags, open bags of chips—so she can try not to spill or lay on something when Chloe inevitably tells her to turn and lie down when instead, Chloe suddenly pulls away, climbs over Beca’s left leg, and shimmies backward until she’s lying down on her stomach between her thighs.

Beca’s acutely aware of how close it puts Chloe’s bare feet to the superhot steel fire ring embedded in the sand but it doesn’t seem to bother Chloe who just looks up at Beca with a smirk as she nudges Beca’s thighs further apart.

She’s never been sitting up for this, and definitely not while outdoors in what could be full-view of the public if someone were to stroll by, but she finds herself not caring as Chloe’s hands move to tickle the backs of Beca’s knees. It makes her bend them and Beca realizes that’s exactly what Chloe wanted: her knees bent and feet pressing into the blanket open her quite nicely.

“Perfect,” Chloe sighs as she leans in and Beca watches from her perfect vantage point with rapt attention as fingers hook under her briefs to pull them aside. Chloe’s tongue follows, its pointed tip finding her clit immediately to make her hips twitch.

“Oh, okay,” Beca laughs weakly. She can see what’s happening but only in brief moments as the light of the fire dances behind Chloe. It feels somewhat pompous to do, but she leans into the log at her back and lets her arms stretch out along it so she can just watch and feel. And it doesn’t seem to bother Chloe; she watches Beca do it and then moans quietly as she starts to lap at her with purpose.

Beca doesn’t think it will take very long. She was wet before Chloe’s tongue even touched her. But Chloe’s also taking her time, intentionally building Beca up and then easing off before she gets too close. Her fingers tug a little harder at Beca’s briefs to expose more of her and Beca watches her lift her head, take her first two fingers into her own mouth to suck on and wet them, before sinking them into Beca to start a steady pace.

Her head falls back against the log; she can’t watch anymore. She can only listen to her own quiet moans and Chloe’s muffled ones in response, and the crackle of the fire and the waves lapping at the shore as Chloe laps at her clit over and over again until Beca can tell she’s going to see it through this time.

“Just like that,” she breathes and she forgets to clench her jaw to quiet her next moan when Chloe’s fingers pick up speed until they’re almost pounding into her, lips sucking hard at her clit as her tongue grinds against it.

All at once, she comes, and muting herself is the last thing on her mind as her hands fly down to tangle in Chloe’s wind-and-water-mussed hair to pull her closer. Chloe’s moaning with her, though muffled, and Beca opens her eyes long enough to figure out Chloe’s free hand is beneath her and between her own legs.

“Oh, fuck, are you coming,” Beca groans, unable to stop her hips from grinding forward.

“Close,” is all Chloe can manage with what her mouth is doing to Beca.

“Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop,” she says quickly; she can feel in how hard she just came that she’ll come again, and easily.

Chloe understands what she means and her groan is needy and wanton and this time, Beca watches as Chloe fucks her. It’s messy and barely coordinated but it doesn’t matter now. Especially not when she’s also watching Chloe’s hips rolling and grinding as she fucks herself along with Beca.

She hears it in Chloe’s voice, voice getting higher the closer she gets and Beca manages to hold back until she sees Chloe’s hips start jerking and she groans as they come together.

She’s still breathing hard when Chloe eases back until she’s pushing herself up to sit back on her knees. She’s backlit by the fire, features almost indiscernible, but she can see enough to know that Chloe’s lips are cleaning not only the fingers that were just inside Beca but those that were inside herself, as well.

“Fuck,” Beca says with a deep sigh as she watches until Chloe starts crawling forward to sit next to Beca again. Then she lets her head fall back to stare at the night sky.

“Good?”

Beca glances at her. “Meh,” she says with a shrug.

It makes Chloe’s eyes go wide and an offended scoff follows. “‘Meh’ yourself!”

Beca cracks a smile after a few seconds, not wanting Chloe to spiral into actual offense and concern about nonexistent shortcomings. “That was so fucking hot.”

A chorus of whistles and hoots and hollers reach her ears from the distance and the realization that sound travels well over flat surfaces and water registers: their private moment wasn’t as private as she’d let herself believe.

Chloe hears it, too, and bursts into a fit of giggles.

“Oh, my God,” Beca says with a groan as she throws her hands over her face.

“Well, at least they know we have great sex.”

“I don’t need people to know about our sex life.”

Chloe’s hand encircles her wrist to tug one of her hands away from her face. “Our fucking hot sex life.”

Beca can’t disagree with that and lets her other hand fall away just in time for Chloe to kiss her. This time it’s slow and peaceful, the impromptu urgency of earlier now gone in favor of quiet comfort.

“We’re not leaving until they’re gone,” she says when it ends. “I’m not walking past them after that.”

Chloe laughs and pecks her lips again. “Why not? For all they know, you were the one making me come. Twice.”

That makes Beca take pause; she didn’t need people looking at her who just heard her orgasm (twice), but the thought that they would see Chloe and her together...they wouldn’t know it was Beca. And she kind of liked the idea that people might think they’d heard her get Chloe off like that.

She supposes the pride that accompanies that feeling is what Chloe is genuinely feeling. And she really doesn’t want to hurt her pride. “Yeah, okay,” she says with a nod. “Let’s pack up and go home so I can return the favor.”

Her response earns her particularly hard, deep kiss from Chloe. “Can’t wait.”

The End

#bechloe #bechloe fic #fanfic #pitch perfect #ppfandomdrive

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violet-knox · 4 years

Text

Returning Home

Part 2 of Conflict of Interest

Pairing: Severus Snape x Reader

Summary: You head back to Hogwarts to fight for the Order during the battle and find Severus to get answers to your questions.

Warnings: Angst... with a capital A 👉👈👉👈 Death, Blood, Voldemort and more angst

Word Count: 8386

A/N: This takes place a few months after part 1 in the middle of the war. I’ve pasted a few quotes from the book which I’ll mention at the bottom to avoid spoilers and obviously the credit for that goes to JKR.

Obviously I've been writing too much fluff lately soooooo...... I'M NOT SORRY!

Part 1

Everything was in ruins. The castle in a worse state than the night you’d left, abandoning your home, the responsibility you had to the students that now lay dead on the floors of the one place they were supposed to be safe, the place their parents had put their faith in when they agreed to send them back in September. You’d abandoned your love, your life, everything you’d held dear. A job that gave you everything yet left you feeling so unfulfilled. But what choice did you have? Severus Snape, Headmaster of Hogwarts, your partner and thought to be soulmate had done exactly what you’d feared and led the once great school into war. And where was he now? Hiding away somewhere to save his skin? Or perhaps he truly was the Death Eater everyone but you believed him to be, gone to stand by his Master’s side. Oh how the great have fallen, crashing and burning to the ground with nothing to show for but betrayal and loss. What would he say to you now that your nightmares had all come true? All that hope you’d carried for him gone. How could he possibly explain this chaos and exonerate himself from the horror he’d caused?

Every corner you turned you were greeted by more bloodshed. Innocents dead, Death Eaters throwing every type of Dark Magic left and right. Not a single stone in Hogwarts walls was left undamaged; some chipped or torn out from its place and most others displaying the blood of students, staff members, Aurors… your friends, ex-colleagues and peers. The sight made you wish you’d both arrived sooner and never shown up at the same time. It made you wish you’d done more than the petty hunting you’d taken part in these last few months. What good were a few caught Death Eaters now that they’d all gathered and attacked the school, destroying the place you’d left to protect?

Heading down to the end of the corridor, you turned towards the loudest of the three halls the castle offered you, filled with nothing but chaos and found a few Aurors, some you recognized, others you thought were too young to enter such a racking fight, defending themselves against a bundle of Death Eaters. You quickly joined them, throwing curse after curse, standing by their side, holding your own against the Dark Magic thrown your way.

You’d barely begun defending the school when suddenly, the wall behind the Death Eaters you fought exploded outwards, sending rockets of stone their way. You quickly shielded yourself, casting protego and watched as the school defended itself. Every Death Eater was thrown off their feet, some greeting death as soon as they hit the ground and others finding themselves not so lucky, facing wounds that would defeat even the best Healer in the world before facing down the end of an Auror’s wand.

Holding your wand up stead, you made your way towards the rubble, casting the killing curse towards a Death Eater the second you saw them twitch and stepped over the broken wall to a sight even worse than that you’d previously been greeted with. Groups of students lay dead as others ran down the corridor only to fall at the hand of another Death Eater. You couldn’t stand the sight and your anger grew the more you thought about how insignificant your helping hand really was these last few months. You were only one person, what could you possibly do to truly help these poor kids?

Making your way down the hall, you did what you could, saving as many students as possible until you heard the familiar sound of a voice you could have sworn could only belong to man of the hour himself, the Chosen One; Harry Potter. But it was him, it had to be, who else would be so bold as to use the name of you-know-who so openly, especially at a time like this?

"You need to find out where Voldemort is, because he'll have the snake with him, won't he? Do it, Harry- look inside him!" You couldn’t recognize the girl's voice at first, the fear hidden in her tone masking her usual confidence, but of course it had to be Miss. Granger.

Silence fell a while and you edged closer towards them, still hiding behind the broken wall, keeping your presence scarce.

"He's in the Shrieking Shack,” Harry finally spoke. “The snake's with him, it's got some sort of magical protection around it. He's just sent Lucius Malfoy to find Snape."

Your heart nearly stopped at the mere mention of Severus. So, it was true. It was all true and you’d been too blinded by love, convincing yourself his words were enough to believe when they were nothing more than lies. Your vision blurred as you placed a hand over your mouth, trying to keep from falling apart, tears running down your cheeks. You slumped to the ground and all the noise, all the chaos around you disappeared as you spiraled down the rabbit hole of grief. There was no need for a spy now, no need to pretend during this wad and if Harry’s words were true, that left you with one obvious conclusion; Severus Snape was a Death Eater.

"He's not-he's not even FIGHTING?" Hermione had never sounded so outraged before, her risen voice snapping your mind back to reality. Your head pounded, fighting your heart which begged to find another explanation for Severus, anything to prove what you had with him wasn’t a lie. You wanted so badly to believe you’d hallucinated this conversation, that Harry had made up what he said was true but the more they spoke, the more your hope faded along with your dreams of a pleasant reunion.

"He doesn't think he needs to fight," said Harry. "He thinks I'm going to go to him."

You closed your eyes, unable to hear anymore. Your head felt like it was about to implode from rejecting the fact that Severus had lied to you, telling you he was fighting, spying for Dumbledore when he’d double crossed the Order, he’d double crossed you. Placing your face in your hands, you brought your knees up to your chest, taking deep breaths as you tried to clear your mind. Now was not the time to panic. Now wasn’t the time to feel resentful. A war had broken out and you were in the midst of it. The important thing right now was to fight and win this battle before all was lost to the darkness that had enveloped your love.

But if Severus had been truthful to you, the one person in his life you knew he trusted more than anyone, then perhaps there was something going on greater than these attacks. Something you were unaware of. Why was Harry Potter looking for that snake and why was it so heavily protected? If anyone knew, it would be Severus, and if Potter and his friends were planning to make their way to the Shrieking Shack then it was only logical for you to go with them. Even if Severus had betrayed you, even if there was no deeper plot, you could still do your part and protect the boy who lived. He was supposed to be the key to winning this war after all, so the best thing you could do for the sake of the Wizarding World was find the truth and protect him.

Just when you’d finally made a decision and jumped back up to your feet, you heard two Death Eaters shouting for Potter, approaching him with their drawn wands. But Miss. Granger had beaten you to the punch, attacking them before making a break for it. With the sudden chaos that ensued, you could no longer spot them. You honestly weren’t sure if they’d decided on their next move, but you knew at least one of them would head to the Shrieking Shack which meant they would all do what they could to assist.

You quickly sprinted towards the Entrance Hall, encountering Death Eater after Death Eater on your way, but finally you’d found yourself outside the castle doors, spotting Potter and his friends running out of range of a giant screaming ‘Hagger’. You couldn’t even stop to question the giant and his eagerness. Time was of the essence. You watched them sprint towards the Whomping Willow and remembered the story Severus had told you about the time he’d caught Sirius Black.

He’d told you about how he’d found him in the Shrieking Shack by following Potter into a secret tunnel under the Whomping Willow. He’d never told you how he knew about the tunnel, but at the time, you hadn’t thought to question it, enticed by Severus’ bravery and ambition instead. Whatever the case may be, his story clearly had some truth to it and could help you find your own way to the Shrieking Shack after those kids who suddenly seemed to have disappeared.

No matter, you knew exactly where they were heading, and they couldn’t be too far ahead of you. Soon enough, you’d managed to make your way to the tree that had begun aggressively swinging its branches in every direction. You quickly found a nearby branch and made your way to the knot under its trunk, immobilizing it as soon as you hit it, just as Severus had described. Ducking into the opening under the tree, you found yourself completely in the dark with nothing but silence accompanying you. Taking out your wand, you cast lumos and began making your way down the seemingly endless tunnel.

Eventually, the end came near and you felt your heart pound aggressively against your chest, your adrenaline beginning to wear as the fear of what you might encounter on the other side of this trap door ensued. You’d come all this way, there was no going back now, no backing down. This is what you’d come for, what you’d left Severus for; the chance to help end this war.

You summoned up every last ounce of bravery you had to spare and pushed aside your doubt along with the trap door, climbing into the Shrieking Shack and immediately found yourself met with an agonizing scream coming from the room next door. You slowly edged your way to the exit, staying with your back pressed against the wall, wand at the ready and found Potter, Granger and Weasley all crouched down, listening in on whatever was happening in the next room. When the commotion settled and you heard he-who-must-not-be-named leave the room, you watched the trio walk in with a lack of defensive precaution.

To say you were baffled by their motions would be an understatement. Clearly there was still someone in there and to head in acting as if they’d been called for dinner without their wands at the ready was completely absurd. You quickly moved forward gripping your own wand tightly, ready for whatever it was you were about to walk into as you followed them into the unknown room. But no amount of precaution or training could have prepared you for the sight you saw as soon as you turned that corner.

“Severus,” you whispered in complete and utter shock. He was lying there with his throat cut out, his hands desperately grasping at Potter as the floor was painted red with his blood. You felt your heart collapse, your head spin in agony as you rushed forward, pushing past Granger and Weasley, throwing yourself on the ground beside Severus. You’d never felt so helpless, so useless before in your life. You wanted to help, you wanted to save him, but you didn’t know how.

A terrible rasping, gurgling noise suddenly issued from Severus’ throat and your attention was brought up to watch his eyes desperately begging Potter for something you could never begin to even imagine.

"Take...it...Take...it..."

Memories oozed out of his mouth, eyes and ears but you couldn’t be bothered to wonder what he was doing, you couldn’t accept this. He can’t die, he can’t. He hasn’t explained himself to you yet. He hasn’t told you how wrong everyone was to call him a Death Eater, how he truly was fighting for the light, how he was simply doing as he was told standing by the side of you-know-who as Dumbledore had asked. He hasn’t told you how much he loved you.

You looked down at your wand and blinked away your tears. This can’t be it, it simply can’t. This is not the end, it just can’t be. Hovering your wand over his neck, you began muttering every healing charm you could think of, holding on to the hope that one of them would work despite the fact that you knew deep down those marks on his neck indicated snake venom was running through his veins, poisoning him and ripping out any smidge of life he had left to give.

You didn’t stop, you couldn’t stop until you felt those familiar slim fingers graze your hand. Severus had motioned for you to halt your motions, but you couldn’t accept that, shaking your head as your eyes filled with tears, looking into his. His hand felt so weak, so cold, colder than usual and his face was so pale. He was dying and you couldn’t do anything but beg and plead for him to stay.

“Please… please don’t leave me,” you whispered, leaning as close to him as you could, placing your hand above him as you dropped your wand.

Severus kept his eyes glued to yours, a few more memories escaping his lips as he focused on your touch, the delicate features of your face, your hair. He’d missed you so much these last few months; they were torture without you and he knew he’d only made it as far as he did with this mission because you’d been by his side. Even when you’d left, it was the thought of seeing your face once this was all over that kept him going. How poetic must it be for your face to be the last he’d see now.

"Look...at....me..." he whispered, bringing your attention from the second flask Granger had used to capture the last set of memories he’d given up and back to him. Your eyes met one last time before that twinkle behind his black orbs vanished, his hand slipping between yours and thudded to the ground.

“No.” The word stumbled out of your mouth as you desperately went to reach for his hand, grasping it tightly with your own and bringing it up to your chest. Your swallowed screams came out as incoherent whines as you tried searching his eyes, finding nothing but emptiness. He was gone.

You’d barely had two seconds to process what just happened when suddenly, the voice of he-who-must-not-be-named echoed through your ears, filling your mind with vile thoughts of anger and fear atop the grief you’d felt for your lost love.

"You have fought," said the high, cold voice, "valiantly. Lord Voldemort knows how to value bravery."

You closed your eyes, somehow hoping that would shut him out, that it would shut out the world to leave you be or wake you from this hellish nightmare you were living. But you were given no such luck as he continued to speak, his voice resonating the agony and despair you felt.

"Yet you have sustained heavy losses. If you continue to resist me, you will all die, one by one. I do not wish this to happen. Every drop of magical blood spilled is a loss and a waste. Lord Voldemort is merciful. I command my forces to retreat immediately. You have one hour. Dispose of your dead with dignity. Treat your injured."

Dispose of your dead. He spoke as if the lives lost during this war were nothing more than trash to him and why would he care? He who never learned to love, never cared for someone as you had Severus. You couldn’t bear looking at his eyes anymore knowing they’d never look back at you. His hand lifeless in yours, never to hold you again. Placing two fingers over his eyelids, you closed them and placed his hand over his chest before reaching into his robes where you knew he stashed his wand to retrieve it.

"I speak now, Harry Potter, directly to you.” His voice still rang in your ears and you finally remembered you weren’t alone. There was still a battle to be won, a war to end, lives to save. “You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of that hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle recommences. This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman, and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour."

"Don't listen to him," said Weasley.

"It'll be all right." Granger’s sudden wild tone threw you back and you felt yourself go stiff under all the stress and grief this war had brought. "Let's-- let's get back to the castle, if he's gone to the forest we'll need to think of a new plan--"

The trio all stood to make their way out, but you couldn’t move a muscle. Eyes closed, you hung your head and planted your palms on the ground. You had to wake up, this couldn’t be real. These last few months, they must have been a dream. You’d dreamt it all and you were back in bed with Severus in his chambers at Hogwarts sleeping next to him after making up. It was the only reasonable scenario because this simply can’t be real, it can’t.

“Professor.” But Granger’s voice had just proved you wrong. This was your reality and it was too much for you to withstand. You wanted to stay with Severus no matter what it may bring, yet you knew you couldn’t. You had to protect the children, the students and help the Order fight against that monster.

You took in a deep breath and shoved your grief into a cupboard in the depths of your mind, locking it shut before jumping to your feet, griping hold of your wand along with Severus’ and the flask of memories Granger had left for you. You followed Potter and his friends back through the tunnel from which you came, nothing but silence passed between the four of you as you tried to wrap your head around the events that just occurred.

You couldn’t think straight. It was all just too much. You wanted answers, you wanted to help and that was supposed to be the point in your trip to the Shrieking Shack but instead of having your questions answered, you’d been shown nothing but what you’d lost and could never regain.

The darkness accompanied you out of the tunnel as you exited out of the Whomping Willow and dragged yourself to the Great Hall, following the others. You felt unhinged, like this reality wasn’t your own and perhaps it wasn’t. It was the cruel reality of fate, rejected by those who’d stood over their love’s empty vessels.

You somehow felt yourself envious of those mourning the ones they lost in the Great Hall because at least they could mourn knowing they were loved, hugging those still present in the land of the living. Walking down the room, you gazed upon the students, Aurors and staff members lost in the war, the survivors huddled in groups where the house tables used to stand. Nothing more than hardship and devastation passed from one person to the next.

Fresh tears streamed down your face at the thought of Severus lying there alone in the shack where you’d left him. He should be here. You should both be huddled in the corner alongside the others thanking Merlin you’d survived this long instead of this loneliness you felt accompanying you as you found your way to the nearest wall, throwing your back up against it and sinking down to the ground.

You brought your knees up to your chest and wrapped your arms around them, instantly rocking back and forth in an attempt to comfort yourself. You’d never felt such a cascading rush of emotions before, thoughts of anger and resentment replaced by agony and remorse the second you saw Severus on the ground. In that moment, it didn’t matter to you what side he was on. He was your heart, your soul, your everything and he was gone.

You could never speak to him again, never see him or touch him. It wasn’t fair. You’d never gotten the closure you needed after you’d left and now you felt like you never would. You’d hoped the end of this war would give you the means to find the closure you needed, whether that be accepting Severus as the Death Eater he was or the brilliant and brave man you’d come to know him as. You’d never thought of the possibility you’d be faced with his death instead because he’d always seemed so invincible to you. He was an amazing Wizard with skills you were sure would have rivaled Dumbledore at his best. The possibility of his death seemed laughable back then. Even now as you sat there, playing back what you’d seen, what you’d heard, you weren’t sure what had happened, why he-who-must-not-be-named would kill him when he’d gained his favour last year, becoming his most trusted follower after killing Dumbledore.

Questions upon questions piled up in your mind and suddenly it became clear to you what you had to do next. The war no longer mattered to you, the battle felt like it had taken place eons ago. You needed answers and the flask Granger had handed you may very well be the only thing you had to provide you with what you needed most.

Quickly standing to your feet, you began making your way to the Headmaster’s office, your pace fastening the second that gargoyle came into your line of sight. You were about to mutter ‘Dumbledore’, hoping Severus hadn’t changed the password since you’d left when the gargoyle spun open with none other than Harry Potter stepping out of it. Your eyes met and you both froze in place, each one aware why the other was there. It was you who’d moved first, taking a step toward the open door before you heard him speak.

“I’m sorry,” he said, voice small and shriveled. “I didn’t know.”

You looked back at him and watched as he handed you his flask, unsure of what he meant. You took it regardless and gave him one last look before making your way into the office. You’d spent many nights here, speaking with Severus, watching him take orders from Dumbledore’s portrait. You’d resented the place honestly, feeling it too crowded, too grand. You much preferred his old office next to the potions classroom, but with the way he looked when he first entered the room, clearly ecstatic about it all had you keeping your opinion to yourself, letting him enjoy the bit of luxury he’d been given.

Your eyes finally met with the pensieve, unsurprisingly pulled out of its place. Slowly, you made your way towards it and looked down at the two flasks in your hand. Without a second thought, you put away the one Harry had given you, opening the second one and poured its contents into the pensieve. The blue and silver looked beautiful swirling around in the water and you only hoped the memories you’d see as you dunked your head in would be just as alluring a sight.

The room spun and you felt yourself falling into darkness until a clear image of Diagon Alley rolled into view. You looked around and noticed the lack of people roaming the streets. It didn’t take long for you to spot Severus in his oversized robes, making headway towards Flourish and Blotts. I remember this night, you thought, smiling to yourself as you quickly followed him into the shop.

Severus made his way straight for the academic section of the shop knowing exactly where to look as you let your eyes roam around the store searching for…

“Hello.” Ah, there you were. “Do you need any help?” Your cheeks burned red, feeling awkward at how innocently young you looked back then. You were so clueless back then and it almost hurt to watch you interact with Severus. Though despite the clear lack of love between you both, at least your past self had the pleasure of speaking to him at all. It was more than you could ever hope to do now.

“You’re new, aren’t you?” Severus looked you up and down, seemingly unimpressed with you but looking at him now, you realized he’d hidden a small smirk behind his ‘better than life’ attitude.

“That obvious?” You’d cracked a smile at him, shifting your weight from one foot to the other. Yes, you could remember this day very clearly now; he was the first customer to have actually struck up a conversation with you while working here and it made you nervous.

“No,” he replied, looking down at the book he had in his hands. Leaning in closer, you realized he’d done that thing he always did when he was nervous and let his hair fall in his face to hide his growing smirk before composing himself and looking back at you. “I shop here every few months and this is the first I’m seeing you.”

“Ah, a regular. Perhaps I should get to know your name then,” you said, pushing yourself to do as you’d been told and show the customers nothing but a willingness to help as you offered him your hand. Severus looked down at your open palm, hesitating before firmly grasping it.

“Severus Snape,” he said, looking into your eyes and shaking your hand. You could almost feel his slim, dry fingers grazing the inside of your palm just looking at the figures you knew were just memories. But you couldn’t help the tears that gathered in your eyes, it was so good to see him so full of life again.

“Well, Severus Snape, do you always shop in the boring section or do you ever explore the rest of the store?”

You chuckled at your own joke, whipping away your tears and immediately looked at Severus, watching him scuff in response before the memory washed away, snatched from you just when you felt yourself reconnecting to him.

“No!” You shouted into the nothingness surrounding you, turning in your place as colour began to settle into place revealing the empty streets of Hogsmeade with Severus standing in the middle of the road, looking as though he was contemplating doing something regrettable.

You ran up to him, standing before him and examined the look on his face. All you wanted to do was cup his cheeks, wait until his eyes met yours and ask him what was wrong, but it was just a memory. You knew if you reached out, you wouldn’t feel a thing. He’d pass right through you and you just couldn’t handle that disappointment. So you held back, waiting for him to make a move instead.

After taking a few more moments, he finally began to walk down the street, stopping right in front of The Three Broomsticks as if he was afraid he’d run into someone undesirable the second he walked in. He paused once more as soon as he’d stepped inside, looking around before making his way to the bar. You followed his lead and walked with him as you searched the practically empty pub; the few people who were present all seemed to be minding their own business, nothing out of the ordinary really.

You watched him slump into a seat, clearly nervous about being here for reasons you didn’t understand. You’d come to this pub with him multiple times and he’d never acted this way. Unless, perhaps, this was the first time he’d stepped foot in Hogsmeade since the night he was thrown out The Hogshead, that would definitely explain his nerves.

Severus suddenly went completely stiff and as you followed his line of sight, you realized why.

“What can I get you Severus.” Your younger self had immersed once again, this time as a bartender. The shocked look on Severus’ face amused you. He’d never looked so confundled before he’d met you for the second time.

“Are you following me?” He shamelessly let out.

“Me?! I’d do nothing of the sort,” You placed a hand on your chest adding a bit of sarcasm to your tone, acting as though he’d offended you to the highest degree while offering him a small smile. Severus eyed you a moment and you laughed at the interaction, realizing now how silly it looked from an outsider's perspective.

“Firewhiskey,” he finally said, adjusting himself in his seat to get comfortable. “Double.”

You looked over to the bar and watched as you reached for a clean glass and a bottle of Firewhiskey. “So, what brings you to Hogsmeade?”

This was the second time fate had brought you together and you remembered thinking it had to be some sort of sign, that coincidence couldn’t possibly explain this encounter when you’d done nothing but think about finding him again after you left your old job. You were nervous that night when you saw him again, wondering if you should go as far as to get to know him a little.

“I work at Hogwarts,” he said, watching you pour his drink before pulling out a second glass and doing the same for yourself. “What are you doing in Hogsmeade?”

You tore your eyes away from the drinks your past self was pouring and looked at Severus to find an oddly curious look on his face. He seemed intrigued rather than skeptical as the tone in his voice perceived.

“Fate,” you said, smiling to yourself, keeping your gaze on the bottle you had in your hand as you sealed it and went to put it back on the shelf behind you. “I got let go at Flourish and Blotts. Said they didn’t need me after the school rush anymore, so here I am.”

You picked up both glasses and offered him one. Watching the interaction had you suddenly feeling the aftertaste of the Firewhiskey on your tongue as your own image take a sip. At this point, you remembered wanting to know more about Severus. He was intriguing to you, different than those you’d met in England thus far. He seemed to have lived a long life despite looking to be in his late twenties. Looking back at Severus, you began to wonder what he thought of you the first time you’d met.

“So, what do you do at that mysterious school?”

“I’m the school’s Potion’s Master,” he replied before taking a large sip of his own. “Have you never been to Hogwarts?”

He rose a brow at you and you could see his curiosity peek. You’d never noticed it before, but knowing Severus now, he must have thought of you as something special if he’d shown you any sort of interest.

“Nope,” you replied with a little too much enthusiasm. “I was sent to Beauxbatons because my parents thought it was more conservative.”

You shook your head, blushing at the sight of yourself speaking of your upbringing. Keeping your eyes on Severus instead, you began examining his expression, trying to memorize every detail of his face. But once again, the image before you began to vanish, and you found yourself in the darkness once again. It seemed as though fate also had a cruel sense of humour, taking away the thing you love just when you felt yourself ready to grab hold of it again.

Spinning around, you tried searching for the new image that should have formed around you by now, but you could only make out a few lights to your left and you’d begun to think something had gone wrong until you realized you were in the dungeons of Hogwarts. You were standing in Severus’ old chambers, before he’d become Headmaster. All you could make out was the pale tone of his face reflecting the yellow candlelight and his hands which were held up close to his neck.

Walking closer to him, you realized he was standing in front of his mirror, tying his ascot, looking nervous once again. You smiled and simply admired him as he looked his reflection up and down, obviously unhappy with what he saw, but you couldn’t say you felt the same. He looked perfect to you, even his hair which he couldn’t seem to stop fiddling with.

You’d never seen him like this before, so worried about his appearance, unable to stand in place. Finally, he walked away from the mirror, whisking away into the sitting room where he began pacing, debating something you could see he was on edge about. You bit your tongue, wanting to ask what was wrong until you realized how stupid that was. He wasn’t really here, this wasn’t really him and you’d clearly been shifting through these memories long enough to forget that.

You frowned, just standing there waiting in anticipation for him to make his next move. Eventually, he composed himself enough to open the door to his chambers and make his way out towards the Entrance Hall where you finally remembered what night this was; your first date.

This was the first time you’d seen him out of his teaching robes, all dressed up in his navy-blue formal attire. You’d been waiting on the other side of the doors he’d opened, probably more nervous than him. He’d visited you many times at the Three Broomsticks after your first encounter there, finally offering you a tour of Hogwarts months later when the students had all left for the holidays.

You watched yourself step inside from the cold, shivering with your arms wrapped around yourself. You let out a giggle as you realized how nervous his first date with you had made him. It was adorable, though you knew what Severus would say if he’d caught you using that word to describe him. ‘Kittens are adorable (Y/N), I am not.’ Though you would respectfully disagree of course.

“I trust you weren’t waiting too long?” He said as he closed the doors. Your younger self was busy brushing snow off your jacket, but you could see the concern in his eyes. You knew that look and it saddened you to see him wear it so early in your relationship. How had you not noticed before his worry over disappointing you had started before you’d even officially began to date?

“Not at all. You’re just on time,” you replied, meeting his gaze with a warm smile. “This school is huge! Will we have time to see it all today?”

“No, but I thought I’d show you the more grand parts of the castle before dinner,” he said, accompanying you down the hall.

“So, does that include your classroom?”

You followed the figures, watching Severus closely, his eyes beginning to soft as he grew comfortable with you. It was an amazing first date and you were happy to relive it.

“If you wish.”

The figures suddenly disappeared as they walked down the hall and you found yourself standing in the dungeons again, this time outside of the Potions classroom where Severus was hesitantly leading you. You remembered this part of the tour; the best part of the castle, unable to help yourself from imagining him teaching a classroom full of students, but it was clear Severus didn’t feel the same way. His nerves were back and he looked unsettled as he opened the door to let you into the room.

“Wow,” your younger self said under your breath and you just couldn’t help but roll your eyes. You were exaggerating your interest and it made you wish the next memory would appear already to relieve you of this embarrassment. But you held out and kept watching if only to remember the lust you knew would blossom between the two figures in the memory.

Ignoring your weak attempt at flirting, you instead resumed your admiration for Severus, trying to read his thoughts through his expression, but all you could see was the unsettlement he’d shown back in his chambers when he was preparing for your date. His eyes darted back and forth from one table to the next, analyzing it as if he was searching for a reason to punish some non-existent students. Was he nervous about the state of the room? Is that why he’d hesitated when you begged to see his classroom earlier that evening?

“So, is this where you work? This is your desk?” You spun around at the sound of your own voice, following Severus’ line of sight to watch you run your fingers over his desk at the head of the class.

“Indeed, it is,” he said cautiously walking up to you. You followed along and watched him approach you as you leaned on the edge of the desk, smiling as if you were about to do something devious. A moment of silence passed, both figures exchanging looks before you spoke again.

“Thank you for today Severus. I enjoyed the tour,” you bit your bottom lip and pushed yourself up so you were standing but a small grasp away from him. There it is.

You sighed out of sheer joy when you saw Severus’ breath hitch as your figure leaned in, placing both hands on his shoulder and pressed your lips to his. He went stiff and you could feel his lips press against yours as you watched, your fingers instinctively hovering over your mouth at the loss of contact you felt.

Your smile grew and tears formed under your eyes when he began kissing back, wrapping his own arms around you, pulling you in tightly before your image quickly pulled them both back a step, enough so that you could jump onto the desk without ever parting from him. The kiss quickly became heated as you wrapped your legs around him, his hands slowly making their way up the desk as he leaned forward, your back pressing against the wood of the desk. Your first kiss looked so normal from here, but at the time, you felt it to be the most magical moment you’d ever experienced. He was amazing the first few months you’d spent together, you could relive every second of it and you only wished you could. It was nice to see this moment again, but you wanted more. You wanted to feel him, to feel the emotions you felt when you were with him back then, not just observe the faint memories of you both falling in love with one another.

“No,” you whispered as the classroom behind the two on the desk began to fade. “Not again, please!”

You begged the nothingness that gobbled up one of your happiest memories, but it was too late. They were gone and you found yourself in yet another memory, a more recent one by the looks of it. You were in your shared chamber; the Headmaster’s chambers. You heard the door slam shut and began looking around, trying to find your figure along with Severus.

“No,” you said when you spotted him, realizing what memory this was. “No, Severus please. Why would you show me this night?”

You spoke to the figure as if he could hear you but of course, he ignored you and slumped into his armchair, the light from the dying fireplace illuminating his outline enough for you to kneel right before him, looking desperately into his heavy eyes, tears forming, threatening to fall down your cheeks as they did his. This was the night you’d left, the night you regretted full heartedly and it hurt to see the aftermath of your fight; the broken man that sat before you.

“I’m sorry Sev, please, I shouldn’t have left, I’m sorry,” you said desperately before giving into the one urge you’d been fighting during this trip down memory lane and tried to place your hand over his only to have it pass right through. You couldn’t bear the pain anymore and felt yourself break down as the memory kept playing. You placed your face in your hands and let your heartbreak escape through the tears you shed.

You’d do anything to take it all back if you were given the chance. If you had a time turner to spare, you’d sit there spinning it until you went back to the right moment to fix things, no matter how long it took. If you’d stayed with him, you could have helped save him, you should have stayed to convince him to fight for the Order. It wasn’t supposed to end this way. This wasn’t supposed to happen. You never should have left!

Was this your punishment? To be reminded of what you could have had with him? What you’d lost after making the biggest mistake of your life? You kept your head in your hands until you heard Severus shifting in his spot and you opened your eyes just in time to watch him pull out a box from his robes. You looked down at it, focusing your vision to watch him fiddle with the box, the same nervous and disappointed look you saw from your first date, the first time you met now scribbled all over his face once again.

“Oh Sev,” you whispered as you peered inside the box he was slowly opening, revealing a small, but elegant engagement ring. Your vision blurred again as fresh tears formed at the realization of what you’d done. You wanted to scream, to cry until time reversed itself and gave you the chance to rewrite history. He loved you. He wanted to spend the rest of his life with you and you’d slammed the door in his face, rejecting him before he could even ask, all because you let this battle, this damn war cloud your judgment of him.

Severus suddenly stood and you instantly rose, staying as close to him as you could while he walked over to the fireplace, picking up the clock you’d given him for Christmas the same year you’d begun dating and popping out its bottom. He slid the ring inside the clock and reassembled it.

“Oh Sev, I wish you’d asked,” you said through tears despite the fact that you likely wouldn’t have given the same answer back then as you would now. It was true what they said; you really didn’t know what you had until you lost it, and it took losing Severus to know that what you had with him was real and true. It took losing him, knowing you could never speak again to realize how much he meant to you, no matter which side of the war he stood.

Looking back at the clock, you watched it disappear along with the fireplace.

“No, no not another one, please I can’t take anymore,” you pleaded, but it was no use, Severus was gone and once again the scene around you changed and you were back in the Headmaster’s office. For a second, you thought it to be over, that you’d been freedom from your ward, but when you looked to the side of the room, you saw the pensieve was put away and all the figures in the portrait present, which meant this was yet another memory. You let out a defeated sigh, feeling as though this truly was a punishment you weren’t sure you could bear any longer.

“Severus, you made a promise.” You spun around when you heard Dumbledore’s voice, trying to search for his figure, but it was Severus you’d found instead, standing in front of a portrait, looking as broken as he did in the last memory. “You must stay by Lord Voldemort’s side until the time is right. You’re the only one that can do it.”

“You should have picked someone else,” he said looking as miserable as ever. You’d in fact never seen him like this in all the years you’d known him; broken, hollow, left with no ambition, nothing left to live for. “(Y/N) left yesterday. I’ve lost everything to this war.”

You walked closer to him, realizing what he was saying, what he was asking to do. He wanted to come after you, to abandon his post, the position he’d worked too hard to gain, killing Dumbledore, betraying everyone he cared for, all to become he-who-must-not-be-named most trusted follower. He was ready to throw it all away for you.

“You said-”

“I know what I said! I was wrong!” He spat at the portrait. You took another step towards him, ready to make the same mistake you’d made earlier and attempt to hug the memory only for it all to disappear before you. This time, instead of a new memory replacing the darkness, you felt yourself being grasped and pulled out into the real world.

You feel back onto the floor, losing your balance when you came out of the pensieve. All those memories, everything you’d just learned was all too much. Severus hadn’t betrayed you after all, he wasn’t a Death Eater, he was a hero and he’d died just that. You should have gotten up, returned to the battle that was sure to resume any moment now, but you couldn’t. Your body couldn’t handle any more. You couldn’t do anything but lay there on the floor, crying until you had no tears left to shed.

It all felt so meaningless now; winning the war, defending the school. What was the point when you felt like you’d already lost? The hour was up but the chaos had yet to resume. You barely had the energy to drag yourself up and recollect all of Severus’ memories let alone join the others and see what would become of Hogwarts.

Closing your eyes, you took in a trembling breath, trying not to think about the breakdown you felt was on the verge of exploding out of you and gathered yourself enough to leave the office. Standing there as the gargoyle closed, you looked down the hall that led to his chambers. You weren’t ready to revisit the place where it all fell apart yet that’s where your feet were taking you.

Everything was right where you’d remembered it, nothing had changed, not even the picture you'd taken together at the Yule Ball, still propped up on the coffee table beside the armchair. It still smelled just like him, the closet in the bedroom still full of clothes; yours on the left, his on the right. He hadn’t bothered to throw a single thing away, your comb, your toothbrush, your journal still sitting exactly where you left them, nothing had changed.

Waking over to the bed, you picked up his pillow and pressed it to your nose as you closed your eyes and slumped down onto the mattress. Hugging his pillow with the upper half of your body pressed against the black silk covering the bed was the closest thing you felt you’d ever get to feeling his touch, smelling his hair or finding comfort in his arms. Still it wasn’t enough, it would never be enough.

You missed him so much, more so now than you had the last few months you’d been apart. Your body shock but you had no more tears left to shed. Your mind searched for memories of Severus, but you couldn’t find any more left to mourn over except the last moments you had with him. His eyes slowly glazing over with darkness as his soul escaped your world, leaving you behind.

He’d spent his last breath sharing all of himself with you and you had to honour that. He died so that the Wizarding World may prevail, and you couldn’t let that go in vain. You composed yourself the best you could, thinking of the victory you had to win for him and dragged yourself back to the sitting room.

You looked over the bleak outlines of the furniture you’d spent hours sitting in with Severus before making your way to the fireplace. Picking up the clock, remembering that Christmas morning you shared together, you turned it over, popping out the bottom to find the ring he’d hidden still sitting there, waiting to be worn. You removed it and placed the clock back in its place, shifting the ring around between your fingers to reveal text engraved on the inside of the band: ‘Always and forever yours’.

It was a beautiful ring, small, but you were never one for theatrics and he knew that. The diamond in the middle was crystal clear, pure as he’d once described you to be. Beside it, two small emerald stones were placed on either side, signifying his promise to you; that he will always be with you no matter what the future held. Looking at it now, the memory of him holding it in this exact spot where you stood, you could almost feel his presence around you, as if he’d just proposed and you’d abruptly accepted like you so desperately wanted.

You quickly whipped away the single tear running down your cheek and slowly slid the ring on the ring finger of your right hand, symbolizing what should have been but never was. He was gone yes but his legacy would live on, you would make sure of that.

Before heading out, you searched your pockets and removed the flasks carrying the last memories of your lost love and placed it next to the clock on the fireplace, removing his wand from your person as well, carefully laying it before the clock.

“You can rest now Severus,” you whispered, hoping that by some miracle, he’d hear you from the afterlife. “I love you so much, I hope you knew that.”

And with that, you slowly backed away from the fireplace and withdrew your wand, ready to fight for the good of the Wizarding World, for Hogwarts, for love, for Severus Snape and everything he stood for.

A/N: Ok, I'm sorry 😭😭😭😭

Scenes taken (and edited) from the books: Harry looking into Voldemort’s find to find his location and the heartbreaking shrieking shack scene.

@marvelschriss @bush-viper-cutie @moonie-writes

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yeoldontknow · 6 years

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Hero: 13

Author’s Note: if you have waited one year for this chapter; if you have read hero and told me you love it; if you have left me an ask in the last year talking about hero showering; if you have commented simply to say this story is still your favourite: thank you and this one is for you. Pairing: Chanyeol x Reader (oc; female) Genre: Vampire!Chanyeol; horror; thriller; drama; suspense Rating (this chapter): R Warnings: graphic depictions of blood; graphic depictions of torture; graphic depictions of violence; gun use; knife use; explicit language Word Count: 11,011 (make a wish)

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The last time the word yes felt heavy and loaded, like lead on the center of your wet tongue; the last time the word yes made you feel something other than complacent acceptance or the dull caress of an impermanent external joy, a boy with trembling, awkward hands promised to love you. He promised to love you, and to make sure that this kind love would not hurt.

For years, you have looked back on that night and wondered what exactly it was you said yes to. Was it to the loss of your virginity or the loss of your youth? Was it to the vow it would be painless or the knowledge that it would ache, regardless? Some nights, nights when you are forgiving and look at your past with kindness, it’s easy to say you granted permission to all of it, every agonizing, messy piece of it. On those nights, yes becomes an encyclopedia of inclusion, a word that stretches like your body to accommodate the pain and the pleasure, the act and the fiction of love, and, most of all, to accommodate him.

But then, that isn’t entirely true. In the light of day, you know you said yes to an ending. This yes was a bullet: to the softness of sinew, the false hope that not all boys lie, and the myth that sex is the same as magic. When you said yes, you said yes to extravagant loss - to a loss that made you bleed and bleed, staining him and your underwear and your outlook on what it means to be a woman. That night, you said yes to the burning of your body and the licking of the ash from your skin, unmade and naked and blissfully apathetic.

That day, you said yes, and you wanted the world to quake with you.

Today, yes is a disease.

Today, yes is infectious and addictive.

Today, yes spreads, all over you and without limit, consuming you like a fever.

It rolls over you in waves, traversing first down your spine and then into your blood, saturating even the pores of your skin with each beat of your heart. Like this, you let it fill the dark corners of your bones and organs, making a home of the cavernous ruin that rests within your belly. Languidly it coils around your nerves and your muscles, taking root and taking form, a liquid gold inferno that makes your chest swell with purpose.

The flush at your chest has yet to subside, the roughness of your clothes pressed and sticking to you in uncomfortable angles, but these things become a catalyst. A mess has been made of you, always without your consent and always when you were not looking, and, now, yes has become a great remaking. It builds itself around you like armor, full bodied and wrought, a monstrous guardian born by your tongue and not by the need of a boy, but the will of a woman.

Chanyeol studies you carefully after you say it, neither surprised nor alarmed, simply waiting, expectant. He holds your stare for several seconds and waits for you back down or say that you were mistaken, the air between you unusually calm as his eyes moves over your face. This is not the first time you have let his gaze penetrate you, nor the first time he has waited for you to wither, but this is the first time you have let him in and wanted him there. This is the first time you hope he tastes you, your convictions, your pride, and your affection for all seven sins.

This is the first time you have let him in and wanted him to stay.

Time seems to bend, losing logic and shape, becoming meaningless. Silence lingers, the anger that kissed your fingers slowly dissipating to leave behind excitement for the prospect of control over your future. Still, you are furious, but this fury is different, directed inward. Held by your own hands, it feels like propulsion, movement starting to itch in the crevices of your joints. Something creeps up into your mouth, so foreign you almost don’t recognize it but, you suck at it delicately, savoring it, reacquainting yourself with it as you wait for him to move.

Eventually, Chanyeol speaks, unblinking. ‘A man will die today.’

The sharp edge of his voice pierces the room, cutting shapes into an atmosphere you’d seen as a metal, immovable curtain. With room to breathe, your chest compresses and releases the air you didn’t know had been trapped. This is when you realize that you have become poised, sitting taller and gripping the sheets tighter, both excited and delighted and glad that, today, limbs will break.

This is not a challenge, this is a statement of fact. He is not asking if you fear it, he is asking if you can stomach the smell of it, the taste of it against the roof of your mouth. He’s asking if you can embody it, take it in and hold it there, willing you be to strong enough to let it become part of you - a tool. And now, with a straight spine and fighting words from Yixing burning through the fire of your blood, you think you are ravenous.

Now, you think you've earned the glory of it.

‘Many men have already died,’ you counter, reminding him that you came from a place of death, from a collision of gunfire and flesh and life that spilled between the grooves of a truck, into your waiting mouth.

Still, he remains unmoved. ‘I am asking you to watch.’

Now, you are braced and you eager. Now, you do not hesitate.

‘I’m saying I’ve watched a halfling die.’ The memory of her body collapsing, heavy and ungraceful and much like meat, replays in your mind, carrying with it the smell and taste of the vomit and the rot. No, you are not the same person he found in the trunk - and never would you be again.

‘Have I not already tried to kill for you?’ you press further, reminding him that merely days before your hands did not shake, the effort of putting bullets into a warm chest somewhat comforting. You were proud then, even though you could not feel it, unaware that not once did you blink, and you are proud now. Proud that men who seek death find it by your hand and by your will.

Narrowing his eyes, Chanyeol leans back and regards you cooly, mild surprise kissing the edges of his irises. With him, you are bold - grandiose promises partnered with unsteady follow through, but never has he doubted your strength, and now you are offering it to him. This is not the battle cry of survival, born from desperation and need, this is a promise to unify, if only partly, because you both want to watch the world burn.

‘There will be no reward for this,’ he says seriously, making it clear he deals neither in favors nor wishes, but in money that comes with a body count. Here, you have purpose, and, for him, your purpose is endless. ‘This is not a gift of kindness.’

Never does he underestimate your strength, but always he seems to underestimate your autonomy. He made it clear you create your opportunity in a world where choices are made for you, but still he forgets you are a vessel of immeasurable potential, and you are confident he will never really fathom you.

Leaning forward, you let yourself get close, closer than you’ve ever been of your own volition, and now you can smell him. He smells human, impossibly so - he smells like you. Sweet and warm and old, and you realize this is what he eats, and so you too are now eternal.

And when you speak, it is just above a whisper, demanding that he listen. ‘I decide what is a gift for me and what is not.’

And then, he smiles.

While only the second time you’ve witnessed the expression, already you can see the difference. Before, it was impish, born of a violent sort of joy that made his muscles twitch with bloodthirst. Now, he is delighted, thrilled that you are just as hungry as he, and he looks grotesque, awed. This smile is dark, bewitching, born of a future soaked in death, and never has he been so beautiful.

Without any word at all, he lifts his arm and gestures to the door. The motion is so rarely directed at you, you half expect someone to come through and bind your wrists once again, making a spectacle out of your hope. But he keeps still, keeps his eyes on you, and feasts on the way you realize this small freedom is yours.

It dawns on you slowly, emerging cautiously out of the void and preparing to be smothered once more, that he means for you to open the door. For a moment, you consider him a statue, for the effort of keeping his position never seems to cause him strain, body becoming marble. Following the length of his outstretched arm, you see the door as though it is a trap before realizing traps only exist if you are not wise enough to acknowledge their context.

You have a purpose, and of this purpose you are in control. This time, you are the semantics, dictating what is and is not a prison.

And so you are neither careful nor delicate as you leap from the bed to tear it open, barefoot and unsteady on your legs, suddenly reborn. A breeze generated by the movement cools the dampness of your skin, and you close your eyes, relishing the sensation. The hall is empty, no one there to stare or question you, no one to bind you or threaten to chew at your center with a greedy tongue.

Now, this hallway is yours.

Now, you are not running through it, you are claiming it.

Space feels different when one can claim part ownership of it, when they can say their occupancy in the room or in the world makes it partly theirs, simply because they have confidently, and resolutely existed within it. Breath tarnishes wallpaper, fingerprints leave oily stains, the residue of life left behind to drip in smears - touched and held and fondled by choice.

Space feels different when you are liberated, moving through and within it freely. Like this, it is easy to say my feet touch the floor, and so this floor is supporting me, on my behalf; my lungs breathe this air, and so this air is keeping me alive, on my behalf. It means you can make space into your servant. It means you are autonomous, an admiral geographical space, making yourself into the narrative rather than the object.

It strikes you then, how easily you take to the coven now that you move within it of your own volition. There are no hands in your hair, dragging you. You are not chased from a room and down a hall, neither by the will to live or the need to survive or even the desire to save. Each step belongs to you, is born of you, and now the coven walls feel born of you, too.

Now, you are the coven, and there is no longer a separation.

At your side, Chanyeol moves with confident, powerful strides, jaw clenched and fists furled as though he were moving through wrath itself, a phantasm of malcontent. Like this, he is greed and he is pride, glorious in his rage and already demanding the world bleed at his feet. The gun, loaded and likely cocked, is tucked into the back waistband of his trousers, making his posture appear rigid, stiff. He is metal and he is murder, brutal in every action and elegant in execution, and, now, there is not a hint of empathy in his eyes.

In contrast, you are sure you appear an amalgam of too many insufficient things. You are too soft, too human, to feminine, too warm to operate in this world, but this too is how you saw Chanyeol in his first life, his warmest life. Together and apart, you started from the same place, full of blood and full of optimism, only to be stolen away, slaughtered and reborn. Together and apart, you both bent to the will of other-wordly myths, burned to ash and forced into a new shape, unable to reconcile the difference between your past and present.

If you are where Chanyeol started, he is where you end, and thus you think it is impossible to ever see this coven as anything less than yours.

It’s yours in the way you keep pace, matching Chanyeol’s steps and falling into a rhythm that is both unfamiliar yet comfortable. It’s yours in the way men seem to part around you, watching the way you move at Chanyeol’s side and sucking in air they do not need, but crave just the same. It’s yours in the way the lights flicker overhead, faulty and fissuring, as though bowing at your feet.

It's yours in the way you make it yours, reducing its power because walls and concrete are not things that cause pain; pain is only temporary and, in the end, all men die the same - in blood and in agony and as nothing more than boys.

With each step, you are acutely aware of the route you are taking, familiar with the way the walls seem to sweat and drip with dampness. Once more, they are breathing, sighing as you pass without pressing a palm against them, but now they are not whispering secrets of your doom. Now, they are muttering secrets of your victory, telling tales and making you into myth.

You’re glad they seem to remember you, the walls, the men that watch you with narrowed eyes and tight jaws, even the flickering lights overhead; announcing your arrival with each beaming flare.

The last time you came this way, a man with agile fingers and a thirst for dominance showed you how you'd look beneath him, naked and bleeding on a table, desperate to die. You're ready to fight, against him and against every man who didn't bother to learn how to hold you properly, angry once more that men have decided to make a home of you. In the dim yellow light, you recognize the doors to your left as the doors to the chapel; a place of implied holiness and reverence, and where you learned anyone can be a god if you want to convince them you are worthy.

For a moment, you expect Chanyeol to turn and enter, to lead you back into the heart of a funeral pyre. But Chanyeol passes the doors without a second glance, eyes forward and focused. Instead, he walks further down the halls, knuckles cracking in suppression of fury, fire coming from the tips of his fingers like sparks. He shakes the flames away, moving them through the wind as though riding a current you cannot see. The bloodstains on his fingertips make the flames appear crimson, bleeding into the fire.

He leads you to a wide open area, tucked behind turns and turns and hallways that take pleasure in eating faith; a space that almost looks like a garage, yet multiplied in length and height, a compound of metal and concrete. Immediately, you recognize this as what would be an airport hangar, abandoned and repurposed, and you wrack your mind for any disused airports near the city, only to come up empty. Once again, your efforts of triangulating your location, of playing cartographer and learning your map, have failed.

As you pass through the entrance to the hangar, the air becomes thick, swollen with pieces of ash that have not yet burned, and it makes your lungs begin to sear as you give pause. Closing your eyes and focusing on your breath, your skin begins to feel tight, expectant, tongue moving around your mouth as though you can taste the sour entrails of death. Weight settles on you and against your shoulders, constricts your chest as images bloom behind your eyes. Smears of things, colours and sounds that all end in a summary of unparalleled pain resonate through your nerves. Slowly, you open your eyes, unable to pinpoint where or how the pain started, only that it did and that it will, and that, once again, this place means death.

Chanyeol moves away from you, heading directly for his generals who have gathered in the center of the hangar, and leaving you cold. Standing in a poorly shaped circle and looking more like a cluster, they speak with low voices and furrowed brows, some with arms crossed and others anxiously twirling knives in their hands as though the blades themselves are a comfort. The flames at Chanyeol’s fingers have died, the skin now merely red and brutal, but the fire seems to have moved to his eyes. He studies his men carefully, clenching his jaw and remains impossibly still as he burns and burns.

As if feeling your eyes on the group, Yixing turns and sees you, expression hard though his gaze turns concerned and quizzical. Nodding to his sire, he bows briefly before heading towards you, softening with each step. You keep your eyes trained on Chanyeol, expecting him to watch or expecting him to care. He doesn’t, simply continues talking to the man who makes your fingers feel numb, iced to a blackness that does not exist.

‘It’s nice to see you standing.’

It’s the loudest you’ve ever heard his voice, an echo attempting to be born along the metal roof, but still there is peace and serenity to the way he speaks. Loudness does not suit him, but the small smile playing at his lips does, makes him look powerful and beautiful. With him near, your breath comes easier and without a wheeze, comforted by his presence.

‘What is all this?’ You nod your head in a generic, vague direction, gesturing to the room and the people, before studying the way he somehow looks violent.

Tension has gathered in his neck and shoulders, you can see it and feel it in the way his posture makes his spine appear as a metal rod. The smile at his lips, thin and poetic, is beautiful but it does not reach his eyes. Not the way it usually does when he regards you. Today, Yixing does not bother to make himself into something gentle to appease your human empathy.

He hums, though the sound is not pleasant. It is lethal, a growl that rumbles in his chest as he studies the vast expanse of nothingness. ‘To us, it is retribution. Vengeance.’

You scoff and roll your eyes, bored and frustrated with his aloof clarification. ‘That’s hardly clear.’

Cocking his head slightly to the side, he appraises you momentarily, fingers fondling the hilt of a knife tucked through his belt loops. ‘Did Sire not tell you what you would witness?’

‘No,’ you start, before countering, ‘well, maybe.’ You watch the way he delicately strokes the barrel, thoughtless and slow, caressing. ‘He said a man would die today.’

‘He will,’ he states, simply. ‘He was meant to die by your hand.’

Memories blaze in your mind: the inherent violence of the number four, the way blood cakes underneath the nails and never seems to truly fade, the way you became a judgement and a reckoning all because you <i>decided.</i>

‘Taeyong?’

‘The mole, yes.’ He shapes the words differently on his tongue, clutches his syllables for longer than he should, reluctant to let them go. Bitterness taints his speech, a harshness you find foreign on him, but he takes to it well and lets it run along his edges, creating fissures in the man you understood him to be. ‘You’ve been brought to seek the truth. Men say a lot of things when they know they are about to die, empty things meant to satisfy their predator, all things that function as a bargain. We negotiate our way through life, asking to live and asking to survive, even if we don’t know to whom we are begging.’

Again he detaches himself from reality by choosing words that seemingly hold no value, staring off into the center of an empty hangar as though he can see an infinite expanse of answers. But this, his metaphorical speech and the way he chooses his words carefully to deliver you context without sentiment, you see right through. ‘You want me to tell if he’s lying?’

‘Taeyong will not escape his death.’ At this, he faces you, expression cold and somewhat furious. ‘Your purpose here will not save his life.’

This, you know, is a challenge, a test to see how far you have come and how far you are willing to go. In the heat of a war, you shot a man and demanded that he die. Today, there is silence in the coven, even if you cannot call it tranquil. Chanyeol stands, tall and proud, with confidence nestled against his skin and into his bones. He stands and he is whole, and so your hands do not ache with the urgency of keeping him alive. He is breathing and he is powerful, and he is radiant, and your humanity supposes that today is not a day in which someone should die.

But it is. It must be. It must be, for you want it to be, and therefore it will happen. Ethics may dictate that the stealing of life is immoral and inhumane, but since you arrived at the coven the threads of your humanity have slowly been falling away, pulled apart by several hands, including your own. It feels good to fight for them, to keep them close and keep them near, to say that you can walk through the heart of an inferno and remain unchanged, but you know that would be a lie. You have not been human since you willed D.O. to die, and you do not want to be so anymore.

You want to be better. You want to be more.

And so you say the only thing that feels truthful, the only thing your heart knows how to give, because you mean it with every fibre of your existence.

‘I don’t want it to,’ you say, voice strong and even.

Holding Yixing’s stare, you watch the way his irises swim, amber and gold and demanding. He keeps kindness nestled within the cavities of his joints, but so, too, is he prepared to bleed a man dry.

‘Do you wish this for yourself,’ he begins, words slow to ensure you catch his meaning, ‘or for us?’

Cloaked behind the words he uses is the notion of choice: choosing to let a man die because you want him to and choosing to let a man die because his actions against a collective <i>you</i> dictate that he should. Lately, you have been making choices that are separate from you, choices that serve a group rather than the self, and while you can’t say you have been proud or even consciously aware of your choices, you know that you do not regret them. Lately, you haven’t been choosing for yourself, even though the choices have been yours alone.

‘I want answers just as much as you,’ you offer, hoping this is enough.

‘You deserve them,’ he clarifies with a nod,

Narrowing your eyes, you keep gaze focused and hard. ‘We all deserve them.’

Your thoughts are interrupted by the sounds of the generals agreeing, breaking apart with the dull hum of acknowledgement. Towards the right side of their circular gathering, you see a familiar figure step back from the group with his arms crossed, eyes trained on the ceiling as he centers himself, walking towards you without seeing you. Jaw set and chewing on his tongue, eyes narrowed as he glances from corner to corner before bringing them down to scan the circumference of the room; he exists to you as a nightmare, the shadow of a man brought forward in the clothes of something monstrous.

The sight of him is a flood in your lungs, a smothering torrent and a gasp for breath ripped from your chest as your skin turns wet and slick with memories that aren’t yours, but should be. It’s the graceful cruelty of his jaw that makes you remember the knife, the jagged and beautiful line he carved into you, merciless and greedy; his eyes, steel grey and storming, are filled with your blood, delighted that, on you, death is something righteous. You remember Chanyeol’s heat, the impossible and terrible heat of his mouth, and the way his lips scorched against your skin, and the way this man watched you burn, unmoved.

Mostly, you remember his hands, how they held you in place, pressed bruises that could not form into your arm, giving no room for argument or fight. Now, his hands linger like mold against your skin, on and inside you, pulling bullets and pulling mercy from your bones and your muscles, and you hate him. You hate the way he tore through you, as though you were cotton and something made for breaking, something made to be taken. You hate the way he suggested it, as though you were a martyr, and as though martyrdom came without choice.

You hate the way he reduced you, slowly and as though you were a fraction, a problem to be solved.

Without conscious thought your legs begin to move, willing you forward and into the oncoming tide of the man you have started to view as a demon. He sees your approach but his expression does not change, viewing you with an impartial sort of glare, one that could appear bewildered if placed on any other man's face, but, on him, he simply appears bored and disinterested with your existence. As you move, studying his features and making sure you commit each one to memory, you swiftly begin to feel your blood begin to change.

Beneath your skin, it becomes thick, turning into a venom that flows through your veins and makes your heart race as it struggles to push it through. To him, you are poisonous; to Chanyeol, you are honey; to any other man that wishes to touch you, you are absolutely fatal.

Standing before him, you fist your hand into his shirt and pull him forward, into your orbit so he may taste how it feels to truly be caught against your will. You hold him as he held you, roughly, harshly, and with absolutely no room for argument. ‘If you lay your hands on me again,' you hiss, hoping your teeth and tongue appear as daggers, 'I will have your throat.’

‘Is that a threat?’ He asks, the storm in his eyes settling on you, as though you are the moon to his sea.

Mirroring his pose and crossing your arms over your chest, you dig your nails into the flesh of your arms, wiling yourself into a placid state of calm. ‘Do you not believe that I would?’

‘No,’ he says, evenly, ‘I simply question if you could.’

Once more, he means to break you down, envision you as something less than you know yourself to be. A tightness grows in your chest, one that makes your words turn into pins, sharp things that you hope drag against his skin and make him bleed even if they do not break him down. ‘It is a promise.’

‘Good.' At this, he leans forward, bringing himself close enough for you to smell. Oddly, he smells of nothing at all, and you find this realization to be unsettling. 'I would welcome it.’

‘Is that a joke?’ you scoff, stepping back to move yourself away.

‘No,' he sighs, suddenly becoming distant. 'Death would feel very much like relief.’ He says this to nothing and no one, not even to you, allowing himself to become slightly hollowed. This, though, does not make him into something small or less or even something terribly sad. Instead, he appears old and tired.

‘I will not apologize for my choice,' he says, collecting and gathering himself to study you once more, threading his seams together with a spite he keeps at the corner of his lips. 'And you should not apologize for your wrath. Ever.’

He means this, every word of it. It's perhaps the most honest thing you've heard in the coven, the fact that he is glad you are angry and furious and ready to kill for the briefest moment of vindication. Now, you see that he does not question your power, merely that, here, there are no longer any rules. Here, there is no space for question or morality, there simply is a will to survive and a will to continue, and apologizing for either is the only sacrilege.

For several moments, you hold his gaze, watching and waiting for him to move or explain his meaning, but instead he keeps himself silent. The pink of his hair allows his lips and cheeks to take on a nonexistent flush, and for the briefest of moments you see flashes of the man he could have been, most likely was. There's a childish youth to the corner of his eyes, a delight for life that died over time and became something more akin to cracks of time and waste. Lines on his face of smiles he used to offer have weathered, and it is this that floods you with memories of a man who craved peace by the sea, and found neither of those things.

Your thoughts are cut short by the doors on the opposite side of the hangar swinging open, the metal on metal clack reverberating around the room, its echo seemingly endless. Several men enter, each dragging a chair with stoic expressions and mouths set into frowns. Nearly all the chairs are empty - eight steel chairs that look neither comfortable nor welcoming, with the tenth containing a man bound by zip ties. You recognize him to be Taeyong, though he does not appear as you remember him.

Chanyeol said you had been unconscious for three days, three days in which Taeyong eclipsed death, kissed at its shoulders and decided to continue breathing through the horror of it all. The bruises at his cheeks are blackened into large swells, smears of blood cacked into the centers and giving his cheeks a purplish tint before moving into large, red gouges. Pieces are missing from his nose and some of his cheeks, but he does not seem affected. Not anymore.

His left eye is swollen shut, face morphed into a permanent grimace and scowl, though you are unsure if this was his usual expression hardened into place by the slow breaking of his will. Blood lingers on his lips, the plump flesh chewed raw and having dripped down his chin and neck, giving the impression he engorged upon himself. His hands rest in his lap, knuckles reddened and splotched with scratches and blood. From where you stand, you can see his fingernails have been pulled off, ripped through and away without any effort made to clean the wounds.

For three days, they have systematically pulled him apart and ripped him clean. For this, you are glad, but still you, and everyone else, remains unsatisfied.

These will not be the worst of his injuries. Likely, these are little more than small dalliances to satiate hungry appetites, until all that is left are his bones to be burned to ash. With all of you, you want this to be true.

Your conversation partner walks away, spine set to steel as he watches Taeyong be dragged to the center of the room. Yixing swiftly follows, footsteps sure and silent as he moves to take a chair, and as he moves away, you find it harder to breathe. The generals gather in a dignified row, each taking a chair and sitting with a posture that makes them look regal. Necks long and eyes peering down noses, they regard Taeyong with various expression ranging from abject grimaces to bloodthirst.

It strikes you that the one who made your eyes hurt is not included. Briefly, you think back to the initiation ceremony, how gazing at him made your eyes hurt and burn; how Yixing had said Baekhyun was the light bringer, and you wonder if that is who he had meant. But even as you remember that day, you remember how they stood - they stood in a row and smiled and they are incandescently proud. Then, they appeared a brotherhood witnessing an act of glory.

Today, they are vicious. They are vicious and they are absolute.

With Taeyong placed unceremoniously in the center of the hangar, the generals sit and watch as Chanyeol moves around the room in much the same motions as he made when he first met you. You sat in the cage, then, and watched him pace, move to gather thoughts and words without burning alive from the fury. Today, he does the same, hands behind his back so his fingers can stroke his gun. He's more quiet than you remember him being. With you, the noise of his motions was endless, his legs and the weary intake of his breath a thunderclap in the center of your mind. Now, he is little more than a burning flame, quiet until the spark at the very center of his soul ignites into something truly majestic.

Turning on his feet, he narrows his gaze on Taeyong and sets his jaw, the change in his demeanor making the hairs on your arms stand on end. Pulling the gun from his belt, he reaches into his pocket and wields the cap of a silencer between his fingers, lips parting to release a silent moan as though delighted by the sight. Walking back to Taeyong, he studies the traitor blankly as he screws it into the barrel of the gun.

'I will not ask if you know why you are here,' he says simply, glancing to the weapon with a reverence reserved for a lover. He hums quietly as he screws, sighs as though this sort of connection brings him pleasure. 'You are not an ignorant man.' He returns his focus to Taeyong with narrowed, piercing eyes and a darkness that seeps into the sharp angles of his cheekbones, murderous. 'I will also refrain from asking you why,' he announces, stepping into the space between his generals and his captive, lifting his gun proudly to make sure it is seen. He tosses his head back, gesturing to the men behind him, as he sneers, 'We are not ignorant men.'

The weight of the room changes, and this you, suppose, was the reason Chanyeol asked you to be here. You wonder if he can feel it, feel the way the air takes on the stench of decay and dishonesty. If they, too, can sense the great and terrible unmaking about to occur, so powerful and all- consuming that you too almost wish to run from it. Taeyong knows he will come apart, much like cloth. Taeyong knows there will be no great relief that comes from this, only that he will continue to fight until the last of his breath is stolen from the cells of his blood.

It's hard to imagine anyone would stay and ask to live through this, knowing immediately that Yixing was right - this is the space in which lies are born, pretty, soft words that make bargains sound appealing and generous. It's hard to imagine someone human wanting to taste this, but you do. Already, you are glad that he will die, for now it is easy to see him not as a man, but as a beast.

Chanyeol moves with unpredictable motions, walking slowly as though hypnotizing his prey. Eventually, he settles before the chair, leaning down with an oddly soft expression. Gently, he extends one elegant hand forward, tips of his fingers touching just beneath Taeyong's chin and tilting it upward. To you, this image momentarily appears holy, almost biblical. Chanyeol stands before him with the posture reserved for a god, features remarkable and beautiful and impossible. It would be beautiful, if it were not merciless.

'We were bound, you and I,' Chanyeol murmurs, voice low, and dark. 'And now, I cannot wait to eat the heart out of you.'

Taeyong jerks his head away from Chanyeol's touch, the first movement he's made. He's sharp and violent with his actions, all wrath and belligerence. 'I know what you did to Jun-Yeon,' he spits, peering at Chanyeol through eyelashes coated in blood. 'The loss of my fangs does not scare me.'

At this, Chanyeol cocks his head back and laughs, the sound empty and brutal. There is no joy in this sound, simply a dead and rotting sense of sarcasm that makes the chambers of your heart turn cold.

'Do you really think that's what this will come to?' he asks, the tone almost too casual for the weight within the room.. He regards Taeyong with something akin to patience, though you know he is anything but. 'You really think I'm after your fangs?' With this, he presses the barrel of his gun to Taeyong's temple, cold and unblinking. 'That something as trivial as your bones would satisfy me?'

Taeyong remains quiet, he too immobile as he studies his Sire, and for a moment they simply regard one another, challenging to see who will break first.

Chanyeol smirks, preparing to laugh. 'My boy -'

'I am two thousand years old,' Taeyong barks.

'My boy,' Chanyeol repeats, ruthless and hissing. 'I am not after your fangs.' He leans down, and lets his gun move from Taeyong's temple down his neck and chest, pulling at his clothes, until it settles in the center of his lap. 'I am after your soul.'

The sound of the gun going off is muted only slightly by Taeyong's howl of agony. Blood spatters from the wound, spraying against Chanyeol's pants and painting the floor. You jump at both sounds, though more-so at Taeyong’s exclamation of grief, the silencer making it easy to handle the sound of a gun at close range.

Dropping his gun to his side, Chanyeol turns on his heels. 'You'll heal,' he snaps, unaffected. 'Maybe.'

As he moves to his chair in the center of the row, he glances at you, compassionless yet somehow imploring. Instantly, you know that he is asking if you can stomach it, if you are brave enough to watch this unfold, if you are willing and ready to join him. You do not speak, nor do you even nod, you simply keep still, unmoved and unafraid.

When Chanyeol takes his seat, the cold one rises to a stand, and you find it odd that it is he who makes you most uncomfortable. He has apologized to you, he did so when he touched your head and made you fall numb. He has never hurt you, not really. Not in a way that cannot be healed or even fully remembered beyond the knowledge that your skin did hurt. Perhaps, you think you fear him most for he is the one who seemingly lacks remorse, eyes empty of all things apart from a hunger for answers and for dearth.

Perhaps, it is in him you see yourself the most.

He moves towards Taeyong with calculated steps, walking with a foreboding sense of doom that makes your lips start to ache from the cold. From his breast pocket, he pulls a knife. It's small, smaller than the knife Yixing keeps hooked to his belt and much smaller than the knife D.O. rests in his lap. The curve of the blade looks made for cutting bungee rope, jagged and piercing and ready to tear at the roughness of wire. Dropping to his knees, he quickly grabs hold of one of Taeyong's feet, his legs bound by the ties to the legs of the chair. Without a single word, he pushes the blade roughly through the flesh of his foot and drags, slicing a long, delicate line from his sole to just above his arch.

Taeyong does not scream as you imagine he would, instead he simply growls, gritting his teeth and grinding them together in an effort to keep himself impassive. Blood drips from the wound, thick and greasy over and between the man's fingers, and onto the floor. Blood drops from his feet and his legs, and, you think, his will to live. His other foot is lifted and the same slice is repeated, this time terribly rough and with the skin pulled harshly enough to flay, exposing the muscle below.

'Where the fuck do you expect me to go?' Taeyong grinds out, attempting and failing to pull his foot out of his captor's hand. With slick skin, he unable to find purchase, thrashing weakly in the chair before falling still, impotent.

With a hiss, the man on his knees presses his fingers deeper in the flesh and bones of Taeyong's ankles, leaking more blood from the wound with the force of his touch. 'That was theory,' he states plainly, voice emotionless. 'Now, we have a contingency plan should you suddenly feel brave.'

Tilting his head to meet Taeyong's eyes, you are startled to see the brilliant ice blue of his irises. He is an avalanche of malcontent, brutal and animalistic, though he does not appear to take pleasure in this act the way you expected him too. All the other generals seem eager, even Chanyeol was pleased with the way his bullet made a man scream. But this man, the curl of his upper lip gives away his displeasure for all of it, for everything Taeyong stands for. He is not happy to simply torture a man, he is happy to erase him from existence. Only then, you think, would he find great happiness with the turn of events.

Placing the knife in his pocket once more, he extends his fingers and gently touches Taeyong's toes, keeping his eyes locked on his face.

'You are little more than a rat to me,' he murmurs softly, as the flesh of his toes turns the gangrenous purple and black of frostbite. As they breathe, the air escapes their parted lips in smoke, the air taking on an intense chill. 'I relish cutting off tails.'

With that, he pushes hard against Taeyong's feet, breaking the bones of his toes with ease. Taeyong groans, and you think it is merely because his threshold for pain has continued to grow.

Rising to his feet, the cold one laughs, icy and low, as he studies Taeyong before turning away. His movement signals another change in the atmosphere, and you read this energy as a beginning. Everything leading to this moment was preliminary - the gunshot and the cuts in his feet are insurance, securing the promises of weakness and ensuring Taeyong will suffer today, even if they deem the discussion must continue another day. Even if his death is metaphorical, the slow shattering of his will shall be enough to carry forward.

Leaning back in his chair, Chanyeol presses the barrel of his gun to his lips, relaxing into the oncoming storm of death as though it gives him wings. Humidity fills the room, moist and damp, and you bring your eyes to the man with pink hair, suppressing a surprised hum at the sight of water dripping in a stream from his fingers. It flows, thick and full, from his hand and down to the floor, making a small river that moves towards Taeyong's feet. This flow of water has a direction, needs no current to dictate its movement, and you know that it is born with a path of intent. As it runs and runs, it pools delicately around the chair, the blood from Taeyong's wounds turning it to a dark burgundy.

When an inch of water has gathered at the chair, Chanyeol drops his gun to his lap, tilting his head back with a sneer and begins to speak.

'How long.' It is neither a question nor a statement, but a demand.

When Chanyeol came to you, announcing he felt he would be betrayed, announcing there was a mole, he made it clear he could not know how long it had gone on. His greatest fear in his admission he might not be doing what was best for his men meant he feared he may be initiating the wrong people, and he no longer knew how to trust the promises of the men he chose to honor. Even as you study him, you see the way this one question haunts him. It does not cause him strife or grief, but it makes him murderous, born not out of fear but of the loss of control.

Taeyong says nothing, merely lets his breath fall in quiet rasps and lets his only sound be the very act of living.

'How long,' Chanyeol repeats, lowering his gaze to eye Taeyong. At the harshness of his tone, you feel like recoiling.

Even with this repetition, he remains silent, and this is when you feel the tangibility of his mistake.

The man you remember wearing a green cloak leans forward, lips curling to an impish and foul grin that makes you feel queasy. Looking at him makes you feel ancient, transported to a time when the sun never set on an empire and the ink of calligraphy on temple walls was still wet. Etched into his bones, his irises, the very stature of his posture is the notion that he was born of war, and so he considers war his home. He is old, as old as Chanyeol and absolutely as powerful, and, with your eyes on him, you can tell he never once bothered to consider control or patience a virtue.

Resting his elbows on his knees, he lets his hands fall gracefully between his lap, fingers long and stretching to their full wingspan. Running his tongue along his teeth, he allows himself to smile, though the action is hardly comforting. At once, the room lights up, igniting in a blinding flash of red and green light that makes Taeyong’s back bow off the chair, burned by the electric shock that makes his skin begin to smoke.

Lightning. It falls from his fingers in irregular patterns just as water comes from the man with pink hair. Together, they are an impenetrable force, incomprehensibly powerful alone but utterly lethal when combined. The water at Taeyong's feet still glimmers with electric sparks as the flash of lightning dies, devastating and magnificent. Flower burns arch over Taeyong's skin, marking him as though a red tattoo has been drawn on him in delicate, uneven strokes. The burn climbs over his neck, up his jaw, to curve over and around his ear. Head fallen back and chest heaving terrible, ragged breaths, Taeyong stars at the ceiling with empty, vacant eyes while the others wait for an answer.

'I will do it again,' the man says, voice rich and clear, somewhat musical in its projection. 'I am not above watching a man burn to death.'

Rolling his head to face the row of generals, Taeyong coughs. 'Nine hundred years.'

Voices, you think, are not meant to sound like this, as though glass has shredded the very nodes that produce the sound. But that is how Taeyong sounds, as though a steel cable has snapped within his chest and the rattle is his only way of communication. As he speaks, you fall back through time, arms falling to your side and hands grasping the air as if trying to take hold. It's incoherent and disorganized, but it feels true, feels as though the time slip is the answer he gives, and now you understand why you were so desperately needed.

When you open your eyes, Chanyeol watches you with worried, imploring eyes, concern for you paling in comparison to his concern for the answer. Holding his stare as though he himself were your very tether, you nod.

At once, Chanyeol turns back to Taeyong, lips pressed in a thin line. 'What was in it for you?'

A laugh brims up from Taeyong's chest and falls over in splinters, the clanging metallic laugh sounding shattered and cold. 'Unprecedented glory.'

Now, it is D.O. who speaks, hard and unforgiving. 'Was this coven not glory enough?'

The sound of his voice makes you hug yourself, unease pressing against you with greedy hands as you remember; his voice brings with it the images of blood spilling from the back of a truck, and the way your ears stung endlessly with the tenor of a bullet. Even with his attention not directed at you, it takes a mighty effort not to back away or demand answers from him, instead. Disdain laces his cadence, an inherent dissatisfaction at the insult that rested behind Taeyong's words. All these men chose to be here, Chanyeol said, made immortal by their free will, and you are pleased he seems to finally understand the agony of a reduction or loss of choice.

'This coven is weak.' Taeyong leans over and splits blood, coughing as he does so. His body quivers, muscles in his back tightening and constricting in an effort to retch all the contents of his stomach, but nothing comes. Turning back to the generals, he snarls. 'Small time deals and crime, when we could be the holy ones.'

Again, a flash of lightning blossoms around the hangar, Taeyong's hands tensing as his fingers attempt to curl into fists.

When the light dies, you are met with the image of Taeyong standing, young and beautiful and soft. Softer than you could ever imagine a man being - but then, that's the thing. For he is not a man, but a boy, and he is delighted by the very length of his life. He reads, reads everything he possibly can, and prefers the colours of his imagination to the colour of reality. On him, laughter comes easily. Through his actions, there is kindness and there is love, every notion of his existence born from the very idea that all things deserve to be nurtured. Here, you think, is a boy who deserves to be loved, loved and worshipped and protected.

The image fades, blurs into a painful, steely nothingness, only to be replaced by the burning of buildings and the burning of bodies. Human flesh smells sour as it burns, and Taeyong covers his nose with disgusted sigh. They will not be missed, and they will not miss with world. Death, he thinks, is a favor.

All at once, you are back in the hangar, and Taeyong's joints have taken on the twitch of someone nearing nerve damage.

'Explain,' comes Chanyeol's even voice, the low cadence somewhat comforting.

The silence in the hangar looms, thick and foreboding, but a headache grows at the center of your mind, searing in its effort to be noticed. Something must be said, and the frustration of not knowing, of being unable to discern the truth, makes your body begin to ache.

It takes Taeyong several seconds to gather the will to speak, but when he does, he does not let his voice quiver with defeat.

'You hide,' he rasps, keeping his eyes trained on Chanyeol, unforgiving. 'Pushed us into the edge of darkness and to the edge of starvation - as though that is the true nature of our power.'

Clapping his hands together, Chanyeol laughs, wicked and unimpressed. 'Do you really expect me to believe that the purpose of this, of all of this, is for something as simple as exposure?'

At this, the man you know to be Sehun rises to a stand, infinitely more regal than you remember him being the first time you saw him. Perhaps, you think, he is learning his War Lord, learning who he is meant to be during battle, learning the other half of his soul. He leans forward, inspecting all the ugly details of the man Taeyong has become, and frowns, disgusted. He stays that way for several moments, simply looking and simply waiting to see what Taeyong will do.

It strikes you that they do not appear to be far in age, physically, though you know they are centuries apart. You wonder if they were friends, if they were companions. Now, for the first time, you wonder how this hurts for the others, and not just Chanyeol, and wonder if they are usually this violent when confronted with betrayal.

Sehun lifts his hand to linger just before Taeyong's lips, his own set in a childish pout. Extending his index finger, he cocks his head to the side before crooking it forward. Immediately, Taeyong begins to choke, suffocating as his eyes go wide in shock. It takes you a moment to remember, remember the wings that were born for Sehun out of air and smoke and wind, and realize that it is not simply the wind he controls, but air itself. Sehun takes the air from his lungs and drinks it, inhales it with a smile as though he has tasted a holy nectar.

Leaning back, he lets his hands rest at his side as Taeyong gasps for breath once more, coughing.

'We are not ignorant men,' Sehun says evenly. 'Please don't turn the act of killing you into a farce over something so infantile.'

'We were fated,' Taeyong calls as Sehun returns to his seat, though his voice has little reach. His breath falls from his lips as helpless whimpers, though he does not ask to be healed. From where you stand, the limpness in his form is worn with honor, pride. He's glad he will die this way and you want to cut the curl of his smile out of his flesh. 'We were written and destined to be powerful. Every single creature kept hidden away has been given a time to come forward. And ours is now.'

'Is that so?' D.O. asks, sounding apathetic and distant.

Tilting his head back, his eyes narrow and you watch in surprise as the legs of the chair Taeyong sits upon begin to bend. In the earth, cracks form, the earth caving and breaking beneath an impossible weight. And this is when you watch Taeyong, the way he closes his eyes and strains to exist as gravity presses against him, the earth seemingly making every effort to cave him inwards. The bones in his chest break, collarbone shattering with a loud crack and rupturing through his flesh from the pressure. It's agonizing to watch, the way the carriage of humanity can splinter if the conditions of living are not exactly right, and you bite the inside of your cheek as the bones in his fingers begin to snap.

And then it's over. He breathes, though it does not come easily. He falls forward, no longer forced into the back of the chair by the very earth itself. His body shakes and shudders, eyes wide with full understanding of the coven's power. It is not, you think, that he underestimated the strength or the unity, merely that he had never received every piece of it at once. Still, he does not break, does not beg. He lifts his gaze to the generals and continues providing his answers, proud of every word he speaks.

'Even the humans know,' he croaks, his words barely audible and you find yourself straining to hear, 'though they choose not to believe. They believe they are the gods, the masters of the universe.'

Crossing his legs, Chanyeol folds his hands in his lap and narrows his eyes. 'And how does Jin Soo plan on doing this?' There's a touch of humour to his voice, as though he were talking to a child and hoping to appease their sense of authority. 'Did he forget his numbers are limited?'

'There is always an army waiting to be found.' These words are clear, all his energy focused on giving them weight and strength. 'War is always waiting, and everyone is hungry for it. All you have to do is invite them.'

You see them, though who exactly it is you cannot quite tell. There are no shapes or details to their features, simply hair that has been coated with blood from hands that has continued to push it back and out of unfocused eyes. They are innumerable, utterly parched and desperate to watch the world burn. Something has been stolen from them, something taken that they valued, or did not know they valued until it was lost. There's a sensuality to the way they ask men and women to die, to the way their hands grip and pull at throats, to the way they laugh as blood cascades down their throats. The end of the world will be sexual - for that is what this is. A great release of all the souls from the earth, to an endless, limitless black, and the rapture will be not be beautiful even though it will be glorious.

This was his gift, the unprecedented glory. An end to all living things, apocalyptic in its reach, and ravenous in its breadth.

Chanyeol nods as though he understands, closes his eyes as Taeyong gags once more and lets a smile spread across his lips. 'I love it when they suffer,' he murmurs to no one but himself. 'I have one last question.'

At this, Yixing rises to approach Taeyong, and you find yourself alarmed. You see him as he has always appeared to you, although now he is the embodiment of harmony. All of his features soft, he runs a delicate hand through Taeyong's hair and touches each ones of the wounds with affection, concerned and sweet and adoring. Taeyong stares up at him and blinks, eyes bleary as he tries to focus on the beauty Yixing carries within every angle of his features. He's soft, resplendent, made of the pure entity of love, and you find yourself wanting to deliver him the world. If he asked, you'd give him everything, for the feeling he delivers you is nothing short of bliss.

This, you know, is the full force of his power, the full height and enormity of it. Along Taeyong's frame, all his wounds seal, the stains and bruises fading. His shattered bones reconnect, closing wounds and piecing themselves back together, as Taeyong sits taller and breathes easier just because Yixing has decided to be near. The colour returns to his cheeks, lips suddenly full and plump. The water at his feet retreats, toes long and pointed - delicate, and you wonder if he too was a dancer like Yixing. As Yixing steps aside, you see Taeyong as he looked in your vision - young, and noble, and positively exquisite.

'Was it worth it?'

Chanyeol's question comes slowly, his voice rich and imploring, though it does not sound antagonistic. He's genuinely curious eager to know if the loss of his life was worth the risk, worth the possibly reward for starting a war. True, there would be nothing specific in it for him, but there is more behind the way Taeyong breathed and answered. He was honest, but he was indirect, and you know his every word will haunt you until you have exposed the very core of his existence.

Without the knives in his throat and the wounds on his skin, Taeyong's voice is a masterpiece. Had you not seen the way he could shift, you would have imagined his gift was glamour.

'Yes,' is his simple reply, and he seems to glow in the truth of it.

And as Taeyong says it, you watch a small smile pull at Yixing's lips. It's hard to reconcile, this Yixing and the one that offered you forgiveness without even receiving your apology. To you, he had always been the vision of honor and duty, the beacon of hope that presided over the coven like an angel of protection. Now, you see your perception of him had been wholly infantile, half-formed at best. When you first met him, he told you he was exactly like the others, and the comfort he provided you lead you to believe he was simply being humble.

Now you see he is every bit as terrible as the others, and even more great in the magnitude of his reach.

Bending down to Taeyong's ear, he lets his lips press feather light touches to the shell as he speaks. 'I just wanted to make sure this would hurt.'

With that, he steps away and moves to his chair, but it is not he that you watch. Every step away hurls Taeyong into a pit of agony, the wounds he had just healed forming back along his skin. In the center of his chest is a bullet wound, your bullet wound, and you realize now that they did not bother to remove the silver. He had been powerless to heal himself, and Yixing, for all his gentleness and kindness, had done the work for him only to take it away. His bones break once more, and, this time, without cracks of lightning of the great maw of the earth bending a chair to distract from the sound, the sounds of his bodily torment are amplified.

Blood drips over and along him, splashing through the air with every scream that is torn ruthlessly from his chest. The burns reform along his skin, flowering and blooming in angry red lines that sear and sizzle. At once, the room smells of blood, piss, and burned flesh. His death is a sensory overload, and it overwhelms you, makes you gag and release a sob of abject horror.

When you open your eyes, you find you are alone in the room, all the coven members and generals having left in the swiftness of Taeyong's great undoing. Glancing from corner to corner, you seek a familiar face and find you are alone with him, the door at the opposite side of the hangar closing shut with a snap.

Immediately you are covered in darkness, a black so thick you think your vision has left you in protest of all that you've seen. Erupting in the center of the black, so bright and blinding it causes you excruciating pain to focus on it, is a single word painted in the air with an elegant script.

HELLO?

As soon as you read the word, it fades, immediately replaced by others.

YOU ARE SUFFERING

This too swiftly fades, and your eyes snap to Taeyong, who watches the words with the same awe as you.

I CAN TAKE THE PAIN AWAY

The brightness of the words illuminate Taeyong's gruesome features, and this is how you know the words are real, not a figment of your imagination or a manifestation of your own discomfort. Taeyong watches the words with greed, scans over them repeatedly as though they are a beacon of hope or an escape route. For a moment, you think he is being saved.

Through the doors in the center of the hangar, directly across from you, a man emerges, bathed in white light. He's holy, the sun carried behind him as a halo. You recognize him as the man you could not see, the one who stood next to Yixing.

Baekhyun, the lightbringer.

With each step he takes into the hangar, the light begins to reshape and illuminate the space, his skin bringing the daylight. Eyes adjusting, you can finally see him clearly, see the sweetness and generosity that swims in his irses. The curvature of his lips carries a soft, concerned smile, and he regards Taeyong with an empathy you have not seen since you arrived in the coven. Baekhyun, you think, is easy to love. Like Yixing, you want to trust him, but it is because you want to love him. Where Yixing made you feel comforted, Baekhyun made you feel safe, and so you think you have found yet another pair.

Leaning in front of Taeyong, he runs his hands through his hair, pushing it from his eyes and tilts his face upwards. Taeyong regards him as though he were God, and, in the delirium of pain, you imagine he could be.

You imagine that he is.

'I can make it all go away,' Baekhyun says, gently. He's gentle. He's gentle and he's beautiful, and he is so incomprehensibly horrible. 'I can bring you to glory.'

Taeyong leans his head into Baekhyun's palm, sobbing. You aren't sure what made his break like this, though you imagine it was Yixing. Nothing, you know, hurts quite as much as the offering of comfort and serenity and hope, only to have it ripped away.

Baekhyun simply nods, pulling away from Taeyong with an even, sweet smile.

'Not long now,' he says, before thrusting a bag over Taeyong's head.

With his head covered, all the light in the room dies as Taeyong screams in fury. Baekhyun's face morphs, drops immediately to one of impartial apathy as he moves behind the chair, and grips it to drag it towards the door. He walks with confident strides, strong and forceful, moving Taeyong with him as though he were weightless. With his free hand, he pushes through the doors, smiling as he greets the sun, though there is loneliness tucked into the crevices of his lips.

Outside, Taeyong continues to scream, even as Baekhyun lets go of the chair when he reaches the center of an empty field.

It takes merely seconds.

Baekhyun lets go of the chair, and walks towards you. He sees you, you think, much the same you see him: without seeing, looking through and beyond as though you are not there at all. Behind him, Taeyong screams.

He screams, and he burns, body consumed in flames.

#chanyeol x reader #kpopwonderlandtag #kwriterskollection #noonanet #park chanyeol x reader #chanyeol scenario #exo scenario #chanyeol au #vampire au #chanyeol fanfic #chanyeol fanfiction #exo au #exo fanfiction #park chanyeol #exo ff #exo fanfic

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dylanjonferguson-blog · 5 years

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S01E07: “Target For Terror”: Dichromatism

Our misty, videotaped dreams of the un-human Hobo as an actor of radical freedom may have been premature, if not delusional. The dog's narrow focus on interpersonal justice leaves no room for ideology, politics, or other forest-over-trees considerations. “Target For Terror,” the seventh episode of TLH, is a mix of menace, moral clarity, and naiveté that mimics a dog’s worldview, but draws uneasy parallels with our own.

The fairly fantastic characters of “Target For Terror” literally leap from the headlines. The first thing we see is the bold, 72-point pronouncement at the top of a broadsheet, filling the screen: "TERRORISTS MAKE MORE DEMANDS." The unidentified newspaper reader then folds down the page, which, like an upside-down opera curtain, has the effect of revealing our human hero. Paul Hamilton – young man, snub-nose, Lego-hair, jacket-collar popped, flared pants swishing – is striding confidently into a train station. Following closely behind are two sketchy characters, who we immediately surmise are the terrorists. It is as if the dramatic headline conjured these players, or as if we have passed through the headline, into the world of ALL-CAPS anxiety, entering the fear-soaked deathscape of broadsheet news.

Briefly now, let’s jump ahead to an almost unaccountably strange moment that occurs halfway through the episode. One terrorist walks in on the other, who is perusing a thick paperback, and tells him to “Stop reading that junk!" Why were we invited to this moment? The title of the book, unfortunately can't be glimpsed. The only part of the cover we can see in an element in the lower left-hand corner: a swastika! Is it a book about Nazism? Are we being told that the terrorists are Nazis? Or that they're anti-fascists who consider Nazism "junk"? Perhaps it's a red herring to focus on that graphic detail. But surely there's a reason the one terrorist is chastised for reading a book.

I think it has to do with the newspaper headline at the start, which introduced our setting as a reductive and fearful world. Being in the world of a panicked newspaper means rejecting the world of books, which would include depths of context and greater stores of information, reasoning, empathy. Even the terrorists reject any intrusion from that world, which is foreign to the territory of the tale.

A dog must naturally see the world as tense and simple, but we are coached that way by broadsheet profiteers. And those who manipulate their message.

Paul Hamilton is a kind and rich fellow. The terrorists want to kill or capture him as part of an obscure plot to get at the boy's grandfather, Chief Justice Hamilton, played by John Carradine. Carradine, very old at this point, sometimes struggles with his delivery, but still has a large, theatrical presence, and beautifully gnarled, expressive hands that cling to fine lapels in his opulent office, which is replete with mahogany furnishings and a deep, patterned carpet that no doubt hides expensive Cuban ash. The camera films that office with a certain staid reverence: we’re not to scoff at this man, we’re to see his perspective as right and proper. The terrorists, in comparison, have weird, strained faces, natty clothes, and awkwardly-carved facial hair (one is played by the great Cronenberg regular Geva Kovacs). The dog – named Nick, this time around – saves Paul in the train station, but Chief Justice Hamilton warns his grandson that the rugged schemers are still out there. Now that the terrorists have spooked their prey, they take another line of attack. By successfully kidnapping Paul’s fiancée, Pam, they force the groom-to-be to come out to a remote hotel in the country, where he too is kidnapped.

“We have a cause,” the terrorist tells Paul, warning him not to try any funny stuff. “We live for it, and we’re willing to die for it.” But what this cause might be is, glaringly, never even hinted at.

In the 1988 Lockerbie bombing, US intelligence officials initially concluded that Syria was behind the attack, as retaliation for America’s downing of an Iranian passenger jet earlier that year. President Reagan, however, shifted the blame to Libya’s President Gaddafi, who was a more convenient villain (and happy to play along, to boost his anti-American cred). The U.S. president-cum-actor even participated in the creation of a neo-conservative conspiracy theory that had Gaddafi and Carlos the Jackal heading a deranged hit-squad hellbent on assassinating Reagan. A similar form of narrative alchemy happened in the weeks after the 9/11 attacks, when the Bush administration shifted the story to point blame at the unconnected Saddam Hussein, even though almost all the attackers were Saudis. The point is that American government ideologues seem to kind of like terrorists because, unlike a state army, their origins and motives often seem unclear, and so can be manipulated in the public mind. Obviously, anyone willing to kill and die for a cause has strong beliefs, but American governments would rather obscure the meaning, or even existence, of a cause. We can all remember George W. Bush nonsensically asserting that the terrorists simply “hate our freedoms.”

This matters, because our films tend to reflect, intentionally or not, the false storylines being peddled. At the height of the Bush-era terrorism panic, The Dark Knight was released, starring a Bush/Blair-style Batman battling an anti-ideology lunatic who just wanted to “watch the world burn.” Why? Oh, no reason. Terrorists, we’ve been counterintuitively led to believe by state propaganda, don’t really need a reason. Apparently they just want to fuck shit up (or “maximize chaos” to use the ridiculous description of Nazi motives peddled by Jordan Peterson). It’s clear why we’re fed this lie. Obfuscating the position and ultimate aims of the terrorists makes their actions seem mad, and any opposing actions seem justified.

With both Pam and Paul captive to the villains, it’s up to the dog Nick to save them. And here we’re introduced to the episode’s most sympathetic character: Osborne, the meek, bespectacled man who runs the dilapidated country inn where the criminal action is happening. Unlike Paul, Osborne is not aligned with state ideology; he’s motivated by narrow, everyday concerns, like ensuring no dogs loiter on his property. We’re clearly meant to identify with Osborne: when Nick sprays the hotelier with a water hose, to get his attention, the water is first sprayed directly on the camera lens, at us.

Nick rouses the non-ideologic self-interested character to the defense of one political side. However, he does this not by appealing to ideology, but by threatening the comfort of the passive actor. This is reminiscent of how the newspaper is always declaring our comfort to be under threat. The sleight is possible, since the terrorists’ positions have been strategically re-written so that it appears that threatening stability is a goal unto itself, rather than a means to an end.

The Hobo is of course not actually acting in defense of state ideology, but his narrow focus on context-free morality (and waking up the non-ideological actor with his moral concerns) can be exploited to that end.

The dog comes from a third world, not of power or of resistance, but the world of the woods. Among the trees, living as an animal, there are only immediate concerns, so of course he can’t see the greater context of his actions. But at times, this can also be an advantage, for him. When the terrorists chase Nick, he leads them off into the trees, and there they become hopelessly lost. In the woods, among individual trunks, their ideology can't follow, so they're easily duped.

Osborne has a “No Dogs Allowed” sign on his property. By forbidding dogs, Osborne wishes to keep the wildness of apolitical moral action at bay (the forest, after all, is cut down a safe distance from his beloved lawn). And yet, even though he appears unaligned, Osborne’s cherished obsession with self-concern is policed by the channels and apparatuses of the state (which are nourished by a particular ideology, though he doesn't see it).

The wildness of the dog's morality runs outside of these channels. And yet, it is the dog, the apparently-radical actor, that draws Osborne's actions to a political side, for it is a roused Osborne who eventually unties and frees the kidnapped couple.

Here we see the dangers of radical actions being co-opted to state ends, if the actions don't have their own, competing ideological compass.

This is why Osborne changes his sign at the end, crossing out the “No,” so it says simply “Dogs Allowed.” Since the moral-ideological motivation of the terrorists has been successfully hidden from him, and his own morality has been manipulated to be indistinguishable from self-interest, he is now able to see morality, state ideology, and his own comfort as compatible, and indeed mutually-reinforcing.

The freed Paul Hamilton says he wants to make the dog his “best man.” Nick has been granted humanity because he is perceived to have collaborated with the correct (state) ideology.

The Hobo naturally flees this.

2 stars

#dogs #thelittlesthobo #littlesthobo #canadiantv #terrorism #vintagetv #politics

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evanismfic · 6 years

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half - agony. chapter one.

第一章 . BACOPA ( 假馬齒莧 )

summary: when you last set foot inside the palace seven years ago, your heart was shattered into a thousand pieces. now, after the dowager empress’s death, you find that you still cannot even dare to hope.

pairing: yanjun x f!reader

genre: historical, royals au

word count: 6855

a/n: please expect a lot of artistic license in terms of historical accuracy and medicine i am neither a doctor nor an expert on the song dynasty :’)

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YOU HAD ALL THE MAKINGS of a rags-to-riches story.

Born a month and a day before the summer solstice, the town shaman told your father –– a man of science who made this augury his one exception –– that you would bring great change. As you grew older, her prediction became less and less likely. Your father once muttered that he should’ve known better than to put stock in “that hogwash.”

Your family was poor, relying on both your parents to make ends meet. Your mother died not long after you were born, leaving you in the care of your father. He was well-meaning but lacked the emotional competence to navigate raising a child, precocious as you were, alone. More instructional than nurturing, you grew to maturity spending half of your life helping him in his shop. Your father was confident that you would follow in his footsteps and become a healer. That was his anchor.

You spent the other half of your childhood frolicking by the stream on the outskirts of town. In those nearby woods dwelled the boy you loved. You first met him when you were but four years old, washing bloodied linens from an operation the day before. He peered at you from between the trees. When you first noticed him, he fled.

There are a great many places where your life would’ve been better had things just ended there. This was one of them.

But the boy came back a week later.

Bolder, he came to a stop beside you and asked what you were doing. Your father told you once never to speak to strangers. He also saw no problem, however, allowing a small child to travel all the way across town to do laundry, so you can somewhat blame him for your lack of prudence. You can still remember the boy –– “Yanjun,” he introduced himself, chest puffed outward in pride –– and his tone. Painfully posh, he didn’t hold a lick of the drawl you became accustomed to from your small town. He spoke like the people from the capital, and you were instantly entranced. You had never met a child from Lin’an before. You decided you liked Yanjun very much. If your father noticed that you stayed out longer to play with the boy by the river, he never commented on it. After all, he was just a child. It took you six years to find out who Yanjun really was.

Given that he only spent summers in the so-named palace –– a sprawling villa on the hill that overlooked your hometown –– you hadn’t really known him for all that long. For roughly three months of every year, the two of you (Yanjun, mostly) would get in as much trouble as you possibly could. From playing in the river to snatching low-hanging apples from a nearby (privately owned) orchard, the two of you were nearly inseparable. On the days where Yanjun didn’t come to play, you were miserable. And it wasn’t until your tenth year that you learned just why he was sometimes nowhere to be found.

It had been twenty-four days since you two last met before your father was summoned to the Summer Palace. He brought you along on a whim, not knowing how long he would be gone and reluctant to leave you in the care of your gossipy neighbors. He did not expect your gasp of recognition when you laid eyes on the frightfully pale Crown Prince lying in his bed. His younger brother Chaoze sat by his side and shook him awake. When your eyes met, you felt your stomach drop.

You had spent your summers for the past six years befriending the future Emperor. And his illness, a cold from too many hours spent in the stream, was your fault. Perhaps this was when his mother started to hate you.

You thought that compromising his health would have you forbidden from ever seeing him again, but he sought you out the moment he recovered. He told you that he never meant to lie to you –– and he didn’t, really, only by omission –– and that nothing had changed. “I hope we can still be friends,” Yanjun said, earnestly taking your hand.

But things had changed, although you couldn’t be sure if it was for better or for worse.

When puberty hit, things only got more confusing.

In your current opinion, at all of twenty-five years old, it’s when everything started to go downhill.

You always liked Yanjun. He was funny, smart, and cultured. He would tell you about Lin’an and, after you discovered his identity, he would relay funny anecdotes about his tutors and the goings on of the Imperial Court. As he got older and his voice deepened, he suddenly became more interesting to listen to. And while Yanjun had always been good looking, he was especially handsome when the baby fat left his face and granted him those killer cheekbones portraits still fail to replicate. In a year, you had begun staring at his plump lips more and more.

You didn’t miss the way he’d been looking at you too.

He first held your hand when you were thirteen, shyly brushing his thumb across your knuckles, and you pressed your lips to his cheek in return. He kissed you on the lips at fifteen, and you told him that you loved him the next year. At eighteen, his father died, and you held him in your arms as he cried. A week later, his mother declared that Yanjun needed to marry in order to inherit the throne, and he asked you to come back with him to Lin’an.

Saying yes was one of the worst decisions you ever made.

Somehow, you’re back here seven years later, staring at the palace gates as your luggage is wheeled in behind you. Your father had succumbed to cancer just as spring began to wane into summer, so you have nothing keeping you in Changqi. Not long after his death, you received a letter with the imperial seal requesting that you take on the now vacant role of the royal doctor, as well as requesting that you work on a cure for one of the nation’s deadliest plagues. Imperial patronage was a stunning offer few could even dare to deny. But you still have to wonder why you would return when you had tried so hard to run away after a short five months within the palace walls.

The answer is rather simple: because Yanjun asked you to.

On a broader scale, it was easier to provide excuses. No one in their right mind refuses the Emperor. There is a vacancy in the staff. The Court is in need of a healer, and you earned yourself quite the reputation for your innovative herbal remedies. Only the best of the best can serve the Emperor, and you more than enough deserve that title. It has nothing to do with the fact that Yanjun once loved you and that you loved him just as much.

That time is long gone, and nothing displays that more than how much the palace has changed since you left it.

It’s certainly livelier, more colorful than it was when you departed. Having come when it was in a period of mourning, though, that is to be expected. Observing servants as they move pots and crates around, you presume Yanjun is doing a bit of remodeling as well. It’s a bold choice for an emperor whose nation is currently at war.

“There’s no view quite as magnificent is there?” Honglin, the page sent to fetch and safely deliver you to the palace, hands the reigns of his steed over to a stable boy. The fortnight of travel didn’t afford you an extraordinarily close friendship with the young man, but he was currently the only friend you had in Lin’an. You know that he is mixed, his father being a Jurchen defector and his mother a Han woman. Honglin is incredibly proud of his heritage, bearing a zealousness you find endearing. That’s about all that you know about him. “I came here with my father when I was seven and I’m still in awe every time I return.”

You don’t have the heart to tell him that you have very few memories of the palace to look fondly upon. You smile instead. “Indeed. It’s a testament to our great nation.”

Honglin seems pleased by your response. He gestures toward the Western Wing, which houses most of the residences of the staff. You’re surprised that your brain has retained that information, considering how you tried to forget everything that you could. “I’ll direct you to your rooms, let you get settled in before I bring you to meet His Majesty. Would you like me to do anything with your supplies?”

“No,” you say, shaking your head and following Honglin as he starts down the palace’s winding halls. “Just leave them in their crates in the infirmary. I’ll organize them myself tomorrow.”

“As you wish.”

Honglin deposits you in front of a bedchamber only marginally smaller than the one from nearly a decade ago. How interesting it is that the quarters of the presumed future empress were roughly the same size as the royal healer’s –– or, rather, how interesting it was that the Dowager Empress thought to give her successor such lackluster accommodations. Both rooms are just as lifeless and empty. Only a desk, a table with which you could receive visitors and dine, a bed, and one of the trunks containing your clothing served as furnishing. They couldn’t even afford you a wardrobe. Honglin chirps that he’ll be around and that you only need to holler for him to come running. He leaves you to decompress, and you collapse on your bed the moment he shuts the doors behind him.

You don’t plan to lay there longer than twenty minutes, but you’re exhausted. You know that coming to Lin’an was for a good cause. Aside from the honor of being the royal family’s sole physician, imperial support allowed your research to flourish. The royal summons didn’t mention how much of it Yanjun was willing to finance, only that he would give as much as it took to eradicate tianxing illness. You also knew that anything was better than your lack of funds back at home.

You wonder if the ladies of the court are still here. At least one of your tormentors is gone. Though you feel terrible for being relieved that the Dowager Empress is dead, you still find yourself consoled by the fact that you don’t have to deal with her. You’re terrible, and you have to force yourself to fight the instinct. Horrible to you she might have been, she was still Yanjun’s mother and is apparently the current reason you are employed by the court. Your hopes that the volatile atmosphere of the palace had vanished were dashed by the rumor that your predecessor killed himself for failing to cure the Dowager Empress of her ailment. Is Yanjun really that foul-tempered now? Perhaps this is what his mother was trying to save you from.

“This is no place for a commoner,” she had said when Yanjun first announced his intention to take you to wife. You wanted to protest at first. You loved Yanjun and Yanjun loved you –– surely such a fairytale romance would triumph over all else, wouldn’t it? You weren’t in control of the circumstances of your birth. It wasn’t like you chose to be born beneath Yanjun’s station. You were naïve to think that the strength of your character would prove you worthy of the role of empress, particularly because you weren’t as strong as you thought.

You could stand ridicule from one person. Yanjun, young and headstrong, had a rebellious streak that reinforced his insistence that you disregard his mother’s protests, that you two were soulmates and nothing could come between that. However, you weren’t prepared for the near-ubiquitous vitriol and abuse sent your way. You expected jealousy. You weren’t a fool. The Crown Prince was going to be sought after no matter who he was. To marry the future emperor was the easiest way to secure one’s future. In some respects, you could understand the utter incredulity that a random girl from the country managed to snatch Yanjun away from the noblewomen who knew him all their lives. That didn’t justify their cruel words, though. Of how you didn’t belong, of how Yanjun deserved someone of higher status who wouldn’t pollute the royal bloodline. Of how he was making a terrible mistake by choosing you and how he would come to regret this decision for the rest of his life. Of how you would be an unfit mother to his children, passing on both stupidity and inferiority to his heirs.

You thought yourself a strong girl. But there was only so much even the strongest could take.

At least now, you’re not a threat. You don’t mean anything to Yanjun anymore. They have no reason to snap at you, broad as his harem is.

You spend so long in your miserable reminiscence that you don’t realize how much time has passed. Honglin has to knock on your door and snap you out of your self-pity. “Just a moment!” you shout, scrambling to your trunk and throwing on your nicest gown. You comb your hair as quickly as you can and hope that minimal makeup will be enough. Honglin smiles and tells you that you look nice when you open the door. You slip your hand into the crook of his elbow when he offers his arm, taking a deep breath.

Chuckling, Honglin begins to guide you toward the Great Hall. “You don’t need to look so nervous,” he tells you, patting your hand gently. “His Majesty isn’t going to rip your head off for being late. His meeting with the Ministers of Defense ran a little long, so I doubt he’s noticed anyway. Between them and the men of the Inner Court, I’d be surprised if he actually gets a word in beyond granting or denying their absurd requests.”

“Is he really so busy?”

“Oh, of course. The nation is on the brink of war at all times, miss, no matter what harebrained but effective schemes General Cai has up his sleeve. Invasion is a constant possibility. The Jurchens simply refuse to let up.”

You pretend to know what he’s talking about. “Right.”

“Well, whatever the case, I’m glad we have Yanjun leading us. With him, I feel as though victory is just around the corner.”

“I see,” you murmur. You hadn’t thought much of public opinion on the current administration. Politics were less your forte. You simply followed your moral compass, bureaucracy be damned. Honglin might be a little biased, but you still find yourself fascinated by the open admiration in his tone. It seems Yanjun is the great leader you always thought he’d be, bringing to life the praise you’d whisper to him late at night as he laid his head in your lap and voiced his doubts. “You think very highly of him.”

“He deserves it.” Those three words settle the matter.

After what seems like an eternity navigating the palace’s endless corridors, Honglin stops in front of the large crimson doors of the Great Hall. Covered in gold decorations, it’s even more ornate than you remember. The phoenixes and floral imagery are new, somewhat clashing with the preexisting spiraling dragons and flamboyant clouds. Somehow, though, the doors seem smaller than you remember them last. Perhaps you’re no longer as intimidated by them and the secrets they hold. You know what type of vipers dwell within. There’s only the one on the dais that you’re still apprehensive of. There is still the slight chance that Yanjun is still as harmless as a garter snake. In your infinite maturity, though, you know better than to hope.

“Are you ready?” Honglin asks. You don’t give yourself room to hesitate. At your nod, he smiles encouragingly and pushes the great doors open. Voice booming, he calls out your presence. “This humble servant presents the new imperial healer to His Majesty the Emperor, Son of Heaven and Ruler of the Earth, He of Ten Thousand Years.” Bent at the waist, he shuffles forward. You follow him, head bowed and hands folded in your sleeves.

Yanjun says your name when he tells you to rise. As you obey, you force yourself to suppress a shudder. If even such a short vocalization can send shivers down your spine, you can’t imagine what a full sentence will be like. “Look at us,” Yanjun says. A rustle of silk indicates he beckoned you with a finger. You raise your head to fully look at Yanjun –– Emperor Qiànzо̄ng, you remind yourself –– for the first time in seven years.

He’s just as beautiful as he was back then. No longer boyish, he’s replaced that youthful charm with a regal and dignified demeanor. His hair is longer and spills over his shoulders, flesh paler presumably from years indoors. He waves at you almost teasingly, fingers still slim and pretty. It’s a wonder he can still move with the heaps of fabric atop him. He’s always been scrawny, but you see that he’s filled out his robes. The rich silks are adorned with golden embroidery depicting his family crest, the Phoenix –– so, it was his addition to the doors after all –– along with, you notice on his sleeves, tangerine and citrus trees. To reflect the flourishing growth brought about by his reign, you suppose. He truly is an emperor now.

“It’s good to have you back,” Yanjun says. For all the refinement in his dress, he still slouches a little, shoulders raised as he cants a hip to the side –– the way he used to when the two of you were still kids. He’s twenty-five now. Handsome as ever. Voice still rich and soft and tender when addressing you. One would think that his father-in-law isn’t standing less than a foot from him. For all your avoidance of all things imperial, you can remember the beady eyes of Lady Pingting’s father easily. The emperor’s Right Hand eyes you with obvious distaste, sleeve already raised to his mouth as if he is mere seconds away from whispering disparaging comments about you into Yanjun’s ear. You have no doubt that he will as soon as you are out of sight. Seven years have brought very little change to Lin’an.

In the wake of your silence, the emperor looks at you expectantly. You have to remind yourself that this isn’t the little boy who used to fish your ribbons out of the river for you, who would stand on his tiptoes to pick the ripest fruits to share. You doubt he is still the same man that you loved. He is a man of power, now. He is atop the world’s finest nation. He is expected to lead it in war, to reclaim the lost North. “This humble servant thanks the crown,” you tell him, lowering yourself to your knees. Gripping the insides of your sleeves so tightly you dig crescents into the fabric, you bow once more and press your forehead into the velvet carpet so hard you think it may leave marks. “It is an honor to serve the great Dragon Emperor.” When you dare to meet Yanjun’s eyes, his mouth is drawn into a tight line. Perhaps that was the wrong thing to say.

For a long, tense minute, neither of you speak. Honglin looks nervous on your behalf

Yanjun’s gaze switches to something akin to… disappointment. Something else you can’t name flutters in your stomach. You’ve felt it before when looking at him, you just refuse to acknowledge it as affection. You like Yanjun. But you don’t love him anymore. You can’t. So, while you can care and fret over why he seems disappointed in you, you are not allowed to bend over backward to try and please him. That’s not your job anymore, assuming it ever was.

The emperor clears his throat, snapping you back into reality. “How do you feel, coming back to the capital after all this time?” He pauses. “We’re sure you must’ve had some reservations, clean and… succinct as your parting was.”

If you were more naïve, you might dare to presume that there’s a hint of regret in his tone. Yanjun as a prince was sentimental. Soft. As an emperor, he is not allowed to have such unnecessary inclinations. And you, though not quite the commoner girl you once were, are still light years beneath him. You are a healer, not the daughter of a nobleman or a foreign princess or his empress. You have a place –– one that is not with him. “Not at all,” you say, feigning ignorance to the way he leans forward in interest. “Whatever my previous feelings for the palace were, I have grown in the past seven years. And I would be foolish to disregard a royal summons. I thank Your Majesty for your generous offer. I know that with imperial support, I will be able to complete my research and create a better standard of living for our people. Improving the health of our citizens is my greatest priority and I am grateful that Your Majesty has deigned to allot such a great sum to such a wonderful cause.”

You’re suddenly made aware of the dozens of pairs of eyes on you. Though the throne beside Yanjun is empty, his many advisors are all around him, among other members of his staff like scribes and entertainers. To say nothing, as well, of the diplomats and bureaucrats from afar. How many of them know who you are and what you once meant to him? How many are willing to use that and this lackluster reception against you?

Yanjun blinks. “We… see.” He opens his mouth to speak further, but his Right Hand cuts him off as the old man lunges forward to whisper in his ear. Nodding, Yanjun waves him back with an arm. “We are terribly sorry to curtail this… long-awaited reunion, but we have some business to take care of.” Glancing at Honglin, Yanjun dips his head. “If you would be so kind as to escort the lady healer back to her quarters. General Zhu and his retinue will be here shortly.”

And just like that, you are dismissed and his attention is elsewhere. You and Honglin bow before you depart, but Yanjun hardly seems to notice as he unfurls a scroll in his lap and listens to the rambling of his ministers. It’s probably for the best.

When the doors of the Great Hall shut behind him completely, Honglin throws you a smile. “That wasn’t so terrible, was it? He’s still fond of you!” It seems he does remember you were betrothed to the emperor. Prior to this, he hadn’t mentioned anything of the sort. Maybe his memory was jogged by Yanjun’s words. Regardless, you appreciate the attempt at levity. “I told you he’s a good man. You had nothing to be worried about.”

He’s right, in a way. You didn’t know why you were so worked up over a conversation that took less than ten minutes. What were you expecting? For Yanjun to beg you to love him again, for him to confront you over breaking his heart? Clearly, it wasn’t very broken in the first place, considering the fact that he married Pingting not long after you left and gained a reputation of being something of a womanizer. Not that anyone would ever accuse an emperor of debauchery to his face.

“Would you like to go back to your room, or are there other matters you would like to take care of?”

“Actually,” you say, “do you mind taking me to the infirmary? I think I’d like to begin unpacking.” It’d take your mind off of things, at the very least. And you’d like to get your practice off the ground as soon as possible. Momentarily forgetting about Yanjun is just a bonus.

Honglin eyes your robes with an arched brow, but when you look at him expectantly, he shrugs and grins. “As you wish. Follow me!”

By the time you’re finished with unpacking most of your surgical equipment and organizing your anesthetics, you are sweaty, your hair has come undone, and your arms are sore. Just thinking about having to put away everything else has you sighing in exhaustion. You’re only about halfway done, and remembering that you still have to take inventory of all of your herbs makes you want to quit even before you’ve started, but you grit your teeth and decide to have everything finished by the next evening. The sun has long since set, and the palace has fallen into relative silence. Having removed your shirt jacket for ease of movement, you have to slink back to your rooms with it draped over your shoulders, hoping no one sees you in a state of moderate undress. You breathe a sigh of relief as you successfully make it back to your room without being spotted. Only to scream –– thankfully short and quiet enough not to cause a large commotion –– when you see the scene laid out before you, of course.

Lin Yanjun and an extravagant dinner are at your table, and he looks moderately amused by the sight of your surprise and messy attire. His mother ambushed you similarly seven years ago, but you were wearing more clothes then. You doubt he is aware of how much he takes after her. “Sit,” Yanjun says, sounding more like he’s suggesting rather than ordering. “I wanted to speak with you in a less ostentatious setting.”

And the candles, golden cutlery, and huge roast duck definitely serve to create a more minimalist, humble atmosphere.

Biting back the quip, you do as he says and take a seat across from him. When you dined with his mother (whom you can see in him so clearly with the way the shadows dance across his face), you were expecting an apology. She did a good job of maintaining the impression of civil conversation, though its content was anything but civil.

Without a hint of aggression, she told you, “You must know that you are no good for him.”

You tried to protest, only to get plowed over.

“Look at it this way,” the Dowager Empress had said. You still remember her words and the way her hair decorations clacked as she moved clear as day. “You are doing my son no favors. You may operate under the idealistic belief that true love will conquer all, but I must remind you, young one, that Yanjun will become the leader of a country in the real world. A country at war, constantly being attacked by our enemies to the north. He will reclaim the North and drive the Jurchens out once and for all. What he needs is someone who will provide him with the most aid in his endeavors. What could you possibly offer him that he could not find elsewhere?”

At the time, you weren’t able to speak, tongue stuck to the roof of your mouth. You never needed to challenge such a great authority before. The Dowager Empress took advantage of that.

“Money? Connections? Are you a tactician of any sort?” You had no response. She was right. Yanjun was meant for greater things. And while you thought you’d be with him every step of the way, you knew that it wasn’t practical for him. Lady Yun, whose father was the second largest landowner in the entire country, or perhaps Lady Likun, whose father and brother were prominent figures in the military and who was a capable strategist in her own right, were better matches. He ended up choosing Lady Pingting, the daughter of a high-ranking official in the Ministry of Defense, so Yanjun evidently took his mother’s wishes to heart. What did you have to offer him besides your love? “You are a commoner, my girl. He will be an emperor. Surely you see something wrong with this picture, yes? You may believe that the two of you are in love, but that is only because you don’t know any better. The universe has an order and it will always right itself. This is a lesson you would do well to learn now.

“This is what is going to happen,” said the Dowager Empress then, so sure that she could tell the future. “You are going to tell Yanjun that you no longer wish to marry him. You will then pack your meager belongings and return to Changqi. You will remember your place, and you will never speak of or to him again.”

As it turned out, the old bitch was a prophet.

Except here you are, sitting in front of Yanjun as he places a leg of duck in your bowl. It’s something a husband would do. Is this the universe righting itself? No, it can’t be. You remain frozen, hands in your lap. “Why?” You thought you could do this. That you could speak to him again without wanting to flee. It should be easier without all those eyes on you, but it isn’t.

“Is it wrong of me to wish to speak to an old friend?” He arches a brow and smiles at you. It isn’t pleasant. He looks every bit like the shark his mother was when she last spoke to you. He looks like he’s just waiting for you to spill blood so he can strike. “We are still friends, are we not?”

You don’t respond. The question hangs awkwardly in the air as you turn instead to eat. Perhaps it’s petty of you, but you’ve learned to pick and choose your battles. Professing any affection for him would do you no good, especially when taking into consideration the people who could hear you but who you couldn’t see. “And I suppose you thought you were doing me favors by coming to my quarters?” He blinks in surprise as you speak after sipping some broth. It’s remarkably easier to speak to Yanjun when you think of his mother at the same time, of how he’s no longer the lovesick boy that you knew –– of how he might not have your best interests at heart anymore. “There are eyes and ears around the palace and you thought that coming to my bedchambers alone was the best course of action. I see.”

Yanjun laughs then, releasing a rather cavalier scoff. “My apologies, I didn’t think ––”

“Clearly.”

His chuckle cuts off abruptly. “I was hoping we could be civil.” Clearing his throat, Yanjun returns to his meal. Each movement –– even to raise his chopsticks to his mouth –– is practiced and sharp. Though it is only dinner, and a private one at that, Yanjun still can’t relax. You feel a little bad for snapping at him. The last seven years probably haven’t been very good to him. He had to have been forced to grow a thicker skin. Scales, if you will. The bags under his eyes say as much, anyway.

The two of you eat in silence, as you don’t dare to speak lest he turn your cold attitude against you. You had often imagined what it would be like to share meals as husband and wife. What it might be like to sit beside him in the grand hall, reaching over to add some vegetables to his rice and as he ladles you soup. How domestic it might have been. How useless these fantasies were. The Dowager Empress was right. At the time, you were a frivolous, naïve girl in love with the idea of love. Now, you are not. You’ve grown, and you’ve grown beyond him. The two of you were better off without each other. This isn’t you finding your way back to each other, or whatever drivel your eighteen year-old self would’ve come up with.

This is not the universe correcting its course.

But still, you have to wonder.

“Why me?”

The two words startle Yanjun out of his apparently length and intense internal monologue. From the harsh way he was staring at the plates in front of him, you thought he was trying to consume them with sheer willpower and ocular strength alone. He looks up at you and raises a brow. “I beg your pardon?”

“Out of all the doctors in the Middle Empire, out of every physician, every healer, every master of the art of medicine, why did you choose to extend this position to me?” There are plenty of people more famous than you, renowned across the nation for their prowess and advancement in the field. While you had garnered a bit of popularity (and something of an ego) for your improvements of herbal medicine, you still had doubts that these accomplishments alone warranted your sudden and enormous rise in status. “I highly doubt it’s because we are friends. If you’ll forgive me for the rudeness of the accusation, I believe you may have some ulterior motives.”

It isn’t something you would have suggested of him before. At least, not out loud. Yanjun was shrewd and playful, but such an important position, one that held the entire palace’s health in its hands, was not one to be taken so lightly. Nepotism had no place when life and death were involved, and you always thought that he knew better than to place personal preference over effectiveness. But you hardly know him anymore. So much of him is physically familiar. The details, however, are too dissimilar not to notice.

His relative reticence, the almost sleepy way he blinks, head occasionally dropping and his chin staying tucked against his clavicle as if he doesn’t want to lift it back up. The calluses on his fingers from hours of holding a brush. The wry curl of his lips resembling something like guilt. Like you’ve sniffed him out. The light dusting of pink across his cheeks, either from the wine he’s been indulging in intermittently throughout the night or embarrassment. Surprise, given that you never thought to challenge him like this before.

So, you were right. He was hiding something. Maybe you know him better than you think.

“That is a rather abrasive way to phrase your concerns,” Yanjun says mildly, “but I will forgive you for your tone.” He folds his hands in his lap. “The simple truth is that I needed someone I could trust implicitly. Although I had my doubts that you would be able to hold up under the pressure, there are very few people I trust to make sure that my family and friends and allies are healthy.”

You swallow roughly. The pressure. Right. When you told him you no longer wished to marry him, you cited pressure as the deciding factor in your departure. Of course, he’d remember.

“Nevertheless, you are correct. I owe you the truth. I am well aware of what was written on the summons. None of it is particularly untrue. I fully expect you to conduct research to combat the tianxing plague in Guilin. But that isn’t all I wanted to ask of you. I suppose that, upon reflection, my apprehensions no longer seem very reasonable. And, as such, I no longer see the point in hiding anything from you. Are you aware of what happened to your predecessor?”

“Only that he leapt into a river not long after your mother’s death.” You decide to keep your conspiracy theories to yourself.

“You were not informed of why?”

You shake your head. You wish he would just get to the point, though he’s had a history of being superfluous in his storytelling.

“The official narrative we passed along to the palace staff is that he feared punishment for failing me because he was unable to prevent my mother’s death. She had an ailment of the liver and suffered a painful death. It would not be surprising to hear that he feared retribution from the crown.” Would it? You didn’t think he was that kind of man. But people change. Yanjun leans in and your traitorous heartbeat quickens. If he notices the way your breath catches in your threat, he doesn’t say anything.

“Only three ministers, the Empress, myself, and now you know the truth. The Crown Prince’s health has been deteriorating for the past month. While it seemed the doctor had been making some headway, he took his life two weeks into my son’s illness. I can only presume this was because he reached an unfavorable prognosis. But rather than do anything he could to save a seven year-old boy’s life, he took the coward’s way out.” Yanjun clenches his fists. You fight the urge to reach over and take his hand.

What little surprise you felt at learning that he was a father quickly faded and was replaced by sympathy. You had no children to call your own, disgraced to spinsterhood after the dissolution of your engagement. You had no idea what he must feel to watch his son in pain, to watch the boy die. You could scarcely fathom it. It puts the exhaustion in his visage into perspective. Your heart aches for him.

But you still aren’t very happy with him. “Why… why didn’t you just tell me the truth?” For someone who claimed to trust you enough to put his family’s life in your hands, the fact that he decided to withhold this information from you didn’t support his assertion whatsoever.

“I couldn’t risk your summons being intercepted. If the news that the heir to the Empire was dying fell into the wrong hands, I feared the worst. Morale dropping in the midst of a war we are losing is the mildest of consequences.” He clenches his jaw and avoids your gaze. “Worse yet, the Jurchens may send someone to finish the job. We are aware that they have spies within the palace. We just don’t know who they are.”

“That sounds like a bunch of excuses. Valid ones, yes, but not the truth. Yanjun, if you want me to do the best that I can, you have to trust me.” Not all of him is entirely unfamiliar –– the way his voice wavers and the way he refuses to look you in the eye are little dishonest quirks you recall from his childhood. Your fingers twitch and his flex in return. You’re both too stubborn to reach over and complete the movement. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Licking his lips, Yanjun drops his head. He reaches up to rub his jaw. He used to do that when he got in trouble and his steward was about to wring a confession out of him. “I was afraid. And foolish. I thought that you still loved me. That you would refuse to treat a child that you thought could’ve and should’ve been yours. For that, I apologize. I should not have let my assessment of you be clouded by fanciful sentiment.”

Can you resent him for his line of reasoning? Part of you wished that he thought you still loved him, but that notion was supposed to work in conjunction with the idea that he still loved you too. That part of you, the smallest bit of romanticism remaining within you, was wrong. He thought you still loved him, and he used that to think the worst of you. You are not afraid to admit that it hurts –– both on your behalf and his. What happened to Yanjun to make him this cold? Was it… was it you who made him this way?

“Oh, Yanjun.” Your words are pitying. You can tell by the way his shoulders tense that it irritates him. “If you had just asked, I still would have come.”

A chill creeps down your spine as Yanjun stands and meets your eyes. You’ve never seen him like this before. Aloof, icy. His eyes are hard as stone. It’s difficult to categorize him, and he always seems to be shifting. For much of your dinner, Yanjun was nowhere near as cold. Just because he wasn’t talking didn’t mean that he was trying to freeze you out or scare you. But now, you can’t be sure. When you look up at him, you can’t help but remember the way he used to look at you. He gazed at you with such warmth, like you were the sun and stars and everything in the universe –– a sentiment that you shared toward him.

Now, none of that remains. Yanjun looks at you, and there is… nothing there. Negativity, resentment, and bitterness, perhaps. Though you don’t want it to be so, there is no longer anything warm and loving when he beholds you. There is only dislike. He speaks deliberately, mouth forming his words with self-assurance. You can’t construe his tone as anything but loathing. “I couldn’t have known that.”

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