#if he takes the wrong path in winds ill try to come to terms with his self inflicted doom but i will still place a curse on george | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

probably-haven · 3 years

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Hello!! After seeing what you wrote about xiaoven fics I went to see what things you usually write and omg, your archon Venti headcanons????? I am absolutely in love. So if it isn't annoying, could you talk about xiaoven or Venti or Xiao or whatever ship or character you like? I don't care what you are going to say, I just want to know more about your thoughts ^^

I- is this... bestie, this is essentially a free ramble pass- kerujsgheskdfug. Trust me when I say that in no way is this, and in no way will it ever be annoying in the slightest- i literally- lets just say rambling off thoughts is kind of my specialty, especially when provided a topic to branch off of because otherwise I'm just- really indecisive about it so- iujskdh yeah- 100% definitely down to talk about Venti, Xiao, and/or Xiaoven XD. Also, yes- it may have been awhile since i last posted one(cuz again, indecisive about which direction to take part 5), but the Archon War Era Venti headcanons are still without a doubt my favorite posts I've made. It's just such an interesting topic with such endless potential that so few people actually think about or consider or even realize is there, so i always just get really psyched whenever i see someone interact with them lol.

.... this ended up being a bit of a mess: warning in advance

Anyway! onto the actual content!

- You see the thing about Xiaoven is that there's a lot of different ways that it could end up working out, and just personally my favorite way of portraying Xiaoven in my mind is as an unlabeled relationship because if anyone in genshin would give off that vibe its these two. And a number of other reasons.

- Firstly, I heavily headcanon Venti as being an aroace polyplatonic or perhaps heavily demiromantic. However, regardless of this I just don't think that Venti is really the kind of person to worry about how he should label his feelings, thinking it's silly to try to put them in one box or the other, especially with feelings and emotions being as fluid as they are in general. Plus it fits his whole God of Freedom vibe. I just- dont think he's the biggest fan of labels or social categorization in general.

- And secondly on the hand of Xiao... his defense mechanisms are very much ingrained in his personality. It's probably hard enough for him to not go into fight or flight(the answer is fight) at the slightest affection at first, at the slightest feeling of vulnerability. Even further down the line, with his fierce dedication to Liyue, I cant help but get the vibe that the moment he recognized that he was falling for Venti he would begin avoiding him, not only to avoid distraction from his duty, but to avoid corrupting him or losing him in general like he has with like basically every other person he gets close with(even believing that the cycle had repeated once more when he first heard of Morax's death)... now imagine Venti tryna slap a label on their relationship and tell me Xiao would have a positive reaction.

- The thing with Xiaoven.... honestly, i feel like theres more ways that it can go wrong than it can go right, but if they do manage to make their relationship work out, it's just simply beautiful in all terms of the word.

- Lets talk about killing. - During the Archon War, both were forced to kill a large number of people and gods alike- Venti out of a need to remain alive to protect Mondstadt, it's freedom, and the nameless bard's legacy by extent- and Xiao out of servitude to the god that was once his master

..... actually- break here- ive talked a lot about Venti on this blog but I havent actually spoken about Xiao all that much- so i should probably do that a bit first... do note though that my characterization of Xiao is pretty flexible actually- this is just- the possible characterization of him that i tend to favor as being the most- uh- "realistically complex"

Theres a line I saw this one time in a certain story: "He is a trained weapon. That's what he is, was, and always will be. You cannot change that so stop trying." And i just- think its a really interesting concept- that applies pretty well to Xiao now that i actually think about it. - the concept behind it is this: After spending more than a vast majority of his life killing or otherwise in battle, it's become a part of who he is, a normalcy that after centuries and centuries would be near impossible to get rid of or reverse, and even if it was possible, with his karmic debt constantly eating away at him its unlikely he has enough time left for that to happen. - it sounds like a cruel thing to say about him- but in context it's actually pretty layered and i think about it a lot. It's not as much a "he's a killer lol, that his whole personality" its more of a "The centuries of trauma he experienced have conditioned him into a constantly alert and battle ready mindset while also shaping his dehumanizing inferior-in-worth-but-superior-in-capability view of himself that would have likely been necessary to get through those time, and at this point he's been under that conditioning for long enough that it's essentially ingrained itself in his personality."

- the main idea is- it's a part of who he is, that needs to be accepted as who he is because its not something that he can just up and change. It's not all he is of course but his constant battle mode, as though always waiting to be ambushed or to be granted a new target to eradicate.

a couple character story quotes:

-"His past of service under the evil god had rid Xiao of his innocence and gentleness. All that remained within him was the means to kill and the weight of his sins. The only way he could be of service to mortals was in combat." -"Xiao does not feel any hatred. Having lived for over two thousand years, no single karmic debt constitutes anything more than a fleeting memory. No grudge can last a thousand years; nor is any debt so great that it cannot be paid off in this time. Xiao has spent many long years alone. But his battles have never been in vain." -"where did Xiao have to return to? He was merely leaving the battlefield." -"since Xiao wages a constant war against dark forces powerful enough to devour Liyue in its entirety, any bystanders who witness him in the heat of battle are likely to end up as collateral damage." -"The war he fights can never be won, and will never come to an end." -"Because ultimately, the one with whom Xiao wrestles is himself."

i feel like at some point this very nearly did consume his whole personality, almost turning him into nothing more than a being of slaughter under Morax's control, devoid of any "humanity" at all, consumed and corrupted by his karmic debt like his fellow yakshas before him. - until he experienced a moment of clarity- a song in the wind, the peaceful melody of a dihua flute. - and pulled back from the border of something he wouldnt have been able to return from, there a was a shift in his mind- a concept grown unfamiliar enough with time that it took him a great time to identify what it was; a curiosity. Something that there was no place for on the battlefield, something that by all means should have been completely useless to Xiao, and yet he held onto that curiosity, slowly regaining over time, a sense of who he was and who he could choose to be with each song that the wind chose to carry towards him every once in a blue moon.

and eventually that curiousity turned to longing. Longing "for a day to come when he will wear the mask and dance — not to conquer demons, but to the tune of that flute amid a sea of flowers"

...... uh- heh- if you couldn’t tell already i have a tendency to make my characterizations/analyses of characters more serious that i probably should.

to summarize: Xiao is constantly toeing the line between his ingrained nature and his humanity- almost as though still trying to decide how much of that humanity he deserves to have, how much he is allowed to have, and how much is safe to have.

^looking back after writing this, i think the best way to explain it is that this is the view that i keep in mind/the lense that i tend to most enjoy looking through and refering back to while examining and/or analyzing his character, actions, story, lines, and overall personality.

idk- i kinda got off track but i just think its a really interesting interpretation to think about because it has some really interesting implications ig- it’s not the full extent of how i view him of course, but i kinda got ahead of myself and its long enough as is so ill just elaborate as i go- Lol i actually have in progress playlists for both him and venti and just- vibes- i could ramble about the playlists alone for hours explaining everything... It’s probably a problem- uh- ill keep going now lol.

anyways! stepping off the angst path for a brief break! Brought to you by their lines in the snow: both waiting for it to get thick enough, Venti for the purpose of a snowball fight and Xiao for the purpose of a tasty and nutritious breakfast.

but its actually something of note that Xiao doesnt actually need to eat so anything he does eat is usually out of obligation or enjoyment- so like.... snow.... like i dont blame him, but of all things- an adeptus who refuses to eat basically anything but almond tofu looks at the freezing-cold-floor-water that yeeted itself from above and decided at some point- damn- that seems more edible than basically ever single actually edible thing ever.... im gonna eat it- like- im glad if eating snow makes him happy but- at the same time...

He probably convinces Venti to eat snow too though and Venti wouldnt even resist I mean he’s wind and has probably consumed worse things in his time so- 2 anemo cryptids with glowing tattoos sitting in Dragonspine monching snow in the dead of night is an amusing thought to me.

- kay, now back to more serious-toned thoughts

One of the things about the ship that i really like is the different contradicting parallels between them:

A lot of how i view Xiao’s character is someone formed largely by the things he cant control and who was forced to accept that accepted that and learned to thrive in it as much as he can. Venti on the other hand is surrounded by things he cant control and is ever adapting to control as much as he can while embracing whatever he cant as being part of the unpredictability of the world, seeing beauty in it.

both of them have lost people and do what they do to honor their memory: Xiao continues to do what the Yakshas once did And Venti chooses to do what his friend couldn’t

Xiao’s power coming from himself and Venti’s from others And both seem to appear to use their power for their own gain while truly helping others behind the scenes

both have killed a lot of people during the archon war Xiao views it as another necessary event out of his control and Venti would likely view it as a tragedy he chose to enact himself

and this is where we meet out balance

Xiao- contrary to how i think a lot of people view him as thinking of himself as a monster- seems canonically to have accepted this as part of his duty, as long as those he killed are not mortals. I dont think he enjoys it no- but someone has to do it and he’s just accepted that its a part of his duty Venti on the other hand-

See the beauty of the ship- as someone with an angst-centric mind- is this- these are two of the most traumatized mfers in the game

Xiao is by far the one who needs the most help and who can serve to benefit most from the ship- but he is nowhere near self aware enough to recognize that there’s anything wrong or unhealthy about his mindset in the slightest-

whereas you have the contrast with Venti who sorted through most of his trauma with the nameless bard alone during the archon war and while the result appears more healthy- is still really not- but he’s not self aware of that either because i mean- who’s going to tell him? nobody even knows.

however- venti is aware enough to notice flaws in Xiao’s mindset and “Venti” enough to want to help them through it-

Xiao- while not aware enough to recognize the flaws in Venti’s mindset, can recognize where it contrasts with his own, and is blunt enough to point it out- and then it’s out there to be mulled over-

they’re so similar and yet so different and a feel just conversing between the two of them, being in each others precense, just being exposed to two mindsets that are so very different could do both of them a whole lot of good.

GEEE THAT BIT OF RAMBLING HAD LITTLE TO NO DIRECTION AT ALL- LET ME-- LET ME MAKE THIS START MAKING SENSE- WITH... DYNAMICS OR SOMETHING

I don’t think Xiao needs to sleep really- and i dont think that sleeping would do anything except make him uneasy at first- he’d probably just get nightmares after all he’s been through- but with Venti he would soon learn that it doesn’t have to be that way, lulled into the first peaceful sleep he’s had in... as long as he can remember.

anywho back to not making sense cuz im fickle and i think most questions about ships are best displayed through character interactions so like- a possible exchange thats cliche but cliches exist for a reason

Xiao: Why do you try so hard to help me, it isn’t easy. I know that much Venti, with the most adoring expression: Because you’re worth it, obviously Xiao: But surely there are others more deserving of- Venti: No Xiao, everyone is just as deserving as the next person, you included Xiao: Then why me above others? Venti: ehe, cuz ur my warrior of course [O//////O oh shit, hes right] Xiao: My contract is with Morax alone [gay panic but in broody yaksha]

it’s kinda difficult cuz neither of them really address their feelings. I mean Venti does but he does it very indirectly and its rare that he ever does it with like- genuine directness- even spilling his backstory was in the form of a song- and told in the third person- so a lot of their interactions would often have some deeper meaning, especially with Venti being the bard he is.

I come up with a lot of- errant thoughts about Xiaoven- but this is making me realize that a true analysis of their ship is rather difficult because it just encompasses so many dynamics so its hard to settle on just one and not go rambling about who knows what bouncing from one end of the ship to the other- Because you truly can and thats the beauty of it

within one moment you can be having a heartfelt conversation about the archon war the impact of lost friends and times past, and the next moment Venti is trying to forcefeed Xiao an apple while Xiao screams about disrespecting the adepti and its just- so lovely

so while they have picnics with nothing but apples, dandelion wine, and almond tofu they can sit down and talk about the dreams Xiao once devoured, and the dandelion wine and apple cider that the first Ragnvindir invented from the plants that never could have grown in Old Mond. The foods that tasted of familiarity, or of the grilled ticker fish Pervases always used to eat, foods that tasted of friends and frankly family that had since passed, glaze lilies and cecilias and qingxin flowers scattered in the surroundings and woven into Xiao’s neat braids and Venti’s now messy ones, rebraided by the steady and inexperienced hands of one unused to gentle action.

and then of course Venti steals Xiao’s tofu once the mood becomes too grim and replaces it with a bottle of wine that Xiao refers to as “vile poison,” a remark that fatally wounds Venti as he collapses on the floor, proclaiming how he can only be healed by a Yaksha’s kiss. Xiao ignores this of course and simply takes back his tofu with a slight smile on his face, but as Venti persists he soundlessly places a kiss on his own palm before intertwining their fingers and pulling him back up from where he was dramatically sprawled on the floor, grumbling about how such action was “unbecoming of an archon.” A sign of affection only Xiao would ever know about. But Venti is literally wind and I hc his senses work differently anyways so he definitely knows- plus Xiao’s face is red as the blood of his enemies and the way he is pointedly not looking at Venti at all really speaks volumes anyways.

-Venti playing epic battle music whenever Xiao goes into fights in what looks like a ridiculously extra performance to anyone else but is actually doing wonders to keep Xiao’s karma at bay

-Venti preaches the practice of “kissing wounds better” and Xiao is unfamiliar with this medical treatment but views it as unnecessary regardless because adepti have accelerated healing, doesn’t mean he’s going to stop him though.

-Messages whispered on the wind

-Venti’s 1000 year sleep- an accident, not a fun time for the yaksha, and not a fun time for Venti once he woke up. Venti is actually more afraid of restful sleep than Xiao is, hence the sleeping in trees thing, but when Xiao is there, he can sleep restfully with faith that Xiao wont let another millennia slip through his fingertips.

- Xiao tends to make excuses when doing things that aren’t necessary to his duty, like in his birthday voice line “Have this, it’s a butterfly i made from leaves... Okay. Take it. It’s an adepti amulet -- it staves off evil” because at the current point in his progress it helps him to feel like he’s allowed to do these things. Not wanting to put him off from progress, Venti never comments on his excuse but never fails to whisper a quick reminder of how proud he is of how far Xiao had come.

- Xiao’s karma saddens Venti greatly- not only because of how it effects Xiao but also because its a reminder that as much as Venti tries to honor the memory of those he’s killed, there will always be those who resent him for it, and when he took the option of living away from them, he truly can’t blame them. - And when he gets too wrapped up in thoughts, whether around this topic or similar ones or otherwise, eventually, he’ll hear the sound of a flute on the wind. It’s not divine by any means, but as his own wind connects him to the source, he gets the sentiment all the same. “What impact does one individual’s remaining wrath have on the present. You have done much to help the living in the present” the unspoken idea that Xiao has included himself in that statement, because now, with Venti’s help he’s beginning to learn just how to experience living for himself.

- Venti’s form and Xiao’s mask are off limit topics though because if either mentions it the other will counter with the opposite and the mood will turn immediately bitter at the idea that both know that what they’re doing is destructive but neither are willing to change

- Venti who has different tells for negative feelings than most people because as much as he likes to pretend it is- this form isnt his, and Xiao who is able to identify those

- many fanfics and headcanons have Venti recognizing when Xiao is uncomfortable and getting him out of those situations. I see that and I love it but i raise you: - Venti taking Xiao to Mondstadt, careful that he doesn’t get to the point that he’s uncomfortable. And nothing goes wrong exactly, but Xiao notices the the way Venti’s cape is blowing in the wind, the way he’s holding his weight, barely on his feet so much as floating on the wind, connected with the ground only for the sake of appearance, all the while he looks just as happy go lucky as ever. And without a word, he grabs his hand and teleports them both out of Mondstadt. - turns out it was just a slight thing that reminded him of the archon war (cuz i will die on the hill of him having more tragic backstory than just Decarabian), and he of course gives a sincere if not flustered thanks to Xiao, because he’s really not used to people noticing.

- Venti trying to vent sneakily through fictional stories and Xiao is just like “Didn’t that basically happen to you” and Venti is just like “<_< shit”

- Venti once said affectionally that he wished he had met Xiao sooner and Xiao immediately and seriously shot it down by saying “If you had, I would have been forced to kill you” and both of them now stay up at night wondering who would have won that fight, not sure which result would have hurt more. (because honestly I have no idea who would win in that fight and that terrifies me- I like to think it would have been one of those legends that end with “and the fight persists to this day” or something along those lines)

- “How long have you been together?” “Adepti have no need for-” “1000+ years T^T how dare you deny our love” “O///O our...? ...useless”

- its disney- let me explain- i have this- i have this headcanon inspired by watching too many animatics- - so venti has a human form that isnt his- which he would have had to get used to moving in- and he’s a bard- - uh- anyway- as a third degree black belt in mixed martial arts, i can speak as an authority on this(not really an authority since i havent gone since quarantine but lets pretend). We have a thing referred to as the big three(most things do), and those things are martial arts, gymnastics, and dance. The idea is that they reflect really well off of each other and the best in any one category are good in all three. Timing, balance, form, discipline, technique, hand-eye coordination, grace, ease of motion, they all play a part- anyway-

- Venti taking Xiao’s prowess in martial arts and acrobatics and teaching him how to dance, and as someone who’s extremely skilled in the first two, the third comes easy to him, almost naturally. And it’s delicate and beautiful and lovely and it isn’t hurting anyone. And Venti points all these things out and more and despite how much Xiao insists that he feels ridiculous he truly does enjoy it and it goes a long way towards helping him form more healthy views of himself and his worth. - Verr Goldett walked in on him once and made a joke about performing at the inn. unfortunately Venti was there and agreed on Xiao’s behalf before he could protest and- and it wasn’t as bad as Xiao thought it would be... he still wouldn’t do it again though without reason, but with good enough reasoning he could probably be convinced.

- anyways point is he likes dancing to Venti’s songs and i just think that’s really cute - just picture the idea that all the animatics you see actually have the potential to be canon- ugh

- venti tries holding something out of Xiao’s reach since he’s taller and Xiao just fucking teleports

- both need their space but when they dont, all they have to do is speak the other’s name and they’ll be there.

- and because i just had to.... love languages

- lets start with Xiao- i don’t think he’d view acts of service or quailty time as a love language tbh, and he blunt but really bad with words so affirmation is out, leaving gift giving and physical touch. However, he seems to view most material things as meaningless so- - Xiao who’s love language is in his fleeting touches, something he’s only recently grown comfortable with because of Venti, and now is giving back, which he knows he doesn’t have to do, but that he want’s to, though he’ll still continue to make excuses for each one. “you were shivering” “The inn is high up, you could have fallen..... I said what I said, you’d question an adeptus?”

- and as easy as it is to say words of affirmation for Venti- he does that for everyone- i want to say his is actually acts of service - its the acts of service that let him see just how much Xiao has progressed afterall, from teaching him to dance, to playing another song on the flute, to supplying him with the almond tofu he seems to enjoy so much. Every little thing he does helps Xiao to grow and he couldn’t be happier about that.

- of course most of my headcanons for the ship do take place latter into the relationship because- y’know the less serious unhealthy vibes allow for greater range of thought, but i do still love to think about the serious implications so i kinda hopped back and forth. So sorry about how messy it is btw, i kinda- got carried away- it kinda got some kind of structure near the end tho so- maybe it’s okay. anyway- back to... lol something, we’ll see where thought forests lead.

#genshin impact #genshin xiao #genshin venti #xiao #venti #xiaoven #genshin analysis #genshin headcanons #xiaoven headcanons #xiaoven analysis #this is a mess i really shouldnt be putting all these tags but oh well #oh wow the grammar and spelling here is truly repulsive #sorry to all my english teachers i have failed you all

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lady-literature · 4 years

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no point wishing on stars

aka the jasonette aladdin au literally no one asked for

This is a great big amalgamation of semi-canon miraculous, batman and a heavy dose of bastardized Aladdin but here we go-

The story goes like this:

Jason is our beloved street rat turned prince Boy Wonder and billionaire’s son (not that he’s gotten that far yet).

Marinette is Ladybug, is the Guardian, is our modern-day Jasmine. She’s next in line after Fu to lead the Order, which, I suppose, is like High Royalty for superheroes/magic users.

But before she can take her rightful place, she needs a partner by her side. It’s so stupid rule that says she, as a Ladybug, needs a Black Cat by her side in order to be properly balanced.

The only problem is, she doesn’t want one. Or, well. More accurately, it’s that she doesn’t like the ones offered to her, and she doesn’t quite like the idea of being tied to someone she barely knows, especially not at fourteen.

There have been many Black Cat candidates to cross her path but there has been only one she did not immediately veto. Adrien Agreste may be a Black Cat, but he cannot be hers. He will never be anything more than her dearest brother, and that is not what Creation needs.

Creation and Destruction—life and death—have a certain type of relationship. They are lovers, mated and married in every meaning of the word.

And, for as much as she loves and adores Adrien as her brother in her soul, they will never be like that. She will never want him the way she must should he take up Destruction.

So yeah. Marinette has a problem. And yeah, she has some time to figure it out, but the Order is looking to have her figure it out sooner rather than later. Adrien is a good place holder for now, but if Marinette doesn’t choose a Black Cat by the time she’s twenty-one, Adrien will either have to do, or she forfeits her crown and the Ladybug miraculous (which she would never do, she loves her people and Tikki too much to ever do that).

(wait? Does this mean I made Adrien the human equivalent of Raja?… yes. Yes it does.)

And, to spice this up just a bit more, let’s say Hawkmoth is Jafar, yeah? This little shit is really trying to push his son to be the next Black Cat because he wants power what’s best for his son. So he be out here sabotaging potential Black Cats because he’s an asshole his son is the best candidate at the moment. He could give less than two shits about if Mari and Adrien actually like each other that way, he will shove his son at her until she has no choice but to choose him.

Anyway, so Mari leaves the temple one day. Which is fine, she’s not trapped there or anything, she can come and go as she pleases! (she may have to normally take someone with her and is currently ignoring that rule perhaps, but that’s besides the point!)

So she’s at a market in Gotham, strolling down the street, having a good time enjoying being around normal people, when she notices a boy getting into some trouble.

(I’ll give you three guesses as to who it is and the first two don’t count.)

Jason was stealing from market vendors because the hubbub of the street is distracting and nicking a few scraps here and there is practically child’s play. Only, he miscalculates.

One vendor was paying more attention than he thought.

Mari’s across the street and sees the whole thing. Sees the vendor grab Jason’s hand in a bruising grip and snarl in his face.

She’s in between the pair before she even realizes it, mouth already opening around some made-up story about ill-advised dares and how ‘it won’t happen again, sir’ and ‘here, I’ll pay for that right now, no harm done!’

Jason stares at her utterly baffled and, thankfully, silent until after she’d already grabbed his hand and pulled him away.

Only, she pulls him away down the wrong alley. (Look. Mari’s a real sweet-talker and knows how to smooth ruffled feathers, but she is hardly street smart.)

Jason swears, and it’s the first words she’s heard him speak, and then it’s him tugging her along. Up a fire escape and over the rooftops because Jason likes to think he’s tough, but there’s no way he’s picking a fight with five guys bigger than him and wearing masks.

He likes to keep his heart beating more than he wants to keep his pride unharmed thank you very much.

They end up on a rooftop, panting and like, seven blocks away. Marinette is now very lost and with a strange boy who she doesn’t know. He seems… nice, and she’s a good judge of character, but that doesn’t mean much when they’re still very much strangers.

But then the two just look at each other and suddenly they’re both laughing.

And that, my friends, is the start of a beautiful friendship.

***

During those first few months, she and Jason just seem to click.

Mari starts leaving the temple more and more to meet up with Jason, and on more than one occasion dragging behind her a picnic basket bigger than her. (it’s stupid to let one of her friends starve just because he’s too prideful to take her food. So she plans lots of picnics for them both, and pointedly ignores the way he eats and hoards most of the food she brings.)

He is her friend—though she would be lying if she said she didn’t like him a bit more than what one would consider friendly.

And Jason, who is funny and kind and made sharp by the life he’s been forced into, likes her right back. She is one of the few great parts of his life, a bright spot in the darkness he has called his world for so long, and there are few things he wouldn’t do for her.

It’s… scary—just a bit—how important she is to him.

He tries not to think about it too much.

And it doesn't really matter anyway, because she is good and bright and amazing and he is… there’s nothing he can give her in return. Nothing good, anyway.

She deserves someone better. Someone who could buy her things as pretty as her and take her nice places.

Someone who isn’t a street rat.

And then he learns she’s Ladybug, right up there with Wonder Woman and Robin and all the other amazing people set on saving the world, and he feels he got that much farther from her. How can he ever compare?

Jason doesn’t wish, because wishing is childish and he learned too young that shooting stars don’t exist and he’s come to terms with the fact that this is his life years ago, all right? He doesn't need the burden of hope to weigh him down now.

(but perhaps, deep down, tucked away in the corner of his heart, there might be a thought. Small and scared and aching, he might think, ‘if only I could be there with her, if only i could fly with her, maybe then I’d be enough’)

Six months after he meets Marinette, Jason comes across the Batmobile.

His first thought is, this can’t be real.

His second is, I could buy Mari a real birthday gift with this.

His third thought is less of a thought because he’s already got two tires off by that point and then suddenly Batman is there and Jason is swinging his tire iron.

This then leads—somehow—to him winding up at Wayne Manor with Bruce Wayne and then he learns about Batman and Robin and he gets to be Robin and-

(and what else is a Robin meant to do but fly?)

It’s too good to be true. Wishes don’t come true and good things don’t happen to him unless their name be Marinette but… but Jason’s here and it’s not a dream. He’s no prince but, well… he thinks this might just be as close as you can get.

And, okay. He really does try with the whole secrecy thing, because he can understand why that’s important but, I mean… it’s Marinette, who is Ladybug. There really was never any chance of Jason keeping that particular secret, Batman or no Batman.

And about,,, two years pass like this ig. Mari is almost seventeen now, and Jason turned seventeen recently and the pair are getting closer and closer every day. They’re toeing the line of ‘more than friends’ but neither have really taken that next step.

The pressure is on Mari from the Order because she’s getting older and as much as she likes Jason, knows him but he isn’t a good candidate for Destruction and Mari must think of her people first.

Jason doesn’t get to be hers to keep and that aches but what else is she meant to do? She cannot—does not—want to change him in any way. So they stay, in their strange little limbo, with neither making a move.

And then, the unthinkable happens.

Hawkmoth hears of the boy finally, and is, obviously, furious.

He doesn't care if this boy can be a Cat or not, he’s going to ruin all his plans. So, there’s only one solution. He needs to get rid of him.

(i’ll give you three guesses as to how and the first two don’t count!)

Robin—Jason—dies, and Marinette feels when he does. She doesn’t know why or what happened, but the moment he leaves the world her blood turns cold and she feels sick.

Jason hasn’t even looked at the ring and already Marinette could feel the thread that had begun to tie them together. When she hears of his death—when she learns that he’s gone—Marinette shatters.

She shatters and cries and the world tips just a little, with the force of her sorrow, with the agony of her screams.

(justice is blind, yes, but is she deaf? Can she deny the sobbing of such a being as Creation herself? Can she stand, unfeeling, before the agony she has wrought?)

Marinette does not bring Jason back to life… but she has done something close. Has opened the possibility. Is, perhaps, the reason that six months later he screams and claws and drags himself from his own grave.

He is wrong wrong wrong, but he is also alive.

The league finds him, as they must. And Talia throws him into the pits, as she must. And Jason is reborn, screaming and angry and violent, as he must.

Marinette had known, Before, that Jason would not be a good match for the ring. He was tough and wild and willing to get his hands dirty if that’s what it took, but that was not what his core was. He was familiar with the rust and decay of back alley streets, but that wasn’t where he belonged. He would throw a punch but he didn’t relish the blood on his knuckles after a fight.

Jason was surrounded by destruction, but that’s not what he was.

Now… now the destruction he spent so long dancing with has slipped through the cracks in his mind left behind by the explosion. It ripped through his skin and slithered through into his veins until it settled in his heart like an overly smug cat.

Death and Destruction are inside him, woven in his ribcage and fusing with his blood, pumping pumping pumping its deadly rhythm and Jason is helpless to deny it’s tune.

Jason is a being of Destruction through circumstance rather than design, but make no mistake, that does not make him less.

(in fact, it may even make him more. To be remade from one’s own destruction is a powerful thing, and to be remade into Destruction? Well. There are few things more… miraculous.)

And we all know the next part of the story right?

Marinette mourns and grows and lives.

Jason rages and learns and plans. He’s come far from that street rat of a boy, and farther still from Marinette's petite oiseau.

But, two years after he comes back, when he ventures back to Gotham for revenge, Marinette takes one look at this angry, violent man calling himself Red Hood and she knows. He’s too familiar, even as he stands before her, more changed than she ever thought possible.

She meets the Red Hood when he comes for the new Robin, sweet little Tim who Marinette had grown to like despite herself. (He is not Jason, and never will be, but the boy was too shy and clever and earnest for her to have remained cold to him just because he wore the same colors once worn by the man she loved.)

She loves Tim in the same way she loves Adrien, simply and wholly and uncomplicated.

And then she is there when Jason comes for him.

Their reunion is not the stuff of fairy tales. It is not the beginning of happily ever after or true love.

Their reunion is a punch in the gut because it doesn't matter that he’s alive—except it does, because Mari has never known she could be so happy and so shattered at the same time—she is farther from him than she’d ever imagined she could be.

She reaches out for him, voice cracking around his name—because who else could this familiar stranger be?—and something in her shatters all over again when he flinches back from her touch.

“No,” he says, and it is a million things at once. He sends one last glare to Tim, who is still behind her, and then he’s gone.

***

Jason tries to avoid her.

Marinette allows this for a whole month before the whispers in the streets and the stories Tim comes back to her with, become too much.

She knows he is angry and out for revenge and building an empire out of the criminals that infest their city, but she doesn’t care. He was gone for two whole years and Marinette is tired of not seeing him-hearing him-touching him.

She has missed him like an ache in her chest and she doesn't care if he hates her or is furious with her, she just wants to see him. She needs to reassure herself that he’s alive, that he’s real.

And, it seems, the universe is on her side in this. In her chest, nestled there in the space next to her heart, there is what she can only describe as a compass, pointing to wherever Jason is like he’s her own personal north star.

The first few times, she’s yelled at or ran off. Or he runs off. Either way, for a while, the only moments she’s close to him are short and aching.

But she doesn’t let him run for long, and she doesn’t let him scare her off as she knows he’s trying to do.

Marinette had always been the more stubborn of the two.

Eventually, like a feral cat learning safety (like a hurt, scared animal relearning love), Jason lets her get close. He lets her in, lets her get close again.

The first time she sees him, without helmet or mask, she flings herself at him. Arms around his neck and legs wrapped around his waist, clutching him like her life depends on it. He takes her weight automatically, hand beneath her thighs while the other wraps around her back just as tightly. (he longs for touch, she has relearned, but he is also so frightened of it. She will have to be brave for them both)

The second time she sees his face bare once more, he is still thrumming with energy from a fight, is still high on the feeling of broken bones and blood on his knuckles. The force in his chest, the clawing and raging thing settled just off-center of the very core of him, pulls him toward her and Marinette meets him halfway, her own bright, ruthless force like a magnet in her chest.

They meet in a clash of hands on skin and lips anywhere they’ll land.

It is the first time they fall into bed together.

It will not be the last.

Now, you may be thinking, ‘Lady! This isn’t very Aladdin at all!’ and to that I tell you: I fucking warned you. What part of bastardized-Aladdin didn’t you get?

Also, shh. This is my favorite part!

So Mari is in her own personal little honeymoon stage, right? She practically could not be happier because Jason is alive and he’s hers and, even if he’s more violent and a crime boss, he’s stopped attacking his family at least. Which is good, because Mari really didn’t like the sad look Tim wore every time he brought up Jason.

And, oh yeah. Through a combination of her own detective work and Tikki, little Mari realizes that Jason is her Black Cat. Is the only person her Black Cat could be, not because of destiny—though that had helped—but because of coincidence and the bond the pair forged themselves.

So Mari is, obviously, on cloud nine at the moment and she tells Adrien and Fu who are ecstatic for her, and announcements are going to be made the second Mari tells Jason and what could possibly go wrong?

Well, a lot of things really but the first thing is that, basically, Mari is asking Jason to marry her. Just a bit. And while they both know, in that nebulous way they always have, that they love each other, neither of them have ever actually said it.

And also, they aren’t really dating right now either. Mari’s been too busy trying to just get near Jason again that she hasn’t much been paying attention to normal relationship things like dates or labels.

So when she brings it up Jason is… well, caught off guard is likely an understatement. Which then makes Mari realize what exactly she’s just done and- shit. She’s ruined everything and Jason is going to run away again and the compass in her chest is just going to be a reminder of what she can’t have and-

Jason, who only moments before was terrified and in danger of bolting—because this is a lot and magic-marrying Mari comes with responsibilities and rules and a thousand strings he doesn't know what to do with—now stops and stares at her, babbling and so obviously panicked and something in him abruptly settles.

She starts pacing and he grabs her hand when she passes by close enough, reeling her into his body. She comes easily even in her frazzled state and the vicious clawing thing in his chest sighs contentedly.

“Why?” he asks, and it is a million things at once. Why him, why now, why, why, why?

There are a million ways she could answer, but the easiest? The most important answer is simply this: “Because I love you.”

His breath shudders in his chest at her words and her hands raise to settle on his cheek and the back of his neck, a protection of one of the most vulnerable parts of him, and he leans into her touch like a man starved.

Gods, Jason has loved her for years.

He loved her Before and he loved her in the pits, when all he had was the hate they kept stuffing in his chest, and he loves her now. She is his sun and he will spin around her for the rest of his life. But when it all comes down to it, one simple fact doesn’t change:

“I don’t deserve your love.”

Her hands press harder into his skin, like she can force him to understand through touch alone. “If everyone only got the love they deserved no one would be truly loved,” she counters.

“You would,” he says, quick and quiet and honest. Her breath hitches and he watches her eyes go wide. The hands he has on her hips tighten at the emotions he finds there.

“Oh,” she whispers, already pulling him down to meet her. “Oh you stupid, beautiful man.”

And then they’re kissing and- and it is not the first time they’ve done this, but there is something very different about this one.

They’re kissing, and this time, it feels very much like coming home.

***

And, perhaps, that is not the end.

Because there is still one wish left.

Because Jafar-Hawkmoth is still there, and he’s still murderous, and there a very real chance he’s going to ruin the wedding somehow.

Because there is never truly an end to a story, it just simply stops being told.

But none of that really matters. Our princess and her dearest street rat are together at last, and together they’ll get through whatever happens after the story stops being told.

They’ve always had a thing for impossible odds after all.

#maribat #jasonette #my typewriter #aladdin au

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radioactivepeasant · 4 years

Text

Fic Prompts: Revenge of the Star Wars Wednesday

Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the dashboard... (It’s an entire chapter of the same au as This Free Day Thursday I did a ways back, where a splinter cell of the Rebellion hands Luke over to Vader in a deal with the devil. The context: Vader got called away before getting a chance to tell Luke what was going on, and had to leave the poor guy in his hyperbaric egg chamber of doom. Which is air conditioned all to heck because that suit gets toasty. Unfortunately, Luke is from a very warm climate, and high powered air conditioning does not agree with him. At all. He’s having a bad day by the time Vader gets back and Many Blankets are required.)

Luke dreamed of falling.

"Alright, Skywalker. This is your stop."

He saw Leia screaming.

"You're wrong! You're wrong!"

She was calling for him. He knew that she was.

"I'm here!" He tried to call back to her, "I'm here, Leia! Help me!"

But the wind scattered his words, and he fell.

He fell past Leia's horrified face, towards a range of mountains. Faces he might have recognized formed and disintegrated in the snow around him, and the wicked looking peak directly below.

With a choked cry, Luke flailed his arms and met with stiff resistance. Well. More soft than stiff. And heavy. Very heavy. Slowly, by degrees, Luke became aware of his surroundings. He could barely move. Something was holding him down on a-

A bed.

He was on a bed.

On a Star Destroyer.

Everything came back to Luke in a rush. Kobyvern. The handoff. The cell. The cold.

And Vader.

Luke opened his eyes. He didn't hear the respirator, but the sense of foreboding looming over him suggested that the dark lord was somewhere near. It was imperative that Luke not be so...so vulnerable when he returned.

Why couldn't he move?! Had he been strapped down? Panic flooded Luke's veins.

No no no, take it slow, Skywalker! Breathe in- breathe out.

When his heart had resumed a slightly more normal pace, Luke took a slow breath and tried to sit up.

This turned out to be more difficult than he'd expected. If he craned his neck, he could just make out heavy black cloth beneath the blankets, wound around him and pinning his arms to his sides. Well, that was one way of keeping someone from escaping. Arguably more embarrassing than handcuffs, but also preferable to them.

The amount of effort it took to free just one arm was a thorough enough distraction that Luke didn't hear the door hiss open. He pulled at the cape and blankets, already cursing the cold his free arm hinted at. It was tempting to nestle down into the pile of blankets -- there had to be at least four of them -- and let the warmth drag him back down into sleep. But that would doubtless be akin to trusting the hospitality of a Hutt. You didn't get something for nothing. There was going to be a price to pay for this, and Luke wasn't sure he'd be able to afford it.

Luke tried to push himself up into a sitting position and nearly jumped out of his skin when a hand appeared from his peripheral vision to push him back against the pillows.

"Rest easy, son. You've had a hard day."

Vader had returned.

It was difficult to know what bothered Luke more: the uncharacteristic gentleness in Vader's hands, or that he'd called him son.

Luke recoiled as far from Vader as he could.

It wasn't that far.

"You are not in danger, young one. Be still." Vader held out a placating hand.

His jaw ached from clenching and chattering, but Luke gritted his teeth again nonetheless. "I'm s- s-s s'posed to b-believe that-t-t?"

Ugh. It was still cold outside the blankets.

He did not like that he could actually hear amusement in Vader's voice when the man answered, "If I wished harm to come to you, young one, do you really think you would be here?"

Luke picked at the covers and tried to scowl. But being in close proximity to Darth Vader for an extended period of time didn’t exactly bolster one’s courage. The most he could muster was an anxious frown. Don’t let him get to you. He’s manipulating you. Waiting for you to let your guard down. Then he’ll bring in the torture droid.

“Yeah.” He narrowed his eyes. “D-don’t trus-s-t you.”

Alright, that might’ve been a bit too blunt.

Vader inclined his head -- helmet? How much of that was his head? Did Luke actually want to know? -- and made a sound curiously like a sigh. “That is to be expected. We were not introduced under particularly favorable circumstances.”

Luke stared at him incredulously. Introduced? As if they were diplomats crossing paths at a senator’s ball? Introduced?!

This was the man who just...slaughtered anything and anyone that got in his way. He was there for every horrible thing that happened to Leia. He was the reason Luke was stuck trying to figure out the Force on his own. He was the reason Luke was alone! And here he was, upset that Luke didn’t trust him?

“My medical droid informs me that your core temperature has...improved. But you are still feeling ill effects.” If Vader felt as awkward as he looked, he kept it out of his voice admirably. A little too calmly, he lifted a steaming cup from somewhere behind him and held it out.

Luke shrank back. “I d-don’t want it.”

Vader’s shoulders tensed, just a fraction. “It is not poisoned, young one. Nor does it contain a truth drug, or whatever else outlandish theories you have concocted.”

“You c-could be l-l-lying.”

“I could. But I have no reason to be.”

Luke could think of a few reasons. Pure cruelty came to mind. Or lulling him into a false sense of security. After all the bluster about capturing the pilot who destroyed the Death Star, having a tea party with a dark lord wasn’t really on the agenda.

He jumped when the cup was pressed into his hands.

“You do not have to drink it. But the heat will benefit you.” Vader leaned back into a chair that most certainly had not been there before. “Transitioning from Tatooine to the climate of long-term space travel is...taxing.”

No, transitioning from getting thrown out of a ship to getting locked in the Ice Pod is “taxing”, Luke thought, glaring into the cup.

Whatever liquid was inside, it was dark, and smelled almost earthy. Not caf, some kind of tea, perhaps? The steam curled up to bathe his face, and he could begrudgingly admit that it was doing him a world of good.

“My meditation chamber is not meant to hold such low temperatures for such an extended period of time,” Vader said suddenly. “The General’s summons, I fear, did not give me adequate time to reset the cooling system. You were never meant to experience that.”

Luke didn’t care if it was childish or not. He pulled his knees slowly up to his chest -- fighting through entirely too many blankets -- and rested the cup on them. He refused to look up. He would not make eye contact with his father’s killer.

Actually, where even are his eyes under there?

“D-didn’t exp-p-pect the Empire to ap-p-p-pologize to a p-p-risoner,” he mumbled.

His stammer was decreasing, slowly. He thought a warm drink would certainly help, but he was not brave enough to risk whatever was in that cup.

“I would rather you did not think of yourself as a prisoner, but I understand that your experiences have not given you cause to believe otherwise,” Vader answered. “But you are correct: that was intended to be an apology. I will not allow such a thing to happen again.”

The cup seemed like porcelain. Impossibly delicate. But it held up well under Luke’s grip as it tightened. This was getting ridiculous. The handoff. The fall. The pod. The blankets. The tea.

“Just…”

Vader stilled. He cocked his head, as if listening intently. “Luke?”

It was too much.

He broke.

“Don’t c-c-call me that!”

“It is your name.”

“It’s m-m-my! Name!” Luke’s chest heaved. “You d-d-on’t use it! Stop p-p-pretending! I’m n-n-not going to tell you anyth-th-ing!”

I can’t, I can’t do this, Father. I didn’t want to cry, don’t let me cry!

Vader leaned forward again. “Why do you believe that I am pretending?”

Was he kidding?

Luke finally looked up at him. “Y-you k-kill Jedi,” he spat. “Like you k-killed my father.”

And that was what broke the facade.

“Enough.” Vader reached down and took the tea from Luke.

He set it on the tray and whirled back to face the boy.

“Listen to me,” he growled. “Whatever Kenobi told you, whatever wild fictions he spun about your past, he lied.”

Luke’s shoulders hitched. He pulled back against the wall and turned his face back to his knees. “I d-d-on’t believe you!”

“Look at me!”

Vader took his chin in one hand and pulled it up. “Look at me, Luke. He lied to you. And he lied to me. Why do you think I wear a mask? Do you even know what he did?”

“No no no-” Luke tried to shake his head. “W-why-?”

“Why would he lie to you?” Vader asked angrily. “Why, Luke, would he be so interested in making sure that you believed I killed your father? What did you do on Cymoon, before I knew your name?”

Vader’s anger shook the room, cutting the lights into fragments as shadow overtook them. But somehow, Luke didn’t feel that the anger was directed at him as much as it was at Obi-wan. They really had hated each other, then. But why would Obi-wan lie about his father’s death? He had his lights-

The lightsaber.

Luke’s gut churned.

Vader had his lightsaber now. His father’s lightsaber. And now it was in the possession of the man who had allegedly killed him.

Allegedly.

Allegedly?

Why was he even considering Vader’s words? This was Darth Vader! He was a liar- not this time

He was a monster -- maybe so

“W-what do you want?” Luke’s voice cracked. “I d-d-on’t understand!”

The hand on his chin pulled away without warning. The shadows retreated sullenly to pool around the chair. “I know.”

Vader raised his hand again. He hesitated when Luke flinched, then rested it on the crown of his head. “I know you don’t. Not yet. Use the Force, Luke.”

“What?”

Vader tilted his head back with a gentle push. “I know that you can. Stretch out with your feelings. What did you intend to do on Cymoon?”

It wasn’t enough to simply tell the boy the truth. He needed him to see. He needed him to understand. He was a pawn. They had both been pawns. For a moment he almost wished Kenobi lived, so that he could run him through again.

“What did you int-”

“Kill you!” Luke burst out. It came out with a tiny, exhausted sob. “I w-was going to kill you.”

“Because?”

“B-because you k-killed my-”

“Because you thought that I had killed your father,” Vader interrupted sternly. “Because Obi-wan sent you, untrained, untested, into battle having told you that I was your great enemy in some noble quest to avenge a father you never had the chance to meet.”

“Stop.” Luke didn’t want to hear this. This was a kind of torture after all, wasn’t it? It was emotional. Psychological. But there could be no tactical benefit in telling him these things. Why was Vader telling him these things? Why not just kill him and be done with it?

“Who took you from your mother?” Vader’s earlier question rang in Luke’s ears.

A trickle of sweat dried cold on the back of his neck. What did Darth Vader know about his mother?

Do you really want to pull on that thread, Luke?

“What do you want?” He tried. He tried so hard to keep the tears from coming. But he was tired and afraid, and so, so overwhelmed.

Vader’s hand smoothed his hair, disturbingly gentle. “I want you to understand that you are not alone, Luke. That you were never alone.”

He raised his other hand. Held Luke’s face between them.

“Do you know why Kenobi told you that I had killed your father?”

“Don’t-” Luke whispered brokenly. He couldn’t take it. Not this. Not him.

“Luke. Look at me. What does the Force tell you?”

“I don’t know-” Luke tried to pull away. Please don’t please don’t don’t tell me don’t change things don’t let it all be lies- “I don’t know!”

“I did not kill your father.”

It was said with such an air of finality that it rang through the Force, even with Luke’s muffled attempts to read it.

“No,” he agreed.

His world had a little crack, right at the edge. It was small now, but just the right pressure, and-

“I am your father.”

Crack.

#phew! that was a long one #long post #star wars wednesday #The Handoff au #The Handoff fic #star wars au #good lord that was a whole dang chapter I just threw at y'all #fic prompts #writing prompts #my aus #my fics #darth vader #luke skywalker #dangit vader #that could be a tag on its own lol #local dingus of a sith lord does not know the meaning of Tact or Subtlety

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redcxnviction · 3 years

Text

Stain’s (Potential) Character Arc

[Spoilers for Chapter 300]

[Also warning: This one is gonna be loooooong...]

[Edit: Dear God this was so much longer than I intended. I hope you guys like it! I’m going to bed now.]

So, Stain has re-appeared to send shock-waves through the plot once again (we hope). I’ve already talked about what Stain’s possible plans going forward will be for this arc, but now I want to discuss how his character could grow and change (or show change from all that thinking time in Tartarus) as a person, based on what we already know about him as well as current events.

This is all just speculation at the moment of course, but I think it’s highly likely - given the precedent Stain has already set in terms of moral ambiguity.

Just to be clear, no matter how heroic Stain’s actions may be in this arc, he still deserves to go right back to prison. Stain himself would agree with everyone on that. Heck, he’d probably walk himself back in when all this mess is done.

I really hope he doesn’t die by sacrificing himself, though, it would completely undermine the message of not only Endeavour’s arc, but Stain’s, as I feel his could (ironically) play out very similarly to his that of his most hated enemy.

Dying doesn’t rid you of sin or heal anybody, you can only change and improve things by living with your sins and learning from them. Some things may be lost forever, but you need to at least try, or at the very least break the cycle in some way and make sure no others like you are born.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Let’s take a look at Stain’s two defining flaws! :D

1. Worshipping a human being

It’s been previously established in the story just how toxic the concept of a ‘No. 1 Hero’ is - letting one man shoulder the burden of an entire country’s wellbeing was never going to end well, and only create a culture of overdependence, and a society whose comfort and security were sitting on a foundation of glass.

Stain, like Deku, grew up watching the unbreakable and perfect All Might soothe all their worries and purge every ill from society. Stain idolised All Might the same way Deku did. He believed in a hero who helped others in their darkest hour, when all hope seemed lost, and for no pay and no thanks, every day.

But Deku saw All Might for who he truly was inside - a broken man barely keeping it together.

Stain never saw All Might like that. He practically deified the man, just like society had, and could not conceive of a society without him. All Might ceased to be a human being, but a concept, an ideal that every hero-in-training should aspire to. Nobody outside those who knew All Might intimately realised how dangerous, how ultimately toxic, their saviour’s life was.

A hero is All Might, he sets the standard. The perfect hero is All Might. Someone who gives and gives without any regard for themselves. Blood, sweat and tears all mean nothing when you are a vessel for justice, and because All Might presented that as good and right, Stain believed that it was good and right.

But the end does not always justify the means, and society cannot function on the sacrifice of endless martyrs.

Stain was blinded by adoration and admiration for All Might and the hope he inspired. It’s no surprise he chose ‘Stendhal’ as his vigilante name - referring to Stendhal syndrome, a (debated) condition where sufferers experience various symptoms when exposed to objects, artworks or phenomena of great beauty, a profound emotional response. Stain responded to All Might with the emotion and fervour of a fanatic, and internalised the brutal, solitary and dangerous life of a ‘perfect hero’.

And just as this hero worship dehumanised All Might, Stendhal dehumanised himself in pursuit of the ideal hero. He referred to himself in the third person, as ‘justice personified’, as the righteous executor of villains. He even refers to his killing as ‘heaven’s judgment’ - deifying himself in the same way he has All Might. Stendhal believed himself to be superhuman, simply because he believes so much in the superhuman qualities of the hero he idolised. In Vigilantes he declares a hero to be an ‘extraordinary being’, ‘sublime’, ‘transcendent’ - again coming back to the ecstasy defining the ‘Stendhal syndrome’, and the deification of the No. 1 Hero. He also refers to a hero as ‘someone who crosses boundaries’, or someone who pushes the limit in order to achieve their ends - plus ultra.

If Stendhal was to be successful, he had to become better than human.

All Might may have inspired Deku, but he also inspired Stain.

As Knuckleduster said - people like Stain, and by extension All Might, forget their own humanity and believe themselves to be as invincible as people perceive them to be, and cast safety and common sense to the wind.

This may come from a place of arrogance, but I think it comes from idolising a man who single-handedly carried the hopes and wellbeing of society on his shoulders. All Might may not have waxed lyrical about it so much, but it just shows how utterly obsessed Stain was. Even in his ‘normal’ civilian life, he was a man who "walks along the path of true heroism”. His ideals consumed him.

Stain kept All Might on a pedestal, like Deku, but unlike the boy he never stopped. And unlike Deku, he was absolutely unmovable in his beliefs and unwilling to accept anything below the gold standard. That standard was All Might, and because that was the standard, Stain’s actions and beliefs were as right and true as All Might himself. He doomed himself from the beginning.

Which moves us on to our next point!

2. Narrow-mindedness

Stain’s thinking is so unshakable no outside force can break it. Common sense and humanity are only obstacles to him. His extreme actions coincide with his ability to only see things in extremes. One is either wholly good or wholly evil, with no room for nuance. This is a man who watched All Might, who presented himself as practically perfect in every way, internalised that as the correct way to be, and refused any other ideas.

One is either born with the ability to become a hero like All Might, or they are unworthy of being a hero altogether. A fundamentally bad person cannot change and become a heroic person - such a thing would taint the sanctity of the concept in Stain’s eyes. As we know, All Might is not a human being but a divine concept.

This is shown when Iida decides to make a heroic stand to Stain after being thoroughly beaten and admonished by him. Granted, it was to not shame his family name rather than help his friends, but Stain does not even acknowledge courage or growth of character on Iida’s part, or care to see if the bud of heroism would grow in the boy, whereas he was willing to allow Shigaraki’s bud of resolve grow - knowing the boy was a dangerous, anarchistic villain in the making.

Stain was more willing to see Shigaraki walk a dark path of self-destruction than Iida walk the path of heroism, because he recognised Shigaraki’s path - and acknowledged it. It was worthy because it was backed by an unbreakable conviction, like Stain’s. To Stain, that was all that mattered. As long as you just kept going, with an unshakable conviction, you would be victorious. Literally mind over matter.

All Might nearly killed himself living like this. Stain could have so easily done the same, thousands of times. He put his life at risk every day, not only because of the nature of his quirk - ingesting blood - but also the villains and heroes he clashed with. Not only that, but Stain killed any chance he had of a normal life, throwing away his own wellbeing and humanity.

So while Stain’s mindset allowed for people like Deku to live, it also let people like Shigaraki and the League live to wreak the havoc we’re seeing in the present time.

Stain’s view of the world is so blinkered by All Might’s false perception of how things should be, he cannot accept things for what they are or what they could be - only what they are not. And if they have weak conviction (in his eyes), they are unworthy of a chance to change simply because they won’t.

As a vigilante, he clashed with anyone who could not accept his absolute justice, and had absolutely no room for moral greys. While he helped people he felt were on his side, even villains, he turned on them the second they deviated from the standard he set.

The same applied to his days as a villain. Anyone who wasn’t strong enough, physically or mentally, to live up to All Might’s standard had to die so that they would no longer hold society back. Villains and heroes alike.

Not even what was intended to be a wake-up call had its desired effect. In fact, it only pushed Stain to up the ante. Stendhal didn’t take in any of Knuckleduster’s words about throwing away common sense and safety for a superhuman ideal that doesn’t exist - with All Might specifically used for the accompanying panel. He only listened to the line about lacking ‘conviction’, because he could neither understand nor accept that All Might and the society full of hope that he had created could be wrong.

Only Stendhal was wrong. He had not cast away everything yet. To show true conviction, to succeed, he had to cast away any shred of aspirations for a hero’s life he had in him. It was the only thing that remained of ‘Chizome’.

The vigilante needed to take one step further. He had only been looking at villains for the problem, not the ‘fake heroes’ who were aiding and abetting the spread of villains - like Koichi had by protecting Soga from Stain, as Stain saw it. Stain needed to ‘go beyond’, like All Might, to the absolute limit. He had to become a villain.

And that meant casting even his heroic identity in becoming a villain. That was the only thing he had left to discard.

Stain is so caught up with his own beliefs and worldview he can’t even see the hypocrisy of his own words (as Stendhal):

“Even an innate act of goodness...becomes wicked in the aid of evil”.

He’s so blinded by his own rhetoric that he doesn’t realise that this same condemnation can be applied to himself. His desire to improve society and save it from corrupting elements (which do exist in places) is good, but the foundation of that desire in inherently flawed and, combined with a judgemental and aggressive attitude, doomed to both become and aid evil.

Get to the point! So what does this mean for Stain now?

Several factors, in my mind, came together to provide Stain with some much needed self-reflection during his confinement:

Deku - simply by existing as a healthier representation of All Might’s hero philosophy, and through beating Stain in a battle between their respective takes on All Might’s ‘meaning of a hero’. Stain lost - that has to have some affect on him, just as losing to Knuckleduster did (granted, the latter was not for the better, but it did make him think).

Shigaraki & AFO - if I’m not mistaken, Stain was watching as AFO was wheeled into prison. And if I am, Stain very likely saw Shigaraki and AFO during the prison break and is smart enough to put two and two together and see them as responsible for the current events.

A long time to think - Stain has spent, I believe, several months in jail now. While it is possible to over-think things, the event that brought him to that point and everything that happened since could lead to interesting personal development - positive, this time.

Stain only appeared for a mere two panels in the latest chapter, but already I’m seeing hopeful signs for a change in his character to show and develop.

The first hopeful panel

First, when we first see his face, this expression is very different from his default pissed off face, or even the ‘crazed fanatic’ face he’s well-known for at this point. Given the shitshow he’s just arrived to see, he would be justified in being angry. But he doesn’t look angry - he looks desperate. Almost sad. Am I looking too hard?

I mean, yes, he’s just swam three miles in a storm in pitch blackness, he’s justified in having a thousand-yard stare to go with his soggy clothes, but honestly he looks a very different man. A sad man.

Which is strange, because he’s got what he wanted. He wanted all the ‘fakes’ gone, and now so many of them are retiring in their droves in the face of public backlash. He wanted the public to turn against the heroes more concerned with their own reputation and comfort than protecting citizens in their time of need, like right now. He wanted Endeavour to suffer.

And now it’s all happened. Everything should be great now, right? The weeds have been removed from the garden, so it should look beautiful now, right?

But it’s not beautiful. It’s chaos, it’s destruction, it’s pain and death.

Stain got the results he wanted, but society doesn’t look anything like he envisioned it would. He believed his cause and methods were justified because they were inspired by the perfect hero himself. But that hero wasn’t perfect - in fact, his role was positively toxic in the long-run, and it is because Stain internalised and obsessed and believed in this toxic way of life that he failed. And not only did he fail, he bred more evil by becoming evil with good intent.

‘The road to hell is paved with good intentions’ is apt here. It sums up the culmination of everything Stain has done. He inspired a more critical and questioning culture to take root, which in itself isn’t a bad thing, but his narrow-mindedness and fundamental lack of critical thinking on his part, as well as All Might himself, led to Stain replicating the very worst aspects of All Might’s legacy - a self-destructive road to hell with the mask of nobility and justice.

Judging by his expression, and everything that’s happening now, Stain more than likely has realised or is in the process of realising the hand he has had in all this. Shigaraki’s rise, the League, the division and mass revolt against heroes in general, even All Might’s retirement and AFO could be attributed to him at least indirectly.

The second hopeful panel

Second and last - we see Stain enter an abandoned house, trashed perhaps during the riots, and recovering an old and badly rusted sword. Whether this was his hideout during his killing spree or one of many hiding places, what is truly interesting is his behaviour.

As a vigilante and as a villain, Stain loved to monologue. He loved to drive into his unwilling listeners exactly why he was doing what he was doing, how much they had failed as heroes, his hopes for the future, his convictions. This is probably a carryover from his soapbox days as a teenager. He was never heard then, but he would damn well be heard now.

Even in quiet moments, he would openly reflect on his actions and reiterate his reason for living - his identity as a force of justice.

Here Stain is alone, armed for the first time since his arrest, ready to go out and fight. Perfect time for a monologue. A vow to fix what he can, a vow to destroy all those who’re currently wrecking society?

Nope. Stain just looks at his sword for a moment, and lets go a sigh as he draws it. Serious, committed, and without pretence.

Maybe it was just a lack of space thing or desire to keep Stain’s next move a mystery, but to me it speaks to a possible shift in his character. In a time when he would justify himself, refer to himself as a force against evil, admonish all those he saw as forcing his hand, he says nothing.

Conclusion

Maybe I’m wrong, but it seems that perhaps the Stain we see here is more human than we’ve seen him before. Without his mask or costume to project an image of an ideal or superhuman force, Stain is simply Chizome Akaguro, a man who has little but the ruins of his life and the society he only damaged further.

I’d like to think that these signs show a Stain who wants to do right - the actual right thing - and fix what he can of this mess. How he goes about this all depends on how much he has or is willing to change about himself going forward. Because he needs to change in order to even start trying to make things better now. He was wrong about All Might, he was wrong about Iida. He was wrong to let Shigaraki go. He was wrong that a great hero is someone who destroys himself for others.

If Stain is to make his time as a free man a positive one for society, truly, in this time when they need people to step up the most, Stain will need to fundamentally and drastically shift his perspective on things and people around him.

He needs to accept his current state and the sins of his past.

He needs to see All Might as he truly is, if he hasn’t already.

He needs to see how far Iida has come as a hero, in spite of Stain’s hateful judgement of him.

He needs to see the kind of hero Deku has grown into, the kind that saves others while also keeping themselves as safe and happy as possible.

He needs to LIVE so he can change and be interesting, not just another ‘second-to-final-boss villain’.

And then after all is said and done - DON’T YOU GO KILLING STAIN OFF HORIKOSHI I SWEAR TO GOD - Stain is marched right back to prison because no matter how valiantly he fights, no matter how much he changes for the better, no matter how much he becomes the man he could have been, he is a murderer. He has permanently destroyed lives and wrecked many others. He can never undo that.

The best thing Stain can do in this arc is NOT BE STAIN, but Chizome Akaguro, citizen with mad skills who wants to set society free from the threat of evil by becoming the hero it desperately needs.

Except in the determination to fuck Shigaraki and AFO up. That he can keep.

What do you guys think??

#MHA spoilers #BNH spoilers #spoilers #hero killer stain #Stain #MHA #BNH #My Hero Academia #boku no hero academia #meta #essay #HOLY SHIT THIS TOOK ALL DAY I'M FINALLY DONE #WOO

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divinelydeanna · 3 years

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The Shadow

Time and time again, we may find ourselves turning down a dark road of emptiness, and self sabatoge.   All experience /shadow work, suffering, addictions, is to make the unconscious conscious, and guide us to dive deep into new somatic territory, open new neurological pathways, to create new circuitry of self love and to experience deep intimacy..    Awareness and proper framing of what's going on is crucial. The 'Psychic Winds of Change' blow through our Minds can be crazy fast and volatile , and at any moment may not be showing any signs of slowing down just yet.   Exploring Unchartered territory , spiritual healing modalities, can open new neurological pathways , create new circuitry of self love and to experience deep intimacy if we are willing to do the work. Otherwise it is spiritual bypassing.  

We all have demons inside us. Every day, we fight against them – sometimes we lose, sometimes we win.

These demons haunting us can be seen either in small glimpses or in full chaos. And because of our guilt and shame, we tend to ignore and bury them.

We think that they should stay hidden because they cannot and should not exist in our conscious self. The society tells us to focus on the good things like love and light, but never the darkness or shadow.

However, when we focus only on the “light”, it doesn’t reach to the depths of our being. It just feels like superficially hanging on a warm and fuzzy thing.

“Positive thinking is simply the philosophy of hypocrisy – to give it the right name. When you are feeling like crying, it teaches you to sing. You can manage if you try, but those repressed tears will come out at some point, in some situation. There is a limitation to repression. And the song that you were singing was absolutely meaningless; you were not feeling it, it was not born out of your heart.” – Osho

Inside every one of us are darker problems that exist. In order to touch the very depths of our being, we must be ready to explore our buried self through shadow work.

Here are the basic things you need to know about shadow work:

Beneath the social mask we wear every day, we have a hidden shadow side: an impulsive, wounded, sad, or isolated part that we generally try to ignore. The Shadow can be a source of emotional richness and vitality, and acknowledging it can be a pathway to healing and an authentic life. – Steve Wolf

First, we must define what is a “shadow”.

In the field of psychology, a shadow is a term used to refer to the parts within us that we may try to hide or deny. The name was originally coined and explored by Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst, Carl Jung.

It comprises of the aspects of our personality that we tend to deem shameful, unacceptable, ugly. It can be envy, jealousy, rage, lust, desire for power or the wounds incurred in childhood – all of those we keep hidden. Jung believes that when the human Shadow is shunned, it tends to sabotage our lives. Repressing or suppressing one’s shadow can result in addictions, low self-esteem, mental illness, chronic illnesses, and various neuroses.

“Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual’s conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.”– Carl Jung

You can learn to identify and work with your shadow self so that you can reach your goals and live your best life.

For many people, denying their inner self is the path they usually choose, but as you’ll see here, we are big fans of accepting who you really are and working with that, while choosing strategic thoughts and emotions in order to continue to move forward. Transformation, which so many of us are looking for, does not come from a place of denial. It comes from a place of acceptance. While you might not think it is possible to find your way to the “dark side” and come out a better person, we are here to tell you, it is.

“Man needs difficulties; they are necessary for health.” – Carl Jung

Here are 8 ways to practice shadow work:

1. Believe you are worthy and that things will get better

The first step in overcoming your shadow self and taking back your life is to acknowledge that you are worthy of good things.

When we are feeling low it is easy to continue to feel that way. Humans have an uncanny ability to feel sorry for themselves, and sometimes that is all we want to do and it serves its purpose.

But sometimes, that self-pity takes hold of us and makes it very difficult for us to get out of the rut and get back to our normal routines, or even better, our best self.

The key is learning to love yourself.

However, in this day and age practicing self love is hard.

Why?

Because society conditions us to find ourselves through our relationships with others. That the true path to happiness and fulfillment is to find love with someone else

I recently came to understand that this is an extremely unhelpful standard.

People living regular lives

What I discovered is that the relationship I have with myself is mirrored in my relationship with others. Therefore, it was very important for me to develop a better relationship with myself.

“If you do not respect your whole, you cannot expect to be respected as well. Don’t let your partner love a lie, an expectation. Trust yourself. Bet on yourself. If you do this, you will be opening yourself to be really loved. It’s the only way to find real, solid love in your life.”

2. Pay attention to the emotions you feel

No emotions are bad.

Our negative emotions are portals into the shadow. They help us determine our wounds and fears.

When you feel an emotion, take a minute to examine it. Ask yourself the following questions:

What am I feeling?

Why am I feeling this?

Wait for answers.

Don’t be frustrated if the answers do not come right away. Sometimes, the answers need time to be found and you’ll know it.

Never force answers and jump into conclusion because they might be the wrong ones. Shadow work is considered soul work and it happens on its own timeline. Just be patient and know that in time, the answers will come.

This steps simply means to accept what comes up for you, when it comes up, and acknowledge that you are an emotional being that may, from time to time, find it difficult to manage your emotions.

If you are working to tame your shadow self, then you’ll be paying attention to these moments so that you can stay with them, rather than try to run from them.

So many people simply want to feel better in the moments where we feel the greatest amount of discomfort, but if we can stay with our emotions, name them and be grateful for them, we can overcome them and move on to better things.

The better life is not created by not experiencing those emotions, but by experiencing all of them with gratitude.

RELATED: I was deeply unhappy…then I discovered this one Buddhist teaching

3. Identify the shadow

Our shadows are located in our subconscious. We buried them there that’s why it’s tricky to identify it.

n order to perform shadow work, we need to identify the shadow. The first step is to become aware of the recurrent feelings that you always feel. Identifying these patterns will help highlight the shadow.

Some common shadow beliefs are:

I am not good enough.

I am unloveable.

I am flawed.

My feelings are not valid.

I must take care of everyone around me.

Why can’t I just be normal just like others?

4. Investigate your feelings objectively and with compassion

t’s hard to do shadow work objectively and with compassion. It’s easier to investigate and blame other people why you end up that way.

On the other hand, understanding why the people who hurt you acted in a particular way is hard to accept. But in order to heal ourselves, we must forgive those who hurt us in order to move on.

Try to navigate that they did the best they could do at that time or were simply acting from their own wounds.

It’s also easy to feel bad about yourself for having these negative feelings. But there’s no reason to feel bad. We all experience negative emotions. We wouldn’t be human if we didn’t.

It’s important to accept our negative emotions and be okay with them.

According to philosopher Alan Watts, Carl Jung was the kind of man who could feel something negative and not be ashamed about it:

“[Jung] was the sort of man who could feel anxious and afraid and guilty without being ashamed of feeling this way. In other words, he understood that an integrated person is not a person who has simply eliminated the sense of guilt or the sense of anxiety from his life – who is fearless and wooden and kind of sage of stone. He is a person who feels all these things, but has no recriminations against himself for feeling them.” – Alan Watts

5. Focusing on your breathing

How much attention do you pay to the way you breathe?

If you’re like most people, then probably not a lot. We usually just let our body do the job and completely forget about it.

I think this is one of our biggest mistakes.

Because when you breathe, you produce energy for your body and psyche. This has a direct connection to your sleep, digestion, heart, muscles, nervous system, brain and mood.

But the quality of your breathing doesn’t depend only on the quality of the air — it depends much more on how you breathe.

That’s why many spiritual traditions pay so much attention to breath. And focusing on your breathing is a key technique they use to help people explore, and ultimately conquer, their shadow self.

6. Explore the shadow

Psychologists use art therapy as a way to help patients explore their inner selves. It is because art is a great way to allow your Shadow to manifest itself. Here are some ways to express the shadow:

Journaling

When you write, it allows you to feel emotions and empty your head of the thoughts rumbling around. It’s like magic – even when you write thoughts that have no sense. Just write whatever comes to mind because you can’t do it wrong.

Write a letter

Write a letter to yourself or to those who hurt you. You don’t have to actually send the letter, just let all your feelings out.

Tell the person in mind what you feel and why you feel it. Writing a letter will validate yourself and your emotions. You can burn the letter after you write it as a symbolic release.

Meditate

In meditation, we gain insights about why we feel certain ways. It helps us understand and objectively delve deeper about our emotions, then allow ourselves to heal.

One example is forgiveness meditation. You can picture a person who hurt you in your mind and say, “May you be happy, may you be at peace, may you be free of suffering.”

Recommended reading: A spiritual master explains why you can’t meditate properly (and what to do instead)

Feel

You will never heal unless you allow yourself to face the emotion you’re scared of. So explore them, write about them and make art out of them.

To experience yourself as a whole, loved, and lovable, you need to own up to your emotions.

Dreams

Our thoughts and deepest emotions can come out in dreams, according to Jung. When you experience a dream, write down what occurred immediately so you don’t forget.

By understanding your dreams, you might understand more about yourself.

“The dream is the small hidden door in the deepest and most intimate sanctum of the soul, which opens to that primeval cosmic night that was soul long before there was conscious ego and will be soul far beyond what a conscious ego could ever reach.” – Carl Jung

However, Jung says that it’s important to understand that one dream by itself might not mean much, but patterns from multiple dreams might:

“An obscure dream, taken by itself, can rarely be interpreted with any certainty, so that I attach little importance to the interpretation of single dreams. With a series of dreams we can have more confidence in our interpretations, for the later dreams correct the mistakes we have made in handling those that went before. We are also better able, in a dream series, to recognize the important contents and basic themes.” – Carl Jung

Remember that the shadow thrives in secret but they are part of who you are. Bring the hidden parts of yourself to light and bathe them in self-love and acceptance.

Sometimes, the process hurts but it will make you a better person. Keep in mind: When it comes down to getting what you want, you have to not only confront your inner darkness but embrace it.

Rather than try to turn it off when you feel the shadow self-rearing its ugly head, allow yourself to feel it and be curious about it.

In some cases, you might find that it serves you, especially when you are trying to protect yourself from things that might otherwise threaten your higher self.

When you tap into your shadow self properly, it can be a powerful alter ego that can help you manage trying situations.

It’s when you let it rule your life, or pretend you don’t have a shadow self that problems persist.

7. Nurture your inner child

Our childhood traumas can be caused by the way we were parented or other people who hurt us. It can result in deep wounds that can create behavioral and emotional patterns that create our personality.

Most of the time, our childhood wounds are the most painful. They haunt us and tell us we’re not worthy of love, or that our feelings are wrong, or that we have to take care of everything because nobody was around to take care of us.

Nurturing your inner child involves traveling back in time to when you were hurt and give yourself love. You can do this by:

Go back to the time in your life when you felt most vulnerable.

It can be a scene where you got hurt or a time in your life when you felt vulnerable. Hold that image of yourself in your mind. Stay aware, taking in any messages that arise during that time.

Give the younger you compassion

While reliving the moment, give love to your younger self. Tell yourself, “I love you and I’m here for you. It will be okay, it’s not your fault and you did nothing to deserve this.” You can also give a hug to your younger self.

One thing is for sure when doing shadow work, it is uncomfortable, to say the least. Who would enjoy owning up to their flaws, weaknesses, selfishness, hate, and all the negative emotions they feel? Nobody.

But while focusing on our positive side is enjoyable and boosts our confidence, shadow work can help us grow and develop into a better version of ourselves.

Jung writes in the book Psychology and Alchemy, “There is no light without shadow and no psychic wholeness without imperfection.”

With shadow work, we become whole to live a more authentic and fulfilling life.

Recommended reading:

7 steps to heal your inner child.

Recommended Therepy : inner child Hypnotherapy, Family Constillations, Sound Healing, Earth magnetism Nature, Fasting, Mirroring, EFT, Resurecction Therepy, Heart Coherence Frequency, Deep tissue manipulation, infrared saunas, fasting, 1stSun. Kundalini Meditation , Mantras, ecstatic dance, Qi gong, vibrational machines, resurrection therepy.

Written by:DeannaCook and is free under the Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/3.0/) you may freely copy, distribute, blog, or post it anywhere, so long as the work is attributed to "deannalcook", and the text is unaltered.

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lost-eternity · 4 years

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Control -Loki x Reader-

Y/n, a young woman with a doctorate in psychology is sent to analyse Loki and retrieve any usable information on him. Instead, she finds herself falling for the brooding god of Mischief. What secrets lie behind that aloof smirk? Y/n soon realises that she may have bitten off more than she can chew, after all, ~sweetest tongue has sharpest tooth~

Song fic: Control by Halsey

TW: self harm, and certain mental illnesses.

His eyes are blue.

Touched by ethereal storm clouds, as cold as a tumultuous sea. Eyes that sing of empty promises and pretty lies, an infamously alluring gaze that drags you fathoms below their icy depths. Eyes that leave you to drown there, writhing in your misplaced trust. You had never seen any emotion in them other than contempt. But at that time, they had burned with the passion of a roaring flame. Uncontrolled in their path of desecration, consuming all they touch in the twin flames of hate.

His eyes still haunted you, plaguing your dreams like a wretched banshee caterwauling into the night; calling out for your demise. And yes, they would be your demise. It didn’t take much intellect the figure that out. Despite all of the flashing signs, the warnings- you couldn’t help but feel drawn in. The fog behind that cerulean gaze concealed a mystery of a man with motives and morals all to his own. A man that equal parts thrills and scares you, and ultimately beckons your deeper into his sea. Honey-filled words coat your instincts, cajoling you further into a diminished stupor. It is a sour lesson to swallow but invaluable nonetheless; sweetest tongue has sharpest tooth.

“Doctor!” Stark’s gravely tone shook you from your apparent languor and silenced your mental musings. Lifting your chin up, you found yourself once again revisiting your surroundings. You were positioned at a metal table, spread before you were the remnants of the sandwich you had been eating for lunch. Although it appeared you were the last one to finish. With the exception of Tony Stark, the rest of the cafeteria was devoid of S.H.I.E.L.D agents. Stark loomed above you, wearing an incredulous expression upon his insufferably smug brow.

“Tin-man.” You greeted him with a flat tone, gazing down at your rather unappealing sandwich. “Have you finally found your heart?”

“Ha-ha,” Tony remarked callously in response to your pun, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “Fury wants to see you, Doc.”

You bowed your head, staring impassively at your hands. “I’ve told you. Just call me Y/n.”

A smirked tugged the edges of Tony’s mouth upwards. “But you’re a doctor.” Although his tone conveyed reminiscence, you knew it was just a guise for the triumph.

“Of psychology," you scoffed, now unable to hide your amusement. “We both know I am not a real doctor.”

Tony only chuckled at your disdained tone. With a grandiose swooping gesture of his hands, Stark dipped his head in mockery. “As you say, Y/n.”

You resisted the urge to roll your eyes as you rose to your feet. Your sandwich remained neglected upon the cold metal table whilst you brushed out your immaculate white lab coat. While it was true you didn’t consider yourself a real doctor, you spent a good chunk of your time in the lab with Bruce. Of course, the man’s got a stick up his ass, as Tony likes to say, and only seems to care about safety precautions and lab etiquette. Hence the lab coat. You ducked past Tony, smirking to yourself. You knew that Bruce would blow his top if he found out that you had been eating food in his spare lab coat.

Pausing mid-stride, you twisted your head around to appraise Stark. He was lingering behind, leaning smugly against the table, his head tilted to one side.

“You coming?” You cooed, folding your arms over your chest.

“To talk to Fury? Nu-huh. The man sounded pissed enough as is.”

That dulled the playful mirth in your gaze. “Pissed?” You echoed then sighed for what felt like the thousandth time that day. “Good to know.” Swinging around, you scrambled at a brisk pace down the hall. Nicholas Fury was a terrifying man with a sharp stare and equally sharp tongue. You did not want to contribute to his current moodlet by being tardy.

As you hurried down the hallway you found yourself plunging deeper into your own thoughts, caught up in a tidal wave of passing fancies. You had learnt to embrace the wind of your mind, like a brief gust before returning to a calm sea.

Your ideas drifted back to the conversation you just had with Tony. You recounted his posture, the way he tensely held his shoulders, forcing them upright. How he inclined his head towards you, but still unable to meet your eye. You knew that something was on his mind, and you were tempted to inquire about it once Fury dismissed you... and after you have spoken with him.

Stark liked to fancy himself an anomaly. He would strut around wearing a dazzling smile and an aloof attitude. He used his biting wit and sarcastic remarks as a mask of which to hide behind. All his life he had been treated coldly, expected to depend on only himself and to discount others. This had lead to a vicious cycle of self-dependent cynicism. You recognised this tendency the moment you first met him all those months ago. You had tried to break it, you introduced him to cognitive therapy, to journaling, painting and other methods of self-expression. However, the man had proven himself to be quite stubborn and dismissed you. He rejected your outstretched hand in favour of a bottle of scotch whilst proclaiming: "I'm hungry. Where's the scotch?"

You knew that Stark’s alcohol dependency was a coping mechanism for some form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. You hadn’t been around long enough to figure out what stemmed this, but you figured that it was a culmination of many different elements. The others weren’t of much help and you eventually learnt not to ask questions. Instead, you could only be a bystander to Tony’s self-destructive habits as he continuously searched for the solution to his problems at the bottom of an empty glass. You knew that you couldn’t help him. Not unless he wanted to be helped. And as mentioned earlier, Tony only helps himself.

You pulled yourself from your thoughts as you arrived at an unmarked door. Gathering your sense of courage you reached out, placing your fingertips upon the metallic surface of a recently polished door handle. You must have been shuffling your feet because the contact sent an electric charge crackling through your fingertips and raising the hair along your arm. Taking in a final breath, you flicked your wrist and the door swung open.

The room itself was sparsely decorated. Beams of light interrupted by the blinds along the windows poured into the otherwise darkened chamber. They illuminated swirls of dust, twisting together in some erratic and tumultuous dance. All furniture had been pushed off towards the sides, opening a central area where the man himself stood. Nick Fury, looking as intimidating as ever. Fortunately, his back was to you, and his glowering stare directed towards one of the windows. You weren’t certain, but you could have sworn that he was idly following the path of one of the floating dust particles as it drifted across the room. Clearing your throat, you announced your presence. A heavy silence fell between the two of you.

You were the first to break. “Are you trying to intimidate me?”

There was another pause, causing an empty feeling to open up in the pit of your stomach. It brought you back to your grade school years, trepidatiously lingering in the principle’s office and fidgeting under his cold stare. Had you said something wrong? Were you in trouble? Fury’s shoulder spasmed slightly, it took you a few seconds to realise that he was laughing. “Is it working?” He asked.

“Uh. Yes.” You admitted, making your way over to one of the disregarded chairs. You straddled the chair, leaning your chest and arms against the backboard. “I suppose that is why you’re standing in a semi-empty room with the lights turned off.” A nervously chuckle slipped past your lips. “You, uh, wanted to see me, er, sir?”

“I did.” Fury, at last, turned around to face you. Shadows clustered along his jaw and nose as the byproduct of the backlighting from the closed windows.

You leaned slightly back in your chair. You would not ever be able to quite get used to the threatening eye patch he wore to cover his lost eye. He never talked about how he lost it, and you never were foolish enough to ask. It was probably a traumatising tale, and you knew better than to dig up long-buried memories (if only you knew the truth about the cat named Goose).

“You’ve been spending an awful lot of time with him, Miss Y/n. Why don’t you tell me how that is going for you.” With a dramatised grunt, Fury sat down across from you.

“Uh. What do you mean, sir?” You blinked, quickly withdrawing. Your boisterousness from earlier dropped in the presence of your superiors. You enjoyed your job as the therapist for the Avengers, you weren’t about to lose it.

A contemplative sigh fell from Fury’s lips. “Loki. You keep informing me that you are progressing with our... special guest, and yet I see no evidence as such.”

A look of bewilderment clouded your face. You stitched your eyebrows together, curling your hands into a fist by your sides. Loki, the Asgardian self-proclaimed god was quite an aberration. Perhaps it was because you were attempting to define an alien’s psychology in human terms. Or because his mind functioned differently than a human's. Regardless of the reason, it simply wasn’t working. You had everyone else on the team figured out, even Director Fury himself. But Loki? The man posed a mystery. A convoluted figure who wrapped himself in shrouds, hiding his motives behind complex word puzzles and mind games. It called to you, drawing you in, challenging you. Taunting you.

Over the past few months, you have had many sessions with him, each one bringing you closer to cracking him. Each breakthrough sent a wave of euphoria coursing through your veins, and you began to truly understand him. This god... this eternal being. You understood him in a way no one else did. And he understood you. You could see it in his eyes, the way he ever so slightly perks up when you entered the room. How loosely he speaks with you now. He doesn’t speak with anyone else that way. Just you.

Only you.

“I am so close, sir.” You reported, schooling your features into an expression of apathy despite the stirrings you felt in your heart. “I just need more time.”

“Time? We’ve given you plenty of time.” Fury remarked, stiffly crossing his arms. “Now we need results. Elsewise we might have to terminate your little experiment.”

You couldn’t help the emotion rising to your voice. “No! I can help him. I swear. I can change him. He is salvageable. He is just... wounded.”

“You can’t save every wounded creature you find on the roadside, Miss Y/n.” The Director consoled her despite the graveness of his tone. “To even try would be an exhaust on our recourses and personnel.”

“I can save this one.” You stated firmly, your tone unwavering. “I am not going to give up on him.”

Director Fury met your unfaltering gaze, scrutinising it for any possible hint of doubt. He finally sighed in resignation, shoulders slouching slightly. “Very well. You get one more session. And if you don’t have any intel for us by then, we are pulling the plug.”

“Yes, sir.” You crumbled forward, relief resting heavily on your back. “Thank you, sir.”

“It’s best to be off now. You’re on the clock.” Fury drawled in a taunting tone.

Quickly springing to your feet, you inclined your head towards Fury in a brief nod before scrambling off down the hall.

Loki’s holding cell was deep under the facility. It boasted an impressive array of mechanisms to ensure his complacency and idleness. The original design was intended for the Hulk in case he ever lost control within the walls of S.H.I.E.L.D. Loki had taken up residence shortly prior to its construction and was moved there on orders from Agent Coulson. After a few failed escape attempts, Loki seemed uncharacteristically docile. This was when Fury had ordered you to begin sessions with the Asgardian due to your background in psychology. Fury wanted to know anything that could be used against him, but you, instead, wanted to try and save him from his inner demons.

From the first moment you laid eyes on him, you recognised his tortured soul. From the information Thor had provided you, you sympathised with the god of mischief. Kings have a tendency to cast a long shadow, plunging anyone underneath them into unrecognised darkness. And Loki didn’t want to be complacent in life only to die forgotten. A sentiment to which you deeply relate.

Pressing your identification card up against the smooth surface of the scanner you watched as the heavy-set doors slid open before you. You stepped into a large rectangular room. In its centre stood a large glass tube, reinforced with some science whoo-haa you did not quite understand.

He sat on the floor, his hair immaculately slicked back as always. Obsidian curls covered his shoulder, outlining his sculpted face like an experienced artist’s masterful brushstrokes. Those piercing cerulean eyes passively gazing towards you, his expression unreadable.

Your raven-haired prince.

“You’re unusually quiet.” You remarked as you stepped towards his enclosure. You took a seat in the padded armchair left for your comfort, crossing your legs neatly.

“What do you want me to say?” Came the croaked response after a moment of hesitation. “You sit there, gawking at me from outside my cage. Like I am a zoo animal here for your entertainment. I am a god. You should be my monkey.”

His sharp tone caught you by surprise. You redirected your attention towards him, lifting your chin slightly. “Is that really what you think?”

“You don’t deny it.” This time, he did not miss a single beat.

“Ah.” A ghost of a smile appeared on your face. “I see now.”

Loki’s carefully crafted smirk faltered, his brows knitting together in a perplexed expression.

“This is about control.” You respond matter-of-factly. “That is what your domineering display on Earth was. A last-ditch effort for control.”

The smirk died on his lips. He turned his head away and scoffed. “Like you can understand me.”

“You really are quite simple, though.” You couldn't resist the urge to speak in a haughty tone as you picked yourself up from the couch. “Ooh, yes. I definitely have it now. All your life you have been cast to the side lines. The people around you making your decisions for you. What you should eat, where you should sleep, who you should communicate with. As such are the duties of a prince. But in the end... you don’t even get to control who ascends to the throne. It is Thor. It was always Thor. You were just a ploy, a desperate grab for peace in a time of war. So they disregarded you. They sent you away to find them a fortune. Because in the end, you were just a pawn in their games.”

“Shut up.” Loki’s lips curled back in a menacing sneer. “You don’t know anything!”

“Aggression is a method of deflection.” You remarked as you slowly paced your way around the glass. His eyes followed your movement, poised like a cat waiting to strike. You continued, undismayed. “That’s why you came here, huh? You needed an outlet. Someone to exercise complete control over. And it felt good, didn’t it? Gaining the one thing that you have been deprived of all these years. But then it was all taken from you. And now you’re here, helpless and without any control. And it’s driving you mad. Tell me, Loki, who is in control?”

No response.

Provoked, you asked again, your voice louder this time. “Who is in control?”

“I said, shut up!” Loki barked, the entire room within the glass confines flickered momentarily.

You took a step back. It was subtle, and if you were dealing with anyone else, you would have thought that it was a trick of the light. But this was Loki. Narrowing your eyes, you whirled around to face the deadpan god. “What did you do?”

If he realised he had been caught, he showed no sign of it. “How do you mean?” That self-assured smirk gradually worked his way back onto his face.

“Remove the illusion, Loki.” You breathed, pressing a palm against the glass.

“Are you sure of that request?” Loki drawled.

Your steely glare was the only answer he needed. Sighing, Loki lowered his gaze. His form flickered a few times before vanishing altogether and what you saw in his place caused you to draw in a shuddering breath.

The food you had provided him that morning had been cast aside. The silver tray turned over and smears of blood mixed with cereal stained the glass walls. Loki himself appeared even worse. His pristine complexion was marred by a busted lip, crimson liquid split out of large gashes in his knuckles. His parts of his hair, caked with blood and mats he been ripped from his very scalp and lay forgotten across the stained tile floor. Loki, observing your shocked expression laughed dryly. “And now you see me.” He croaked hoarsely.

“What did you do to yourself?” Your question was spoken in a tone hardly above a whisper, causing your stomach to clench at the sight.

You were left unanswered as Loki slid his gaze away, focusing it on his arm where a bead of blood trickled across his skin.

“You’re... hurting yourself.” You frowned as you gently placed your fingers against the glass.

“Because of you,” Loki answered gruffly, still not returning your stare.

“Why?” You breathed, furrowing your brows together.

“I hate you.” He nearly spat out the words, his shoulders heaving in the strain. “I hate your stupid face, I hate the way you dissect me like some rat. I hate your eyes. And I hate that I can’t get you out of my damn head! Why do you have to follow me in my dreams? Why can’t you just leave me alone?!”

There was a heavy blanket of silence that settled between the two of you. A pressing and soffocating silence that muffled your thoughts. You felt speechless, the pressure of the tension felt nearly asphyxiating and sent your mind reeling. You were jostled from your stupor when you noticed the blood running from his wrists, delicate skin broken under the white-knuckle grip of his nails.

“Stop that.” You demanded in a hushed tone.

He didn’t reply.

“I said, stop it!” You snapped and quickly slammed your keycard against the side of the containment cell. The doors slid open and you rushed inside. You slammed Loki up against the wall and slid your slender fingers underneath his bloody ones.

Panting heavily the two of you stared at each other, you with fear and him with contempt. Slowly, you came to realise his proximity and leaned back, turning away.

“Why... would you do that?” Loki rasped, his eyes narrowed.

“Because. You need help.” You replied, negating the waver in your tone as you gained enough courage to look back at him.

“What do you even care?” Loki retorted. “I’m a monster.”

“I should be scared of you.” You phrased the statement more as a question, despite your situation, you couldn’t find it within you to be fearful.

Loki slowly looked up, his breath ghosting over your face as you two peered at each other. “Yes.” He replied shakily.

You leaned closer, your lips grazing against his. “Really?” You whispered softly.

What ensued was a moment of indescribable elation. His lips met yours, they molded softly against you. His free hand trailed up your leg, snaking around your waist and tugging you against his chest. You could feel his heartbeat against your clavicle, a steady and slow rhythm that greatly juxtaposed your own racing heart.

How could he be so calm?

You didn’t have much time to ponder this when a sudden weight sent you flying off him and slamming into the glass wall behind you. Red hot pain spiked through your spine, causing your limbs and other extremities to prickle with the feeling of needles. It wasn’t long before Loki was on top of you, pinning you callously against the glass.

“Y-you’re hurting me.” You stammered as you squirmed, your arms feebly tapping against his back.

“Good.” Loki snarled, his breath ghosting over your ear. In a haze of golden light, the illusion melted away from Loki's previously haggard form. Your heart caught in your throat as the blood stains dissipated from the walls and Loki revealed his usual composed, pristine appearance.

Your finally spoke, visible confusion painted across your face. “L-Loki?”

The prince regarded you coldly, reaching into your pocket, he retrieved your keycard. The realisation dawned on you slightly too late. You opened your mouth, but the cry died in your throat as he clamped his hand over mouth. Then he brought his lips against your ear. “You’re god damn right, you should be scare of me.” Spinning on his heels, Loki stalked towards the exit.

Making one last attempt to salvage the situation, you made a sprint towards Loki.

With one fluid movement, the Asgardian swiped your keycard against the control panel and the doors swung shut before you, trapping you inside the high-security chamber.

“Hey!” You cried out, tears pricking the edges of your vision. You slammed your fist against the transparent casing. You battered against it over and over again until your knuckles blackened and each strike sent a bolt of pain jolting up your arm.

Still screaming his name, you watched Loki stroll towards the chamber exit, twirling your keycard along with his fingertips playfully and completely ignoring your shrieks. He paused by the elevator doors, punching in his desired floor number. With a tilt of his head, he slowly began to turn around, those blue eyes once again fixating onto you. A twisted smirk distorted his handsome features.

You watched in horror as Loki’s form rippled. Without once breaking eye-contact he assumed your form. You found yourself glaring back at the man who stole your face, wearing your skin and boasting your smile. In a voice eerily similar to your own, Loki spoke one final time.

“Who is in control?”

‘Dii-iing!’

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justlookatthosesausages · 4 years

Text

“In the eye of the storm” ◊◊◊◊ a post-Frozen 2 fanfic ◊◊◊◊ CHAPTER 7: Upwind

The sun rose with the storm for another morning. The hooves of Anna's and Elsa's horses were the only sound on the path as they trotted, accompanied by the whistling sound of the powerful wind blowing on them. Anna turned her head.

"Why are you staring at me like that? Did I put my fur coat wrong? Do I have something in my hair?"

Elsa giggled. "No. You look great. I was actually admiring you and I'm still impressed by your talent during yesterday's meeting."

Anna blushed, which was difficult to see for how much her long red hair was shaken by the wind, and coming in front of her cheeks. She also had buried half her face in her reindeer fur collar.

"Thank you." Muttered the Queen. "It means a lot to me. Especially coming from my predecessor."

Her elder smiled, and Anna looked down humbly. She then stared at the cheerful brown stallion Elsa was riding.

"He has a lot of energy!"

Elsa followed her gaze, then laughed and petted the horse's neck.

"He does. His name is Rask." Anna smiled and scratched the horse. They were trotting close to each other and she just had to stretch her arm.

"Hi Rask. Thank you for bringing my sister safely."

The horse neighed, shaking his head to the younger. They both giggled.

"Why didn't you take an ice horse?"

"A nice horse? This one's really gentle."

"A horse made out of ice, you dummy."

"Oh. Well... I feel like it would be a bit disrespectful towards Nokk, no?"

Anna pouted at the thought. "Hmmm. Point taken. Not because it actually is rude, but because they're very spiteful. And if I were you, I wouldn't want to make them mad against me right now."

She pointed at the dark sky. Elsa lifted her eyes, and her gaze got lost. She slowly glanced down. The redhead bit her lip.

"Sorry. I shouldn't have brought that up. Gosh, I'm the worst at small talk. Excuse me, I got nervous."

"Don't. You're a really good talker. In politics and with people. Never doubt of that. It's just... I wish I could talk with Nokk. To understand the reason behind all this storm. They're not especially angry, it's more like... They're determined to win this fight and giving all their strength in it. I can feel it, and yet... They won't answer my calls. They have their own objective right now. And Ahtohallan knows how stubborn they are.

"Yep, all Spirits are."

Elsa smirked. "Are you trying to mock me? Because despite the direct insinuation, you're technically including yourself in it, dear other half."

Anna giggled. "Well, I am proud to be stubborn."

"Oh, you are." Puffed her elder.

A silence passed as they trotted through a glade.

"Elsa..."

"Yes?"

"I wanted to ask you, while you're here, visiting us in Arendelle..."

The blonde turned to her younger, a bit worried. Anna cleared her throat.

"We were tidying the attic the other day, and..."

She was struggling to say what she meant to, and Elsa helped.

"You can get rid of my gloves."

"I know, we already talked about that. But... Sir Jorgenbjorgen..."

She looked at her elder. "Can I give it to Eydis?"

Elsa got emotional and speechless. Anna smiled at a memory as she kept going. "We were with Eydis when we were moving the furniture around. She saw the rocking horse in the attic, but she also saw your plush. I explained it to her, and what he was for you, and..."

The blonde led Rask closer, and she put a hand on her younger's.

"This is a lovely idea. I'll be happy to know that he'll be the confident and companion of a new person."

Anna melted in the same emotion than her elder.

"Thank you. I didn't dare to ask you earlier..."

The Snow Queen smiled. "It's fine." She then looked at the horizon, and clenched her reins. "Hey, race until the wheat fields?"

Her sister lifted an eyebrow. "Are you serious?"

"What? You're as eager as me to come back to Arendelle. Come on."

"Yeah, easy for you to say. Our horses have the same height, but you only have a bridle. Have you seen how many bags I have? And my saddle, and my stirrups?"

"Don't look for excuses."

"No, for real. You're also lighter than me. I gained a lot of weight during my pregnancy. This will be rigged."

Elsa had to restrain herself to eye-roll. Anna was sword training once per week, and had a fit body.

"Afraid of losing?" She teased. "Listen: first one to get there owe the other one the biggest box of chocolate treats from the store. I'll give you a few seconds head start."

Anna sighed. "You know I can't resist such a challenge."

"Just go, competitive dork, or I'll start counting."

The redhead grinned. No need to tell her twice. She yelled a 'YAH!' and her horse dashed forward, taking a remarkable advance with a distanced laughter.

"Wow, okay, now I regret that." Blinked Elsa. "Rask, are you ready? Let's show my sister what we've got."

The stallion neighed, and with a grin, she rushed behind her.

=======

They eventually arrived to Arendelle in the early afternoon.

"And I'm telling you that you cheated." Teased Elsa, as they trotted through the village.

"I didn't." Repeated Anna. "You're just a sore loser. I want my box of chocolates by tomorrow morning."

Elsa grumbled. "I hate you."

Her sister snorted. "You? You're capable of hate? Have you ever hated someone?"

The blonde winced. "I hated the bishop when he asked me to take off my gloves at my coronation."

Anna first felt sad, then burst of laughter when she saw Elsa's smirk.

"Stop it!"

She nudged her, and they nudged each other with bumps. Anna nearly fell of her horse after losing her balance and because of the strong wind, and they cackled of laughter.

Their laughter echoed in the courtyard as they passed the gates. Kristoff was stepping out of the stables and stared at them with a surprised smile.

"You two are coming back from a freezing weather, and you're laughing out loud."

Anna smiled at his presence.

"What? Is it bad?" She teased.

Kristoff puffed, and shrugged. "If you get a pneumonia, don't tell me I didn't warn you."

"Happy to see you too, honey." Said Anna as she got down her horse along Elsa.

The King laughed and hugged them both.

"And I can't catch such an illness." Reminded Elsa with a smile after their embrace.

"Say the one who sneezes snowmen."

The blonde frowned. "For the last time, it was a stress fever!"

"Yeah, yeah." Smirked Anna. "Well, your immunity is an excellent reason for you to go prepare us a hot chocolate while I go for a quick bath."

Elsa's jaw dropped when her sister put the reins of her horse in her hand.

"Hey!"

But they didn't listen to her. Kristoff swept Anna off her feet and carried her in bridal style, the redhead gasping and giggling in the move.

The blonde sighed with a smile as she watched the spouses hurry inside.

Once in the corridors, Kristoff twirled with his wife in pure happiness to be together again. After they shared a laugh, he put her on the carpet, and Anna wondered why their daughter wasn't tackling her legs already.

"Where's Eydis?"

"Oh, I lost her."

Anna eyed him. "Excuse me, you what?"

He chuckled. "Just to make it clear: we're playing hide and seek."

"Okay. So, the game is to find her, uh? How come you didn't already?" She teased.

"Don't judge me." Nudged Kristoff. "I'm sure you can't find her easily either. She knows the castle by heart now, and I've been at it for the past half hour."

Anna gave him a challenging eyebrow lift, and put her hands on each side of her mouth to yell. "Eydis! Mama's here! Come say hi!"

Only the noise of the wind howling outside and the distant sound of cooks in the kitchens answered her.

"Yeah, as if it would work." Smirked the King. "I told her you would arrive soon right after I received Elsa's ice statue message. She planned this all along."

"I can easily imagine her giggling in a corner." Smiled Anna.

Kristoff's sentence gave her an idea. "Elsa is with me!" She yelled.

Another silence.

"Nope. Doesn't work either."

Anna eyed her husband, and gave it another try. "She'll make hot chocolate!"

Suddenly, a loud thud noise echoed upstairs, like someone who just jumped from the top of a wardrobe. Tiny excited footsteps betrayed the way the child made all along the room then the corridor, heading for the stairs.

"I'M COMING!"

"There."

Kristoff snorted. "You clever feisty pants."

"As Elsa often says, she's a mini-me. That was an obvious trick."

Less than five seconds later, Eydis was running down, leaping over the last steps to run to her mother.

"Where is it?! Where is it?!"

"My, how incredibly rude." Laughed Anna. "Hi to you too, sweetie."

Eydis didn't focus on the right thing. "Sorry. Please, where is the hot chocolate?"

Anna giggled loudly and grabbed her daughter to tickle her belly and shake her playfully.

"You little rascal! Where are your manners, uh?"

Eydis laughed at the tickles, and finally gave a kiss on her mother's cheek. "You're back!"

"Always."

They cuddled, and Kristoff watched the scene with love. Their daughter pointed at him with a small finger.

"Papa, that doesn't mean you won this round."

"Got it."

Eydis buried her face in Anna's collar, then wrinkled her nose. "Why do you smell like mud?"

Kristoff gasped with amusement. "Truth comes out the mouth of children..."

Anna sniffed her clothes and winced. "And I'm not gonna scold her for her manners this time. I truly smell like mud. I'll be back in a short hour."

Later, Elsa arrived with a tray of four mugs of hot chocolate, and placed it on the table of the living room under Eydis' happy gaze, to whom she ruffled the hair after a hug. She understood by her sister's absence that she still was enjoying her bath. She realized she probably needed one as well, but couldn't tell much what she smelled like, for she was used to the musky scents of the forest. Eydis climbed on a chair, sitting on her ankles.

"Auntie? How far did you travel?"

"Oh, not far. Hitiheimr is just next to Arendelle."

"Did you see new animals? New trees?"

Elsa chuckled. "It's the same fauna and flora, sweetie. Mama and I only took less than a day on horse to come back."

Eydis' eyes twinkled at the 'fauna' and 'flora' terms, which did not escape Elsa.

"You're interested in Nature?"

The girl nodded so fast that her pigtails bounced in every way. Elsa bent to her.

"Well, you're a handiwork enthusiast, so know that the Northuldra as well as the Arendellians distinguish between trees because their woods have different properties. Some are very solid, like oak, and we use it for doors in the village, while others are light and flexible, like birch. The Northuldra cut them into staffs to fight, and the cork is used for other purposes as well."

Eydis beamed. "Teach me how! So I can saw and forge every wood in the world!"

Kristoff and Elsa giggled. "You can't forge wood, sweetie." Smiled her father. "Actually, I think we have a book about trees in the library. A big one, an encyclopedia even. I'll show it to you before sleep if you want."

"Awesome!"

She stretched out her little fingers to get her mug, and Elsa took it for her, squeezing the handle to cool it down with magic and avoid Eydis to burn her hasty tongue.

While she gulped down her chocolate, Kristoff asked Elsa how the council went. She went into details to explain at best everything that had happened from beginning to end, including Anna's decisions and the fact Mattias stayed in the neighbor kingdom. Elsa was very biased and very flattering about Anna's qualities as Queen, but the blond simply stared at her with a little smile as she rambled.

When she finally finished, she caught her breathing, and looked at the tray.

"Enjoy your hot chocolates while they still are. I'm gonna bring Anna her mug. She deserves to have it delivered to her bath after such an amazing performance."

Kristoff couldn't agree more, and he watched her go up the stairs. At the corner of his eye, he could see Eydis have a little devil expression. She followed her aunt with slow steps, and he eye-rolled when he understood that she was still in her play mood.

The young princess gave a peek at a corner of the corridor, and watched carefully as Elsa knocked to the bathroom's door with a smile.

"Anna, I brought you your hot chocolate. May I enter?"

The redhead let out a joyful exclamation, that the door couldn't possibly muffle.

"Sure! Come in! I don't mind, and there's too much steam to see anything anyway."

Eydis grinned as she saw Elsa enter, and before she was about to close the door behind her, she ran all she could.

The blonde barely had the time to put the mug near the sink that Eydis suddenly barged in with a loud "BOO!". It was a good thing that she didn't have the hot beverage in her hand anymore, because the Snow Queen jumped high at the spook.

"Eydis! You scared me so much!" Laughed Elsa, and she laughed even more when she heard Eydis' childish laugh.

They went into a giggle together, and Elsa tickled her.

"I have to admit, that was a good one." She said, catching her breathing. "The timing was almost ideal. One second earlier, and I would have dropped the mug. You truly are your mother's daughter. Right, Anna?"

"Uh... Elsa...?"

They both looked over to where Anna was. The steam had completely disappeared from the room. Which made it very easy to see what was happening, and Elsa's blood froze in her veins as she realized that, as well, the temperature of the room had dropped drastically.

"H-help?"

Anna's teeth were shattering and her mouth exhaling smoke as she looked down at her naked body trapped in ice from her collarbones to her feet.

"P-please? Quick?"

"Oh my gods, Anna!"

Eydis' jaw dropped. She stood still by the door, and could only watch as her aunt ran to the bath. Hopefully, it wasn't really awkward, for the ice was blur and covered with the Spirits unity symbol signature, so she didn't see much of Anna's naked body underneath.

"Are you okay?" Panicked Elsa, even if she knew the answer.

"I'm obviously stuck and freezing right now, so if you could do something..." Grumbled Anna.

Elsa knelt and slammed her hand on the surface of the ice.

The ice melted in a second, but the stage of the water also changed its density, and Anna slipped with a yelp to the bottom of the bath. Elsa had good reflexes and instantly grabbed Anna under her arms to prevent her from inhaling water through her nose, then used the gesture to take her out of the bath, helping her numb body to step out.

"Thank you." Managed to utter Anna between two ragged breaths.

Elsa urged to grab a towel from the hanger, and enveloped Anna in it like a crêpe. It also was to give her some privacy, for her long hair couldn't cover her breasts enough now they were wet.

Anna was holding herself to her shoulders, and shivering from the sudden temperature change, so Elsa frantically rubbed her arms and legs through the towel to give her some friction and heat.

"Are you feeling better?"

The redhead nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, thank you."

"I'm so, so sorry, Anna, truly, I didn't—"

"Do it on purpose." Finished her younger, comprehensive. "It's okay. Of course you didn't."

Elsa still had her face paralyzed from the fearful moment. Anna placed a soft hand on her, and she thought.

"So it happened again... Your sort of... Power boost. Does it happen when you're happy? Cause it was right after your giggle with Eydis. However, I'm not really happy right now." Mumbled Anna, her teeth still shattering.

Elsa felt devastated, her joy from a few seconds earlier now entirely replaced by pure guilt. She hated to see Anna suffering from the cold, especially when it was from her magic. This was one of the top 'to absolutely avoid' situations.

"Hold on. Let me reach for your..."

She took an arm out of the hug to get the mug, but could tell by the sensation in her hand and the missing steam above it that it had lost its main property.

"Oh no, your hot chocolate is cold now. It must have frozen as well, then melted, but..."

"It's okay, Elsa. Relax. I'm alright." Assured Anna, knowing by heart her first symptoms of an anxiety attack.

She dove her eyes in hers, and Elsa eventually calmed down. She detached her azure blue irises with a smile, putting the mug back where it was. As she did, she noticed that Eydis was still standing near the entrance of the bathroom, and looking at them with a confused expression, but one could see on her face the firm sensation that she was guilty for everything that had happened.

Elsa could recognize it easily. Her niece had as much physical features from her mother than her father, yet that sad pout was definitely the same than when Anna was a child.

"Hey, Eydis. Come here. This is not your fault, you know that?"

The little princess nodded without much conviction. She stepped forward, unsure.

"You scared me, and I scared Anna." Explained Elsa. "This is a domino effect. Or butterfly effect. None of us is truly the one to blame."

Anna smiled above her towel, happy to see that her sister didn't have much the habit of self-guilt anymore, and that a simple stare into her eyes had managed to move it away. Elsa even didn't fear skin-to-skin contact after an accident, because she now reached for Eydis' hand to join them.

"Come on. Let's hug to give her some heat, uhm?"

The girl finally smiled, and closed her eyes as she tackled the two women in a strong embrace. They closed their eyes as well. Elsa could feel Anna's skin returning to normal from the cheek against her neck.

"I prefer 'butterfly' than 'domino'. It's more pretty." Murmured Eydis, her voice masked by the towel.

They all giggled.

"I'll make you another hot chocolate." Promised Elsa, holding her sister tight.

Later in the afternoon, Eydis came in Anna's study running at full speed, and tugged one of Elsa's trains, so much that the ice fabric was nearly ripping.

"Auntie! Auntie! I just finished my lesson, can you make it snow in the hall's stairs so we can sled?"

The sisters blinked at the girl's sudden intrusion, cutting them in their discussion, but Elsa melted at her request.

"Did you finish your homework?" Teased Elsa.

"I have!" Promised her niece, and she raised her hands, as if proving that she washed them was relevant.

The Snow Queen chuckled. "Perfect. Then go get your sled, I'm coming. Just let me finish something with Mama, okay?"

Anna waved in a dismiss gesture as she looked back at her desk.

"No, go ahead. I'll finish that paperwork and I'll join you."

Elsa frowned. "I'll help you finish."

"Don't worry, I can handle it."

"I wasn't asking." Smirked Elsa. "It's an order. Let me help you with it, so we can go sled with your daughter."

Anna hesitated between a tender sigh or an eye roll. Sometimes her elder was dramatically caring, it reached an impossible level.

"Fine. Eydis, go get Papa and ask him to search for your sled in the shed."

"Awesome!" Chirped Eydis with a jump, and she ran outside.

The blonde shook her head with a smile. "She's adorable."

Anna didn't answer, too focused on the mail she was writing. Elsa approached, sitting at the chair in front of her desk.

"So, this is mainly letters to send to the other kingdoms, right?"

The Queen nodded. She bit into a sigh. "I miss Gale."

Elsa didn't hide her sigh, however. "Yeah, me too."

Ironically, outside, the wind blew in strong gusts.

"The girls are busy, uh?" Guessed Kristoff.

Eydis nodded silently. The King turned to Kai who was making him sign delivery agreements.

"Thank you, I'll see you in an hour or two for the next ones."

The servant bowed and left.

Kristoff's attitude suddenly changed, and he turned to his daughter with a giant smile, bending and slapping his hand on his thighs.

"Who wants to go sled!?"

"Me! ME!" Exclaimed Eydis, raising her hand, though they were alone in the hall now.

=======

They all lifted their heads with awed expressions when Elsa made it snow inside, Kristoff admiring the precision with which she aimed at the stairs only. Anna had the eternal touched smile and sparkling eyes as the snowflakes fell in her open hands, and Eydis went cross-eyed when a group of them fell on her nose. The little girl rubbed her nose to get it off, and she looked at how it soon covered the stairway in a beautiful blanket.

"Mama, how come I don't sneeze when it's Auntie's snow?"

Anna smiled and held her close. "Because it's Auntie's snow."

Eydis frowned at her. "That's not an answer."

Elsa smiled as she was waving her hands and preparing the place, listening to her niece.

The redhead passed a hand in her daughter's hair. "It's magic, sweetie. That's because it's not regular snow. When I was around your age, I called it 'tickling snow'."

Eydis let out a long 'Oooooh'. Then, a few seconds later, the playground was complete. It was so perfectly made and attractive that it was hard to resist playing immediately. Thus, Eydis and Anna shared the same excitement and hurried to go up with the sled, taking advantage of the few steps Elsa had cleverly left uncovered.

Kristoff let them have the first rides, and crossed his arms, side-looking the blonde next to her.

"You couldn't help making decorations along the ramps, uh?"

"Are Anna and you going to reproach that to me every time I craft something?"

Kristoff shrugged. "You may be an artist, but you're also a show-off."

A handful of snow at the bottom of the stairs suddenly flew to him, slapping his face.

"Hey!"

"Oh, sorry, it's not snowball fight? I got mistaken."

Kristoff poked her as he swiped the snow off his face, but Elsa now made the snow twirled around his head. Anna's voice echoed from the top.

"Are you two done? Elsa, I'm waiting for you. Eydis wants to have the first ride with you."

"I'm coming." Grinned the Snow Queen, having pity for Kristoff and making the snow fall to the floor.

They took rounds for descents with Eydis, and had endless fun, for the snow was perfectly slippery.

After two runs, Eydis was a bit out of breath when pulling up the sled with the rope, so the sisters helped her. The little girl only had small muscles, and the sled was crafted with all of the Arendelle expertise, so with thick wood and dense metal, making it quite heavy. Anna giggled and directly took the sled in her hands then walked to the top of the stairs with her.

Elsa followed, not even bothering to use them, walking directly in the snow with her bare feet now that she had melted her ice sandals, her magic and her being one so her body wasn't even sliding. She even didn't make a single whole as she stepped, like she was barely touching the snowflakes or floating above them.

Eydis placed the sled again, and Anna looked at her elder. "Go on, it's your turn."

An idea passed Elsa's mind, and she smirked. "The sled can largely hold the three of us. Sit behind her, I'll sit behind you."

Anna found it weird, but didn't even questioned the suggestion. Sledding was way too exciting to her.

They placed as Elsa said, under Kristoff's amused gaze, and he laid against one of the pillars of the hall as he looked at them.

Elsa was the one on the back, so they waited for her to push the sled. She smiled, and bent to her sister's ear.

"Do you trust me?"

"Always." Answered Anna right away. "Why?"

The blonde twirled her hand forward and crafted an ice ramp at the bottom of the stairs, then covered it with a snow layer that connected with the snow already present on the steps. She added a huge pile of fresh powder at the end of the hall for landing.

"Wait, ELSA."

The elder didn't make Anna think more about it nor widen her eyes completely that she grabbed her waist, so the redhead stayed where she was, and pushed them all with her feet. They started to make her descent and Eydis exclaimed of joy in advance. Elsa share the same excited yell, and Anna first screamed of panic but soon of joy, especially when they passed the ramp smoothly and started to fly in the air.

They plunged in the fresh snow at the arrival with a comic 'fwomp' and jolted their heads from it with shared laughter.

"Again! Again!" Jumped Eydis, standing up then falling down in the white pillow, while Elsa and Anna still were upside down.

Anna shook her head with a puff as she got rid of the snow, and stared at her elder underneath her.

"This is not what I meant when I said that I'd go almost any place you are."

Elsa smirked, and evaporated the snow under them, so they slowly touched the floor down. "Admit it, you loved it."

"Alright, that was awesome. And to think they call me the crazy one!"

"Let's get crazy again!" Begged the little princess.

Elsa, Eydis and Anna laughed their lungs out and they rolled on the floor as they did.

Kristoff came running after witnessing their stunt from afar.

"Girls! Are you okay?"

The lack of answer despite a new wave of laughter gave him the certification that they hadn't hurt themselves, even if they were holding to their bellies as they giggled. He sighed and shook his head at how they were all close to cry tears as they wheezed.

Suddenly, the general sound of wheezing got accompanied by another sound in the air, so close that none of them perceived it at first. It was when a servant gasped loudly a few meters away that they started to stop laughing and turn to him. Now it was distinct, and Kristoff squinted as he focused to identify the noise. It was like metal was bent by force, but it seemed like it came from different places at a time...

Elsa and him understood simultaneously. In fact, Elsa also felt it in her core. They snapped their heads around and stared at the armors standing along the walls, and they noticed that they were moving, like they were crashing down slowly on their bases.

Anna helped her daughter stand up, and felt under her flats that the magic snow had gone a bit colder. Her eyes widened.

"No... It happens again..." Murmured Elsa.

She however forced herself to replace her worry by a good decision. She clenched her fists and her eyelids, focusing on making everything back to normal in the hall. When she felt the temperature returning to a regular one, and magic leaving the place, she opened her eyes. Elsa frowned nonetheless at the slight sensation that magic hadn't entirely left the castle, for some reason.

She shook her head discreetly, discarding this perception for later. With a quick stare, she checked her family members to see if they were safe, and walked to the armors, avoiding Anna's caring eyes.

Her fingers hovered the folded metal, wrinkled even at some parts, especially the arms parts and the protections over the feet. Elsa's gaze jolted from one spot to another; the helmet was completely crushed, and she gulped at how, if someone was underneath, they would be dead in this moment.

"I..."

Kristoff approached, making the same observations. He hesitated for a fraction of second, but put his hand against the back of his sister-in-law, in a warm gesture. She wasn't even cold. Elsa was more stupefied than afraid by the state of the armors.

"It's okay. Those are thin armors. I heard them creak from the cold during multiple Winters. They're old too, don't they, feisty?"

He turned to his wife. His soft tone wasn't entirely used to appease Elsa, but sincere as well. Since the sisters were little, they never had been changed, and only dusted and polished.

"Yes, they are." Stated Anna. "Don't worry sis, it's not that bad."

"I'll pay them back."

Elsa's suggestion surprised everyone, but Anna's laughter afterwards was even more.

"Elsa, please. Those are decorative. Also, I kept bumping over them and made them fall apart multiple times when I was a kid."

"I confirm." Said Kai, passing by.

They all smiled.

"These aren't useable armors, Your Highness." Informed the servant.

"See?" Smiled Anna, happy he intervened. "It's alright."

"You're not saying this to make me feel better?"

"I swear I'm not."

Elsa sighed, and everyone from the servants to the royals return to their occupations after taking care of discarding the armors.

Eydis couldn't help lifting them, so she crouched to take her sled up for another ride. However, as she lifted it, only a part of the sled stayed in her hand, the rest falling on the floor in a heavy sound.

She let out a gasp, and Kristoff looked down.

"Let me have a look." He proposed in a fatherly tone.

As the sisters walked near, the King inspected the runners of the sledge, and the broken wood underneath. He sighed. "Yep, the sled is broken."

"I can replace it with ice." Suggested Elsa.

"No, wait! I can fix it!" Exclaimed Eydis, beaming. "I have the stills! I mean skills!"

"Oh my, here we go again." Sighed Anna.

"Come on, let her have fun with it." Nudged Elsa. "She's been talking about her tools for so long, this is my chance to finally do some handiwork with her."

Eydis' smile stretched so much that the blonde didn't regret this decision at all. Her niece was delighted.

As the girl hurried to go to her bedroom to get her toolkit, Kristoff eyed the Snow Queen. "I don't know if you're over-excited because you got another magic boost, but you'll see, in an hour, you'll be disillusioned."

Elsa smirked. "I doubt it. I sometimes spend an entire afternoon helping Northuldra children weaving scarves. And it requires a lot of patience."

She waved her hand to make the snow vanish in the hall, and she noticed that indeed, since she got that magic boost, she felt a bit more powerful than usual, just like the other times she had those strange impulsions. The white blanket disappeared a fraction of second faster.

In a 'clonk clonk clonk' noise, Eydis came back down the stairs with her heavy toolkit filled with instruments. When she put it down at her feet, Elsa recognized Eydis' tools, especially her wood bracket and protractor, which were beautifully carved with Arendelle's crocuses. She obviously spotted the spirit level that she had offered her several days before, and a tool she had never seen before.

"I even took my new hammer!" Said Eydis loudly.

"That's great, sweetie." Commented Anna with a smile.

The little princess took out the comically large hammer, which shaft was as thick as her forearm. They all snorted at the object, but Elsa was intrigued. The hammer was nearly as large as her torso, and yet she could lift it like it weighed nothing. It was obvious that it was made of metal and wood, like any other hammer, but in Eydis' hands, it looked like it was made of something as light as cork.

The blonde squinted. The last time she had seen such a paradox, was when she realized for the first time that her magic ice weighed nothing in her own hands, but was heavy in others'.

It wasn't the only thing she noticed about the item. A curious but undeniable feeling of magic was emanating from it. She kneeled next to her niece.

"Eydis... What is that hammer?"

"My new one! A very precious tool." Explained Eydis, already pivoting the sled to know where she should place the nails.

"No, I mean... Where did you get it from?"

"I told you the other day." Intervened Kristoff. "She probably got it from Oaken."

Elsa frowned. "No, it can't be. Unless Oaken suddenly started selling magical artefacts."

Anna widened her eyes. "Excuse me?"

The blonde passed her fingers around the hammer, not daring to touch it directly. Whether it was for prudence or out of respect, she couldn't tell. Anna noticed how fascinated she was by the object.

She crouched next to her.

"Elsa, what is it?"

The Snow Queen had a nervous chuckle. "The only word coming to my mind is 'miracle'. Look at it closer."

Anna frowned, her gaze returning to the tool. She suddenly widened her eyes as a flash came to her mind. The redhead had already seen this hammer in illustrations of books she used to read during her childhood.

"Tha- That's..."

She gulped.

"That's Mjöllnir."

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realityhelixcreates · 4 years

Text

Lasabrjotr Chapter 68: The Huldra Stone

Chapters: 68/?

Fandom: Thor (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe

Rating: Mature Warnings:

Relationships: Loki x Reader (There We Go)

Characters: Loki (Marvel), Thor (Marvel)

Additional Tags: Post-Endgame: Best Possible Ending (Canon-Divergent), Loki Has A Bad Time,

Summary: Dancing, anxiety, compassion, mercy, the Huldra Stone

It wasn't that you were trying to avoid Loki, it was just that circumstances kept pulling you apart. He'd been called upon early in the morning, just after you had woken up, and so breakfast and bathing had been separate. Saldis had come by to see if you needed help dressing; you hadn't for a while now, but with your arm still so tender, you had welcomed the help.

She had acted almost in awe, and you quickly found out that the story of you, standing up to a Frost Giant in defense of Asgardian children had flown from one end of the city to the other with the speed of a sonic boom.

People in the halls inclined their heads to you, moved out of your path. Loki was somewhere in the palace complex, dealing with royal duties, and you walked the halls alone now. All the way back to the library, cleaned up now, and with a makeshift door, until a new one could be obtained.

The broken table was gone, and the shelves righted, though there were far fewer people here than usual. You headed to one of the smaller side rooms, where Saga and Lofn were waiting.

“The heroine arrives.” Lofn said without looking up from the harp she was tuning.

“So she has.” Saga said. “And still on time too. How is your arm?”

“Sensitive.” You said. “But it's not getting any worse. The medicine worked really well.”

“Good, because we're going over traditional Buridag music and dances today.”

Lofn strummed her strings.

And you danced.

*****

Loki was moping again. He wasn't even trying to hide it, and though the human ambassadors of Iceland and the human encampments didn't seem to notice, Thor certainly did. He had seen this before, more often after the transplant of Asgard, but also all throughout their lives. The encounter with the Frost Giant was clearly taking an emotional toll on him. Like Thor, he probably thought that he would never cross paths with another Frost Giant again, but the Norns liked to tease sometimes.

With their Icelandic representatives, they had to discuss the disposal of a Frost Giant corpse. The humans were understandably upset at the discovery of unknown alien invaders, left over from a thousand year old war, hidden beneath their feet.

Thor did what he could to reassure them; that evidence gathered from the giants resting site indicated that there were no armies hidden away in the ice. In fact. Heimdall's keen gaze had detected only two more in the ice tunnels, in the entire world, actually.

This did not have the calming effect he had hoped.

“Two! Two hrimthurs still here?” One exclaimed. “One was enough to cause havoc in your city! What chance do we have, if they get out?”

“It was only because we were unprepared. Who would have expected such a thing to happen? However, the two still trapped in the ice are unlikely to cause us problems.” Thor explained. “They are both female, and one seems to be a child.”

He didn't mention the ferocious queen Skadi, who ruled Jotunheim before Laufey took the throne, nor the fact that Loki was child-sized, for a Frost Giant. Heimdall had only given sparse details: Women, no armor, a child. He'd seemed somewhat perturbed by it, and the way he'd looked at Loki had Thor curious. Loki hadn't seemed to notice.

Eventually they agreed to inter the unnamed Frost Giant in a stone barrow on Ok, the site of the destroyed Okjokull glacier. It would be another trip across the country, but Thor was insistent that the giant have a proper place. He hadn't known about the glacier, but the humans seemed to think it would be fitting, and to Thor's surprise, Loki pulled himself into the moment enough to agree.

Another plan to make for an already busy future. It was a good thing that Thor hated to be bored.

With the Trolerkaerhalla representatives he discussed the rules of the upcoming Buridag festivities; what was allowed, what was not, with emphatic warnings not to accept any Asgardian drinks whatsoever.

“Please. Burying so many people before the holiday is already an ill omen, do not fill our time of creation with more funerals.”

They agreed, but Thor decided to have all medics at the ready anyway. Human curiosity was notorious, and it was too likely someone might filch a drink, or that an Asgardian might think it funny to offer one.

After the meeting, he pulled Loki aside.

“You're not here.” He said. “We're going to need you in these next few weeks. You need to be here.”

“I know, I know.” Loki said, but his eyes held that wild and mournful quality Thor had grown to recognize.

“Do you need a few days?”

“It's just..._____ hasn't spoken to me all day, and Buridag is rushing up, and now there's funerals we have to see to. And Frost Giants. There's Frost Giants now, and we're going to dig them out, aren't we? There's a child. Thor, what are we going to do with a Frost giant child?”

“I...I don't know. Raise her?”

Loki grabbed him by the cross straps of his tunic, all mournfulness gone from his features, leaving only the wild.

Thor froze for a second, then grasped Loki's bracers and carefully pried him off.

“Ah.” He said. “Not like that. The woman that's with her must be her mother, or her caretaker. We aren't going to separate them, but we will have to accommodate them somehow. An extra tall apartment, perhaps? Mittens?”

“You cannot joke about this!” Loki exclaimed.

“I'm not. Obviously, we cannot just set them loose on this world. The humans are still coming to terms with us, and we look so similar to them. These Jotnar would seem so different, that there would be no safe place for them to go. Loki...”

His brother had stepped away and was pacing in short bursts.

“Loki. Loki.” Thor reached out to stop his pacing, and drew him into an embrace. “Find your center. You are beginning to spiral. I know. I understand, I do. But this is a good opportunity, isn't it? We can do something to help. I know you must be thinking about it.”

“But what if I mess it up?” Loki whimpered. Thor was glad they were alone here; Loki would have likely killed anyone who heard him like this. “What if I do it all wrong, and she ends up like me?”

“The child?” Thor asked. “Well...she's not an infant, so she probably has some idea of who she is. The circumstances are different here, Loki. And who said it had to be you, alone?”

“No one. But I know it would end up that way. Who of Asgard would want to care for Frost Giants?”

“Even among the giant's most implacable enemies were those who recognized the innocence of a child.”

Loki threw off Thor's arms. “Don't you try to defend him now-!”

“I was talking about Mother.”

“Oh.” Loki grew calm again. “There will never be another like her. I'm the only choice. I'm the only one who's...like them.”

“They're people, Loki, just like the humans. You've discovered a fondness for at least a few of them!”

“Humans aren't ten feet tall and deadly to the touch.” Loki griped. “The woman will try to kill us. She will be too frightened and desperate not to. I do not wish to be involved with that.”

“Then use that silver tongue, and prevent a tragedy.”

Loki breathed in deeply; a familiar sound of annoyance. “Thor...”

“Oh! That reminds me, there is something you should look at.” Thor said, before Loki could unleash his tirade. “Come with me. We probably shouldn't discuss this here.”

He led Loki back to his quarters, half-finished murals showing the barest hints of movement.

He retrieved the soldier's ancient diary, and handed it over. “I haven't read it all the way through. I realized it wasn't for me. Not before you.”

Loki took the book with cautious curiosity and opened it at Thor's huge desk.

*****

I have been scouting this world for some years now. Midgard is vast, that much is very true, but other notes from our records are either wrong, or outdated. The ice that was said to cover great stretches of the globe is simply not there. Perhaps it was once; there is evidence for it. But now, the snows are seasonal, the years short, compared to ours. Permanent ice is found in only a few places. The huge beasts written of in the records are gone. And worse; a small beast has spread far and wide, changing the landscape and hunting the few large animals that are left.

The have not proven hard to kill, but they are very tenacious, and can organize quickly in large numbers.

Perhaps our king would be amenable to a change in plans?

*****

Oh, plans were changed, certainly, but I cannot wholeheartedly agree with their new course. Great Laufey has chosen the route of total eradication. There are so many of these Midgardians that I think it impossible to totally wipe them out.

But Great Laufey has completely committed. He has brought every warrior. He has brought the Queen, even though she is with child. He has even brought the Casket! To bring the very spirit of our world to an entirely different realm seems very dangerous. Though, if it works it will change this world into one like our own, only with more space and resources. We are desperately low on both. Even though I am apprehensive of Great Laufey's decisions, I understand.

*****

The Princess-In-Waiting is here, along with her caretaker. They remain with the Queen, and attend to her needs. I too, am with the Queen. It seems Great Laufey has caught wind of my thoughts on this invasion, and is displeased with me. He has removed me from battle, and tied me to the women. Other civilians will be coming soon. But the Midgardians still remain.

*****

Asgard has come. We should have known. Odin abandoned this place long ago, but the Midgardians still pray, and they have finally decided to answer.

This bodes very ill.

*****

All omens point to failure. All tragedy has occurred. The Queen's child is wrong. He will not survive. The Queen is beside herself with grief; Great Laufey is mad with it. The Princess-In-Waiting mourns her lost husband, lost before his first breath. The armies are routed; Great Laufey cannot lead them. Not like this.

The Queen had withdrawn to Jotunheim, to perform the most tragic of duties. She will offer the infant back to the stars, that he might return someday, in a form that will be able to live and grow tall and strong. But child the size of a Midgardian spawn would never live through a Jotunheim winter, and the Queen is far too kind a soul to put him through the heinous suffering of trying.

*****

Stars receive our lost prince, and treat him kindly. Send him back to save us, for Great Laufey has doomed us all. The armies are gone. Laufey is gone. Asgard has chased everyone back home. The Casket is gone; I can no longer feel its song in the ice.

We received word that the Queen has passed to the stars. May she return to us in safer times. The Princess-In-Waiting and her caretaker are here with me. We are abandoned. We are trapped here, on this warming world.

May the stars receive us.

*****

Tears streamed down Loki's face, as he read on and on. Thor had both his meaty hands on his shoulders, a powerful support that was the only thing keeping Loki from crumpling into a little heap on the floor.

“They wanted me.” It came out as a strangled sob. “They planned for me. None of them ever knew what I was; they all died without knowing. Laufey lost that war because of me. They thought I would return to save them! I returned, all right, but...Norns, what have I done? Will I always leave people in mourning?”

Wherever you go, there is war, ruin, and death!

They wanted him. They had staked hopes on him, on what should have been the joyous occasion of his birth. They mourned him, he could see it in the raised lines of thick ink, how they wavered. A soldier who couldn't protect his people. A mother who hadn't named him. A little girl he was supposed to love.

He had betrayed them all.

“What if that's what the Norns have decreed for me? My very birth brought death. I was supposed to die.”

“No, no. Loki, a child is at fault for nothing. Laufey chose to wage his war like that, and he chose to fight Asgard when he didn't have to. If he hadn't started slaughtering humans, he might even have succeeded in colonizing this world. But he didn't chose peace. That is not your fault. Odin taking the Casket was not your fault. The lies they told us were not your fault. What can a baby do?”

Thor squeezed his shoulders.

“You should take some time. Go see if _____ is ready for lunch.”

Loki closed the book. “I'm not sure she wants to see me. She didn't talk to me at all this morning.”

“Well, you did yell at her.”

His shoulders sagged. “I know. I wanted to apologize.”

“Then go apologize!” Thor shoved him towards the door.

*****

You didn't know what you had really expected from traditional Asgardian court dances, but that amount of leaping hadn't been it. Big, graceful ballroom dancing, sure, and there was some of that: so close to a waltz, but not quite. Line dances that were like something you imagined your medieval ancestors might have done. And just so much leaping. Even at leisure, it seemed Asgardians had to show off their athleticism. You didn't know if you would have the energy to keep up.

Especially after all of the elaborate ceremonies you would have to perform in.

Normal Burigag celebrations did consist of a lot of dancing, and co-ordinated chants of ancient decrees all the way from Allfather Buri's time. They were in a form of the Asgardian language that was archaic even to them, and you didn't understand a word of it. Saga had finally just written the words out phonetically for you to pronounce, even though you didn't really know what they meant. You would just have to memorize the sounds they made.

As a royal Seidkona, you would have a special drum to play, and you were learning how to do that too. You would never be a professional drummer, but you could hold the beats they gave you. There were songs you had to sing, along with the other Seidkonas of Asgard, and a dance you would have to perform with them, and your drum.

And then there were the other things; the things that seemed very old, and very magical, and more than a little worrisome to you.

There was a Buridag sacrifice, of a live ox, and you were not excited about that. You wouldn't be allowed to leave while this was happening; it was Thor and Loki's responsibility to make this sacrifice, and you would have to attend Loki. People would be looking at you, watching your actions and reactions.

They would sacrifice that ox, and you would have to endure, and then it would be cooked for the gathered crowd, along with all the other dishes. There would be toasts, and you would have to drink them all, but you had been promised that special wine, instead of Asgardian drinks, so you would survive.

Then there was the thing you were most uncomfortable with. As part of your Seidkona initiation, you would have to 'mix blood' with the person you were sworn to, and in this case, due to the station you would be stepping into, that included both Thor and Loki. All three of you would be cut, bleed into a bowl, that bowl would be spilled onto the ground...and that would mean something. Something profound. It would make you something different than what you were now. It would make you somehow more real.

There was something frightening about it, deep down. It felt like something cavemen might have done, something primal. If there was magic in it, it was beyond ancient.

There was so much to keep track of, and you were just hurtling towards it. You had to count on Loki to keep you steady and help you navigate.

“Well, I think that's enough for now.” Saga said, and you sagged in exhaustion. “It looks like it must be lunchtime, and a greater force than I has come to collect you.”

You turned to see Loki peeking in the doorway. You couldn't help but notice that though he was dressed in official finery, and held a picnic basket on one arm, he looked distressed.

“Lunch?” He asked, raising the basket.

“Go get.” Lofn whispered.

You trotted out the door, proud of the things you had learned so far that day, but wondering what the troubles might be.

“You seem worried.” You said, out in the hall.

“Yes, I suppose I am.” He said. “These new developments have got me...”

“Stressed?” You suggested. He sighed.

“Courtyard?”

“Actually, I was thinking the Huldra Stone.”

“Sounds good.”

The huldra's stone was a landmark now, set in front of what was going to become the Asgardian House of Justice, the building that was going to be communally constructed during the Buridag festivities. It was meant as a reminder that justice required mercy, thoughtfulness, and compassion. It wasn't enough to merely punish transgressors; sometimes you needed to put in the effort of fixing what had been broken.

There was a little patch of green surrounding the stone, and Loki set out your lunch on it, as you placed your hand on the stone and asked permission. The flowers here had faded much earlier than they would have back home, and you knew Autumn was in full swing, but this bit of green persisted.

“So.” You said, sitting next to him. The air was a little brisk, so you pulled his cape around yourself, and he made no move to stop you. “Still shook up over the giant?”

“Naturally.” He said wearily. “This is a terrible thing to happen so close to such an important holiday. It's the symbolism of the whole thing. Our new beginning, stained with tragedy from a generation ago. It's as if the past reached out to stab in spite at our future. I do not want my past coming back here.”

That last part was said so quietly, you weren't sure you'd caught it, but he continued on.

“Seven funerals to conduct. One almost all the way across the island. I'm afraid I have to drag you out onto the road again.”

“I can handle that.” You said.

“It's almost winter.” He countered. “You weathered summer travel fairly well, but this will be a much longer trip, and over rougher terrain. We will not always be on a road. There will be camping.”

“Yeah, but didn't we want to do that anyway?”

“Not until spring! And certainly not with an entire entourage, and most certainly not for a Frost Giant's funeral!”

“Well, we've got to bury the poor guy. I mean, we can't just...leave him.”

“No. But I do worry for your safety in all this.”

You patted his knee. “I'll be okay. People live here year round, after all. We've figured out how to survive.”

He sighed again. “About the giant...”

“Yeah. I know. I mean, I understand. But you get that I couldn't really have done anything different, right?”

“Yes. As much as I might wish otherwise, you were put into a situation where you had no good options.” He grabbed a cookie and a pot of thick cream. Scooping some up, he handed it to you. “I should not have berated you so. I became too overbearing in my panic.”

You graciously accepted the creamed cookie for the peace offering that it was.

“And I get it. I know you weren't really mad at me, just freaked out by the whole situation. Don't make a habit of it though. I'm not really into getting chewed out like I was still a little kid.”

“No, of course not. However...” He took a bite of his own cookie. “There has been another development that has left me very stressed. We discovered this morning that there are two more.”

“Giants?” You asked. “Still in the ice?”

Loki nodded. “I'm afraid so.”

“Damn. Well. Are we just gonna leave them there?”

“You are not the first person to suggest that. But no. My brother has decided to dig them out.” Loki sighed again, a little dramatically, like Thor's decisions were mere antics that he had to clean up after. “Their bodies may be what's generating the ice down there, but Thor is convinced that this 'Climate Change' thing is putting their slumber at risk.”

“Oh.” You said. “Yeah, that's a thing. Geez, we never had to think about that before. Normally, the only things that thaw out of glaciers are like, woolly mammoths and stuff like that. Now we gotta wonder if we're gonna be thawing out ancient battalions of giant mega-soldiers.”

“Indeed. What's a 'woolly mammoth'? Nevermind, I shall look it up another time. It seems that these two are not likely to be soldiers, however. Both are female, and though that doesn't exactly count them out as warriors, the fact that one is a child makes it unlikely.”

“A child?” You asked in surprise. “Why would anyone bring a child to a war zone?”

“The war was merely the front of a colonizing effort. They intended to put down roots here. We know now how poorly that attempt went, but they were optimistic at the time. Or obstinate. There's evidence for both.”

This must be what had him so shaken up. Loki was very unambiguous in his dislike for Frost Giants, specifically. To have Asgard attacked by one, just when they were getting back on their feet must have been terrifying. To have two more waiting, two that he definitely could not attack out of hand without becoming a total monster, must be nerve wracking.

“What are we going to do?” You asked.

He leaned back against the Huldra Stone, perhaps contemplating justice or mercy.

“What else can we do? We are going to adopt them.”

#lasabrjotr #loki (marvel)#loki x reader #thor (marvel)

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fandom-necromancer · 4 years

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1420. Part 2

This was prompted by the amazing @detroitbecomestickman! I hope you enjoy!

Fandom: Detroit become human | Ship: Allen60

[Prequel] [Part 1] [Part3]

Joseph sat on the bench outside the precinct enjoying his break huddled close to his partner who caught a bit of the autumn wind for him. It had rained the whole week, so they had to enjoy the one day that had spared them of it. It still was a bit too cold for Allen’s taste, but here they could sit together without the whole precinct gossiping about it. They still hadn’t told anyone and why would they? They had decided to take it slow anyways, spending more time together, most of it quietly, just holding each other. Allen would have teased Sixty of how touch starved he was, but, well, so was he himself in the end. They still walked their own path, but together now. And until they had decided to make it official, no one had to know.

Joseph’s phone buzzed in his pocket and he took it out to look at the screen. He pulled a grimace and pulled air through his teeth. Well, one person knew… ‘Who is it?’, Sixty asked grinning. He knew that face could only mean uncomfortable news. ‘My mother…’ ‘And what does she want?’ ‘To visit us…’ ‘Oh. That would be nice.’ ‘Sixty, she wants to come over this weekend. She wants an address. We don’t live together. She believes we are partners for longer than a month.’

The android pursed his lips. ‘Hmm, well, I would be fine with moving in together in the future. What about you?’ ‘I think it would be the next logical step’, Allen agreed hesitantly. ‘I really like you. What you showed me the last weeks was more than I ever expected to have. I mean it when I say I love you, Sixty. But… Isn’t it a bit fast?’ Sixty thought about it. ‘How about we take it as a test run then? I get a few things from my place to decorate yours with so it’s believable. Then we try it for a bit and look at the results.’ ‘Fine… God, I wish this wasn’t that forced’, he sighed, rubbing his forehead. Sixty just shrugged. ‘It’s just… What do you humans call it? A sleepover? We can move together when we decided the time is right. It’s just for your mom.’ ‘Okay, then, how much do you have to move? We have two days.’ ‘Oh, not much. Just a box of little things… And my stasis chamber.’ ‘You are kidding me.’ ‘Hey, an android needs a place to sleep, okay?’ ‘Oh, these will be two very exhausting days…’

‘When did you say would your mom arrive again?’ ‘We still have another hour!’, Allen called from the bedroom, sounding more hopeful than Sixty would have liked. He quickly pulled back the curtains and watched the only empty parking spot on the street. ‘Then I’ll start setting the table.’ ‘Yep. I think I got the lights running! My mom doesn’t know a lot about technology, I think she won’t realise the chamber isn’t actually hooked up to the net.’ ‘Then go take a shower, Joseph!’, Sixty answered. ‘It won’t be very convincing if you look like we last minute shoved everything together. Did we agree on any particular term of endearment?’ Allen groaned standing up and he looked positively exhausted as he appeared in the doorframe. ‘Just use anything you like’, he sighed deeply. ‘I’ll blush anyway. I’m to the bathroom taking a shower.’

As the doorbell rang, Allen was still under the stream. Sixty knew his human was exhausted, so he let him enjoy the shower and walked to the door and opened. ‘Hello, Mrs. Allen, how-‘ he wanted to greet her, but was encased in a tight surprise hug. ‘I’m sorry this was so spontaneously, Sixteen! I’m just so happy for you both that I had to visit! Do you know how long my son was completely alone in this flat? If I’m being honest, I can’t really believe you are really living together! I hope I didn’t cause you any stress?’ ‘Oh, no problem at all, Mrs. Allen, we just-‘ ‘Oh, please, it’s Mary for you, you are family.’ She let go of him and hung up her coat. ‘Where’s Josey?’ ‘We just finished cleaning and he decided to take a quick shower. He’ll be coming soon; do you want coffee? Tea?’ ‘Coffee’s fine, thank you.’ She had just sat down at the table as Joseph emerged from the bathroom. ‘Hey, Sixty, where is the- Oh, hey mom. I’ll be with you in a minute.’ Where his mother was energetic as ever, the SWAT Captain looked worse of than any mission had left them. ‘What are you searching for?’, Sixty asked. ‘Oh, nothing, I just kept a stack of… you know.’ ‘I thought they were dirty.’ ‘They were perfectly fine. But nevermind.’ He hurried out of the bathroom in a towel and Mary laughed whole-heartedly. ‘And I worried about being late.’

‘Sorry, work had us both quite pent-up lately, so we didn’t have a lot of time to prepare’, Allen explained as he came back to the table a few minutes later and sighed deeply. You could have always called. I could have come another time.’ ‘No, no, we are happy you came!’, Joseph emphasized.

She took her cup and looked around. ‘I like what you’ve done with the place. Told you it would look livelier with someone else’s belongings.’ Allen groaned, ready to defend himself, but he took the time to follow her eyes first. The few objects Sixty had arranged somewhere in between his looked forced even to him as if randomly thrown in, but maybe with time… He glanced over his partner’s RK800 user manual he stubbornly held onto and laughed about as if it was the most hilarious joke ever. It stood between his old instructor books from the academy. His eyes darted to the shot-through processing unit soldered to a pedestal to make it look more like an artist’s work and not just an android part that stood on his sideboard. Maybe for once his mother wasn’t wrong about this whole relationship thing. ‘Yeah, you are right with that.’

‘Wait. You are agreeing? With me? Son, are you ill?’ She laughed again and pulled him close, nearly pulling him from his chair. ‘Oh, Sixteen, what did you do to my son?’ ‘Er… actually my name is-‘ ‘I’m so happy for you both really! I was so afraid my son would stay alone forever. I mean, Catharine was such a nice girl, but I couldn’t be more pleased that you dumped her!’ ‘Mom, she dumped me.’ ‘But anyways, the past is gone and won’t come back and you have such a bright future ahead of you! Ah, it’s just like me and Wallace again!’ ‘Oh, I hope not’, Allen groaned under his breath remembering the stories his dad had told him about how they ended up together.

‘It’s just lovely. But now to the important question: When is the wedding?’ It was the first time the façade broke as Allen and Sixty looked at each other completely mortified. Oh no.

[>next]

#detroit become human #dbh #Allen60 #Captain Allen #Sixty #RK800-60 #don't worry there will be another part :)#but after the anniversary stuff

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beneaththetangles · 4 years

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BtT Light Novel Club, Chapter 20 (Part 1): Tearmoon Empire, Vol. 1

Oh boy are you all in for a treat this time around. Our discussion on Tearmoon Empire, Vol. 1 was so huge, I decided that, for the first time in Light Novel Club history, we will have a two-part discussion! The second part will go up tomorrow, but for now, I hope you enjoy this first part of our discussion. After all, if we had so much to talk about that we needed to split it between two posts, you can bet that this was a really good novel.

And if you’re just joining us and wondering what this book is about, here is the official volume synopsis from J-Novel Club:

Surrounded by the hate-filled gazes of her people, the selfish princess of the fallen Tearmoon Empire, Mia, takes one last look at the bleeding sun before the guillotine blade falls…

Only to wake back up as a twelve-year-old! With time rewound and a second chance at life dropped into her lap, she sets out to right the countless wrongs that plague the ailing Empire. Corrupt governance? Check. Border troubles? Check. Natural calamities and economic strife? Check.

My, seems like a lot of work.

Hard work and Mia don’t mix, so she seeks out the aid of others, starting with her loyal maid, Anne, and the brilliant minister, Ludwig. Together, they strive day and night to restore the Empire. Little by little, their tireless efforts begin to change the course of history, pushing the whole of the continent toward a new future.

And why did the selfish princess have a change of heart, you ask? Simple—she didn’t. She’s just terrified of the guillotine. They hurt like hell, and Mia hates pain more than work.

Lazy, selfish, and a complete coward, the ill-equipped princess of the Tearmoon Empire, armed with memories of her past life and a diary from the future, tries to avoid dying at the guillotine again and changes the very course of history in the process!

Joining our discussion this time are Jeskai Angel and Gaharet. Let’s begin!

1. What are your overall impressions of the novel?

Jeskai Angel: I already went on record making an awesome ’80s pun and saying that reading this volume was a life-changing experience. That’s something I can say of very few books, let alone light novels. And as I reread the volume for this discussion, my high esteem for this book felt validated. It’s extremely funny, makes excellent use of its historical inspiration, has a whole posse of heartwarming characters, and raises deeper issues to ponder.

Gaheret: The story grew from the beginning, where the schematic nature of the Empire in comparison to France and the blindness of the narrator -which Jeskai had point out in his article- were harder to swallow, and things felt too convenient. After all, it is not as if by behaving good, or trying to, the outcomes will always be good. But around the time she visited the church, I started to identify a lot with Mia. Like her, I´ve always trying to live in a world by deduction, taking examples and lessons from books and teachings and trying to apply then to deduce the outcomes or at least knowing what the right path was. As I didn´t always understand what I was reading, this led sometimes to absurd results, sometimes to a comedy of errors, and sometimes to good results whose goodness I perceive only in time, including exaggerated or erroneous views of people about me. In that sense, Mia was quite like me.

By the time she encountered Abel, I started to feel truly moved. The role of an inspiring woman in the life of a young man cannot be underestimated, and it helped me in the same way Mia helped Abel. I felt very identified with his good-for-nothing opinion of himself, and I was glad to see him trying his best. He may be my favorite character in the book.

The battle against his brother with Mia watching was the best point for me.

Concerning the central comedy of errors of the book, the one concerning Mia´s self-interest in contrast with both what the characters think of her and what the narrator thinks of her, I think that ultimately, maturity and virtue for us sinners are an effort to humbly “grow into the mission”, even grow into the character.

The Empire felt more convincing in time. I came to like the prejudice against agriculture, the causes of the plague, the diplomacy, the Ministeries and the various issues concerning the future economic crisis. As for now, I´m really interested. I wonder how it will all turn out.

The Academy felt too Japanese high school at first (at least don´t call them clubs or student council! And hot baths! And lunchboxes called such are just unforgivable!), but both the dance and the fencing tournament felt very convincing, with complex power dynamics. By the end, I wanted more of all the characters: the merchants, the petty nobles, the Duchess of the realm Jeskai aptly describes as a sort of Papal States, and the servants too. And more so, I want to see how Prince Abel ends up.

Jeskai Angel: Japanese high school equivalents in fantasy worlds are so ubiquitous that I just kind of take them for granted now. But I agree that some aspects of the setup felt out of place.

“things felt too convenient. After all, it is not as if by behaving good, or trying to, the outcomes will always be good.”

Ooh, ooh, yes! This introduces something I was hoping we’d talk about! (Don’t worry, I’ll get back to question 2 eventually.) At one point in the story, the narrator says of Mia that “After thoroughly experiencing the kind of suffering she’d inflicted on others, she came to understand an essential truth: you reap what you sow.” Later, the narrator expands on this:

“After three years of dungeon life, Mia had come to understand an essential truth, or rather, she thought she had. What she didn’t know was that she only understood half of it. You reap what you sow. Those words do indeed ring true, but the scythe cares not for the nature of the grain. Should you sow the seeds of malice, then malice shall be your harvest. But should you sow the seeds of kindness…Just as how bullying will be repaid in kind, so will acts of benevolence.”

Now, that’s great, but what does it mean? The metaphor of sowing and reaping is all over the Bible. There’s the vivid image of judgment in Hosea 8.7: “For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.” In 2 Corinthians 9.6 there’s a pretty general statement of this principle: “Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.” And perhaps most important of all, Galatians 6:7-8 says: “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.”

The biblical concept of sowing and reaping is strongly oriented toward the resurrection and judgment. God doesn’t guarantee us good things in this life. The scriptures show there’s limited correlation between doing good/evil and experiencing good/bad things, but it’s far from ironclad. If anything, the Bible points the other way, saying we should NOT expect this life to work out so conveniently. The scriptures abound with good people who face undeserved suffering – Jesus above all others! Likewise, the Bible depicts many wicked people seemingly getting away with their sins in this life. God promises us that he’ll sort it all out someday. Until then, we must endure in hope.

But this sowing-and-reaping talk can also bring to mind the concept of karma, which from what I understand originates in Asian religions but today seems more like a global pop culture concept. (That is, most people have heard of karma, but don’t necessarily understand every nuance of, say, the Buddhist definition of the term.) Leaving aside the more technical meanings used by world religions, in popular use, it seems to me that karma evokes an expectation of prompt, earthly correlation between doing good/bad and experiencing good/bad. While not exactly biblical, this is a view we find in the Bible: its leading purveyors are Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar, the so-called “friends” of Job. They carry on about how the fact that Job suffers is proof that he is evil, and that as soon as he stops being evil, everything will be good again. Job is a…complex book, but one point that is absolutely unambiguous is that Job’s friends were wrong. The suffering Job endured was not some cosmic payback for some wicked deed, and the good things Job enjoyed before and after suffering were not contingent solely on Job living righteously.

The novel is somewhat ambiguous, but in the context of a Japanese novel, it seems likely that the author’s conception of sowing and reaping reflects the idea of karma, rather than focusing on God settling everything in eternity. But the fact that different worldviews can use very similar language is exactly what makes it so interesting to consider what’s going on in this story.

stardf29: First of all: this novel is absolutely hilarious. The way all of Mia’s actions get reinterpreted as her being some genius saint is great, and while normally misunderstandings in stories can be annoying because of how they slow down plot progression, here it’s used to move forward the story (and in very funny ways) so I really enjoy that. The snarky narrator adds to all of the amusement, of course.

Beyond that, this story has a fascinating cast of characters, some solid worldbuilding, and a whole lot of charm to it. I’ll definitely be getting into the specifics that I liked as the discussion goes forward.

Regarding “sowing and reaping”: So, out of curiosity, I actually went ahead and asked the translator of the novel on the JNC forums for what the original Japanese was, to see if it was just a localization with a familiar English phrase or some kind of common Japanese saying that might have actually originated from the Bible (in Japanese). (It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve seen this; the phrase “the scales fell from my eyes” is a common Japanese phrase and does indeed reflect the corresponding event of Paul’s conversion in Acts.)

In this case, it looks like the original Japanese is just a sentence saying “the seeds you planted have to be harvested by you as well”, rather than a common saying. That said, I did look up Galatians 6 in Japanese and it seems the verse in question also has a similar sentence (from my very limited Japanese knowledge), so maybe it has managed to find its way into more common Japanese knowledge somehow, or maybe the author looked up the verse or something. Hard to say for sure without having access to the raw texts, but it’s definitely something interesting.

2. What do you think of the characters?

Ludwig

Jeskai Angel: Ludwig is a great nod to historical civil servants like Turgot and Calonne who served the French monarchy in the days before the French Revolution. As a character, he’s admirable because he’s so incredibly faithful. In the original timeline, despite having little reason to care for Mia or the royal family, he strenuously attempted to stave off disaster. And even after revolutionaries took over, he kept trying to save Mia. She lost everything, was abandoned by almost everyone, but he continued to care up the way up through the day of her execution. None of this brought him any benefit, yet he persisted.

One of the major issues in Mia’s life is her inadequate upbringing: she seems to receive no parental love or guidance, is terribly spoiled by those around her, and has no real friends. It’s no wonder she turned out dysfunctional. But Ludwig is one of the rare exceptions. When he greets her by rebuking her for how much it costs to feed her, as well as on other occasions, it makes Ludwig one of the few people in Mia’s life who tries to teach her any sort of discipline. His mentor-like role highlights the void left by her uninvolved parent(s). It’s a mark of how Ludwig cares that he actually makes the effort to teach her. As an aside, the tomato-chef is another (albeit much more minor) example of this: he’s one of the few adults who cares about Mia enough to provide even a sliver of discipline in her life.

At one point in the original timeline, Ludwig tells Mia, “You’d better take a good, hard look at yourself and reflect on your mistakes, Your Highness.” Whether or not she had those words in mind, that’s exactly what she does in her reset life, and lot of it is thanks to Ludwig. Mia didn’t fully appreciate Ludwig’s lectures in her previous life — but she did LISTEN to them, and retained that knowledge! The narrator makes of point of insisting that Mia is as ignorant ever, that she’s merely parroting things OG Ludwig said. Bah, humbug! Have you ever graded student essays? I have. Even just repeating back the things a professor or textbook said is impossible for a student who never actually understood the material. A clueless dolt who didn’t grasp a complicated lecture about economics and taxation wouldn’t be able to regurgitate it in any kind of intelligible fashion – especially not years later. Ludwig is brilliant and, despite his cantankerous appearance, impressively patient as he teaches Mia, while Mia is a quite a bit sharper than the narrator gives her credit for. Yes, she got everything she knows from OG Ludwig, but all the best students owe a great debt to their teachers. She deserves credit for understanding and remembering Ludwig’s teaching well enough to apply in her reset life.

stardf29: Ludwig is an interesting case because, in the original timeline, it seems like he had every reason to dislike Mia, and yet made every effort to try to save her regardless. Maybe he saw Mia as an unfortunate spoiled brat who simply never got the proper upbringing to know any better, or maybe he figured that, as selfish as Mia might have been, executing her would only make things worse for the country. Whatever the case, his willingness to see a different side to things and remain loyal to Mia gets repaid in the current timeline with Mia saving him from being banished to the boonies and getting an advance on his future knowledge courtesy of Mia.

And yes, Mia gets credit for actually remembering all of that knowledge that past-Ludwig gave her. And she even gives him just the tiniest bit of credit in her diary entries towards the end of the volume. (She sounds almost tsundere-like with her whole “it was really just the tiniest little bit, okay?”)

Gaheret: Well, I thought that was because of Imperial ethos of loyalty and pietas. Even the sovereign you don´t especially like, you try to love and support with your best efforts.

Smug Mia is more adorable than she has any right to be.

Anne

Jeskai Angel: Okey-day, first, I want to point out that “Mia” shares all its letter with “Marie,” while “Anne” shares all its letters with “Antoinette.” I commend the author’s cleverness.

Anne is great. Her faithfulness to Mia is incredible, and her loving service becomes a major element in Mia’s own transformation (which interestingly comes back around as Mia influences Anne in the second timeline). When Mia recognizes Anne and seizes the opportunity to reward OG Anne’s service, it’s a hugely effective way to show that Mia has changed. “Why do you still devote yourself to me?” Mia asked the day she died.

OG Anne was remarkably Christ-like as she served Mia despite deriving no benefit from doing so. Feet aren’t mentioned specifically, but when the story notes Anne even washes Mia in prison, I couldn’t help but think of the foot-washing at the Last Supper. In answer to Mia’s query, Anne says “I just couldn’t leave you alone.” The brief but vivid portrait of Anne’s love for Mia is at the heart of how the story sells us on the idea that Mia has changed. Some of Mia’s last words before her first death are to beg Anne for forgiveness for how she treated the maid, how she regrets being unable to act on the gratitude she now feels. It’s wonderfully satisfying when Mia gets the chance to say, “Now… I can finally repay you for your loyalty.” Notably, Mia is thoughtful enough to not only promote Anne, but also ensure she doesn’t face harassment from coworkers. In the bath scene later, Mia scrub Anne’s back, reflecting how the “foot-washing” lesson OG Anne taught her has taken root.

Later, there’s a neat echo of the conversation in the prison flashback. “Um, have I done something for Your Highness before?” Anne wonders. “No, and you need not. I know you to be deeply loyal, and I am repaying you for your devotion. That is all.” OG Anne has changed Mia for the better, and it’s beautiful.

Gaheret: Anne and Ludwig, the faithful servants who stayed when everything crumbled, are admirable just by that fact, and Mia is right to recognize their loyalty and put her trust in them. Yet, it seems to me that this has had the unintended side effect of depriving them of knowing Mia´s character -which is not so bad as the narrator makes it to be-, and thus, of a relationship like they had last time. I find it kind of sad: Mia still needs Ludwig´s clear judgement and Anne´s kindness to correct her blind spots. But now, like an Ami Kawashima of sorts, she can only do it by remembering what they said and did in the past, because they do not know her blind spots anymore. And as a result, Mia is terrified and alone, and she cannot but come to feel like a fraud. I always had people to open up to. She doesn´t, not one. Worse, when she knows that they are loyal enough to love her and commit to her despite her flaws.

stardf29: I don’t have much to add here that hasn’t already been said, but yes, I absolutely love how loving Anne was in the previous timeline to a Mia that was otherwise almost universally hated. And that was at least a major influence on Mia in the current timeline being kinder herself… which leads her to making that timeline’s Anne her retainer and friend… which in turn has her supporting Mia faithfully in this timeline, even behind the scenes. There’s a very beautiful (and amusing) poetry to this circle of kindness here.

Abel

Gaharet: Concerning Prince Abel, I enjoyed a lot seeing him grow from prodigal second son to a man wishing to be an able rival to Prince Sion, and his transformation from that point on felt believable. I think it adds points to the story that she primarily approached him at first due to strategic reasons: literary conventions aside, that was how it was done. A virtuous noblewoman would try to choose well between the options which were strategically good (if she could even do that much) and then try to love and inspire the man, as Mia did. I like how there is evil in his character and his barely avoided destiny remain with him in a way, and also that he has no idea of how to behave in front of Mia. I think he will be a good, loyal support for her in times of need.

Jeskai Angel: While Mia has a positive effect on many characters, arguably the one who changes the most due to her influence is Abel. The story introduces us to current Abel in a way that really helped make his multiple possible futures believable. One can totally see how current Abel could have given up on life and settled for being a shallow playboy. But in the new timeline, his efforts to grow, inspired by Mia, are also believable. I feel like he’s actually an extremely fitting match for Mia. Prince Mary Poppins, I mean, Sion, is and always has been practically perfect in every way. But both Mia and Abel are people with serious flaws who met sad ends in Mia’s first life. And now, in Mia’s second lease on life, Mia and Abel are getting second chances to do better – together. It’s super sweet and poetic and I’m so rooting for them to get a happy ending together!

Involving Abel but pertaining more to Mia, the entire fact that Mia pursues a relationship with Abel is a huge sign of Mia’s newfound humility. In her first list, she thought herself entitled to the most prestigious boy in her class. It signifies how much he’s changed that in her second life she cultivates a relationship a mere second prince from a minor kingdom. Even with pragmatic, guillotine avoidance motivations, Mia had to set aside her pride, change her priorities, to even consider Abel.

stardf29: First of all, the name Abel is strangely fitting in various ways: note that his brother is named “Gain”, which is very close to “Cain”. Almost makes me wonder if the name choice was intentional (along with the sowing/reaping reference, maybe the author knows their Bible quite a bit).

Anyway, yeah, Abel definitely changes a lot when Mia shows interest in him and encourages him to not give up on bettering himself. Putting her motivations aside (and here they’re not even all that “selfish”; she’s actually considering what’s best for her country as well as whatever country’s prince she decides to marry), she sees Abel not for his current shortcomings, but as a person with the potential to grow and change. That’s a very gracious, God-like approach here, and its impact on Abel’s life is huge. Seeing how he takes inspiration from her in the swordsmanship tournament is great.

And on Mia’s part, she’s definitely not completely immune to Abel, either, as we can see from the part where she notices how hard he has trained for the tournament and tells him she wants him to win. This is actually quite a sweet romance, all things considered.

That said, there is an interesting bit of irony here. Mia originally chose Abel because he was a second prince and not very likely to become king… but now, one can argue that Abel is more suited to becoming king than his brother. Could Mia’s plan backfire on her in this way? That might be an interesting obstacle for her to work around…

Jeskai Angel: Since “ka” and “ga” use the same character in hiragana / katakana, isn’t the spelling of Gain / Kain / Cain not merely close but practically the same?

This gets me thinking. If Gain’s hatred of and jealously toward Abel take him down the path of his namesake, he could easily turn into a major antagonist for Mia in her second life. In the new timeline, Gain is arguably the most overtly wicked named character. The bullies go unnamed. Sion is…flawed…but while OG Sion was horrible, Sion of the new timeline hasn’t really done anything wrong yet. Assuming that Mia is going to face some kind of major antagonist, it seems like it’ll be either Sion (based on what we know of him from Mia’s first life) or Gain (based on his name and the fact that he’s the nastiest character Mia has met in this timeline).

Ooh. Now I kind of want / don’t want a scenario where Gain as antagonist captures & tortures Mia (or, rather, tries). I don’t want Mia to suffer, but there could be an awesome scene where Gain tries to torture her, an unphased Mia thinks to herself “This is nothing compared to the torture I faced in my first life,” & then Gain has a complete meltdown when he can’t get a response from her, let alone break her.

stardf29: Heh, that would be pretty amusing. Though if the story does go down that path, I hope that Gain ultimately reforms after all of that, maybe after he misinterprets Mia’s indifference as showing some kind of unconditional love to him or something.

Other Characters (besides Mia)

Jeskai Angel: Regarding Sion, “Sunkland” is a pretty amusing play on “England.” I appreciate his thoughts about how leaders “must always take pride in their integrity and hold themselves to a standard such that they might be examples to their subjects.” It’s painfully relevant as we suffer through a presidential election in America this year. I also like Sion’s pithy observation, “When witnessing the oppression of the powerless, anger was the correct response.” I’ve wrestled a lot over the years with the appropriate place for anger in a Christian’s life, and I think Sion is right on target.

Tiona isn’t in focus as much as some of the other characters, so while she’s a solid character who has an important role in the story, she didn’t really leave a strong impression on me. I look forward to her and Mia getting closer when Mia goes for the visit we’re promised.

I did find it amusing how, because OG Sion and OG Tiona literally presided over her execution in the previous timeline, Mia just assumes Sion and Tiona already hate her guts and are eager to kill her, before she’s even met them in this life. It’s a curious blindspot: she thinks she can change her fate, but doesn’t consider that she might change Sion and Tiona’s opinion of her along the way. However, the fact that Mia has no serious desire to take revenge on Sion and Tiona also reflects Mia’s capacity to forgive (or hints that she’s developing such an ability).

Keithwood mostly serves as a foil to the other characters. He’s our source of insight into Sion, and the one sane person who keeps the lunchbox fiasco from going completely off the rails. Keithwood is also one of the more perceptive observers of Mia. He comes surprisingly close to the truth when he ponders whether Mia is a saint, schemer, or seductress. Other characters tend to lean heavily toward the saintly view, while the narrator insists Mia’s is a schemer. So although Mia is hardly a seductress in any meaningful sense, Keithwood is right to consider that there might be ways to understand Mia besides just the extremes of “saint” or “schemer.” Mia, like all of us, is a strange mixture of good and ill, and Keithwood comes closer than anyone else to grasping that reality.

Gaheret: Prince Sion, on the other hand, is the kind of character I despise. Virtuous, yes, but harsh with others. The kind of man who (original timeline) approaches an imperial princess in disgrace during the crisis of her Empire just to say “I despise you”. The kind of person who consents a young woman to be bullied by the mob and in suffering for three years, even being force-fed those tomatoes just because they discover that she hates them to the point of vomiting, then executes her just because she is the symbol of the old régime. The sort of pretty boy who turns down a vain girl in a painful way, because she is vain and deserves a lesson. And worse, he does all that with peace of mind, because she is bad and stupid, and he is not. Let´s just say that I found the way Mia gave him the cold shoulder wise and prudent: it is best to keep him at distance. The narrator says that Prince Abel and Prince Sion will meet each other in battle. So be it.

I liked Tiona, on the other hand. She was a victim, called a “saint” by the Revolution, and she had endured a lot. I´m glad Mia had to establish a friendship with her, even if she was reluctant at first. As Jeskai says, we still not know the most important things about her. In whose side of the Revolution will she be, now that Mia is not involved in her bullying, but is a friend and a defender? She clearly still likes Sion in this version of the story, but this time he seems not to notice her, what happened in the original timeline? Though they came visit Mia together.

Concerning the minor characters, I would have liked more emphasis on Chloe and her merchant background, and we do not hear much about the character of Tiona´s maiden. Balthezar, Ludwig´s friend, and the noblewoman from the agriculture background look like promising characters. And lastly, duchess Rafina, a future ruler and priestess, the moral inspiration of the Academy, who is said to be the spiritual inspiration and a force silently backing the revolution, strikes me as a terrifying figure, almost in the same way as Sion. The novel depicts her as kind and just, but I see her always judging from above, and subtly making moves through her influence. I could totally understand Mia´s anxiety when she has to explain to her how she has dealt with the offending nobles. There is a “Church” which is mentioned when dealing with the plague: if Rafina is its head (as the Papal states analogy would suggest), this would be something entirely different from the French Revolution.

Oh, I almost forgot Keithwood. And yet, he is the one closer to the truth: as the “wise servants” that abound in literature, in a somewhat Shakespearian position in which he can see above the tale, he is not blinded by his position and can observe. He is deeply committed to Prince Sion, who we know will battle against the Empire, and almost unbelievably wise for his years (I say “almost” because I have known some young people who are indeed wise). Yet, he is clever and just, and even if he doesn´t see through Mia, he knows something to be off. If someone realizes what is happening, it will surely be him. And his moral character seems solid, without the threatening aura of Rafina and Sion.

Jeskai Angel: Okey-day, I agree with Gaheret. Great points. While I do like the quotes I mentioned earlier, Gaheret‘s commentary helped me realize that I’ve been just kind of lumping Sion and Tiona together as the two ringleaders of Mia’s death, when really I should have been looking more closely at them as separate characters. Sion really is a self-righteous Pharisee with no real reasons to like him ever presented. On the other hand, Tiona is a hardworking, long-suffering victim, and while that doesn’t necessarily justify executing Mia, it certainly makes Tiona more sympathetic. She has valid grievances, even if we may disapprove of how she deals with them. Also, it seems relevant that we never actually see OG Tiona acting cruelly toward Mia the way OG Sion did.

Mia’s efforts to befriend Rafina in the previous timeline are truly pitiful. She never had real friends, was never taught how friendship works, and thus tried her hardest and got nothing but scorn. That’s not all Mia’s fault: it’s the result of a sad upbringing. You can tell Mia is scarred by her past failures to make a friend; in the new timeline, she just dreads Rafina, knowing her as someone impossible to please. As someone who spent many years of childhood and adulthood painfully struggling (and often failing) to make friends, Mia’s plight is super sad and super relatable.

On the topic of Sion / Rafina in particular, one aspect of the story I appreciated was the unfair judgments Mia faced in her first life. OG Rafina held Mia responsible for the harassment of Tiona, even though Mia had nothing to do with it. OG Sion went out of his way to be mean to Mia, despite the fact that even if she was annoying, she never really did anything to harm him. It’s actually a nice reflection of the IRL French Revolution. Now, the revolution was a complex phenomenon with multiple causes, but one factor was corruption among the ruling class, some which was real, but some of which was just perceived. For example, Louis XV was a notorious womanizer whose behavior tarnished the image of the French monarchy. His grandson Louis XVI was, as far as I can tell, a faithful family man, but the perception of corruption weakened the monarchy. Similarly, Marie is arguably most famous for responding, when the people had no bread, “Let them eat cake.” Except that she totally never said that. However, the French royals came to have this frivolous image that provides a context where Marie’s fictitious callous words sound plausible.

stardf29: There’s definitely something curious about how Tiona ended up becoming one of the starters of the revolution in the original timeline. If you ask me, Tiona seems a bit too nice to have started a revolution just because she was bullied by Mia. Something else probably happened (beyond her kidnapping, which only really served to endear her to OG Sion) that drove her over the edge. It’s definitely something curious that I hope we learn more about.

Now, Sion… yeah, something about him rubs me the wrong way. He does seem like a Pharisee who prioritizes “justice” (or what he thinks that is) over grace, and on top of that he just has that smugness to him that makes me hope he gets taken down a peg. So far, that hasn’t quite happened yet, but there are some cracks starting to show, and I’m looking forward to seeing how Mia interacts with him later on.

Keithwood is a character that seems to be somewhat common in these medieval settings: the knight that is a close friend of a prince such that he is able to speak more frankly to him, without as much regard to position. He’s a good foil to Sion, and just a good guy overall, especially with helping the girls out with making the sandwiches.

As for Rafina: Score one for Tearmoon Empire for actually having a sympathetic religious authority figure of sorts. Though it does feel like, had that meeting with Mia not happen, she would have very well turned out to be the sort of judgmental, graceless religious figure that we normally associate with fantasy religious figures, as the past timeline shows. However, Mia’s examples of grace (however unintentional) shows her a different way of doing things, and she becomes a friend rather than an enemy. I definitely hope to see more of her in the future.

Mia

Gaheret: As I said, I felt very identified with Mia. I’m familiar with jerk thoughts which go unnoticed, the transformation was fun and her role as a sainctly queen oddly reminded me of people like Blanche of Castille, Marguerite of France or Katherine of Aragon and her daughter Mary Tudor. She may be aided by special, comic Providence, but I count that as a plus. I like that her transformation is mostly outward, and the inner changes are slow: that is realistic. All women confronting powerful foes, searching for allies, trying to do good and trying to operate in a world of nobility, interests and threats of different sorts, like Mia. I´m invested in her relationship with Prince Abel: whatever the narrator thinks, there are signs that she is inspired by him, as he is by her.

Jeskai Angel: Mia is amazing. She reminds me a little of Bakarina, though she’s quite a bit more practical and realistic in her efforts to avoid impending doom. I empathize with Mia on a personal level in multiple ways, but she’s a great protagonist for many reasons. Thanks to the colliding perspectives of the narrator, various other characters, and Mia’s actual words and deeds, Mia comes across as a delightfully complex human being. She’s not the dolt that the narrator claims, and also not the genius other characters think she is. She’s not as petty and selfish as the narrator says, but she’s also not the purely virtuous saint some of the other characters mistake her for. And so on. Nobody – not Anne, not Abel, not the narrator – has a complete grasp of Mia’s character. Just as IRL humans, past and present, are quite complex.

Mia’s story is full of wonderful moments that could only happen because Mia really did live through the revolution of the original timeline. A great example is the story at the end of the volume where she eats the stale cookies, joyfully reminisces about the time she ate them in prison, then hears they are years old and immediately jumps to thinking about how her country could benefit from this food preservation expertise. Mia didn’t have a bad dream, nor a vision of the future. She lived this other life before dying on the guillotine and being reborn at twelve years old. For a twenty-year-old woman, she isn’t especially mature, but that’s fair, given her background. She grew up spoiled, friendless, lacking parental love and guidance, and spent the last three years of her life in a dungeon. None of that can be blamed on her.

But that’s not even the really good part. Before dying at twenty, Mia learned virtues like gratitude and compassion. These lessons came too late to save her in the first timeline, but she retained those qualities when she traveled back in time. It wasn’t inevitable that Mia learned such lessons: she could have used her suffering to become obstinate, bitter, angry, repaying hatred with hatred. She could have fallen into despair. But she allowed the suffering to refine her, help her grow. The fact that Mia is capable of realizing she was a terrible person in the past indicates a strong level of introspection.

Mia is at the center of a whole web of reverberating positive influences. Mia herself changed thanks to Anne’s kindness and Ludwig’s lectures…and also thanks to the hatred and derision of Sion, Rafina, and the revolutionary mob. There’s a sense in which everything different in the new timeline ultimately originates with Mia’s own different choices, caused by the lessons she learned in her first life. She makes a positive difference in the lives of Anne, Ludwig, the people of the slum, Elise, Tiona, Abel, Chloe, etc. Sometimes this even comes back around, as when Mia’s influence on Anne raises the maid’s expectations of her mistress, helping give Mia the extra push she needs to step up and help Tiona. Iron sharpens iron, indeed. Watching the ripples of Mia’s influence brings to mind the Vulcan proverb “One man can summon the future” (Star Trek: Enterprise, season 4, “United”). Mia’s story is an inspiring display of how one person can make a difference for good. I am totally cheeing for her in whatever future adventures she faces.

Another cool side to Mia’s character is how her “really 20 yrs old” nature is portrayed. The narrator rightly notes that the circumstances her first life “somewhat crippled her mental maturity in certain aspects,” but she also gets some great moments where her age experience from her first life shines through. My favorite is when Abel’s brother tries to act threatening and Mia’s reaction is basically “LOL, Senator Little Boy, you’re no Jack Kennedy revolutionary mob.” Her disdain is so complete that even as we repeatedly see her make extra effort to get to know people and remember their names, she doesn’t bother with the name of Abel’s brother.

stardf29: Honestly, I don’t know what to say here that hasn’t been said by others, so I’ll just say that, on top of all of that, she’s just really fun overall. She has a strange but effective sense of practicality (might as well sell this expensive hairpin so it can’t be stolen by brutish revolutionaries), while also being prone to moments of silliness (the horse-shaped sandwich). Even her more selfish and petty moments are more cute than malicious, like a kid trying to get what she wants while being aware that certain actions can hurt her later on. So yeah, she’s a really great character, well-developed while also being straight-up entertaining in and of herself.

Horses love Mia, too. Or at least they like to sneeze on her.

3. What are your thoughts about the narrator?

Jeskai Angel: I already wrote an entire essay about the narrator of this story, so I don’t know what to add, but just be aware that the narrator has such a distinctive voice as to qualify him as a major character in his own right, despite having no direct involvement in the events he narrates.

I’ve ragged on the narrator quite a lot (including an entire separate post!), and I do think he’s often at least partially wrong about Mia and the other characters within the story. But he has some good points.

Although the narrator stands outside the main story, he joins Ludwig one of the only voices who legitimately critiques Mia. Mr. Narrator often goes too far in his attacks on Mia and the others, but there are also nuggets of truth in what he says. I also appreciate the author’s choice to make the narrator so over the top in his view of Mia. A more deadpan narration would have given the impression that readers ought to believe everything he says. But this narrator is ridiculous enough to imply that readers shouldn’t blindly accept everything he says. My favorite example is a comment he makes after “explaining” the ”real” reason Mia said what she did while standing up for Tiona. He tears apart Mia’s “true” motivations, paints her negatively…and then admits, “Now, all of this might seem supremely counterintuitive.”

As already noted, this book is incredibly funny, and lot of that hinges on the narrator. Also, this book had some of the funniest chapter titles I’ve ever seen, and I like to imagine the narrator came up with them all.

The narrator also gets to make some profound points, with no snark, no Rube Goldberg-esque convoluted explanations, just sharp observations. After Mia awakens following her death, she tries to convince herself it was just a childish nightmare. But as Mr. Narrator incisively notes, “…she didn’t realize one, very simple, fact: real children don’t think of their nightmares as childish.” In the big picture, this is one of many moments that help confirm Mia really lived & died in the other timeline, that she didn’t just have a weird dream or vision. But it shows that the narrator has some genuine insight into Mia and human nature more generally. I also loved a moment before the tournament as Mia and Abel talk: “After some meticulous calculating, she looked to Abel… ‘I await your victory, Prince Abel.’ …And let slip her true thoughts.” This statement helps us understand Mia’s true feelings; she might sometimes try to be a schemer, but she’s not actually devious and dishonest enough to pull it off. But this the narrator’s commentary; we have him to thank for this insight. So, yes, the narrator goes to nonsensical lengths to criticize Mia and almost everyone else, and should be called out, but I’ve concluded that his snark sometimes overshadows his perceptiveness.

Oh, another thing I liked about the narrator is his occasional flash-forward moments, where he says “This was the moment that changed so-and-so’s life,” or “Thirty years from now this turned out to be super important,” or whatever. Leaving aside the fact that he knows about multiple timelines, they are fun interjections that contribute to the feeling that one is reading history (and yes, I mean that in a good way, LOL).

Gaheret: The derisive narrator was certainly fun, if sometimes excessive. It was almost like revisionism. In a way, it felt as if a more mature but excessively self-conscious Mia (who else would have known all that?) had found the biography of Anne´s sister excessive, and had wanted to tone things down, sometimes exaggerating in the other direction. I´m not a fan of the detailed flash-forwards: Firstly, because they already have the alternate timeline to convey that kind of information, secondly, because that sort of thing should be done vaguely, and it not always is. I liked one: “a destined battle among men”, as Uraraka would say. But, for example, the hagiography I just mentioned means that the Empire, at least the general public, never learns the true character of her Empress. As this is one of the main points she is working towards, I would prefer not to know if she achieves it beforehand. And I would have liked more intrigue and uncertainty concerning the transformation of Prince Abel. It would have made all the rivalry more uncertain, and we wouldn´t know for sure that he and not Sion is the love interest. That said, the author cares about his characters, and it shows, and I have come to like the worldbuilding, and also the different aspects in which the crisis of the Empire develops, and I liked the novel a lot.

Jeskai Angel: Ah, but therein lies the whole question. What IS Mia’s true character? The story gives us conflicting perspectives: the narrator’s claims, the opinions of other characters, and even the reader’s own interpretation of Mia’s actual words and actions. To say that Elise’s biography doesn’t capture Mia’s “true character” is to assume a certain interpretation of Mia that may or may not be correct. Though, in fairness, a biography written by a monarch’s paid retainer is naturally suspect.

This has prompted me to realize that thinking as a historian has led me to privilege to the opinions of the other characters (Anne, Ludwig, Elise, Tiona, Abel, Keithwood, etc.) above the narrator. When I research history, I give the most weight to contemporary primary sources, that is, accounts written close to the time of the topic by people with firsthand knowledge of the topic. As I read Tearmoon Empire, I am interpreting the perspectives of the other characters as primary sources. What Ludwig or Keithwood or whoever thinks of Mia at a particular moment is an eyewitness account direct from the time of the events. So though I don’t think the views of Mia held by Anne, Abel, et al. are to be uncritically accepted, they deserve great weight. Elise’s biography is also a primary source, but is much more suspect, being written years later and coming from a person with a vested interest (though it still could have much truth to it).

If Elise’s biography is hagiographic, the narrator seems more polemical in tone. And both tones are reasons to take care and read with a critical eye. The narrator comes across as an entirely distinct voice separate from the main story and characters. He speaks as an outside observer from some later point in time. While clearly not a normal scholar (he knows about the different timelines!), I’m inclined to see the narrator as the equivalent of a historian of some later generation. Thus I regard the narrator’s voice as a secondary source. He’s not an eyewitness, and he’s (probably?) not a contemporary of Mia and company.

Whatever the case, this leads to an issue of plausibility. The narrator’s views may be well founded on thorough research, but as a historian, I’m going to give more weight to the contemporary impressions of eyewitnesses than to a later writer’s claims. This is especially the case when the two interpretations diverge greatly. What is more likely? That numerous people with firsthand knowledge of Mia all constantly misinterpreted everything she said and did? Or that a scholar in a later generation is pushing an unduly harsh view of a past monarch? As more and more characters form positive opinions of Mia, I grow more doubtful that they are all just deluded like the narrator claims. It seems to me far more plausible that the narrator is being too harsh than that all Mia’s contemporaries so greatly misunderstood her.

On this topic, one point I find fascinating is that narrator doesn’t accuse Mia of deception. In all the situations where other people interpret what Mia said or did as benevolent, clever, or otherwise positive, the narrator NEVER suggests Mia was deliberately leading anyone on or cultivating a false image. Instead, the narrator just insists, over and over, that despite appearances, Mia really intended something different and all the other characters are just weak in the head. Again, I ask: is that plausible? More plausible than trusting the eyewitnesses’ immediate firsthand thoughts?

tl;dr My background as a historian influenced how I read this book, and incline me to trust the other characters more than when the narrator speaks distinctively in his own voice (though I believe both should be read critically). As a result, my view of Mia tends to be closer to (though not as extreme as) the perspectives of the other characters.

stardf29: I definitely like this sort of questioning about who exactly the narrator is. Personally, I like the idea that the narrator is Mia, several years older and looking back on this period in life and feeling super-embarrassed that her actions of self-preservation got blown out of proportion. However, she can’t ruin her image as the Great Sage for reasons, so she just wrote a more private account to relieve her own embarrassment or something. It’s interesting to think of because, first-person stories aside, we rarely think of who exactly is narrating a story, so for the narrator to have their own clear voice and personality, it invites this sort of speculation.

Jeskai Angel: Mmm… Interesting alternative theory of Older Mia as the narrator.

Yeah, narrators are usually either first-person with a distinct identity as a character within the story, or omniscient impersonal third-person with no distinct identity. It’s much less common to find stories featuring a third-person narrator that has its own voice and personality.

I know all we have at the moment is the first volume of the series, but with what we know from reading it, do you think the series will eventually identify the narrator more fully? Do you want it do so? Or would you prefer that he/she remain ambiguous? On related note, do you think the series will, and do you want the series to, ever address how/why Mia traveled back in time? Or is that better left a mystery in your opinion?

I think the narrator definitely has potential for further development, whether or not we actually definitively learn his/her identity. Like, learning the narrator’s identity might be cool (depends a lot on who it is / how it’s revealed). But we could also see the narrator’s views of Mia and/or other characters change over the course of future volumes, which could be quite interesting.

Gaheret: The diary is interesting, and now I´m thinking that it may be the source of the narrator. That or Mia herself. As you have said in your article, this narration feels a bit like self-derision sometimes. As for Mia´s true character, I think it´s half what she was, half what she is becoming, but it does not lessen her to be sometimes self-conscious, or bratty, or just fearful, or saved by luck. She has a more strong, impulsive personality that she shows. It´s only natural, and the good things she does are good even so. Even by the narrator´s account, she is working hard, trying to repare her debts with loyalty and gratitude and sincerely falling in love.

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And that’s the first part of our discussion! As you can see, we already had a lot of discussion already, and we still have more to talk about, so join us tomorrow for Part 2 as we go even further into this light novel!

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(Links to buy Tearmoon Empire, Vol. 1: Amazon / Other links )

#Light Novels #Christianity #Tearmoon Empire #Tearmoon Teikoku Monogatari #Articles #Author: stardf29 #Author: Gaharet #Author: JeskaiAngel

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alexsmitposts · 4 years

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When the Going Gets Tough, the US Runs to its Criminal Friends Donald Trump’s consistent use of the term “Chinese Virus” when discussing Covid-19 has raised a few eyebrows. Having been locked down and had the foreseeable future taken away, the world has no choice but to defer to his leadership. But rather than leading the world, he leads a chosen part of it against another part of it in every speech, leaving yet more of a legacy of hate and mistrust, as if the US hasn’t done enough of this. Other Great Powers have always had the same problems. Anything associated with former colonial masters is either rejected outright, even when it does not have to have that association, or localised to remove those associations. But this means countries develop by adopting new friends, whoever they may be. Often they are not too discriminating about who those friends are, or what strings are attached to that friendship, as they see it as a “path to independence,” not accepting that it cannot take them there. The former Soviet states provide many examples of this, but so do former colonies of anywhere, who once ran to the Soviet Union to achieve the same ends. So backed into a corner of its own construction, the US is deciding who else should be allowed into that corner. Kim Jong-un was invited, but seems to have been kept out, for now, by exposing that the only global superpower is indeed a helpless prisoner in its corner But there are some states who will always be there, no matter what. Is it because they are also mature democracies which respect freedom, human rights and rule of law? If they were, North Korea would hardly have been invited. Like an addict, the US chooses the friends which justify its crimes. The definition of US values which Washington imposes on the developing world would never be considered acceptable at home. So it seeks friends who play the same game, hoping that will justify this practice – which it would never need to do, if it really believed in the values it claims to have. Double coverage Can you imagine a world in which the US was not a friend of Israel? Many other countries, principally its neighbours, have arguments with the Jewish state, both over how it conducts itself and its very existence. But although there is also a US Arab lobby, based on shared oil interests rather than common political cause, the huge influence of the Israeli lobby in the US is recognised and well-documented. What does Israel actually stand for which other Middle East countries, including democracies such as Lebanon, do not? How is it more consistent with US values to support Israel rather than its neighbours? The usual answers are bound up with “self-determination” and righting historic wrongs, albeit at the expense of others. Why should the suffering Israelites not have their own homeland? Why should all the crimes committed against them over the centuries not be compensated by support for that homeland? Having done all that, should the US not have a reliable ally in this turbulent region? These arguments are of course hypocritical, as they do not apply across the board. Ask, for example, the Kurds, the Serbs, the Catalans, the Native Americans themselves. Israel has another attraction, which is all about the US, not Israel itself. The latest democracy reports by V-Dem and Freedom House, who compete with and do not consult each other, both make sobering reading for Israel watchers V-Dem, run from Sweden, is rather more neutral in its political posturing, whereas Freedom House inclines towards the “socialism for the rich, rugged individualism for the poor” definition of freedom. Yet both reports explode all the claims the US makes about Israel, and about itself. If Belgium were compared to Bolivia as a democratic state, it would be greatly offended. Yet in the V-Dem report, Tunisia, not Israel, is called “the only democracy in the Middle East”. Admittedly this stretches the definition of “Middle East” a little. But who want to be outranked for democracy by a country synonymous with instability, corruption and disregard for human rights? The report paints the following picture: “Tunisia is the star pupil of democratization of the past ten years. Transitioning to democracy in 2012 after mass protests ousted the dictatorial regime of Ben Ali, its score on the LDI rose steeply from 0.11 in 2008 to 0.68 in 2018. However, the data also suggest that the new government is not fully independent from the military and thus potentially vulnerable to interference. Ahead of the election in 2019, political parties are still relatively weak and young people – the driving force of the revolution – infrequently engage in formal political institutions.” Tunisians themselves may feel their country is nowhere near the level of a real democracy, but it is largely being allowed to get there. Democracy exists because sooner or later everybody does it, if left alone to do so. Those who don’t want that are tolerating this expression of freedom, and the US is not vocal in its support of Tunisia and what it is trying to do. Tunisia is 41st on the V-Dem list of liberal democracies, which headed by Norway. Israel is 51st. It is well behind Uruguay and Chile, two countries still struggling to rid themselves of notorious CIA-funded repressive pasts, and just behind Croatia, famous for its discriminatory behaviour towards its Serb population. The Freedom House report includes Israel as one of 25 established democracies where freedom has declined over the past 14 years. The country gets its worst ever overall score of 76, well behind Mongolia and only 6 points ahead of Hungary, which is categorised as only “partly free”. What’s wrong with Israel? This long list provides part of the answer. But the US recognises it as a kindred spirit because the US itself was founded by implanted settlers dispossessing and humiliating the native population. This is what US-Israeli friendship is really about – trying to make two wrongs a right. Other countries have their own sordid histories, but don’t offer the same exculpatory PR opportunity. At a time of global crisis, the US should lead, not try to find excuses for itself. United by the wrong common language US relations with most countries wax and wane, depending on the political direction of the wind vein; the other country it always supports unquestioningly is the UK. Few even want to suspect there is an improper reason for this, but this crisis is indicating that such confidence is misplaced. As the former colonial power, though admittedly long ago, the UK should be seen with much more suspicion by the US. American historiography makes much of the struggle against the British and the principles the American colonies fought for, implying that the UK is not a “land of the free” where “all men are created equal”, so it should be the opposite of what the US wants in a friend. “Special Relationship” However the US and UK have long had a “Special Relationship” – the one which prevented the UK joining the EU and its predecessors for twenty years. Why? For the same reason Australia, which used to describe itself as being the “southern outpost of the British race,” also had a “White Australia” immigration policy for many years? The almost English-speaking White Anglo-Saxon Protestants, WASPs, who founded and have always run the US preserve their privileges by treating the UK as an example, despite deliberately contradicting its political system and developing a very different culture. The British must be racially superior, regardless of their crimes as colonists, or the US would itself be a very different place. This relationship also suited the British, who could regard Americans as the same as them when it suited them. US success was firstly an extension of UK success, then an acceptable alternative to UK decline. But now the “Special Relationship” is coming home to roost in a big way. During the Second World War, despite the tensions and differences in practical impact between the two countries, everyone pulled together. For a generation afterwards, rebuilding was held to require consensus. But for the past forty years both countries have followed a similar trajectory. Regardless of the complexion of government, they have sought to divide people into “good” and “bad” rather than supporter and opponent. The “bad” people – whether they are foreign, Muslim, ideologically unsound or whatever, are responsible for all the ills of their countries, while the “good” are being unfairly disadvantaged by treating those “bad” people the same way as them. These policies have had one inevitable consequence – creating an ever-deepening sense of injustice amongst those who are disadvantaged to begin with, and would be under any sort of policy through no fault of their own. These are the people openly courted by Trump and Boris Johnson to win power. First it was good versus bad, now it is outsiders versus the whole system, because that system, the creation of good versus bad, has failed to deliver what it promised the good. Going down this route will only make things worse, as no one will be satisfied and the sense of injustice will only grow. But having started, both countries are running to each other for help because they can’t stop, or their governments would collapse overnight. The Covid-19 virus was treated by both countries as another dimension of the “liberal elite conspiracy,” something invented to profit the “bad people” who had hurt so many voters. Neither took it seriously, either saying reports were exaggerated or coming up with ridiculous but low cost cures such as Johnson’s “herd immunity.” When forced to realise the extent of the crisis, they have insisted on pursuing racist policies which help no one. Trump reportedly tried to buy up all the cures for the US before nasty foreigners could get their hands on them, and still insists, by classifying his health emergency response meetings, that the virus is about China rather than health. Boris Johnson is refusing to postpone or even delay the Brexit trade deal negotiations because getting away from “foreign control” is considered more important. He refused to either join the EU’s ventilator scheme, a decision later blamed on an error the EU has debunked or boost the UK manufacturers who make them, but then gave the manufacturing contract to a Conservative Party donor, one of the “good people” who can make the problem go away at the cost of the “bad people” who die in the meantime. Johnson also claims to have Covid-19 himself, but gave a post-diagnosis speech at which there was no sign of the uncontrollable cough all sufferers apparently have. It would be entirely in character for this to be another BoJo publicity stunt. Perhaps we will never know, but is this the way to lead his country, or the world, through a crisis to a better future? Rule by the Mob The world’s largest economy and only superpower cannot claim to be the land of the dispossessed, particularly when run by a billionaire. But it has always claimed to be a force for good, which all like-minded nations should want to ally with. The US is not choosing its friends based on how good their values are. It wants ones who will justify its own crimes by being just as bad. When everyone is both a victim and a carrier of a deadly virus, these issues should not matter. But the US is only reinforcing its policy, at the expense of the whole world, because it has left itself with no alternative if it is going to remain the USA. There have been times when gangsters have effectively run cities or whole countries. Democracy is supposed to protect us from this, because at the end of the day, gangsters will serve the interests of their criminal friends rather than the people. This is why career criminals are classified as maladjusted: they cannot survive in a world where people try and act according to biblical precepts, whether aware of doing so or not. The BIGGER the problem, the GREATER the need for both leadership, and some semblance of decency, but we have no choice to trust in our leaders in times of crisis. But the bigger they are, the more they are running to their criminal friends instead of stepping up to resolve the crisis, or stepping down to make way for those who can. This is what a corrupt system throws up, even amongst those who claim to be overthrowing that system. There is an alternative, but it was always going to take a crisis like this to give enough people an incentive to make it real. Human beings are better than those we have set up as examples. This time we should really mean it when we say “never again.”

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the-canary · 6 years

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A Million Stars - B.B. (4/8)

Summary: It’s a whisper in the night, a promise to disappear forever. Don’t trust the Goblin King – it’s just that some princesses never learn. (Labyrinth/Royalty AU!Reader/Bucky Barnes).

Prompt: “The kind of smile that would be cruel not to kiss.”

A/N: This is for @sweetboybucky 1k writing challenge. So, this might be longer than I originally thought, but I am trying to juggle everything I have in my head.

Feedback is always appreciated.

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3

Make sure you do not ever regret the choices you have made, Morgan. There is nothing sadder than a regretful king -- all that power and you still couldn’t achieve your heart’s desires.

King Morgan can hear his first wife’s voice echoing in the hallways to the library as the darkness settles in. It had been days since his children disappeared and all he can do is wonder what he had done wrong for both of them to be sprited away. He had always tried to be a fair and just king, but he had weaknesses like any other man with power -- he took in more than he should in terms of wealth, loved more than one woman that wasn’t his wife.

I may leave you, Morgan. But, our daughter -- she is half yours, but should you play with that temper of hers, fae blood always burns everything in its path. Do not call for it.

His first wife, the one he married more out of obligation to nobility than anything else, had told him before she spirited away. Her family had been said to be connected to the old fae that lived in the land once, that she could see things that normal humans --like him-- couldn’t and he would laugh at her, scorn her heritage for years until their daughter was born, the heir he needed. The Old Queen watched her daughter grow for 5 years before she left -- without a word and in the middle of the night with a letter from one of Morgan’s lovers on her desk. Morgan was sure that’s the moment his kingdom fell into ruin.

War, famine, debt were all that followed his kingdom on the footsteps of the Queen disappearing. Morgan struggled stopping everything from being destroyed or worse have the people going into a full on rebellion, while raising his only child, his bright princess. However, he made sure that she knew nothing of the old stories, of the ill that might run through her veins -- she grew skeptical of the very thought of it instead.

Years passed and Morgan married once again, more due to love this time to a lady-in-waiting to his daughter, though of a lesser nobility compared to his first wife. The happy couple married and welcomed their son, Marcus two years ago and in his new happiness, Morgan forgot his first wife’s warning. He pushed his daughter aside, took away her birthright, and prepared to marry her to a man that was more brute than prince.

Fae blood always burns everything in its path.

War, famine, debt -- he had called on all of those once more after his children’s disappearance days ago, it was only a matter of time. The people were angry and mournful, his younger brothers were surely watching the shadows and waiting to see what was going to happen next. His wife hadn’t stopped crying.

As he sits in the darkness, in her favorite high chair within the library. Morgan can’t help but call out: “ Why do you curse me, Gwyneth ?”

An invisible wind shutters throughout the library, as if answering back.

You called for it.

“Are you sure we are heading in the right direction?” you can’t help but ask as the teddy bear gives you the best glare that it can, only for you to laugh. You didn’t know where Sam was taking you, but after surviving those “blades of death” back in the the bottle dungeon, you were starting to warm up to your guide -- even, if he hadn’t.

“Don’t forget your end of the bargain, Smellington,” the Goblin King chuckles before disappearing with a flick of his cloak. Before you could ask what he meant, a flurry of blades rush in your direction as you screamed and started punching the walls along with the teddy bear until one push forward and you both fell into the clearing below.

You were weary of why the Goblin King knew Sam and where the bear pirate was taking you, but you had to take it one step at a time. You had to play this a certain way to get the information you wanted, however that wasn’t one of the things you were very good at.

“Why did the Goblin King seem so familiar with you back there?” you can’t help but ask, as the bear just shakes his head.

“Don’t ya get tired of asking so many questions?” he remarks back, only for you to shake your head. He groans, not knowing what he has gotten himself into, though Sam couldn’t help but think it was better than all those times that visitors were silent or even treated him negatively when he was just trying to help. You wouldn’t shut up with all your questions, but he was starting to get used to it -- as scary as that was.

“ James knows everyone in his kingdom,” Sam explains, as your ears perk up at the sound of the Goblin King’s true name -- rather ordinary, if you had a say so, “He likes make sure everyone is under his palm and reminds them in awful ways.”

“Oh, that isn’t very nice for a king,” you can’t help but huff out in annoyance as Sam nods in agreement, “A good king cares of his people and the kingdom. This James must not be a very happy fellow.”

“Oh if you--”

Before Sam can say anything else, the two of you hear an angry growl. You jump, but curiosity has always been your downfall, as you head towards the sound completely ignoring that Sam has run the other way. You hide for a moment to see a large green beast being attacked by goblins in silver armor. It lets out desperate cries as it tries to fight back. You look around on the ground, to see that there are smooth pebbles around you and doing what you can -- you begin to throw them, unaware of the sparks coming out of the things you throw, as each pebble lands on their intended mark and electrocutes the creatures until they run away screaming and smelling like cooked chicken.

Brown eyes turn towards your direction, as you can’t help but laugh at the aftermath. The green beast gets up and makes it way over to you, but instead of being scared you look up at it and grin.

“What’s your name?” you question softly as the green beast looks at you wearily, “I just want to be friends. I helped you out, no?”

“Yes,” he manages to say in short burst, as you nod, “Hulk.”

“Well Hulk, I think we should find a way out of here,” you declare as the beast agrees in its own way. The two of you head out of the clearing and that’s when it happens.

A sparkle catches your attention, as you stand there for a moment. The barren wasteland of the labyrinth quickly changed to a castle much like your own, but different with stained glass windows and smooth marble, as you see a long piano in the corner of the room. The melody is sad, perhaps even lonely as you try your hardest to move forward and see who might be playing such a haunting piece.

I dreamt of you last night –

as if I was playing the piano

and you were turning the pages for me.

The familiar voice echoes and your eyes widen.

“ AAAAHHH ,” Hulk yells, which breaks whatever daydream you were just in as you go back to staring at him. He grunts before motioning at you to keep moving within the labyrinth with a new companion and slightly more confused on who the Goblin King is.

The clock strikes eight hours left when he hears it. Over the baby’s giggling and his goblins’ cheering, it sounds like a godsend.

James. James. James.

The first time he had heard his name being said by someone similar to him, like a hymn that boils the magic in his blood. It isn’t said in disgust or malice like when he hears it from Sam, but rather curiosity maybe even a teasing tone, as he sees your lips quirk just a bit, like there is something funny to his name, but it is the brightest way anyone has ever said it.

James , that’s all it takes for his heart to slowly be won over by all too stubborn, tempestuous princess that is slowly defeating his labyrinth.

It takes the warriors only a few hours to reach the kingdom across the mountain path. Queen Rebecca feels their arrival before anyone else comes to her room saying that there are warriors coming into the capital, she is already waiting for them in the throne room when they ask for an audience with her. There are five before her -- three men different shades of silver, gold, and blue. A woman is standing in the back of all of them with her hand to her weapon, but the one commanding the most attention is the man in all gold armor and eyes to match.

Pure fae, Rebecca thinks as her old bones tremble at the thought of what they could want with her, of what her long-lost sibling has done. However, she is the queen of this land and that will not be ignored as she begins to speak in a commanding voice.

“And what do you warriors need of me?” the Old Queen asks from her high chair, as golden eyes turn to look at her.

“Your sibling has taken our country’s princess,” Heimdall explains, as Rebecca gets up in her chair in sudden distress over this new piece of information, “We need your help to get her back.”

“How?” she can’t help but ask, since she can faintly feel the magic coming off from all of them -- more so the man with golden eyes in front of her. It looks like he could see both the past and present all at once. Rebecca could only imagine all that he had seen and experienced, but she could see how strong his loyalty ran in the cautious timber of his tone for said missing princess.

Maybe, that’s what won her over so quickly.

“What exactly would you need from me?” she questions, as she sees the woman behind the man frown.”

Part 5

#sweetboybucky1k #james buchanan barnes x reader #james bucky barnes x reader #bucky x reader #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky barnes fic #bucky barnes fluff #bucky barnes fan fic #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky barnes royalty au #bucky barnes labyrinth au #series: million stars #fabiola trying to write

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thesickpanda · 5 years

Text

Medical Gaslighting

As I scroll through my Tumblr feed, I come across innumerable stories from fellow spoonies who have experienced mistreatment, neglect, abuse and disbelief from the medical institution. I recoil in both horror and in painful empathy as I read the stories, because they are all too familiar and terrible.

It's hard to understate how exhausting and upsetting it is to be questioned on your chronic illness, to be lectured by doctors who know nothing about what you’re going through or even the latest research on your particular condition. It's horrible to suffer something so disabling and debilitating, only to be told that you're not disabled enough to qualify for concessions, finance or support. It's bad enough that friends and family often don't believe us or make accommodations, but it is a truly desperate feeling when the very people who took an oath to help you and do no harm actively dismiss, deride or bully you.

I'd like to list my own examples of what I term “medical gaslighting”, both as a personal record and as a contribution to those stories.

Example One:

It is my first year living in Australia. I moved to this country already suffering from debilitating pain. I had previously been diagnosed with Myofascial Pain Syndrome in the UK; however, even the rheumatologist said it did not account for all my symptoms. The pain had grown a great deal worse, and it had started spreading to other parts of my body. I went to go and see my partner's family doctor. I explained how badly my back ached, that I had a two year history of this pain and that I really want to get to the bottom of it and find some relief. His response? "Everybody gets back pain. Take painkillers and just deal with it." I came away from the appointment stunned and disappointed. This was not the first time I have felt as if my condition was not being treated seriously; however, it was the bluntest delivery of this sentiment. Little did I know this was an experience I was going to have repeatedly…

Example Two:

I have been on the waiting list for a public pain clinic for many months. In order to have access to the pain psychologist and physiotherapist, I need to have an assessment by the resident pain clinician. This man is a dinosaur. He looks to be in his 80s. His thinking is about that old, too. He tells me I need to go on anti-depressants. I tell him that I have been on SSRIs before and that I have always had severe side-effects and that they have never made any difference to my pain. I also tell him that I am not suffering from depression. Yes, the pain is wearing me down but I know what depression feels like and I don't currently have it. He tells me that if I want to go on the pain course and have any hope and improving, I absolutely must do what he says. When I try to express my concerns, he bullies and emotionally blackmails me to accept. I don't want to miss out on the rest of the program, especially as I feel desperate and don't know what else to do, so I begrudgingly start taking the antidepressants. And so begins a four-year horror fest of dreadful side-effects, appalling and long-lasting withdrawal symptoms, and of course no pain relief. To say that I hate this man is an understatement. Not only did his “advise” me down the wrong path, he made an already uncomfortable experience so much worse (and with NO warning of the side/withdrawal effects, either…).

Example Three:

I ask the pain psychologist whether or not he thinks severe childhood trauma and PTSD could contribute to my chronic pain. He dismisses the notion out of hand. Turns out, there's plenty of research to suggest this and that it is not a ridiculous notion by any stretch. I knew this, because I had been reading some of the latest peer-reviewed journals on the subject. But as I soon learned, the so-called experts were not keeping abreast of the research. They were, on average 15 years behind it. Not like I would know anything about my own illness!

Example Four:

At a different stage in my life, I do wind up depressed, but that is because I have just lost a close family member, my relationship is breaking down, and the pain has reached agonising levels. I wind up in hospital after an attempted suicide with a knife. I am put in a room and made to wait seven hours before anyone see me. The only person who comes in is a nurse who tells me that I'm not a priority because “there are real sick people” who need real attention from doctors. The room is full of sharp objects.

Example Five:

When I do get a name for my condition, Fibromyalgia, I soon learn that not everybody believes Fibromyalgia is a real illness in and of its own right. My GP in particular likes to tell me it is a diagnosis of exclusion. Now, I understand that many things need to be excluded before one can arrive at the conclusion that it is Fibromyalgia; however, when she says it she puts it in that dustbin of "medically unexplained symptoms" because Fibromyalgia is just a word for that in her books. Meaning, she doesn't recognise it as its own disease and therefore doesn't know anything more about it. There is a lot of research coming out at the moment that indicates Fibromyalgia might be immune based, among other things. It is also being recognised in some parts of the world as its own disease. It is beyond frustrating to be told that I am just one of those people that have aches and pains that aren't really based on anything and therefore don't warrant much support or understanding. This is a recurring problem with my GP and other doctors. I have heard it called “the fakers disease” and have been told by perfect strangers that it's all in my head and that if I just had a positive attitude I could get over it. I know that this is a universal experience faced by all people with chronic illnesses, but getting it from your doctor is particularly hurtful and frustrating.

Example Six:

The disability employment agency that I go to tells me that I'm too ill to put into paid work because I will not make for a reliable worker. The government tells me I'm not disabled enough to qualify for any financial support. All of the burden falls to my partner who, lucky for me, is a great guy. However, the tens of thousands of dollars we spend every year on medical bills mean that we will never have enough for a deposit for our own home, nor can we easily afford appliances, holidays, events or even gifts for family at Xmas. Literally all his disposable income goes on medical expenses. We have very few savings to speak and rent in one most expensive parts of the world. When my partner asks my GP for a carer’s card to give him small concessions on life's little luxuries, like going to the movies, he is told that because I am not in a wheelchair and a paraplegic, I do not qualify and neither does he. We are constantly being told that I am not disabled enough to qualify for anything: not government support, not concessions -zilch. The only thing that we have received from the Roads and Traffic Authority has been a disabled sticker for the car. And thank Christ for that!

Example Seven:

When I tell the exercise physiologist that I am seeing that I don't think it's a good idea for me to do the types of exercises he's giving me in 40° heat (back then we live in a rough area and the local gym has no air-conditioning) he tells me it's fine and I should do what I'm told. He shows me some exercises to do and then rushes off to see one of his five other customers he’s treating at same time in the same hour. I go into a full spasm because guess what? Extreme heat and exercise do not go together. Even the Bureau of Meteorology tells people not to do strenuous activities on 40° days. But my exercise physiologist, who again seems to know nothing about Fibromyalgia, thinks this is just peachy. Twice I go into flare with this man. One day, he is on leave and his immediate boss comes in to take me for my sessions. His boss watches all the exercises that I have been doing for six month. He tells me I'm doing them all wrong. I tell him that this is how his colleague taught me to do them. He again tells me they're all wrong. I terminate their “services” (read: scam). Exercise physiology is not covered by medical insurance so I have literally spent thousands of dollars on a program that has put me into spasms and done little to nothing to help me with my pain.

Example Eight:

I see a number of different psychologists over the years; often this is not by choice as we either move away or they do. I have seen good psychologists and very bad ones. On more than one occasion, psychologists asked me if I “identify with my illness”. I know this trick question. When I go to them to ask for help on how to deal with the psychological ramifications of coping with a debilitating, continuously worsening and disabling illness, something I am not permitted to speak about with friends and family lest they dismiss me/tell me I’m being depressing, I am told that I identify too strongly with my illness. It seems like you are literally not allowed to complain or express dismay about being sick and sore every waking second of your life to anyone. It should not, apparently, be taking any psychological toll on you and if it is it's because you have decided that it must. I have been told this by both able-bodied and disabled psychologists. Ableism is not exclusive to the able-bodied. Disability is a spectrum: people with chronic illnesses of different sorts face different struggles. I feel as if no place is safe. I give up on therapy and start reading self-care books and following these Tumblrs because I get more validation and assistance from the Internet that I have ever had from a real-life human being getting f-ing paid to counsel me.

These are just some of countless stories I could tell. Having to fight to be believed every day, from the second you get out of your car in a disabled park and have people challenge you, to trying to explain why, to your friends, you needs to take the lift and not the stairs, to begging your doctor or the government for basic concessions, to sobbing over bills that mount up because of all the mobility aids, medicines and treatments you've been taking… This is exhausting beyond description. And after years and years and years of it, you begin to feel a bit hopeless.

So to all my fellow spoonies posting on these Tumblrs: thank you. I am always sad to read the terrible experiences you go through, but it does give me some sense of connectedness and unity when I know that there are others fighting just like I am fighting. I appreciate the advice that is shared in this space and the posts of validation and comfort that we just don't receive from the people in our lives. Thank goodness for this community. I don't know how I would have coped at all, if not for you.

Feel free to share your own stories of medical gaslighting with me. Sometimes it helps to vent.

#gaslighting #medical gaslighting #chronic illness #spoonie #that spoonie feel #Fibromyalgia #myofascial pain syndrome #chronic pain #ableism

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thirdstreetthunderbirds · 5 years

Text

Glancing up to the sky revealed a vast expansion of stars, the milky way shining brightly through the olive-green leaves that were casting shadows across the clearing. Night had fallen. Her companion sent a single glance her way before returning to his fire. It gave her a moment to study the man - or boy? His face looked young, as young as hers, but with a sorrow and weary exhaustion that was most certainly reflected on her own face. He was sitting on a chunk of wood, legs drawn up close around his body. While the fire added a rather unearthly quality to the land around her, it danced across his tanned face, reflecting off of clear, sky blue eyes.

His hair was tied back with a worn hairtie, keeping all but a few wayward dark strands off of his face. The clothes seemed to hang on his frame - not due to illness or malnutrition, but, most likely because they had been stolen. They simply looked too large. An old hunting rifle and cleaning cloth were propped up against a backpack that lay off to the side.

Slowly, she emerged from the swag, looking around as she stood. She wasn't entirely at ease, nor did she trust this unknown stranger, but he had taken the time to pull her from the road and wait until she had woken. That spoke more to her than anything.

"...Greetings." Her words were soft, raspy. Although, that was more from a lack of water than anything else. He inclined his head towards her, acknowledging her presence, but saying nothing else. She sighed, quietly, to herself. Well. "May I ask where we are?"

A grunt and a soft laugh, and the man motioned to a upturned log near him. "How are you feeling?"

That caused her to huff, but she made her way over. She felt weak, shaky; too many days of pushing herself and not enough looking after her own welfare. Collapsing against the log, she scrubbed her face with the palm of her left hand. "Like utter shit, if you'll excuse my language."

The man let out a roar of a laugh at that, and it seemed to rattle around inside his chest before bursting out. "Such proper speech! No, don't excuse yourself," He waved a hand around absentmindedly, "I swear far too much myself, regardless."

She laughed a little then, relaxing more against the log. "How long have I been unconscious for?"

"Just a couple of hours. But that begs the question." He turned more fully towards her, fixing her with an intense, clear gaze, scrutinising. "What were you doing, overland? Alone, as well! Haven't you heard the news?"

She blinked, confused, before shaking her head. The man raised an eyebrow before continuing on. "I suppose you haven't then. There's a new band of raiders. They've made their camp, just east of Pinjarra. The hills are infested with them, and they've begun their way south. I've heard that their leader has their eye on taking over the Southern Forrests."

That made her shoot to her feet, before wobbling alarmingly. "I- I have to go back!" She whipped her head around to look at the man, who was looking rather concerned, with drawn brows and narrowed eyes. "Do you know how far south they've gotten? I've travelled all this way without encountering anyone- well, anyone asides from now."

"Sit."

"What? I have-"

"Please sit. You've been unconscious for a fair few hours now; what good can you do, like this? Sit, and I'll tell you what I know."

With a pained, labouring sigh, she brought herself back down to her seat. The man nodded, to himself, once, before continuing. "Now, I'm taking it that you hail from the Forrests?"

She paused, before nodding once. "I'm... from the city. But yes. My brother and I hail from the Forrests. The Jarrah Forrest, along the Blackwood river. That's... well..." Burying her head in her hands, she fought against the rising heat behind her eyes and in her throat. Taking a deep breath to steel herself, she chanced a look upwards at the man, who's eyes were softening. But there was also an underlying edge of confusion.

"Which city, if I might ask?"

She quirked a brow. "The city?"

The man's eyes widened as he stared. It took a moment before he spoke again, but this time, it was with great awe. "It had been some time since I've met one of your kind. I thought that all city dwellers were long gone."

"What on earth are you talking about? My 'kind?' As far as I am concerned, we are all human, and therefore, all equal."

He held out a hand, placating. "I apologise. I meant no offence. Most travellers I meet nowadays are from the northern deserts, the east country or the southern forests. There are quite a few rumours about people who lived in the city," He laughed, turning his eyes skywards, "I am not too sure about how true these rumours are, but they still fill me with awe." He shook his head. "Please, take no notice of me. Now. The bandits. From what I have heard from my friends down by the coast, the bandits have reached the old Margret River, and are heading for the Forrests from there."

There... there was no time. She was too far north. She would never be able to reach the settlement in time.

A firm hand patted her shoulder, in empathy. "Don't give up hope. Word travels slower nowadays than what it once did, but I am sure that your settlement will catch wind of what is happening before they reach your home. If you don't mind me asking, but which overland path did you travel by? It must have been a fair bit inland if you didn't meet any travellers on the road."

"I... I came through the old Albany Highway, but I cut through Narrogin. There's nothing there now, but I have a few friends that live out that way on their farms. I needed more supplies. I was just heading towards York... but I suppose I'm not going to make it now. I'll have to cut through the lesser dead lands."

That was met with silence. And a look of, honestly warranted, shock. The city of Perth was most often called "The Dead Lands," and were split into different regions. The 'lesser' dead lands was often used to refer to the southern lands, while 'larger' was normally used to refer to the northern lands. Minor and major were also used, but the terms had become less commonly used in recent years. The 'city dead lands' referred to the hulking shell of the city itself, and was where the most danger was concentrated. She was not planning on entering the city itself; only the outskirts. Even the edge of the once sprawling city was dangerous enough to deter most scavengers; not to say that nobody had tried. Far too many had died.

It took nearly three, long minutes before the man had gathered himself together enough to speak. "You..." He sighed, shaking his head. "You must have a very good reason for cutting through the lesser dead lands. Do... you mind if I ask why?"

It was her turn to be silent, after that. What good would it do, refusing to tell the man? He had offered her more help within the past few hours than she had received from strangers in the past year. Fighting to keep her voice steady, she fixed her view on the crackling, merry fire. "My brother is dying. The healer- an old aged-care carer - believes that he had something bacterial. She's quarantined him, which I understand, but she's wrong in her assessment. She's stubborn, and won't listen to me. I'm trying to find some anti-viral medications. It's... it's my brother's only hope."

The man winced, reaching out to brush his fingers against her shoulder. "That sounds like a shit situation, if you don't mind my language."

That wrought a wretched laugh from her that quickly turned into a sob. "That's certainly one word for it."

"I'm assuming that you are a healer yourself? You seem confident in your assessment of your brother's illness."

Waving a hand and snorting, she turned back to the man. "We do have some limited supplies back at the Forrest; it's just, the healer treating my brother believes that he has cholera, and we'd already exhausted our supply of antibiotics. It is... unusual for such a disease to be in the South - we do have reasonably good hygiene standards and waste disposal - but," she gave a jagged, almost broken laugh, "can someone really expect the old conventions to apply? Our world has already changed so much in such a short amount of time; who are we to say that other things haven't changed also? But no. I don't believe he has cholera. The camp would be overrun otherwise."

He fixed her with a intense, searching gaze before giving a short laugh. "You seem to be fairly knowledgeable for someone so young. That'll serve you well." He raised a brow at her incredulous gaze, before laughing again. "Come, don't take offence! It was a compliment."

She snorted, a rather ungangly sound, before flicking her eye back to the fire, melancholic. "You seem quite young yourself."

"I'd imagine that we are close to the same age, yes. I may be a bit older, though, but it is hard to tell nowadays." He smiled, again. "I am nineteen."

Her eyes did shoot upwards at that. He was older than her, yes, but still so young! He laughed, loudly then, at her surprise. "Did you think I was older? Well, I told you my age. How old are you, if I might ask?"

"...I'm sixteen; seventeen in winter." Now it was his turn to look surprised. "And you decided to travel overland by yourself?" His look turned sheepish at her flat glare. "My apologies. That was inconsiderate."

She sighed, shaking her head. "No, don't apologise. I'm worried. And tired. And stressed."

"I suppose that is fair." They both trailed off into silence before he burst into that loud, roaring laughter again, startling her from her log. "How ill mannered of me! We've been talking this long, and I haven't offered my name." Turning to her, he offered a dirt-caked hand, covered in scars and grime. "I am James, of the Northern Gibson Desert. I am a mechanic by trade, but I also help in hunting, retrievals and other odd jobs when needed."

(It was common, or, at least, becoming more common, to introduce oneself by stating their name and place they hailed from.)

She shook James' hand in greeting, quirking a smile at his laugh. It was infectious. "I didn't offer my name either. I am Catherine, of the Jarrah Forrest. I am a healer by trade, although I work in infrastructure and other areas from time to time." She paused for a moment as his words registered. "The Northern Gibson Desert?! What on earth are you doing this far down south?"

The laugh reappeared. "Do all travellers sound this surprised? Yes, that is where I hail from. My settlement is just south of the old town of Nallagine, although I doubt that you have heard of it." He smirked at the shake of her head. "Yes, most haven't. I was hoping to talk to the leaders of the Hills and the Eastern Farms in the hopes of establishing a trade route with some of the settlements in the north. My settlement is rather small, and I was the only person with the necessary skills to survive the trip. Then, I heard of the problems that bandits were causing, and I thought I would stay a while and see what I could do to help." He motioned to his pack, sitting forlornly off to the side. "I have spent the better part of three months couriering letters between settlements, and helping better their defences amongst other things. The attacks have been getting worse."

"I had not heard of it being so bad." She shook her head, sighing sadly. "That being said; bandits have always been a problem in the south, and we have not been in communication with the other settlements for a number of months. Oh, don't look so surprised! People are scared to travel, and most settlements are self sufficient; we haven't had a need to communicate. I have the most experience in my settlement in travelling asides from my brother - and I'm sixteen!" She gave a disgruntled huff, glaring into the fire. It was idiotic, how her settlement leaders refused to teach people the skills to survive in their world. What if they were displaced? What then?

"You are well travelled, then?"

She jerked her head in a nod. "Yes, I have travelled to quite a few places in my time. I suppose that was why I was not as concerned about travelling alone. My brother and I decided to travel around before settling at the Forrest. How far have I travelled?" She mused to herself, recollecting her thoughts. "As far north as Port Headland, my father's old town, up the old Great Northern Highway. The most easterly point I have reached is the Eastern farmlands near Kalgoolie- and, of course, the most southern point has been Albany."

#oh wow #long post #this is catherine #got struck with the urge to write again #at least to finish this convo #still haven't finished it ^^"#oh well #it's late and i need sleep #woop woop #enjoy

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binbonsadoration · 6 years

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Say Something - Part 8

Nick Tortano x Reader

Summary: You and Nicky Tortano are old friends that grew up in the same neighborhood and went to the same schools - childhood best friends. What happens when life takes you both down two different paths, causing you two to drift only to bring you together ten years later as undercover cops trying to bring down one of the biggest drugs rings in Boston?

Only time can tell.

A/N: This will be a collaborative work by myself and the amazing @benbarnesescape. Nicky doesn’t get near enough love, and so, here we are making sure that he gets at least a little slice of the love that he so deserves. We do hope you enjoy it <3

chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3, chapter 4, chapter 5, chapter 6, chapter 7

Nicky found himself still in confusion, his eyes watching the supposed couple take their route out of the small diner and out into the chill air. Swallowing thickly, there was a moment where Nicky just remembered. Days where things were different, where you would find the steps toward him instead of away. The thoughts had his jaw clenching, the muscle tight and he breathed out.

What was he going to do now? Your last encounter wasn’t the best, a scene that he tried his best to dismiss even if all he wanted to do was protect himself.

Protect you.

His world had crumbled that day, the love that he had in his heart fading into nothing more than ashes in the wind, and all he wanted to do was bury himself in the pain. To be numb, and never allow himself to experience anything like that again. It had been your presence that reminded him of that moment. The last of the light slipping away, leaving him with a heart buried in the darkness that dwelled within his hometown.

A darkness that he would soon find himself sinking into without hesitation.

A darkness that he accepted, and approached without fail.

A place that was home now.

His steps leading him away were slow, hesitant. Features were scrunched, that evident debate sketched against his hardened features that dared someone to challenge him in that moment. Ever since that day within the library he wanted to make it up to you. Asked about you when he wasn’t given a task to complete for Sal, a hope that you were doing well.

‘A boyfriend...’ The words echoed against the air, as a frustrated breath escaped dry lips.

The word was foreign in his mouth, his thought on the image of you. The more matured version of the girl he once well so well. The version that occupied his thoughts, his dreams, only to be replaced with an image of you with this guy that was named ‘James’. Emotions were a bitch, that much Nicholas Tortano was aware of. Those feelings that he tried so desperately to rid himself of. That was always the case until he found himself face to face with you. Found himself wanting to reach out, to fix all the stupid mistakes that he had made, and admit once more that love that he only had for you.

Sure, he had his fun. Those that Y/N described as cute, dumb and easy. Those girls were never something that was a permanent fixture. Nothing more than a means to an end. Something that would pass the time, allow him to lose himself if only for a moment.

While Nicky wanted you to be happy, prayed for it even, the thought that your happiness didn’t involve him bothered the absolute hell out of him. He had always seen the two of you together, a house that you built into your own in Boston with a couple pair of feet pattering down the hallway with a soft giggle that would immediately have a smile venturing to your lips.

Needless to say, the thought of you with someone else – a guy that was nothing like Nicky. A guy that had his shit together, wasn’t putting his time and energy into something that would ultimately get him killed; smart, and able to give you anything that you needed, or hell … anything that you wanted.

Another breath surged from his lips, something of frustration and anger balled up within in his chest while he fought off the tight feeling that had fingers tightening against the paper bag in his grasp. Jamming his free hand within his pocket, fingers caught the paper that lingered in his pocket. Paper that had him debating, eyes narrowing slightly at the scribbled numbers that peered back at him. It only took a moment before the decision was made. His pace coming a bit quicker before he was standing in front of his apartment.

It wasn’t much. A small space that gave him all he needed in terms of commodities. It wasn’t as though he lived there, not really, when his head would find the pillow of his latest conquest. That wasn’t what was on his mind in that moment, as he tore into the bag and stripped away his jacket.

His mind came skimming back to that moment. The way your lips pressed against another’s, feeling that immediate green eyed monster take hold before another breath escaped his lips. Taking a seat on his couch, fingers gripped at the burger, but his eyes took in that same piece of paper.

So many questions took hold. A need to know why she was so interested in what was doing by the docks. Why she was other there in the first place? The way she immediately went into defense the moment that his fingers reached for your arm.

There was so much that he needed answers to. Especially when it came to him.

Did you still love him?

Did you still love him the way that you once had?

The way that he still did.

‘....fuck it.’

Reaching out for the paper, arms that were now on display flexed as he gathered the paper in his grasp before he pulled the device from his back pocket.

The past was slowly beginning to catch up to him. The visions of you when he protected you. Was the one that made sure that if someone bothered you would be dealing with him. Something that he still would put out into the world, except you didn’t need protecting any longer. Not when you were the one pulling a knife and catching him off guard.

He needed answers.

Maybe that was why he was dialing your number without another thought, his tall frame leaning back against his worn couch while holding onto a breath that he didn’t realize he was holding onto.

‘Hello?’

The sound of your voice had him breathing out, a twinge of nerves coming to him before he was smirking.

‘Hey, angel.’

It only took a moment for the recognition to kick in, the sigh sounding on the opposite end that had him smirking that much more.

‘You weren’t done with our conversation?’

He inquired, flipping the script regardless of the fact that all he wanted to do was confess his forgiveness once more. He had never meant to hurt that. That wasn’t what that was all about. He wanted to protect you, knew that with the death of his Mother that his life wouldn’t do anything but spiral into an oblivion that he couldn’t have you connected to. A request lingering on the lips of those that ran the town lingering in his ears before his Mother fell ill. A promise that if he took care of them, that it would be a returned notion. Something that fell on deaf ears until his heart shattered into a million pieces, his Father losing his job and wanting better for his brother. There was no other choice – not in his eyes when he agreed to the terms and conditions of a life that would require some blood shed, and his finger permanently hovering over the trigger of his 9mm.

There was a beat of silence, something that he didn’t expect until you were finally talking and Nicky was left with a narrowing gaze settling on the dingy paint that covered his walls.

‘You sure are curious about the ‘bad boys on the playground’? Or, so you like to call them. Why so interested?’

His own curiosity was pegged, and regardless of the fact that she had brushed it off as being concerned about him. Something that he believed, though getting the sense there was more that she was telling him. Nicky knew the reactions of those that were in it on the opposite side of things. While most would have seen him as a ‘bad guy’, one of the those that was on the wrong side of the tracks, causing trouble and adding to the news that coursed the screen that had citizens gasping in disbelief. He was only doing what he thought was necessary.

While others thought of him as dangerous, a made man, it was the secret that laid behind that title that many didn’t know about the man. Something that Y/N knew all too well. It was one thing to pound his fist into someone’s face, send the butt of the gun into someone’s temple, but when it came to ending someone life was a very different thing. These people that got in the way of his boss – they were human beings with families – wives, children, and he had already watched the life drain from his own Mother. He refused to watch someone else, to experience the pain that someone else would feel in finding out that their Father or loved one was killed in cold blood.

The thought had him sighing out, swallowing almost harshly as he listened to the familiar voice on the opposite end of the phone.

Listening to the explanation, something that sounded more like an excuse, he cut you off.

‘I’m sure you have a great reasoning, but … I need you to listen to me.’

It took a moment to get your attention, some convincing on his part, where he had to cut you on more than one occasion.

‘Y/N – please, just let me talk for a minute.’

There was continued talking, an almost frustration in your voice when he heaved a sigh.

‘Y/N – damn it! Will you please listen to me for a fuckin’ minute?’

The frustration was evident, a tone that hung loosely over his words as you fell into silence that felt hesitation.

‘I love you. I always have – hell, always will. Seeing you with .. whatever the fuck his name was bothered the absolute hell outta me.’

Words came with a softness, a bitterness that hung in the air when he thought of the two of you together within the diner.

‘You were always my end game. Ever since we were kids, and regardless of the fact that you don’t believe me – yeah, I may have went for the cute, dumb and easy, but you .. you’re the one that always lingered in my head in knowing that I could never have you. That I wanted to have you by my side, protecting you, being the person that you needed – and you pushed me away. I’m sorry that I did the same. I was scared, worried, and broken – I didn’t want you to see me that way, and I knew that you deserved better. You didn’t need the boy that lost his world and was swallowed up by the darkness. I knew that I could never be the man that you needed .. the man you deserved, but I want to try. You can’t tell me that you don’t want to see where it would go?’

There was a bit of silence, speaking once more before you could allow the words to flow.

‘I have some things to take care of tomorrow morning, but meet me by the docks around .. lets say one?’

While word were stated in the form of a question, it was more of a statement that seemed to be answered with a knowing sigh that made a smirk quirk against his lips.

‘See you then, angel.’

With that he was hanging up the phone, a hope that things would change.

That if you agreed that he would have to keep what he was involved in a secret, the only way to protect the few people that he loved in his world.

To protect you.

tags: @just-nikkii, @ladyblablabla, @drinix, @youveseen–thebutcher, @marauderskeeper, @thesandbeneathmytoes, @cutie-bug, @banditthewriter

#ben barnes #nicky tortano #by the gun #nicky x reader #collab writing #benbarnesescape #blackbird #say something

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