#retreating there too bc I just got the sense I made it awkward somehow | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

iamanartichoke · 3 years

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Congrats on the 1+k followers! I've only recently found you but I enjoy your opinions and the way you write <3

I was wondering if, for the prompt fic ideas, you would be interested in writing Sylvie and Loki exchanging magic lessons in an enchantment for enchantment kind of way.

I imagine them bickering each other with "Pff... That is too easy." and "Come on, that didn't take me so long to learn...", but they would also encourage with some "I know you can do it!". (oh god, now I picture them teaming in some prank against Thor... xD)

Thank you so much, @enabi-seira. Sorry this is a few days late, but it took me awhile to get going. Also my intention was to have something kinda cute and snarky but it ... didn't really end up that way, bc of who I am as a person. I hope you enjoy, regardless.

Summary: Sylvie gives Loki a lesson in enchantment Word Count: 2340 Author's notes: More or less inspired by the blanket scene, but with less awkward and more soul-bearing, bc well, why not.

It wasn’t until she let him into her mind that Loki saw himself in Sylvie.

At first, he thought it hadn’t worked, because all he felt was nothing. There was no sound, no air. But when he opened his eyes he found himself in what, at first glance, was Idunn’s orchard on Asgard. He stood at the center of the orchard, underneath the shade of one of the largest trees. In the distance, he could clearly see the golden spires of Valaskjalf and, looking up, Loki felt a twist of homesickness so strong it nearly knocked him off of his feet.

It took him a moment to get ahold of himself and, when he did and began to take a closer look, he realized that he wasn’t on Asgard at all. The orchard did not have enough trees and no golden apples swung from their branches. Valaskjalf’s spires did not glint in the sun; the gold was instead dull and flat. Everything, in fact, was much too dull and flat.

A chill broke out across Loki’s skin because while he was not on Asgard, he did know this place. He’d built it himself, had begun planting the trees and laying the foundations of deadened grass and dirt when he was still just a child. It was his in-between space, the pocket between dimensions into which he retreated when everything else was simply too much.

“How do you know this place?” he asked. His voice, rough with confusion, seemed far too loud with nothing to anchor it. “It’s mine.”

“It’s ours,” Sylvie corrected. Her voice came from somewhere to his left; Loki turned and saw her approaching, dressed not in the black and green attire he’d grown so familiar with but in a deep purple gown traditional of Asgardian formalwear. Her hair was longer, the top done up somewhat elaborately in several slim braids.

“I thought your enchantment would bring me to a memory,” he said.

“What makes you think this isn’t a memory?”

Loki opened his mouth and then closed it again, choosing instead to merely gesture at the void surrounding them. “Because this place isn’t real. I created it. As an -”

“An escape,” she finished for him. She’d been looking out over the orchard but now she turned her gaze on him, something sad and knowing behind her green eyes. She nodded. “So did I. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t real. It’s as real as you and I are, and I remember it.”

Goosebumps tickled his arms and the back of his neck. Loki looked away, turning in a half circle as he took in the sight of what he used to simply call the gray place, a place he’d thought had been lost; he’d not thought of it in years, could no longer remember quite where it was. The grey place had all but collapsed into the recesses of his mind, along with countless other memories he’d collected and subsequently lost along the way.

Loki looked up at the tree that still shaded them from the sun, although the sun itself was not very bright, nor warm. Everything was so still. Absently, Loki reached out and swiped his fingers along one of the lower branches. “No apples,” he said.

“Nothing grows here.”

“The space grows,” he countered. He plucked a few leaves from the branch and curled his fingers around them. “Grew. Each time I came here, it seemed bigger. It stopped being Asgard and grew into somewhere else.”

“It didn’t really, though, did it,” she said. She walked around him, circling the tree trunk. “Get bigger. It was only that we got lonelier.”

Loki looked at her sharply, but found he couldn’t refute her words. “You were much lonelier than I,” he said instead.

She shot him one of her Sylvie looks, her expression both indignant at what she perceived as a slight, and annoyed at his being right. She disliked when he figured things out about her, but he’d seen that expression more and more as the days passed, which meant that he was getting closer to her core.

Either that, or he was just annoying her more frequently.

“What makes you think so?” she challenged.

He gestured vaguely at the space around them. “Yours is farther along than mine was.” Now that he was getting used to this - both being inside of her head, and grounded firmly in the gray place - he could see the differences. There were more pathways in the orchard, fuller tree branches. In the distance, past the palace, he could make out the beginnings of a rainbow bridge. All things Loki had thought of bringing to the gray place, but adolescence grew into adulthood and Loki created new hiding places, buried deeper in the spaces between worlds.

Sylvie’s gray place felt like a place that had been visited often. Perhaps she even still visited, escaping through dimensions as easily as she slipped through apocalypses.

Her features looked pinched as she dug her fingers into the trunk’s bark, pulling at a loose layer. “When did you build yours?” she asked, instead of answering directly. “Start building it, I mean.”

Loki shrugged, leaning against the trunk. “I don’t know. I was young.”

“Tell me,” she pressed.

He glanced over at her and, despite himself, smirked. “Are we exploring your mind, or mine?”

Sylvie arched an eyebrow and then her features relaxed. “Beats me,” she admitted. “Seems they’re one and the same, doesn’t it?”

Loki’s nod was slow, thoughtful. He looked up, toward the endless gray sky. “I remember having nightmares as a child,” he said, and wasn’t sure if he was answering her question, or simply speaking in order to fill the silence. Her presence seemed to have that effect on him, regardless of whether they were together in the world or together in her (their?) mind.

“It was always cold in those dreams,” he went on. “Bitter, the kind of cold that gets under your skin. It was cold and it was dark, and there were never any monsters or dragons or - not the kinds of things children tend to have nightmares about. For me, it was that there was nothing. Just myself, and the cold, and the dark, and this intimate knowing that no matter what I did or how loudly I screamed, no one would ever hear me.”

She’d circled around the trunk again as he spoke, and now she leaned against it next to him, sliding down until she was settled on the grass at the base. “I don’t think I had nightmares, not like yours,” she said, “but I always had the sense of being wrong, somehow. When my parents told me the truth about what I was, and where I’d come from, I thought it would make the wrongness stop.”

“But it didn’t,” Loki guessed as he sat down on the ground beside her.

She looked over at him, meeting his gaze directly before she shook her head. “It’s in me still. At least now I know why.”

Loki didn’t say anything. They were sitting close enough together that he’d only have to lean in a bit and their shoulders would be touching, but Loki let the observation go without acting on it. Instead, he pulled at a few blades of grass, gaze settling out toward the far end of the orchard which, were this the real Asgard, would have led directly into Frigga’s gardens.

Instead of lingering on that thought, Loki turned his attention to the enchantment itself. It was very strange, the method she’d learned. Their bodies - their real bodies - were out there in the physical world, holding hands to establish the physical connection they’d needed for the enchantment to work, but they were also in here, and he could feel the ground beneath him and the the tree bark digging into his spine and the solidity of the space she took up beside him. He would have assumed that sliding into someone else’s mind would feel like a dream or a vision - not quite real.

“That’s when I began creating this place,” he said, realizing that he’d started telling her about his nightmares for a reason. “To escape after the dreams.” He’d chosen the warmest, safest place he knew then, which was the orchard, and he’d begun creating his duplicate.

“I don’t even really know where it was,” he admitted, with a short laugh. “All I had to do was think of it and, suddenly, I’d be there.”

It had started with the nightmares, but somewhere along the way it had become much more than that. Loki could remember disappearing into the gray place after arguments, or when he was frustrated and felt lost, or even just when all of the things inside of him - the dark things he’d never been able to firmly identify - became far too much and he felt like he would explode from the sheer force of them pressing against his skin from the inside, seeking a way out.

In Sylvie’s mind, all of the details were exact and clear, just as he remembered and more. Loki felt something hollow and cold in his core as it sank in - really sank in - that he and Sylvie were variants of the same person. The same soul, with the same dark things inside. What’s me is you, and what’s you is me.

The full weight of the realization should not have made him feel so lonely, but it did. For the first time since he’d met her, looking at Sylvie felt like looking in the mirror, the way one did when he was examining himself from every angle, identifying and hating every flaw he discovered.

“I know that look,” she said, and Loki blinked. He’d been staring at her, he realized, and felt his cheeks warm. “It’s hitting you, isn’t it? How we’re the same.”

Loki nodded. “It’s this place. I was remembering why I made it, and what drove me to disappear here. It must have been the same for you.”

“Let’s see.” Sylvie drew her knees up a little, adjusting her skirts so that they wouldn’t drag against the grass. “The wrongness of existing. Falling short, no matter how hard I tried. Always found wanting, compared to my brother. And, yes, loneliness.”

“Thor,” Loki said. His voice sounded so flat, even to his own ears, that Sylvie shot him a strange glance. He tugged at a few more blades of grass, pressing his lips together. He’d never asked her about her Thor, because he didn’t want to talk about his - the one who had ceased to exist when the TVA first arrested Loki in the desert and erased his reality, along with everyone he’d ever known and loved. Versions of them existed, of course - the ones who walked the sacred timeline, exactly where they were supposed to be, but those versions belonged to another Loki - a far away Loki.

He had his reasons for not bringing up Thor, but he didn’t know why Sylvie, likewise, had kept her Thor to herself. “Tell me about him,” he heard himself say, dropping the blades of grass from his hand. “Your Thor.”

“I don’t remember much of him, either,” Sylvie admitted. “More blips, like my parents. He’s more of a feeling than anything else - a presence. He took care of me; he pushed me to be better. I could never measure up to him, but I remember he wasn’t the one who was comparing. He loved me.”

“Yes.” Loki was hardly aware of speaking until he heard his own voice. “Mine, too.”

They exchanged a long look, and then Sylvie cleared her throat and turned her attention to the grass. “Could do with a bit more green,” she remarked. “It’s awfully dull, isn’t it?”

“I could -”

But she was already pressing her fingers into the dirt and, as Loki watched, the blades began to darken and bloom as lush grass sprouted outward, rolling from the palm of Sylvie’s hand to stretch in every direction until all of the dead grass had been made new again. Only then did Sylvie pull her hand back.

“Not bad, right?”

“Not bad,” he agreed. “Still feels very plain, though. I’d have added a little shading, a little variety. Perhaps a few more shrubs or rose bushes.”

“I’m not stopping you.”

The corners of Loki’s mouth tilted upward. He extended a closed fist, focusing, and then spread open his hand to reveal a tangled ball of colorful magic, blues and greens and yellows and reds all flickering and shimmering. Wordlessly, Loki tossed the ball; it landed several feet away and dissolved into tiny, colorful flowers, which spread swiftly over the grass.

Loki glanced at Sylvie, quickly enough that he caught the awe on her features before she realized he was looking; immediately, boredom swept over her face. She lifted one shoulder, carelessly. “Where are the rose bushes?”

“You are impossible,” Loki informed her.

“So you keep telling me. Come on.” She pushed herself to her feet and extended a hand, which Loki took without pause. “Lesson’s over for today.”

A split-second later, the gray place was gone entirely; once again, there was air to breathe and tiny sounds in the distance. Loki’s head throbbed; he opened his eyes and let go of Sylvie’s hand in order to press his against his temples. “Ow.”

“Yeah, return trip’s a little rough until you get used to it.” Slyvie - once again looking like Sylvie, draped in green and black - leaned back, watching with some amusement while Loki squeezed his eyes shut, rubbed his temples, and tried not to throw up. “Maybe next time we’ll journey into your mind. Probably’ll pack less of a punch for you.”

“I can handle pain,” Loki countered, finally letting go of his head. “My mind is off-limits. We’ve been over this.”

“For now,” Sylvie agreed.

“For always.” Loki arched his eyebrow at her. “Now. What lesson shall we tackle next?”

#various disclaimers: i'm basing my interpretation on how enchantment works on sylvie and c-20's scene #where there were clearly existing in *a place* together from c-20's memories #no idea if i've gotten the whole of it right or not but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯#also be gentle i'm rusty re: writing quality #charlotte writes #follower celebration prompt series #loki+sylvie(bffs)#loki pokey artichokey #loki fic #loki series spoilers #loki spoilers #loki tv series spoilers

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capricornus-rex · 4 years

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Perseverance Over Pride (2 - End)

Requested by: @stellar-trinity | Prompt:

Hey Hon! I was wondering if you could do a request? No rush on this one :) I will say this one is a bit personal bc I tend to do this A LOT 😅 Cal comforting the reader after being hard on herself? Maybe the reader was working on Cal’s saber, ends up breaking it more (unintentionally) and once everyone is asleep, she locks herself in her own room and cries? Thanks hon! 🥺💖

Tags: Self-doubting! Reader

Previous | Masterlist

2 of 2

Oh no… No, no… NO! Your mind, anxious and panicked, screamed. You wanted to let the words out but you can’t because it’ll alarm the crew.

You covered your mouth with your entire hand, bottling up all of the emotions that’s thrashing and storming inside your core right now.

“No… That’s impossible! What went wrong?!” you gasped, the weapon shook in your trembling hand.

You set it down on the workbench again. You don’t know what to do first: tear it apart again and redo everything or mentally assess what steps you could’ve possibly mixed up. Though, to save your pride, you didn’t do the latter.

You were back to where you started—taking it apart piece by piece, except with the newly-replaced parts this time. You examined and inspected every single component that you’ve detached from the very structure of the saber and looked for possible errors.

Blinded by confusion, you can’t seem to find what’s wrong. Everything seemed to be in place. You can’t pinpoint what you may have overlooked. You repeated everything you did—and perhaps adjusting a little bit of the parts in each step—and then tested the ignition again.

The result remained the same: a short-lived flicker of the blade.

You couldn’t control yourself when you flung your fist to the workbench, hoping nobody from outside heard that—which they obviously did—you jerked your hand away and rubbed the sore part; all of a sudden, your heart felt heavy, your stomach churned, and your breathing was shaky and rapid.

“What’s the matter with me?”

Trying to relax even felt tedious. The doubt in your conscience was beginning to chew its way into you, but your fought it off along with the words that were gradually forming in your mind—the words that you dread to hear, even if it was just in your imagination.

Nothing.

There was no concentration, no calmness… nothing.

Your mind was in a total disarray.

“This is bad,” you muttered fearfully.

You examined the disassembled lightsaber again, thought long and hard as you stared at it, and then wagered which of the new parts must be replaced to better, functioning ones. The next places that could possibly have some components are the Imperial station near the weathered monument and the ice caves. Asking Greez to take the Mantis to Coruscant is the farthest stretch of an option, so you put that as the last resort—even if the Jedi Temple has the best selection of parts, albeit abandoned.

“It’s highly likely graverobbers have looted the temple though,” you assessed.

Afraid to show your face, and scared to be incapable of answering Cal’s questions about his lightsaber, you couldn’t dare to step out of the room—though you badly need to if you want to get your components. You took a deep breath as if preparing yourself to speed through a row of Auger pulverizers, you rehearsed your general response if ever Cal asks, and coached yourself to keep your eyes on the door.

“Okay, just waltz out. Don’t maintain eye contact, eyes on the door. Just say you’re going out to get more parts, and that’s it. Simple.”

The line became your mantra in the next three minutes. Afterwards, you pulled yourself together and followed your mantra physically to a tee.

“I’m going out again, just need more parts,”

You practically ate your words as you briskly walked past Cal sitting on the couch with Cere in the middle of a hallikset lesson. The two Jedi followed you with their eyes until you disappeared out of the ship. Cal was able to sense something from you, it was faint yet noticeable; he contemplated whether to bring it up to you or wait and see if it would worsen or subside.

You gave the shed on the edge of the landing pad a try, but it turned out to be a disappointment when it was just crates of the same materials as the ones in the derelict hangar; and so off you go to where you needed to be.

You take the shortcut at the turbine facility leading out to the ice slide before the weathered monument. You surprisingly mowed down the dispatched unit of Stormtroopers just on the other side of that blaster door.

“Okay, gotta get to that station fast,” you tell yourself.

You’ve reached your destination: the Imperial command center with a landing platform. You had hoped that with a station this big, you hoped you’d find something worth of all this short trip.

You took every Stormtrooper stationed there singlehandedly by surprise; banking their shots right back at them until all that remains is the black R2 unit strolling across the metal halls.

Now that you’re in the clear, you scoured all of the supply crates that you can find, taking apart the control panels and power terminals for possible substitutes, and even harvesting the parts of a Stormtrooper’s blaster and a Scout Trooper’s staff. By sheer luck, the staff ran on a diatium power cell and prayed that this could be your key to actually fixing the saber.

When you got back, you came in with such a burst that the crew just watched you speed past them. Understandably so, you were too indulged in getting that lightsaber fixed—but they don’t know that you’re protecting your ugly secret of busting it a second time after the Jotaz did.

Cal walked in on you and found you on your second attempt.

“[y/n]?”

You jumped, startled by the softest call of your name.

“You startled me right there!” you gasped, clutching on your chest while sucking in air.

“Oh sorry, I figured you didn’t hear me the first time so I went closer. Sorry…”

“It’s okay,” you tried to hide the saber by blocking his view of it with your back. “Look, it’s not ready yet. I thought I finished it but turns out I had to do it again. I… I’m still fitting the power cells underneath the sleeve of the second saber.”

“Look, I’m more worried about you than the saber itself. Could you please do me a favor and don’t stress out on this? Like I said: don’t rush on this.”

“I’m sorry, I… I suppose I just got a bit worked up. Won’t rest until the job’s done—force of habit.”

He raised his lips to your forehead.

“Well, there’s no need to be worked up, okay?”

You nodded and replied in a hushed tone. He dismissed himself, saying Cere owes him another hour of hallikset lessons, and then walked out of the bedroom, leaving you again with his busted saber and in your solitude.

More hours have passed, at this point in time, your confidence has deteriorated. While the power-related parts—namely the diatium power cell, conductor, power vortex ring, and inert power insulator—were finally replaced with the whole, new ones supplied by your inventory and the ones you’ve picked up, it appeared that they weren’t the answers to your question.

You repeated again, tweaking some of the parts that you assumed could have gone wrong.

The same feeling that you had on the first attempt return—only this time, it was five times worse on the third and fourth tries. You wished that you knew what the problem was.

“No… NO!” you growled, pounding the edge of the worktable out of frustration. The force of your outburst was so strong that you managed to make the thin pipe railings creak.

The crew kept it quiet between one another whenever they would hear one of your outbursts: the grunts, startled cries, and groans of frustration. An hour later, you were still stuck in the loop of trying to figure out the mistake. Cal decided to pull you away from that spiraling mess you’ve gotten into.

“[y/n]…?” he called as he knocked. “Dinner’s ready. Are you coming?”

“N-No, Cal… I… I’m not hungry,” you spoke to him through the sealed door, your voice is muffled but still coherent. “I’m not hungry.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. Sorry, Cal. Please, I just want some time alone to finish this,”

“Alright then. Call me if you need anything, okay?”

“Oh… okay. Thanks, Cal…”

Cal appeared out of the small annex to join the crew at the dinner table. Cere started to get worried when he appeared without you.

“Where’s [y/n]?”

He repeated your reason to everyone as he took his seat. There was awkward air that somehow exuded the empty chair next to Cal—where you usually sit.

Cal left some food for you and personally put them away on his own after dinner. Cere watched him prepare your serving in case you finally decide to come out of the room and eat, as he sealed off the food container, she confronted him gently.

“Cal, is [y/n] okay? She’s been acting… unusual lately. She’s been locked up in your room for hours now and missed dinner. The last time we saw her outside that room is when she came to scavenge for spare parts.”

“Something’s off about her ever since the last time she went out. She didn’t even open the door to talk to me, she just spoke through the door. I didn’t think that she’d put that much pressure on herself to repair my lightsaber… but now I do.”

“Go talk to her. I am absolutely sure she needs it,” Cere clapped him on the shoulder before retreating to the cockpit.

While they were eating, you have already gone through your fifth attempt. You’ve given up in the middle of the sixth try and ended up sitting on the floor, hugging your knees, and just succumb to crying. When Cal got close enough, he could hear you weeping in the room and that further confirmed his presumption about you.

He knocked on the door again, calling your name.

“Come on, I saved you some dinner,” he coaxed. “Greez made your favorite.”

“Please just… go away, Cal…” you replied.

Cal noticed the change of tone in your voice and the sniffles.

“No, I won’t,”

The two of you conversed with a sealed blast door in the middle. You wanted it that way because you didn’t want him to see the teary-eyed mess that you are and his still-busted lightsaber.

“Look, I couldn’t fix your lightsaber; I could have broken it but not on purpose—you should be hating me right now!”

“I don’t hate you,” he coolly said. “I could never hate you.”

There was no response from your end at the door, you buried your face in your knees in shame, letting tears pool on your pant legs in the process. He decided to open the door via the control keypad on his side. When the door whizzed open, he saw you curled up on the floor by the workbench; you didn’t look to him when he got in.

“Oh, [y/n]…” he purred, sitting on the floor and then taking you into his arms.

“I’m sorry, I thought I could do it…!” you sobbed. “I didn’t mean to break it, honest. I really wanted to fix it but I just couldn’t… I thought I could!”

He shushed. He rested his cheek over your head after kissing your forehead. “Please don’t cry. It’s okay. I’m not mad, I promise.”

“I was too afraid to ask help from you…” you hiccupped. “I was afraid you’d think of me as incompetent.”

“Aww, no,” he cooed. “Baby, no—I’d never think of you as something like that! What made you think that?”

“Cal, look at me: I’m a Jedi who can’t fix a lightsaber! I’m the perfect definition of that word. What else would I call myself if I’m incapable of rebuilding the most vital part of a Jedi?”

He cradled your head to his chest and allowed you to let it all out whether through tears or lashing out.

“You know, back in Dathomir—when I was opening the door to the Tomb of Kujet—I got myself into a Force vision,”

You listened, prompting him to continue with soft grunts.

“Master Tapal was standing there in front of me. When he saw that I didn’t fight back, he said something to me,”

“What was that?” you asked, your voice has calmed down and the sobbing hiccups have gotten lesser.

“He told me that persistence reveals the path. And you know what I’ve gotten from that?”

You look up at him to find sincere eyes staring back lovingly at you and a small yet reassuring smile. The word “What?” was a mere blow of air between your lips when you urged him to continue.

“When failure hasn’t deterred you from trying again and again, no matter how many times,” he spoke as he stroked your hair. “You’ll find your answer at the end of the path sooner than you think.”

“But I’m afraid. I’m afraid to fail… like I always have been, secretly.”

“But have you really given up?”

Your eyes wandered blankly into space, pondering on his question as well as your own answer—the true answer. Your eyebrows furrowed as you somberly reflected upon it. In response, you shake your head. You promptly stood up from the floor, Cal followed and stood by your side; you let him watch you work and to his surprise, you’ve picked up a soldering iron you found back in the Imperial command center.

From time to time, he would help out in certain parts of rebuilding it—handing out the parts and components that you need, giving you an extra hand when needing to hold something really still until you’ve perfectly fitted it into place as well as helping with a few of the trickier steps in the procedure.

The last part of fixing it was refitting the blade energy chamber—the narrow tube that bridges the kyber crystal and the emitter—and when you presume everything is finally done, Cal let you do the honors of meditating once more on the lightsaber.

“Go on,” he coaxed. “Relax and concentrate.”

“Okay…”

It may not be yours, indeed, but your connection with Cal—that you have unconsciously overlooked and shut out this whole time—was soothing the whole time up until this very moment. For a moment, that anxiety that was flooding your entire being was gone and all you could think of was thoughts that signify tranquility: the waterfalls, the sunrise at Bogano, the empty abode, and even an image of Cal himself.

Click…

Your heart skipped a beat when you hear that tiniest of sounds. You fought off the hesitation of opening your eyes. In face value, the lightsaber looked normal. You stared blankly at it, not even realizing that your hand was gravitating to it; once again, your fingers clamped around the handle and lifted it up from the workbench placemat. You shoot a look at Cal.

“Together?”

He placed his hand over your hand, his thumb over yours on the switch.

“Together.”

He squeezed on your thumb downwards, subsequently doubling onto the pressure applied on the switch button. A sharp buzz snarled out of the polished hilt. Cal removed his hand from the hilt and stood back, while examining the beam of light that shone in the room. You exchanged glances with him, you swallowed the nervous lump in your throat, and your heart was pounding that you couldn’t catch up with your breathing. Steadily, you waved the weapon around the small space where you stood.

More than ten seconds have passed and the blade of light didn’t die out. Your official sixth attempt finally was a success!

You exhaled laughingly. Finally! You thought. We did it!

You looked over the blade and found Cal smiling with a sense of pride in you. You pressed the switch again and the blade retracted back into the emitter to set it down on the workbench. You hopped toward Cal and—in an uncontrollable urge—threw yourself in his arms.

“We did it!” you beamed, relieved and happy.

“But you did most of the work, I only helped on the sidelines,”

“Don’t be silly. Well… I was silly myself,” you shrugged. “I guess I had too much pride earlier. Thanks, Cal, you’ve helped me a whole lot—more than enough, in fact.”

You yawned and rubbed your eyes, apologizing thereafter.

“It’s okay, sweetie, rest as much as you need. I’ll be here,” Cal planted another kiss on your head as he cradled you like a baby, trapping you in an embrace as your puffy eyes felt heavy. He continued to stroke your hair until you drifted off to sleep. “I’ll always be here. I promise.”

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ludvik-petrikov · 5 years

Text

This is a mess of doodles I've been working on but hey it's something

Most to least recent.

SAM AND MAX REDRAW

(Simple Sam and Max scene comic redraw. The aurin is an esper-explorer named Venian, and the chua is Anani, a medic-scientist. They're... different.)

HUMAN CONCEPTS

A couple of humans, the warrior-explorer Etty and spellslinger-settler Marcy. Besties. Etty rescued her, in a sense. It's complex, I'll go into it later.

Awkward perspective in this one, dunno what I did to go so wrong, but it's just concept stuff, so pfbbbbt. They're both in the same squad as Venian and Chym, who's up next.

(Chym and Venian notably grew up together, Venian being an orphaned outcast that Chym reached out to and treated as family despite his perceived flaws.)

And uhhhhh oh yeah this next piece is kinda disturbing so if you detest that at all I'd leave while I still could if I were you, thanks. Boy got torn apart by the limbs by a couple of war-crazed dominion soldiers at an ambush doing anything they could to blow off steam, tugging at whatever limb made him scream the hardest.

And he's naked in the shot. Artistic censoring is down there, though, so yeah. It's also, I'd say, softer than most of my gore. It's not him actively being torn, but the flesh is stretched and kinda warped in some places bc it be like that.

That's about it, yeah.

I am incredibly desensitized to my fictional characters, and I'm sorry for that if you feel otherwise, but somehow I don't think that's going away any time soon.

GORE?

So, right. He was torn apart from both sides, nearly bisected, and that fucked Venian up. Chym had been the strong, stern, centering figure in his life for years, one of the only ones that'd stay for him as he was. In that, Chym wasn't just a friend, but a brother, father, therapist figure in his eyes. He couldn't watch it happen, so he fled. Chym had warned him to do so if anything like this occurred, but he couldn't have prepared for anything that drastic. In a way, Chym had sheltered him. Venian believed him to be dead as he ran as far as he could, unaware he'd actually saved him in his panic with his abilities. There are times when Venian's mind plays tricks on him, and at the time, he'd visualized flashes of much worse damages to Chym in guilt for what he believed to be happening as he lived. Venian didn't think he deserved Chym in the first place, let alone to be the one that lived any longer than him.

Just as Venian never could have prepared for what happened, neither could Chym. On both ends, what he'd said meant little in the long run.

Chym didn't necessarily want to leave, per se, but as he was tortured by the tearing, he'd given in. It was time for him to go, and yet... here he remained, unsure of how or why he'd made it, his own torment at the time blurring the world around him. And now his partner was nowhere to be seen, the unusual calm around him in the brush making him question whether or not he'd really made it for some time. He hadn't heard or seen the cassians retreat. There was too much time for him to reflect, he never was quite the same, despite every promise he and Venian had made. He was so talkative and heroic once, but became little more than a husk, believing he was abandoned by his friend and his life to be some cruel joke.

POP TEAM EPIC REDRAW

And to close off on a cute note, I forgot this chua's name (darn), but I do remember him being a warrior-soldier. Shameless pop team epic redraw, but I told myself I'd post it all here.

That's all for today. Apologies if the short story makes no sense, I've been thinking on this plot for so long that I'm not sure where to start or how to say it, paradoxical as that might seem. ^^;

#wildstar #original art #redraw #my writing #?#ocs #guro #gore #pop team epic #sam and max

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nikanndros · 6 years

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How much do I have to pay you to continue the Adultery AU bc that was iconic and I enjoy pain

Hahahaha. I like you.

I actually tried to write a sequel to the adultery AU a while back, but it somehow morphed into a Laurent POV version of the story. It’s only 1.5k but I’ll post it under the read more so that I can give you something at least hahaha.

As for an actual sequel, I wanna say I’ll probably do it???? after I finish The Time Travel AU.

@ anyone else about to click the readmore, I definitely recommend reading The Adultery AU first. I also recommend listening to Sweet Nothing by F+tM when reading Laurent’s pov.

“Are you going anywhere for the summer, Laurent?” Isander asks. His dark curls in Laurent’s periphery make him look like someone else.

“Maybe,” Laurent says. Exam block will be over in three days and he still hasn’t decided. There’s an unanswered message on his phone from Auguste, asking the same thing. Are you coming home?

He loves his family, but it’s an odd time in his life. Going home would mean dinner parties and events he doesn’t care about. It would be his father pretending to care about his middle son. It would be Nicaise, demanding all of Laurent’s attention while simultaneously insisting he doesn’t want it.

It would be Damianos, bronze skinned and grinning, giving him playful looks that never last long enough. Pining, is the word.

“I might stay here,” Isander is saying, “if you do too, maybe we could-”

“I have a boyfriend,” Laurent lies.

Isander escapes not long after that. Vannes puts her textbook down to give him a long look.

“What?”

“You didn’t need to make up a boyfriend,” she says.

He looks away, jaw clenched. He wonders if in another life, he would have said yes to Isander. Up until now they’ve gotten along, and there’s a sweet quality in the other boy that lends itself to thoughts of soft candlelit nights and holding hands under tables. But in this life, he knows that even if he went off with Isander, that wouldn’t be the name he’d call for in his dreams.

Still, Laurent had considered inviting Isander home with him. Not to fuck, but to stand him next to Jokaste, and look at Damen and say, ‘See? I like your colouring too’.

“Get laid,” Vannes says, standing. “This jilted lover thing you’ve got going on doesn’t suit you.”

It doesn’t count as being jilted, he wants to tell her, when the object of your affections doesn’t even know about them.

He texts Auguste back. Only if I can stay at your place. He can avoid family events for a while. Laurent feels so full of longing that he doesn’t know what he’ll do the next time he sees Damen. Something stupid, probably.

He opens the door and Damen is there, upset and looking for Auguste. Laurent lets him in.

They have a moment of connection and Laurent is helpless but to kiss him. He knows he’ll be rejected, because Damen isn’t the adulterous sort.

Damen kisses him back.

“Take me,” Laurent says, thinking now’s the moment he’ll cast me away. He has to come to his senses.

But Damen lies him back along the couch and kisses his mouth, his cheeks, his neck. Laurent wants to cry and cling to him. He’s terrified and elated. Instead he just gasps, clings onto Damen and feels like something that’s newly been made whole.

It’s like he’s been made of ice for all of his life, and Damen has come and set him on fire. When they make love it’s both too much and exactly what he needs. Laurent can sees it like burn scars all over his body, that he looks up and thanks Damen for. Every kiss, every touch is an act of violence to Laurent’s heart. He’s hit the point of no return and yet he still continues to tumble past it.

Take me, he thinks, until there’s nothing left.

It’s weird how easy it is to knowingly hurt another person. Jokaste is only guilty of the same crime as Laurent - she’s in love with Damen. But she’s been allowed to have him for the last two years: it’s Laurent’s turn now, and he can turn off thoughts about how much this would destroy her with ease when it comes with Damen’s steady fingers trailing down his clavicle.

It feels more real on New Year’s Eve. He hasn’t seen Damen all day, until there he is, in the midst of both of their families, holding Jokaste’s waist. The countdown is the worst part.

Everyone has someone: his parents, Damen’s parents, Kastor is kissing his wife, and Auguste and Kashel have snuck off to kiss in private. The last ten seconds of the year, Laurent spends alone, in a corner, watching Damen and Jokaste sharing the same glass of champagne, giggling while they goad each other to finish it before the new year officially commences.

The glass is empty and set aside right in time for Damen to sweep her into a long kiss at midnight. Jokaste wraps her arms around his neck and kisses him with laughter still left on her red, red lips. She looks buoyantly happy. Her dress is white. Bridal. Laurent wants to disappear.

Their parents, and Kastor’s family, all retreat to the sitting room after midnight, to share glasses of cognac. The rest of them decide to make use of the pool, and then everyone is stripping down and throwing each other into the water.

Damen spots when Laurent attempts to retreat inside from the festivities and throws him over his shoulder. Pressed together like this, the warmth of their bodies mingles. Laurent is weak: he craves Damen’s touch in a way that permeates his bones. Everyone cheers when Damen throws Laurent in the pool, but the sound is distant to his ears.

There’s a moment underwater, where he thinks he’d like to stay down there, away from everyone. Surely once his head breaks to fresh air, the water will have washed away his casual mask, and they’ll all see it in his eyes. His heart will only ever beat for Damen.

Arms enter the water and pull him up until he’s face to face with Auguste. He doesn’t know what his expression is, but Auguste’s gaze makes him feel vulnerable.

“Happy new year, Laur,” his brother says softly, and in an odd display of affection, he pulls Laurent into a hug and kisses his temple. “I hope it treats you well.”

There’s a moment later that night - or early that morning - that Damen finds a moment to pull Laurent aside. He kisses Laurent like a benediction. “Happy new year,” Damen says.

It’s an odd sensation to simultaneously have someone and pine for them. “Happy new year,” he says back.

Of course, the situation is unstable. It’s impossible for something like this to stay a secret in families as close knit as theirs are. Laurent, however, is so clouded by his feelings that he doesn’t anticipate this.

Maybe he has a chance to avoid it.

“You said you’d take me to the beach before you go back,” Nicaise pouts.

“I’ll take you next week,” Laurent says. He’s trying to read.

“No you won’t,” Nic says. “You’re never even here.”

“I’m trying to read, Nicaise.”

“You don’t even care,” he says. “You don’t even care that you promised me.”

“I said I’ll take you next week.”

“I don’t want you to take me anymore,” Nicaise snaps. “Jokaste said she would. She said that she’ll be like my sister when she marries Damen. I’d rather have a sister than you.”

It’s a trapping sensation, being a middle child. Spending time with Auguste makes him feel older, more mature. Nicaise just drags Laurent down to the level of a child. He drops his book.

“You don’t know anything, Nicaise,” Laurent says, his voice too harsh. “Go away, I’m sick of you.”

It’s not entirely his fault. It’s impossible to be born into a world where Damen exists, a world where he gets to see him almost daily for most of his life, and not fall in love with him. Damen is made with the beauty of a Greek statue, and all the warmth of life itself, and Laurent doesn’t remember a time when he didn’t adore him.

Dinner is tense only in Laurent’s mind, at first. He knows it’s not Jokaste’s fault, but he can’t help but hate her. Every attempt at comradery is like her rubbing salt in the open wound that is his feelings for Damen. He’s rude to her. Nicaise keeps kicking him under the table.

Then, the great reveal: Nicaise knows about the affair and so does Auguste. And now, so does everyone.

When Damen stands to go after Jokaste, it feels like the most vulnerable moment of Laurent’s life. This is the moment Laurent wanted to avoid: the moment when Jokaste has a chance to convince Damen to stay away from him. If she and Damen reconcile after this, he feels like he’ll die.

“Well,” Auguste says, knocking back half a glass of scotch in a move he could have only learnt from Kashel. “Now I actually do need a refill. Laurent.”

Laurent stands and follows. No one tries to stop him. It’s all so painfully awkward, but he’s too busy trying to keep his expression at least somewhat dignified. The corners of his eyes are hot.

The door that separates the sitting room from the dining room shuts and, finally alone with only his brother, Laurent can feel the tears coming. Auguste takes one look at him.

“Oh,” he says, grabbing Laurent’s shoulders. “What a mess you two have made.” He pulls them over to the couch and makes Laurent sit with him, face pressed into his brother’s shoulder. Laurent can’t remember the last time he cried.

“Are you okay?” Auguste asks softly, when Laurent finally pulls his head back.

“I think I’m relieved,” he replies. “I think I would have kept it happening forever, if nothing had changed.”

#the adultery au #ask #writing #Anonymous

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