#tbh most of these are abandoned and gathering dust | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

wxrgirl · 3 years

Text

Forged in Flames, Forged in Darknes: Gabriel Corday // NPC Bio.

tw: Death, Suicide, Body Horror, War, Blood, Violence, Gabriel Corday is his own trigger warning at this point tbh.

It began with Gabriel Corday, born August 5th 1791 in Saint-Saturnin-des-Ligneries, Écorches, Normandy, France. A young soldier that fought for Napoleon in Waterloo (18th June, 1815) after he spend several years in the Kingdom of Westphalia.

Coming from a minor aristocratic family not much was known about his parents. It was his aunt Charlotte that made the Corday name immortal when she assassinated Jacobine leader Jean-Paul Marat and died on the guillotine. Gabriel was only two years old when the Revolution ate its children and he has not many memories of his family. He grew up without any roots, being tossed between friends of his grandfather. No one understood why but his grandfather Jaques made sure that Gabriel was raised on the ideals of equality and brotherhood, dreaming of freedom and power for the people, without ever meeting his cousins or any other member of his family. He knew only that his mother Eloise-Marie de Corday handed on her dark hair color onto him and then died shortly after he was born through tragic circumstances. Of his father he knew nothing.

It was in 1809, when Gabriel was eighteen years of age and ready to join the efforts of Napoleon in bringing their French ideals to all of Europe. He was about to join the army when a stranger approached him, a friend of his mother. He told Gabriel to run from the fight and rather go to the Kingdom of Westphalia, were Napoleon's brother was truly changing the world and progressively working on the future. This stranger, a brown haired woman that appeared to be not more than ten years older than he was, also spoke of his mother. She told him, if he wanted to find the truth he needed to look for Isla Le Maingre rather than Eloise-Marie de Corday.

And so Gabriel left his grandfather and all these well-kept secrets behind to find the truth on the other side of the Rhine.

In Westphalia he had no trouble mixing with the local aristocrats, ignoring the poverty that swept through the streets outside their grand halls like a ghost whispering of Russian soil and endless winter. There was no sign of the woman that had pointed him in this direction and whenever he spoke of Isla Le Maingre he was met with a wall of silence until he met Savannah during a ball one night. She sensed some spark of ancient magic within his soul and suddenly Gabriel was thrown into the arms of the Nocta and while the Children of Pandora showed him a world he had only dreamed of before, filled with liberal rights and a new-found equality it seemed as if the boundaries of reality became more fleeting with every passing day.

Marian crossed his path and changed his life forever. They fell in love, helplessly, completely. A love that was greater than the both of them, greater than their mortal lives for it had been foreseen in ancient times. At least that was what they believed. The world could not bring them apart, the war and Napoleon's defeat in Russia could not darken their mood, not even the Kingdom of Westphalia crumbling into dust only six years after it was founded seemed to be worth their attention. It was them against everyone else.

But Marian was destined to die, a sacrifice for the gods, death giving way to life. It was too late to save her, everyone was sure of it. But in all his life Gabriel had learned about progressive rights, about magic and fate, he had learned about the gods and even came close to finding out the truth about his mother - how one gave up had never been part of his lessons. He finally joined the war, fighting for Napoleon and against the Nocta that refused to help him in his quest against the gods. He and Savannah gathered knowledge, gathered power, their alliances ever shifting and in the end not even Marian understood what was happening.

She loved Gabriel still, she trusted him. And she allowed Savannah to perform magic on her, to stop the sacrifice from happening. Napoelon was defeated at Waterloo and thousands found their end in blood and mud. But the true tragedy struck a year later. For 1816 was the year without summer, when temperatures dropped and then refused to rise. Spring never came and in the end thousands more died of hunger because crops could not grow and flowers never blossomed. Marian knew it had been Savannah's spell, it had been their love that caused all this. And she wanted to rectify that mistake. But Gabriel was not finished yet and he finally declared war against the gods, an army of ghosts at his heel.

Now the thing is, gods are not gods for nothing. And if you spend aeons fighting titans and the things that live between the stars one mortal, may his love be ever so strong, is no adversary for you. He dreamed of revolution but it was rebellion he caused, a speck of dust that is nothing in the eye of the mighty.

So it ended with Gabriel Corday, died December 21st 1816, Verdun, France, aged 25.

The gods are not known for their kindness, especially not those that were forced into the annals of history and almost forgotten. So death was not enough of a punishment and instead they cast him down into the deepest and darkest pit they could find, the shadows of Tartarus. For a hundred years he was locked up in darkness, with nothing but pain and his own regrets for company. Slowly but surely his mind succumbed to that darkness and then, when he had almost lost all sense of himself, a whisper made it through the haze in his skull. Kronos, the god of time, the titan that had been imprisoned aeons ago spoke to the mortal of vengeance, of rising against the gods once more. If Gabriel was to be freed, if he was to return for the titans and break their chains they would make him one of them when they marched against Mount Olympus.

Gabriel agreed and when Kronos reached for him to seal their deal with blood the boy used all his rage, all his madness, that ancient spark of fire that his once distant father had given him and forced his own heart to burst. He devoured the shadow of Kronos, he devoured what was left of the mighty titan after aeons of darkness. And he became a titan himself.

It began again, with Gabriel Corday, clawing his way out of tartarus and onto the blood soaked remains of Verdun, on March 15, 1916.

Gabriel stumbled into a world of violence and war, he became a soldier once more, spending the better half of a century dying and returning, a Wiedergänger in the trenches of two world wars, wondering what had caused humanity to reach a point of greater madness than he had achieved in the deepest depths of hell. He knew who to blame, the gods that had abandoned all of them, turned their backs on their own creations. He knew which magic he needed to use, he felt it burning through his veins now that he had stolen it from Kronos. And most of all he knew who should fight beside him in the second and final rebellion against the gods. Arise dear Spring, he thought when the battles of mortals had finally ended and we walked away from the fields of slaughter to find her. His love, his heart, his Marian.

mortal, timeless, nurture, no affiliation but himself, Wiedergänger

#I really don't know how to tag Gabe devouring a fucking god but I hope this is enough #I love him so much I hate it #xx silent is the call of my ocean and the sirens washed ashore xx Gabriel Corday #I call this 'quick overview'#x priestess of death and daughter of spring x backstory

2 notes · View notes

carpemermaidtales · 6 years

Text

WIP Meme

The Rules: Post the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous

Oh boy, thanks for the tag @gracie137blogs now we get to delve into the WIP Folder of Doom™️ hahahaha I do actually tend to name my files with something descriptive because I have somewhat of an archiving habit from my day job, so I don’t think any of these will be toooo wild. Long AF list, so under a cut to save your dash ;)

Drarry

A Fragile Web - wand bond hogwarts 8th year repair - Ah, an aging wip with 20k that’s going no where. Good to see you again, old friend. Looking mighty fine with that thick coating of dust you’re sporting. New Year’s Promises - Another aging wip that’s nearly all written that I can’t seem to finish arg! Maybe this year will be the year?? Who knows, all I know is that I keep meaning to finish it so I can release it sometime between Dec-March every year I attempt to get it done. *sweats loudly* Post War WWW - This was going to be my HD Big Bang project until I had to drop because of my work schedule. I had some really fun stuff planned with it, especially Draco working with tinkering with magical objects and charms spells. Snapchat Sexting - Ohhhhh I need to finish this!!! Dang I started this in like Feb and forgot all about it, but it’s the usual whacky concept of tech comes to the wizarding world as a vehicle for Drarry to sext via social media hahaha. Harry is very Shook™️ in this little fic. Accidental Marriage Bond - Oh nooo they’re accidentally married and bound magically oh noooooo. Kidfic Adoption Partners - Probably my fave of my wips that I haven’t had much time to work on, the idea is that drarry are very close business partners that are mistaken for partner-partners when draco decides he wants to adopt. Grimmauld Place is Sick??? - Idk what to call this one hahaha, but it’s basically your run of the mill oh no Harry isn’t sure what’s up with GP and Draco Malfoy is His Only Hope at Finding Answers.

Victuuri

Banquet AU Canon Diverge - Omg this was my big project at the beginning of the year that I put on pause after almost 30k because it’s only 3 chapters in and it’s already so big. Basically just a big YOI canon divergence after the banquet and clothes sharing and social media. Yuuri wears Victor’s Olympic RU jacket and I get a little emosh every time I think about it :’))))

Klance

Our Hearts Ablaze - a/b/o in space - Just your basic oh no I thought I was one class and turns out I’m another but no worries because your pal has your back and will help you out through this Trying Time. Amnesia Lance - Back around season 2 I had this wip idea where Lance gets hit during battle or whacks his head somehow and wakes up with amnesia and thinks team voltron kidnapped him. FWB Klance - Probably what it says on the tin tbh Waxplay Klance - Hnnggg my candle-moment fic. Just needs one scene to be complete, note to self please go back and finish this. Let Me Take a Bite Out of You - lovebug/fakedating/soulmate/garrison au - A wip I started and even posted ch 1 of last year because I’m a monster and every time I get a comment from a reader hoping the next chapter is coming I cower under a blanket. It’s not abandoned, though, I swear. I just need to untangle the plot and write the damn thing. It’s a biiiig epic with conspiracy, a race against time, and everything ending up just as it should when the series timeline starts.

CaPri

Jaimeric Modern Fake Dating AU - Holy shit this story is massive. It was plotted out with @goldentruth813 and @gracie137blogs months back when we were crying together about Jaimeric and Aimeric and how we needed a story where he lived, so this is our version of that.

Berenger Character Study - I read Pet and then Berencel took over my life. This is just a short Berenger POV character study of the events in Pet.

Zutara Accidental Bond Post War - A maaaassive outline for a story picking up right where the Agni Kai with Azula ends and the events of that fight cause a spirit bond to manifest in Katara and Zuko so that they’re tied together and can hear each other’s heartbeat. In the midst of putting the Fire Nation back together they have to embark on a journey to the spirit world to find out what happened to them and if they can undo it. Haikyuu!! Oisuga - Fake Dating - Oh no >:)))) Suga’s parents >:)))) want to set him up with marriage interviews >:)))) and he makes up a fake boyf >:)))) and Oikawa over hears and thinks the description fits him well enough >:)))) so he slides in and pretends to be the fake boyf >:)))) and now they’re invited to a weekend family reunion at Suga’s family onsen in Miyagi >:)))) Oisuga Week - Starbursts - Need to finish up these last 2 chapters but this is a wip that started for a ship week in august that’s been post-as-i-go, essentially Oh no, and they were roommates with looootttsss of pining. HQSS - Haikyuu!! secret santa exchange fic that’s nearly done, can’t talk much about it but it’s cute and for a very fun ship <3 Kurosuga - FWB - A future fic plot from a convo on an hq writing server about Kuroo and Suga being friends with benefits while falling in love with each other the whole time, so a big pining, bittersweet sexy fic dealing with hiding emotions and soaking up as much physical intimacy as they can get away with because their touches speak so much louder than their words. Original 👀 👀 👀 👀 👀 👀 👀 Soooo I’m kinda....doing a thing.... 👀 👀 👀 👀 👀 Matchmaking Ghost - This is the wip I did the 7-7-7 meme with. If you enjoyed Phoenix Repair Services then you might like this one, it’s a pretty similar concept of house repair going totally wrong with a handyman from the protag’s past to fix the mess, only now there’s a ghost involved in the mix haha! Also it’s tentatively set in Boston because haunted New England houses are a Vibe™️. It’s got a persnickety ghost and a snarky protag who refers to himself as “””emotionally efficient””” because he’s the picture of good mental health 😹 😹 There are 12 other wips that have gathered in this folder but I’ll save the deets for later, this one is the most fleshed out at this point.

Sooo that’s me and my writing folder right now hahaha, someone send a shovel so I can dig myself out, yeah?

Tagging: If you want to play, you’re tagged!

#tag game #carpemermaid writing #wip meme

18 notes · View notes

ircnlace-blog · 5 years

Text

{ SOFIA BLACK-D’ELIA, 27, cis female, she/her, muse an } welcome friend! you know, i just saw ANDROMEDA “ANDY” WILLIAMS in town. it’s good to see them. they’ve been staying in town for ONE YEAR and making a living as an ASSISTANT MANAGER OF THE BOWLING ALLEY. not too bad. i hear they can be a bit CRASS, but LOVING. so, really who blames them? i hear they’ve been thinking about SETTLING DOWN AND FINDING PEACE. good for them. { it’s ash, y’all }

here she is, finally, the chaotic bisexual who likes to ruin lives, under the cut you’ll find bio info and some wanted connections !! suicide mention and death and severe poverty tws below. like this or just hit me up for plotting !!

info:

andromeda roselle williams was born in nyc in 1919 to very wealthy parents, her father being old money

only child

she’s born on halloween

her childhood was very lavish and she was wanting for nothing ever

she had the pony, the private tutors, the friends, she had everything

ever since being very small, her parents valued her education and by the time she was old enough to walk practically, she was being tutored in french, german, italian, russian, and japanese

she also loved spending time in her father’s office when he was working, trying to make sense of the stock business

she never liked going by andromeda, and instead preferred her father’s nickname of “andy”

her life was just short of perfect until late october of 1929

everything was lost

everything, her family had nothing come the 29th of october and that night, her father killed himself

her mother was distraught and andy was numb, not understanding fully what was happening

her mother tried to send her away to her aunt’s house, she wasn’t too bad off yet, and her mother didn’t know how to raise a child by herself and she just wanted the best for her daughter

andy didn’t understand this, and grew angry with her mother, so on the train to her aunt’s house, andy snuck off and disappeared into the night

she was an incredibly smart child, so she made it work

chores and favors here and there for people for food or a place to sleep

when that didn’t, she stole or conned for the the things she needed

to get around, she rode the rails, hitchhiked, walked, she one time even found an abandoned horse in the dust bowls of oklahoma and she rode him to minnesota before finding him a good home

met the worst and best of people on her travels

and andy met who a little boy who basically grew to be her little brother and she took care of him

his mother was sick, but took care of him and when andy landed on her doorstep, she took the girl in too

the dad was long gone

the mother ended up dying, but andy promised to take care of the little boy

and she did

she took him on all of her travels and they grew to be a real family, just the two of them

she took care of him and fiercely loves him

the issue is now she was another mouth to feed and he’s even less useful that her for work, so stealing and conning it is

she got really good, like could make only her fool good

as they grew, they became the scoundrels of the tracks, but they had each other

one snowing night in 1937, now 18, they found themselves in new york city

her brother wanted to see the sights, and andy finally grew enough courage to go back to her hometown

while exploring the poorer parts of the city, she found a person she never thought she’d see, her mother

and her mother was on her death bed

they reconciled and andy held her hand as she died

the loss of so many friends and family was beginning to take a toll of the girl, and she started going down a darker path, blackmail, threats, and injury were no longer things she wouldn’t do to survive

she killed her first man 1938 when he tried to hurt her brother

she didn’t like it, but she also felt absolutely no remorse for him

her and her brother never spoke about it

the heists, the cons, the embezzlement, all of it started getting riskier

as things were improving in the late 30′s and 40′s, so did their lives, but andy wasn’t keen to give up her way of life, she just really didn’t know any other way and change terrified her because change had very rarely ever brought the girl anything good

change came for her though, two days after the bombing of pearl harbor

she was arrested off the streets and brought to building she hoped never to see, the headquarters of the fbi in new york city

her language skills, her proclivity for violence, her insane wit, and her skill set didn’t go unnoticed

she was given a deal she couldn’t refuse, she was given immunity for her numerous crimes and her and her brother would be made legal family, he’d be taken care of, and he’d be given immunity from the draft if she served as a spy and assassin for the military in their most delicate cases

if she didn’t she’d definitely be going to jail and he would be drafted immediately

there was quite literally no other choice

so, the was recruited into the early form of secret services

when they were doing weapon training, discovered what a deadly shit andy was

she helped get important info the d-day invasion, intercepted a lot of plans and cargo lines

has over 150 confirmed kills

was entrusted to do spy work and take out high, sensitive, and valuable targets

as well as intel gathering and transporting high priority and highly sensitive messages and info

she has been personally thanked by the heads of the allied forces for her service

earned a reputation for being a cold blooded and terrifying killer, and a nickname, the red butcher

after the war ended (she was involved with the manhattan project and man, does that keep her up at night), she and her brother moved out to redwater for a fresh start

she’s working as an assist manager at the bowling alley mainly because would you tell her no?

she’s tired man, she’s just tired and wants a break

does not care what you think

is mysterious

wanted connections:

alright, here we go

she’s... a loose and fast lady, so friends with benefits, girl, boy, whatever, doesn’t matter, but also, rip if you kiss and tell with her, she likes being discreet and likes the less known about her as possible

drinking buddies, she goes out at night and dances and gets drunk

someone come fight with her, she loves a good fight

people to go shooting with tbh

outdoor activity buddies in general, she loves hiking, canoeing, fishing, hunting, horse back riding, all of it

a friend that like, they actually cuddle and she opens up to and has a good relationship with

if you are looking for more characters, then her brother and the other half to her plot would be awesome!!

#redwaterintro #;; hc

6 notes · View notes

annesanquish · 6 years

Note

I heard you're lookin for prompts... i love love your writing... all your camp camp fics are honestly making my LIFE rn. would you have any interest in writing a sickfic with david? maybe smthing where he takes max out on the 'no technology' trip he went on as a kid and spikes a SUPER deliriously high fever?? and max is pissed like "why didn't you bring a phone" and david is like "i figured if something happened to you i could carry you" but he didn't see HIMSELF needing help. i just lov angst

I would like to thank @patchettwalsh-blog for finding the information about smoke signals for me. Writing club presidents are the best TBH. Also this is unedited because my beta isn’t home right now.

I hope I captured the angst. It ended up being fluffy a bit towards the middle? I kinda butchered the prompt because I was taking a state test while writing it so I didn’t have the full prompt in front of me, I’m so sorry I failed you my follower. Thank you for the prompt though, I actually had something to do with my life ^^

“David, are you sure this is a good idea?” Gwen asked as David rubbed sunscreen onto the back of his neck. David looked at her with a frown, ignoring the pink flush that dusted his cheeks.

“It’ll be fine, Gwen. It’s just a hike. We’ll be back before lunch.”

“You said that last time you went on a hike without me, and you didn’t fucking come back until after dinner.”

David mumbled a soft reprimand at Gwen’s language, wrapping his scarf around his neck and tying it. “I won’t be alone this time. I’ll have Max, remember?”

“I still don’t understand your obsession with the kid…” She muttered as she followed him towards the door of the cabin.

“I just want him to understand how great Camp Campbell really is, and I think this is the best way to do it.”

“Or you’ll get yourselves lost, and killed.”

He punched her shoulder lightly. “Don’t be like that. We won’t get lost.”

“Whatever you say, David.” She patted his back lightly before trudging on out into the daylight. David followed shortly, a slight skip in his step.

“Good morning, Max!” He chirped when they reached where most of the kids were sitting at the fire circle.

Max looked up from where he and Nikki were stacking rocks in preparation for something David was glad he was missing, and scowled. “What is it, Camp Man?”

“You and I are going on a hike today!”

“Oh. Right.” He rolled his eyes and went back to gathering stones. “Yeah, I thought about it last night, and I decided I’m not going on one of your shitty hikes.”

“I”m afraid you don’t have much of a choice in the matter, Max,” David said, putting his hands on his hips.

“Goddammit,” Max muttered. “Fine. Whatever. I’ll go with you, if it’ll get you to leave me the fuck alone about it.”

“That’s the spirit!” David cheered. “Now come on.” He walked towards one of the trail heads, and Max scowled as he grabbed his water bottle off of the end of his cot and followed the uncharacteristically optimistic counselor.

Once they got into the woods and away from the camp, David seemed to calm down a bit. He took a deep breath, and let it out, face falling into a relaxed smile. “You smell that Max?”

“No.”

“That’s the scent of fresh pine. Gosh, I’ve been coming to this camp for years, and I still never get tired of it.”

“You don’t get tired of anything, fuckface.”

David chose to make no comment on this. “Now. I just want you to be aware that this hike I’m taking you on is the exact same hike that made me fall in love with Camp Campbell.”

“You mean the one where you got lost?”

“The exact same! Although I have the trail memorized, so we won’t have as much trouble as Mister Campbell did back then.”

“Uh huh.” Max didn’t sound convinced.

“So I hope you left your compass at the tent, because using it would be against the rules.”

Max felt his heart drop to his stomach, and he subconsciously sped up to fall in line behind David. He wasn’t quite sure why, but he supposed it was the prospect of being alone in the woods without technology that put him on edge. If asked though, he would deny any questions about moving within the counselor’s arm reach of his own free will.

The longer the hike went on, the more tired David seemed to get, and this concerned Max. It had been obvious something had been wrong by how sunburned David’s cheeks looked at the camp this morning- the dude was religious about putting on sunscreen- but it hadn’t occurred to Max until they were well over an hour away from the camp that something could be seriously wrong.

It wasn’t until David was walking slower than the camper that Max decided to pipe up about the issue.

“Hey, moron.” Max stopped in the middle of the path to turn and look at him with a scowl. “Why are you going so slow.”

David was panting, and his face was definitely more flushed than when they’d started. Max frowned. “I’m fine.. Max.” He leaned against a tree carefully. ‘Just a… bit out of breath. The thin air, and all… you know how it is.”

“I can’t say that I do. You’re /David/, for fucks sake. You never get winded.”

David let out a short, breathless laugh, before slumping against the tree, body threatening to collapse as his knees buckled underneath him. Max felt a rush of adrenaline and he was suddenly at David’s side, holding his arm and helping him sit down on the ground carefully. His skin was hot to the touch, and Max furrowed his brow. Once David was situated and catching his breath, Max reached up and pressed his hand to David’s forehead.

It was slick with sweat, and hot to the touch, and Max pulled away as if having been burned. “Do you have a fever?”

David let out a short breath, as if trying to laugh but not having the energy to, and shrugged. “Didn’t check.”

Max cursed, and pulled his water bottle out of his pocket, thrusting it into David’s hand. “Here. Drink.”

David looked at it, and frowned. “Max-”

“Right now, you need it more than I do.” Max averted eye contact as David took the bottle and unscrewed it carefully.

Max stood up, and paced along the path in front of David, who watched as he took controlled sips of the lukewarm water.

“Max-” David tried to say, but he was cut off.

“Just shut up a second, will you?” Max snapped as he wracked his brain, trying to come up with a way to fix the predicament they had currently found themselves in.

“You didn’t bring your phone, did you.” Max turned to him accusingly.

“… no…” There was a hint of shame in David’s voice. “It was supposed to be a technology-free hike, Max. I wasn’t going to break the camp rule.”

“You didn’t even consider bending it? Just to avoid being stuck in an emergency situation like this, and not have any fucking way out of it?!”

He didn’t answer, and Max ran his hands through his hair, resuming his pacing. “We can try walking back, but it’s an hour and a half, and you might pass out on the way.”

David nodded along to Max’s thinking, but his words were drowned out by the increased ringing in his ears and his head sagged.

“…vid! David, wake up!”

David jerked awake and looked up at where Max’s face- or, what he assumed that blur was- was visible against the stark blue sky. He frowned, trying to focus his vision but failing miserably. He felt like he was floating.

“Fuck, David, what the hell?”

David let out a noise from the back of his throat, tongue heavy in his mouth, and Max disappeared. He sighed and closed his eyes, before hearing Max’s voice again.

“Open your mouth.”

He frowned and opened his eyes slightly as he obeyed. Max dripped some of the water into his mouth, and David swallowed a few mouthfuls before reaching up and pushing Max away groggily.

Max sighed and capped the water bottle, resting it on the ground next to David before sitting back on his knees. “Dammit…” He muttered, tugging at his sleeves nervously. David looked like he was about to dip into sleep again, so Max shook his shoulder.

“Don’t fucking fall asleep on me again,” he scolded, voice shaking as his heart pounded in his ears. David frowned, but opened his eyes a bit. He looked at Max, eyes glassy and unfocused, and Max tried to ignore the concern eating away at his stomach. He wasn’t sure what to do in this situation, but he didn’t…

Unless…

He leapt up off the ground and set about gathering kindling and leaves from the forest floor, stacking them in a pile in the middle of the pathway. He frequently had to shake David’s shoulder to make sure he stayed awake, but he did, and that was the one thing that kept Max hoping his plan would work.

He pulled his hoodie off over his head and drenched it in a good portion of what was left of the water bottle. He wanted to save a bit for David while they waited. After that, he dug a lighter out of his jeans pocket (because why wouldn’t he just carry around a lighter wherever he went) and activated it, before lighting the small pile of kindling on fire.

He glanced at David, his stomach dropping when he saw David close his eyes, and swallowed, hoping this worked. He turned back to the fire as black smoke crept into the air.

“Three for an emergency…” he muttered to himself, and he watched the smoke snake its way into the sky, before throwing his drenched hoodie over the pitiful fire. He waited a few seconds, and then took it off, letting the smoke creep into the sky again. He repeated this twice, and then kicked dirt on the fire to put it out.

He abandoned his wet and smokey hoodie on the ground as he hurried over to David’s side, pressing his hand to David’s forehead again. It was no longer sweaty, but dry, and scarily warm. Max swallowed past the lump that had formed in his throat as he shook David’s shoulder softly.

David just barely stirred, and Max coaxed the last bit of the water bottle past his lips, before pushing David further into the shade of the forest, ignoring how his hands were shaking.

All that was left to do was wait.

#camp camp #david #max #sickfic #fever #delerium #smoke signals #camping #relatively factual #heat stroke maybe?#writing #fanfiction #prompt

48 notes · View notes

bettsfic · 7 years

Note

Do you ever deal with having too many ideas? I come up with a story, completely plot it out, outline it, establish my characters, and next thing I know I’m coming up with a completely different story line that I feel like I have to flesh out. I feel like I’m constantly hopping around, back and forth, between a million different stories and getting very little actually finished. Do you have any advice on maintaining focus?

god for real tho. i met with my thesis advisor a few weeks ago, and i had to sheepishly tell her how many projects i was tackling, to which she said, “well it’s better to have too many ideas than too few.”

(and then at the end of the meeting, she told me to send her everything i had so far, and i was like, “you mean short stories,” and she said, “no, everything.” i told her that would be about 300 pages, and she insisted that was fine.)

and wow, that made me feel so much better. in my head it’s like. something to be ashamed of, writing too much and too quickly and having too many ideas and scattered attention. but in the grand scheme of things, we’re in the minority. a lot of writers have trouble getting anything down. a lot of writers only get a good idea once in a long time. so i try to be grateful of the constant buzz of ideas, because there might come a day when it stops.

i read something yesterday that was a reminder of the old adage, the only way to become a writer is to treat it like a job. ass in chair, two hours a day or more.

and oh boy, thinking about writing the same way i think about my bullshit 9 to 5 really brings the muses out!! tbh i think the idea of Forcing Yourself to Write Things is very much a privileged notion and a skewed perspective. the people who are saying this are already successful, and they want to portray their work as if it were some immense burdensome struggle, like you too can have all this if you make yourself suffer.

moreover, i just? don’t? want? to see? writing? that way? as some kind of productive output, like i’m a machine. like my creativity is a factory for churning out media to be consumed en masse. so i think the idea of focus and diligence is all bullshit. writing is absolutely a discipline, but it is not factory labor. you do not have to clock in, work on your designated project, and clock out. maybe that works for some people, but it doesn’t for me.

that said, not being able to finish things is totally frustrating and disheartening, because it feels like you have no control at all, jesus-take-the-wheel style. so i’ve tricked myself into a few workarounds so that i get shit accomplished.

i let myself write whatever is in my head. i do not deny myself anything. if a scene or piece of dialogue comes up, i stop what i’m doing and write it down, because ignoring it feels like being given a gift that you decline. it feels rude. but here’s the crux: if this happens, i don’t force myself to finish whatever story that scene belonged in. sometimes it’s ok to just write the scene and do something else. sometimes it’s ok to let that one scene take you to the next and let the story consume you, and put everything else to the side for a bit. but the point is: write it down. no matter what. give in to the ideas that come to you.

don’t feel bad about giving up on a story. a lack of focus is a consequence of expectations, and i think most expectations--for yourself and for others--are stupid. they put people in unasked for boxes and lead to disappointment. so i don’t feel bad about myself for giving up on a story just because i expect myself to complete shit. sometimes the story just isn’t good enough, or it’s not ready to be written yet. giving up on stories that lose my attention without beating myself up makes focusing on the more worthwhile projects that much easier. this may seem counterintuitive, but i swear, the second i took the pressure off myself to follow through, the easier it became to follow through. it took the obligation out of it. i could say to the story, “i could give up on you if i wanted, you know. you’d gather dust in this folder for eternity, unfinished.” and sometimes the story would be like, “yea ok,” but sometimes it goes, “NOOOO just one more scene. one more scene pls.” and i end up finishing it, because i give myself permission to quit.

i limit the scope of the project. i try to write the first scene of every story idea i have, and sometimes i write more, sometimes i finish the story, and sometimes i give up on it. but i need to write the first scene to figure out how long the thing is going to realistically be. if i think it’s a short story, but i come up with enough content that it’s going to be a novel, i either:

table it for a time when i have the patience and focus to work on a longer project

ask myself, “how can i reel this in?” and pare down the plot until it’s a totally manageable length and something i can get finished in a week or two. because once a short story is down, you have a completed work, and if you want to expand it later when you have time, it’s still there for potential revision.

practice writing short stories over allowing them to greedily take up more space than you intend. this really helps with focus. it’s like building muscle. keep things concise and short and finish them quickly and move on, and then you learn how your writing pace really feels when it’s in check. you know how it feels when something is complete. you know how it feels when something isn’t worth pursuing. you learn how much effort to put into it. your stories may ask for a lot of attention from you, they might beg you to expand and become complicated and overlong, but you don’t have to give in to them. it is better to complete a short story and move on so you have a completed draft to work from later than it is to start a novel and abandon it.

notecards! buy some notecards and write all your scene ideas down in summary on them, then organize by project and keep in a little box. you might neglect some, you might pick up others later, but the point is that all your ideas are put in a readily accessible place.

and lastly, prioritize using the snowball method. make a list of all the stuff you’re working on and order it by whatever will take the least amount of work to complete first. finish that item, and then go to the next, until your To Be Written list is pared down and you can re-focus your efforts. if you get to an item and think “this isn’t worth finishing” move on to the next.

thanks for the question! hope this helps!!

#writing advice #dow17 #Anonymous

90 notes · View notes

fialleril · 7 years

Note

Any chance we can get some Anabasis or DAV in celebration of Triduum/Holy Week?

Late reply is super late, but better than never I hope.

I’m working on the next DAV fic which would actually be a perfect fit for the Passover / Easter season, with its focus on themes of liberation, but it is, alas, not finished yet.

So in lieu of that (and by way of apology for being gone so long), here’s a snippet of Anabasis.

This one is pretty spoilery, tbh. But Holy Week for me is all about liberation and new life, and this part of the story is definitely that. So when I finally publish the whole of Anabasis, you all can pretend to be surprised...

[In which Anakin finds Palpatine’s collection of Sith holocrons...]

The place was dim and musty, and it clanged with the distantechoes of crumbling old machinery. Padmé’s hand drifted uneasily and came torest on the blaster at her hip. Just in case.

The door Dinsa had stopped before was the seventeenth in aline of identical doors, each unmarked and wholly unremarkable, the sort thatmight be found in any number of abandoned factories or warehouses in the Works.

But Padmé didn’t fail to notice the way Dinsa stood wellback from the door, or the way she and Sabé watched Anakin closely, alert andready for any sudden directive. Anakin himself was focused intently, seeminglyunaware of anyone else around him. Padmé shifted from foot to foot, watchinghim stand perfectly still, watching the light of memory burn in his eyes.

“Anakin?” she whispered, hesitating only a moment beforeplacing a hand on his shoulder. Warmth bled through his clothing and into herskin.

He blinked slowly, just once, then turned from the door toface her. His mouth curled, far too vicious to be called a smile.

“This is the place,” he said. “I can feel it.”

There was a keypad just beside the door, but Anakin didn’tbother with that. His eyes closed briefly in concentration, and then the doorexploded.

The durasteel crumpled inward, fire sparking from thecontrol panel and lending a sharpness to the ancient smell of the room beyond.Padmé blinked. Shafts of faint light streamed through the shattered remains ofthe door and caught on the thick motes of dust dancing in the air.

It wasn’t an especially large room. What space there was satmostly empty – there was only one hefty durasteel storage container in the farcorner of the room. A fine layer of dust covered the floor, undisturbed by anyfootprints. Spiders spun in their corners, weaving vast networks ofunchallenged webs. The air smelled like a tomb.

Dormé stepped closer to Padmé, taking up position slightlyin front of her, a small blaster ready in her right hand. Sabé and Jothra wereeyeing the room intently, cataloging the space from corner to corner and backagain. But Dinsa seemed wholly focused on Anakin.

He drew a deep, ragged breath and his face set in a still,inscrutable mask.

There were a series of seals and locks on the storagecontainer, some obviously requiring codes and others far less clear. Padméwatched as Anakin examined them, his fingers hesitating over a keypad. Shewatched them ghost across a series of numbers, draw back, and then return againin a different pattern, never truly touching the keys.

“Stand back,” he said at last, drawing his hand away. Hiseyes didn’t leave the cabinet.

Padmé stepped well away, Dormé following in her wake butstill keeping between Padmé and the mysterious container. Sabé and Jothra stoodto either side. Dinsa moved barely a pace, and her gaze remained fixed onAnakin, who didn’t move at all.

The heavy durasteel door of the storage container crumbledloudly and fell away, its echoes trembling through the room. A sudden arc ofwicked fire leapt out from the casing, searing blue, but Anakin only raised hisright hand. The fire seemed to gather there, gleaming and pulsing against hisskin, until he turned his palm down and it jumped from his hand to grounditself in the warehouse floor. There was an awful smell of burnt dust. A thick layerof black soot scorched the floor beneath drifting tendrils of smoke.

“There are…precautions in place,” Anakin murmured, flexinghis fingers. Steam curled around his hand, but the flesh appeared unhurt. “Tokeep the holocrons out of Jedi hands.” His mouth twisted. “Only someone trainedin the ways of the Sith can access them.”

Padmé cast a nervous glance between Anakin and the storagecontainer, which remained shut fast. She hadn’t really thought he intended totell the Jedi about this place, of course, but…

“What are you going to do?” she whispered.

Anakin turned and smiled at her. It was a soft expression,almost tender and shockingly open. Ridiculously, Padmé found herself smilingback without even knowing why.

“I told you,” Anakin murmured, his smile quirking at thecorners. Without any further explanation, he turned back to the storagecontainer and pulled the door open.

It moved easily, soundlessly. Nothing else happened. Padmédidn’t know what she’d been expecting, but this felt somehow anti-climactic.

Inside the container were row on row of holocrons. Mostlooked exactly the same, small pyramidal constructs of dark metal, shot throughwith dull lines of red. Three holocrons, prominently displayed at the center ofthe top shelf, were noticeably older than the rest.

Anakin was evidently looking for something. His eyes wereclosed, but his face turned from side to side as though he were examining eachrow, scanning carefully over the contents.

A moment later his eyes snapped open and he selected aholocron from the exact center of the unit. Padmé thought he was laughing verysoftly.

“He did make one,” Anakin whispered.

He drew his hands back, but the holocron remained, floatingeasily in the air. The red lines began to glow, and then to separate, and thenan image of Palpatine appeared, shrouded in black, only just larger thanPadmé’s hand.

She drew in a sharp breath and stepped back as a voice she’dheard recently only in her nightmares began to speak.

Anakin’s grin was sharp and violent. He slashed the air withhis hand, and something in the holocron sparked and snapped. Palpatine’sterrible voice died. Smoke curled from the bottom of the device.

“You don’t get to speak,” Anakin hissed. “Not ever again.But you’re going to watch.”

It must have been an illusion, Padmé thought. Holocrons wereteaching tools, but they were only minimally interactive and they certainlydidn’t possess any measure of sentience. So she must have imagined the suddenrage that twisted Palpatine’s face.

The Emperor’s lips were still moving, but whatever he had tosay would never be heard now.

“Of course a Sith holocron can’t be destroyed by justanyone,” Anakin said, evidently directing his words at Palpatine’s image. “Noteven by a Jedi. Security precautions. Access only to those who are worthy.That’s what you always said.”

Anakin selected the midmost holocron from the top shelf. Heheld it easily in his right hand as he addressed the hologram.

“But you made me a Sith, Master,” he said. “Not worthy ofthis knowledge, oh no. Of course not. But well trained. Enough to do this.” Hechuckled suddenly, his hand tightening around the ancient holocron. “This isDarth Bane, isn’t it? The last and first. The founder. You always said he wasthe greatest of all the Sith, apart from you, of course.”

Anakin smiled.

A sudden sharp premonition made Padmé step back again. Dinsafollowed, moving back several paces to stand beside Sabé, her eyes dartingquickly between Anakin and the floating image of Palpatine.

“This is your legacy, Master,”Anakin said, and lightning sparked from his fingers, blue and bright andcrackling with ozone.

The holocron melted into slag and dripped to the floor.

Something howled.

It was a scream without a voice, filling the breathless airof the room and echoing back through her mind, burning like a star going nova.The darkness swallowed it.

I will destroy himcompletely, Padmé remembered Anakin saying, and how they’d both hoped thatPalpatine was watching from whatever reality waited after death.

She looked again at Anakin. He stood in profile, his face aferocious mask of shadow and reflected blue fire, another holocron alreadymelting from his fingers. At his feet was a steadily growing pile of slag. Hiseyes shone as blue as the flame.

The Force was screaming.

Barriss felt it where she waited, pacing her quarters untilAhsoka returned from her meeting with the Council. The feeling tore into her,leaving her blinking and off balance, suddenly unsure of the reality around her.Something was shifting, but she didn’t know what, and she wasn’t certain if itwould prove to be for good or ill. She only knew that it felt like a beginning.

The members of the Council felt it where they sat injudgment. Master Windu’s arm shook with it, and Ahsoka’s lightsaber fell to thefloor. Master Yoda grimaced and clutched his head in pain. Masters Dooku and Nuflinched as well, but their eyes found one another and something unspoken andsignificant passed there, unseen by the rest. Master Gallia’s eyes slippedclosed, and Master Kenobi’s hands clenched the arms of his chair so tightlythat his knuckles shone translucent.

Ahsoka herself staggered in the center of the CouncilChamber, gasping for breath, half elated and half terrified and not knowingwhy.

The younglings felt it, gathered together in the mess hallunder the supervision of two of the older padawans. They felt the shift butcouldn’t name it, and they clung to one another, wishing that Lahksa andBarriss were there to promise everything would be okay.

The howling in the Force went on and on, until suddensilence fell.

And then there was Light.

The Jedi Council was waiting in Padmé’s receiving room.

None of the security systems had been triggered, and they’dhad no warning from 500 Republica’s security team, either. It was all tooobvious that Padmé and her handmaidens weren’t expecting to find guests in herapartment.

Maybe Anakin should have said something, after all.

The Jedi rose as they entered, and Padmé started visibly,her hand reaching automatically for the blaster at her hip and half-drawing itbefore she stopped herself. Dormé and Sabé had moved to shield her, theirblasters already leveled at the intruders. Even after the moment of initialsurprise had passed, they didn’t back down. Dormé, in particular, looked furiousand was making no effort to hide it.

That was…a relief, Anakin thought. It was good to know thather loyalty to Padmé was so absolute, that she wouldn’t cower to the Jedi anymore than she would to him.

Anakin himself eyed the Jedi with undisguised amusement. Hedidn’t bother to pretend surprise. He didn’t bother with innocence, either. Theacrid scent of melted metal and plastic still clung to him, and he didn’t doubtthe Jedi had noticed. But he’d let them wonder, just a bit longer.

“Welcome back, Vader,” Windu snapped, his voice bone dry.The other members of the Council spread themselves around the room, circlingAnakin loosely, their hands hovering easily near their lightsabers. They’dapparently decided to ignore the presence of Padmé and her entourage entirely.Anakin bit back a laugh. The last Master who’d done that had required a genetictest to identify his body afterwards.

He wouldn’t make that mistake. His eyes darted quicklyaround the room, blocking people and things in a mental map. The Jedisurrounded him, which meant they surrounded Padmé and her handmaidens, as well.Dinsa and Jothra had fallen back slightly, their eyes fixed on him, waiting fora signal.

Anakin only smiled. He’d expected this. Counted on it, even.

There were few things Jedi disliked more than the game ofpolitical nicety. Anakin had always thought this a strange quirk for afundamentally political organization. And it had served his Master well in thelast days of the old Republic. He wondered if the Jedi had fully realized thatyet.

So he arranged his expression in a mask of genteelpoliteness. He knew it was effective, because Padmé had told him once that itlooked entirely unnatural on his face. His Master had been quite capable ofportraying a genuine smile when it suited him, but Anakin had always found thatthe vague discomfort the wrongness of his society smile raised in others servedhim much better than a believable lie ever could.

“Hello, Master Jedi,” he said easily. “What can I help you withtoday?”

The members of the Jedi Council looked at one anotheruneasily. Anakin did not allow himself to grin.

“A great disturbance we sensed in the Force,” said Yodaseverely. “Many voices, crying out in rage and hate. A strong surge of the DarkSide, it was.”

“I see,” said Anakin, nodding politely. He could feel Padmélooking at him, but for now she kept her questions to herself, hidden behindher own neutral politician’s face.

Windu, apparently, had already run out of patience for thegame. “What did you do, Vader?” he growled.

Anakin laughed.

He hadn’t meant to. But he found now that he couldn’t holdit back. His Master’s holocron weighed heavy in his hand, the last remainingrelic of a dead world, and the Jedi still didn’t understand.

He looked at them each in turn, until his eyes landed onJocasta Nu. She was watching him with open curiosity. It was such an unusualexpression on a Jedi that Anakin found himself unable to look away. Instead, headdressed his confession to her.

“I destroyed the Sith,” he said. And with the words herealized it was true. He was free. His vengeance was complete.

Almost.

There was a ripple of shock and frank disbelief in theForce, maybe even a hint of anger from several of the Jedi. He might have proddedat them with that knowledge under other circumstances. But not now.

Now, Anakin raised his fist and released the last Sithholocron. It floated in the air, lines of red light flaring, and opened on thehologram of his Master, his mouth still forming words that would never beheard.

“I wanted him to watch,” Anakin said, smiling at Nu’swidened eyes. “The others are all gone. Destroyed. Thousands of years of Sithknowledge and teaching, up in smoke. He is the last.”

He could sense Windu and Kenobi tensing, ready for anyopening he would give them. Dinsa and Jothra had moved closer to him again,which wasn’t entirely unexpected, but so had Padmé, and that was…

The warm weight of that knowledge was a distraction hecouldn’t afford to think about now.

Anything you hesitateto destroy is a chain, he could hear his Master saying. It was one of theoldest lessons.

Anakin looked down at the holocron and the silent, powerlessimage of his Master. But I am Unfettered,he thought, and laughed again.

Lightning sparked from his fingers, dancing over theholocron. For one breathless moment, his Master’s face seemed caught, elongatedin a terrible snarl. And then it melted away into the drip of molten metal andthe seared ozone smell of burning circuitry. The holocron dissolved. Now thereremained only a black, stinking pile of sludge on Padmé’s floor.

There was silence. Anakin flexed his fingers. The blue firealways left behind a strange, mildly unpleasant tingle.

“Well,” said Jothra brightly, “that’s going to be fun toclean up.” He prodded the sludge with the toe of his boot.

The absurdity of that statement was apparently enough torouse the Jedi from their shock.

“So,” said Windu. “You don’t know the location of the Sithlibrary.”

Anakin smiled brightly at him. “I didn’t when you asked meso politely before.”

The Jedi exchanged brief, nervous glances, all but Dooku andNu, who looked openly confused. Well. That was interesting.

“But I’ve found it now,” Anakin continued easily. “And I’vehelped you with a matter regarding the Sith. I believe that was our agreement,in the terms of my release? You wanted to find the Sith holocrons, and I foundthem for you. And I destroyed them.”

The Jedi exchanged a glance. Anakin knew he was stretchingthe terms of his parole, but he also knew that Senator Amidala was standingbeside him, that she too was inside the circle of Jedi, and he was counting onthat. Whatever they might do to him, the Jedi would only push the Senate sofar.

And he was right.

“Proof of this, have you?” asked Yoda, his eyes narrowed andhis ears lowered. The question itself was a concession, and they all knew it.

“He has witnesses,” said Padmé. Her chin was raised and hereyes flashed and she stepped just slightly in front of him, almost unthinkinglyprotective. For just an instant, Anakin forgot that he couldn’t afford to bedistracted.

The rustle of movement at his side brought him back to themoment. “And he has holographic evidence,” said Jothra, grinning and hefting asmall datarecorder. Anakin turned to look at him in surprise. Jothra’s grinwidened. “Thought you might want it later, Boss,” he said. “A nice memento,that kind of thing.”

Sabé let out a snort of laughter. “We can also take you tothe storeroom,” she said with a shrug for the Jedi’s benefit. She too nudgedthe black sludge on Padmé’s floor with her boot, then pulled her foot away withan exaggerated grimace of distaste. “If you want to see the other pile of goo,that is.”

“That would be appreciated,” said Dooku. His tone containednothing but distant, polite interest. Anakin was impressed. There was one Jedi,at least, who understood how the game was played.

“You won’t all need to go, I trust?” said Dormé sweetly.“Surely, Master Jedi, someone could be spared to discuss the Senator’s securitywith me?”

The Jedi exchanged another, longer set of glances. At lastKenobi seemed to draw himself up – like a man preparing himself to facetorture, but determined to keep a brave face on it, Anakin thought. He bit hislip to hold back a wholly inappropriate laugh.

“It would be my pleasure, Milady,” Kenobi said.

#replies #mermaidelephant #i write things #star wars #anabasis #anabasis spoilers #seriously so many spoilers #tho without context some of them may not be obvious #also yes this was incredibly satisfying to write #i can't even lie #and in other news #anakin really likes it when padme defends him #and poor obi-wan is the junior member of the council and always gets stuck with the least fun jobs #one of the strangest things about writing anabasis #is that anabasis anakin is actually really good at the political game #the kid was essentially raised by palpatine #he's cynical as hell and he doesn't actually /like/ politics any more than his canon counterpart #but he's good at it #and listen i'm not saying padme sometimes enjoys watching him run circles around orn free taa #(but she totally does)#padme amidala #anakin skywalker #sabe #dinsa atray #jothra pavin #obi-wan kenobi #and a bunch of other people but this is more than enough tags already

317 notes · View notes

xseelenfrieden · 7 years

Text

Scarecrow

So with all of the theories going around, whether Scarecrow could be Hide or not, I got inspired to write this little thingy.

Pls note that this is my first time writing a fanfiction and that English is not my first language! So If you spot any mistakes or things I could improve on, don’t hesitate to tell me!

You can also read this on AO3!

Fandom: Tokyo Ghoul

Characters: Hide (centric), Kaneki, Touka (slight Hidekane)

Word count: 1765

Rating: G - T ? I’m not really familiar with this tbh

Preview: He could not wait to finally see his face up close again, to finally talk to him again. And boy, they needed to have a long talk as soon as possible. A talk that would clear up everything, solve all the misunderstandings and bring them back a part of all the time they lost. Four years were such a long time and he wondered what had changed. Would he even be able to recognize him anymore? His face certainly looked a little different than it did before.

Read it under the cut!

It was the valentines day fair. And everybody was fighting.

There were tons of corpses littering the floor where just a few moments ago people had been standing and celebrating. Some of the attendants might have thought that the ghouls would not be this cruel. They surely would not plan an attack during a festival of love and peace, right? But they were wrong. They did not expect the sheer ferocity that was the clowns.

Now most of them laid on the ground, bathing in their own blood or the blood of other citizens. Yet the battle continued and got even more brutal when the CCG arrived.

Everyone was fearing for their lives, trying to get away and protect their loved ones at all costs. Because of that, nobody noticed the dark figure standing in an alleyway and carefully observing the events. Their silhouette looked like the one of an old man, clothed in a thick coat and a hat. But what one could not see was his face. It was covered by an old looking straw sack with a henohenomoheji-face painted onto it. The same face young school children would use for their kakashi, thus earning himself the name of 'Scarecrow'.

How he could remain unnoticed by clowns and humans alike was a mystery. Strangely, he seemed to always know when exactly he had to leave his hiding spot, so that the investigators entering the now deserted alleyway were only able to pick up a silent and quickly disappearing cough, if they listened closely.

Like that he managed to quietly observe the whole battle and take notes in his head concerning certain investigators that could become useful in the future. That was, however, until a particular group of ghouls entered the raging battle in the 22nd ward. Their white suits could be seen from far away, sticking out of the smoke and shining in the sunlight. Nobody knew who that group was and what they had in mind, except for the individual called 'Scarecrow' who would have recognized their leader in any time and place. Just one look at the mask covering his face, his hair and the way he moved had him retreating further into the small alley. How could it be that he and his group chose to appear right at the place he was currently investigating? He had certainly not planned a meeting this early, which meant that he had to be extra careful to not be noticed by the new ghouls. He could see it in the eyes hidden behind their masks that their senses were on a whole new level which would serve as quite the challenge for his hiding skills.

The 'Scarecrow' was just moving to head deeper into the alley he was currently standing in when his eyes ghosted over the group of ghouls once again and then met with the one of their leader. Of course he knew that he could not recognize him in any possible way due to his disguise but the look he saw in his eye triggered something in his mind and body, which had him stumbling backwards and quickly hiding at the end of the alleyway behind some boxes.

How long had it been since he had seen this eye or his other one this close? He wondered if it had always looked this lost. Of course you could also see the determination and strength lying behind this orb, but if you looked closely all that disappeared and what was left was the eye of a disorientated little boy, totally lost in the role he had to fulfil. Was he the only one who noticed this? Was this boy completely alone with all of his insecurities and hidden doubts?

Thinking of that urged him to just run out of this alley to the side of the ghoul and pull him into a warm hug. A hug, which they had shared once before, in a time and place long gone and forgotten. He had to try his hardest to resist that urge. It was affecting his throat more than all the running and hiding he had been doing on this day and he was starting to cough once again. Just like the other times the pain seemed to spread from that one specific point just above his left collarbone through his throat and neck to reach his left cheek. It usually faded after a few moments but this time his large scar continued to ache for more than five, long minutes.

'I can't go on like this', he thought to himself, still coughing and hiding behind the boxes, 'I need to get out of here before anyone notices me.'

He could certainly not risk being discovered and arrested when he had already gathered this much information and was just about to meet up with the person, he had been hiding from for all those years by now. Until now there was just one person who knew what he had been doing for all this time. Hopefully, she had kept quiet, like he told her to. Soon the wait would be over after all.

After taking a few moments to gather his remaining breath, the figure got up, cast one last glance towards the familiar ghoul fighting on the bloody street and then made his way through narrow, dark alleys until he reached a seemingly abandoned apartment building.

Of course he had another small apartment in the 15th ward, where he spent most of the time he was not undergoing some examinations in the hospital. But for his private investigations he needed another hideout to store his disguise and weapons, so that nobody in his neighbourhood would be suspicious of him. Luckily, he managed to discover this empty building during one of his long walks through the different parts of Tokyo. It was perfect. Due to the barricaded windows and doors, nobody could see what was going on inside and he could go after his work undisturbed.

Standing on his tiptoes, he pulled down the fire ladder which he then used to climb up to a window on the second floor. He barely made it inside the dusty and dark room, until he broke down, coughing and fiddling with the rope around his neck that held his mask in place.

The moment he managed to loosen it, he pulled away the straw sack and took a deep, long breath. It really felt good to finally breath some fresh air again, even if it was filled with dust and every little breath hurt his throat. Absently he raised his hand to touch the centre of the pain, right below his Adam's apple but quickly flinched away when he made contact with the leather-like texture of his scar. He could not live through one day of his life without being reminded of that certain day and the decision he had made. Did he feel any regret? Not really, if he thought about it. He managed to save his best friend without dying in the process, which was a great success from his point of view.

With the pain being mostly gone now, he moved to lay on his back and stare at the ceiling. 'This poor guy probably still doesn't know a thing about what was going on', he thought to himself while shaking his head. And it was not easy for him either. Hearing and seeing his best friend fight (and almost die) at the auction had caused him so much grief. He had wanted to reveal himself to him so badly, but also known that he would not have remembered him. It was not his fault, he knew that. To remember everything he needed to fight even more battles, mostly within himself. And now, that he finally knew who he was, the timing was not right again.

He had already spoken with that other person and she supported his belief that this reveal would just distract him from the important task at hand and their new organization, Goat.

A silent, suffocated giggle escaped his lips.

'Seriously, who else would've come up with such a name, if not you?'

He could not wait to finally see his face up close again, to finally talk to him again. And boy, they needed to have a long talk as soon as possible. A talk that would clear up everything, solve all the misunderstandings and bring them back a part of all the time they lost. Four years were such a long time and he wondered what had changed. Would he even be able to recognize him anymore? His face certainly looked a little different than it did before.

Having thought of that, he got up and walked over to a dusty mirror hanging from one of the broken, old walls. It was like a miracle that it only had one large crack, going straight through the middle and dividing the face of the person looking into it in two halves.

The right half of his face was mostly unscathed except for a scar over his eyebrow and, of course, the large one beginning at the crook of his neck.

He brushed his now dark brown, shoulder long hair out of the way to reveal his whole throat. The leather-like scar was starting at his left collar bone, went on to covering nearly all of his throat from just below his Adam's apple onwards and then moved to his left cheek where it stopped just below his cheek bone. It was not nice to look at, but it did not disfigure him either. It was just there, a constant reminder of that night and of his undying devotion and love towards his most precious person.

If not having this scar meant abandoning him in that important moment, he would choose to wear it for his whole lifetime. After all, the doctors did everything they could and now he was able to almost live a normal life, except for having to visit the hospital every week and not being able to speak properly anymore. In his view it was a relatively small prize he had to pay for being able to save that special person. And now it would not be long until they could finally meet again. If everything went right, he would be waiting for him at the coffee shop in just a few days time.

A soft smile formed on his lips and he looked directly into the mirror.

'I can't wait to see the look on you face when I finally come home, Ken.'

28 notes · View notes

dalishious · 7 years

Text

Asunder Ch4 & Ch5 Greatest Hits

(Previous)

I’m combining these two chapters because separate there’s not a lot of content.

TL;DR: Wynne needs to get off her high horse

Well, what better way to start this than a quote about how things could so easily be better in the Circle?

[Cole] was also a perfect example of why the Circle didn't work. What if mages had been there to greet his arrival at the tower, with understanding rather than fear and scorn? What if he had been made to realize his talent wasn't terrifying, but unique and fascinating? -pg 37

This is part of Rhys reflecting on his time with Cole, who is living in the abandoned, run-down part of the tower. Rhys, who has a special connection with spirits, is the only one who can see and remember him. But at this point, Rhys isn’t really sure what Cole actually is. All Cole says is that he was brought by the templars, somehow got out, and is now somehow invisible. Like, Rhys isn’t even all that shocked to hear his horrid story. He’s probably heard it a thousand times.

Meanwhile, Evangeline is going to follow Rhys. Oh, Evangeline. Much like most of the characters in this book, one minute you seem okay, and the next, you say shit like this:

"So are we mages now confined to our chambers?" the First Enchanter called up to her. "Traditionally we have always been given the run of the tower. You cannot squeeze people into a smaller and smaller box and hope they will disappear." "Or there will be a rebellion? As in Kirkwall?" She allowed more annoyance into her voice than she intended. As she descended the stairs, blood vial in hand, she tried to keep her temper under control. "Conditions were harsh there, I'll grant you that. Considering all that's happened, I'd hope even you might agree it's not the same thing." He shrugged. "An attack on the Divine was foolish, without a doubt. All I ask is that we not all pay for one man's crime." Evangeline reached the bottom of the stairs and turned to him. "Perhaps Enchanter Rhys is not involved after all. What if he is being stabbed right now, to cover up someone else's guilt? The templars are here to protect mages, whether you like it or not." "Even if it kills us?" The man absently waved away her immediate retort. -pg 43-44

Every time someone says “Conditions were harsh” in Kirkwall, the Understatement Fairy gains another year of life.

What the First Enchanter is saying is not at all unreasonable. Last time I checked, every single templar isn’t punished when one commits a crime. (Although, the criminal templar is rarely punished themselves.)

At that last bit, oh my god.

Once, she supposed, these dungeons had been full, and the ancient torture chambers had seen regular use. She shuddered at the thought that those devices might ever be dusted off once again. It could come to that, if the mages pushed it. Evangeline wasn't foolish enough to imagine otherwise, and hopefully neither were they. -pg 44

I really love how she sees it as the mages forcing torture to be used. Love, as in wanting to puke. That is like, victim-blaming at it’s core.

Well, Rhys ends up confronting Cole about the murders going on. He then wants to take him and tell everyone, scaring Cole and a fight ensues. Evangeline catches Rhys seemingly destroying shit all on his own. Having already been suspected as part of the plot to kill the Divine, he gets taken to the dungeons himself.

They hold him for four days, without food or water. He is interrogated by Evangeline. He spends his time in the dark, crying, realizing what Cole had meant now, until eventually templars come and tell him he’s being released. They give him the first meal he’s seen in ages.

It was cold, practically congealed, but he didn't care. He shoved it into his mouth so fast he almost gagged, but it was still the best meal he could remember. The water poured down his throat like ambrosia. And then he keeled over, his stomach protesting violently. Kneeling on the ground he clutched at his guts while the men laughed. -pg 48

Rhys was held in the dungeon without food or water for four days. And the templars' reaction to his pain is laughter.

After an elven tranquil girl helps him clean up, he’s brought out with the rest of the mages in a gathering. This next scene is so awesome, I had to highlight it in itself here. Basically, Wynne shows up, says the mages need to just shut up and do what they’re told in hopes of not being punished more severely, and Rhys calls her the fuck out.

I suppose now’s as good a time as any to insert this:

Rhys watched in disgust as two mages started shoving each other nearby. One was a Libertarian, while the other was part of the Loyalist fraternity —"Chantry apologists," as some liked to call them, for they advocated obedience to the Chantry and bitterly opposed all attempts at independence. -pg 54

I only want to point this out because I think some people think the term 'Chantry apologists' was made by fandom, but it's not. It's used in canon to describe people who are pro Chantry.

Anyway, after it’s over, Rhys is called up to Seeker Lambert’s office. Adrian tags along and, as she says, “invites herself.”

This is the part where we find out Wynne is Rhys’ mother, as he greets her as such. She then, despite their public argument, says she needs his help in saving a friend who’s become an abomination (by going through what was went through in DA:O.) But not just any friend, a tranquil. Who, you know, isn’t supposed to be able to be possessed.

"My help?" Rhys glanced at the Lord Seeker, and then Ser Evangeline, but their stony expressions offered no enlightenment. "What could you need my help for? And why would I offer it?" "Would you rather go back to the dungeons?" the Lord Seeker interjected. Rhys didn't answer. Inwardly he rankled at the threat. Wynne merely nodded, as if his reply was nothing more than she expected. -pg 56

This just about sums up their relationship, TBH.

Lambert has a hissy fit, so Wynne shoves a message from the Divine down his throat (okay, she actually just gives it to him) that basically says “I can do what I want.”

Well, Lambert grants it as long as Evangeline goes as an escort. He warns Wynne that “If your intention is to spare your son from justice, you will not be successful. Even the Divine will not protect you if our investigation is interfered with.” Ugh. Go soak your head, Lambert. This doesn’t even make sense, considering Wynne’s very appearance was her saying all the mages need to bend to the templars, or whatever. When has she, since appearing a few pages ago, even hinted at being anything but a ‘Chantry apologist?’

So, Rhys agrees to go, on account of the other option being back to the dungeons. But he requests Adrian come as well. Because someone needs to save this story. (And because Rhys doesn’t want her taking his place in his cell.)

And so the chapter ends, with Rhys just happy he’s getting out of the tower before his execution. What a silver lining, that is.

(Oh boys, do our heroes not even know what’s in store lmao.)

#asunder #asunder greatest hits #dragon age #pro mage #anti templar #anti wynne

42 notes · View notes

katyjustso · 7 years

Text

It is my first post of the year so I shall begin with the obligatory…

#gallery-0-6 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-6 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 100%; } #gallery-0-6 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-6 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

Yes, it’s the fucking 19th alright?

New Year, New Me.

Except it’s less an Emphatic Statement of Intent and more a Bewildered Question.

New Year, New Me…?

Erm….perhaps next year.

Listen, you’re going to have to excuse me for a minute because I’ve reached that age (and weight) where I can no longer blithely dismiss sudden chest pain as ‘just trapped wind’ and it feels like someone just dropped a breeze-block on my sternum. I better go and investigate. I’ll be back (I hope).

Yup. Just a massive fart. Yet more of the anxiety wind which is currently blowing through my life. Anxiety, you say? This early on in the year? Even with the kids safely installed back at school?

Well, yes.

Sadly, I haven’t had the kick-ass start to the year I was dreaming about. More a massive kick you UP the ass kind of start to the year that I could not have anticipated in a billion years.

The wank start to 2017 comes hot on the heels of a fairly dog-shit end to 2016 which left me uncharacteristically desperate for the festivities to end and gagging for the 1st of January.

I use the term dog-shit advisedly (believe it or not) because that’s what our festive period felt like tbh. Like, if Christmas 2016 was a spanking new pair of white Nike Tn’s, then I spent the majority of it trying to scrape off a steaming turd only to find I’d walked through it again.

But, much like a shit-covered shoe, our Christmas troubles were mere trifles; annoying inconveniences which rather threatened to spoil everything than actually doing so.

The main culprit was sickness and disease. Having swerved such things at Christmas for the last 16 years or so, I guess we were due a turn. But it’s always crap when your kids are poorly and it’s even crapper at Christmas.

A particular highlight (for me, not him) was Thom’s impeccable sick-etiquette on Christmas morning. Not wanting to spoil the splendour of the occasion, Thom repeatedly asked to be accompanied to the kitchen between opening his own gifts so he could chuck up what was left of his little guts. Bless.

Although between MTV’s Bangin’ Bassline Christmas Hits (absolutely no fucking sign of Bing Crosby at alll) blaring out of the TV and the frenzied ripping of wrapping paper by his siblings, his bile-only retching would doubtless have gone unnoticed.

The real highlight of my Christmas morning is still telling the kids not to worry about dropping all the wrapping paper on the floor cos we don’t live with your anti-mess freak father anymore.

The smug satisfaction I still get from saying this after five years is quite shameful but in my defence, as a single mum at Christmas you’ll take any little win you can get.

I might have to chalk it up as a loss though, cos it’s one thing to let the kids open presents without following them around the room brandishing a carrier bag for the rubbish but when you use it as an excuse to leave the room strewn with wrapping paper and ribbon for about 10 days, you start to look less care-free and more lazy bastard.

So yeah. The ‘Noro-Virus’ did the rounds over Christmas. Noro-Virus sounds more sympathy evoking than 24hr bug. Also, I don’t think 24 hours carries sufficient gravitas when you’re 8 and the 24 hours in question starts at 11pm on Christmas Eve and lasts right the way through your Christmas dinner.

And, whilst I felt dreadfully sorry for Thom and his khaki coloured sick, my Christmas Eve wasn’t exactly all wine and wassail. Well, it wasn’t wine cos, recovering alcoholic obvs, so yeah that bit of Christmas has gone out of the window. But as is my Christmas custom, I still had about 80% of the wrapping to do once the little ones finally lost consciousness.

But no sooner had I rolled up my sleeves and attached my snazzy new ‘On-hand Sellotape dispenser” than I was interrupted by Thom’s tired and tremulous crying. Actually, to my shame (just add it to the fucking list shall we?), I sent the teen upstairs the first time I heard him crying and that was only after there was a break in the carols I had blaring out from the TV. The teen has even less patience than me, if that is even possible, so when he came downstairs after fifteen seconds armed with the considered conclusion that Thom was ‘over-excited’, I took him at his word and carried on with my frantic wrapping.

By 8am Christmas morning, there was a pile of presents under the tree that might as well have been wrapped by an 18 month old. I was so tired with darting up and down stairs to hold back Thom’s hair (oh, hang on, I don’t do that with him do I – so why does he need me?) as he was sick every half an hour that I’d barely bothered to hide all the tape and left over bows. Not that anyone noticed.

Boxing Day saw the girl fall foul of the wretched bug and the day after that had me dashing between bathroom and bedroom all day.

*Sigh*

God.

With all this festive digression, I have quite forgotten the subject of my post. Which is a relief actually, cos it’s fucking painful to think about.

The reason I have entitled this post The Moving Memoirs #1 is not because I believe these posts will be moving in any emotional sense. Whatsoever. They will be filled with a shit load of whingeing and bitching about various stuff going on but this is not a sympathy seeking exercise. I can’t be arsed. No, I shan’t be moving anyone to tears.

For you eagle-eyed readers, the #1 is not accidental. The thread of this blog will probably take at least three months to exhaust itself and so I may manage to write a few more posts. That’s not a threat, nor am I making any promises. I am struggling to write at the moment. I am struggling to do most things. Functioning is at an all-time low.

So. Not trying to ‘move’ anybody emotionally and it might be a three month long series. Dunt take a genius to work out that the moving in question is a house move and I shall be blogging about this for the foreseeable future.

I have moved house before but in the five years that we’ve lived where we live now, so much has changed, and I fear this move is going to be pretty different to any I’ve done before.

So. I remember seeing something on Pinterest once – like a ‘countdown to moving day’ list or something like that. I must have read it cos I sort of remember it saying shit like this:

Three months before you move

Begin to compile a list of removal companies you could use

Make an inventory of each room

Invest in some ‘packing boxes’ and begin to label them by room

One month before you move

Inform the relevant phone and cable TV companies of your impending move

Start wrapping your breakables in newspaper

The day before you move

Make sure you have left the kettle and other essentials out for your last day

Have your gas and electric meters read (my mother just told me this…seriously I have no idea about this shit.)

The day of the move

Get up early

Blah

Fucking blah

Right. You get the picture.

Here is how my list thus far with my confident predictions for the next few months:

Three months before (eviction notice served)

Spend 36 hours in a stunned stupor because you can’t believe your home will no longer be your actual home in ninety days

Say ‘fuck’. A lot

Cry

Hide under a duvet

Desperately call parents and incomprehensibly wail about impending homelessness

Two months before

Still say fuck. A lot. Also shit, wanker, twat and bastard. For example:

(a) “What the fuck are we actually going to do though?”

(b) “You tell me where we’re going to fucking live then you stupid fucking twat.”

And so on.

More crying

Spend excessive amounts of time on sofa whilst permanently hiding under a blanket that now hasn’t been washed for six weeks and is covered in tears, snot, chocolate and crumbs

Eat everything you see that is in the sugar/carbs group

Stop cleaning the house in a kind of half-assed protest over being evicted

Continue to barrage those close to you with totally inappropriate over-emotional calls about your ‘desperate’ predicament

One week before

Resign yourself to fact that you are absolutely fucked and you’re going to end up moving you and your three children into your mother’s house

Start hurling random things in Morrison’s carrier bags whilst telling everyone how you’ve ‘nearly finished packing’

Panic and start throwing away things you need simply cos you don’t know what box to put them in. Seriously, do tea-lights go in the box marked kitchen or living room? You fucking tell me.

Order a massive skip that you can’t afford whilst kidding yourself (but actually nobody else) that THIS time you mean it when you say you are going to de-clutter. Then spend two of the three days you’ve hired it for watching inconspicuous members of the public (seriously, they may as well put on a comedy moustache and glasses) surreptitiously chucking all manner of shit into YOUR skip because THEY’RE too fucking tight to hire one themselves.

On the evening before the skip is due to be collected, gaze in wonder and horror at how little space there is left to put your own mountain of crap into now the skip-jackers have filled it.

Try to remedy this problem by shifting all the contraband crap to one corner of the skip.

Stumble upon at least four priceless pieces of other people’s crap you can’t believe has been thrown away and now you can’t possibly live without. Like, we could be talking about a fucking lava lamp or a scabby nest of tables that you just know you could upcycle with that tin of Annie Sloane pain that has been gathering dust in your garage for the last three years. Y’know, ever since you abandoned upcycling that old book shelf you had and ordered a brand spanking new one off ov Very instead.

Seriously, you are genuinely thinking how unbelievable it is what people will throw away as you cradle your new free treasures (one man’s trash etc..) and take them into your already shit laden abode. At this point, it is fair to say that the balance of your mind is clearly disturbed because the child’s manky old bicycle you’ve picked up has only got one wheel and is clearly for a four year old. Your youngest child is 8.

OK. I’m majorly rambling now but are you getting the diabolical picture?

Moving house is a great big pile of shitty turd. Moving house is something you don’t want to do even when you do want to do it. As in, when you’ve chosen to move out, onwards and upwards in your life.

But when your only reason for moving is a big fat eviction notice that couldn’t have been any less expected if it had parachuted through the letter-box and kicked you in the fanny, well, the prospect of moving is bloody, fucking, shitting, bastard horrible.

So. There you go.

My blogging raison d’etre for the next ninety days – give or take.

If the last fortnight is anything to go by there will be tears, tantrums and possibly some hilarious moments – like when I tell my kids that two of them are going to have to share a bedroom (jokes. It’ll obviously be me hunkering down on the sofa until one of the little bleeders moves out).

Arm yourself.

It ain’t gonna be pretty.

The Moving Memoirs #1 It is my first post of the year so I shall begin with the obligatory… New Year, New Me.

1 note · View note