#the loose structure of it (and by loose i mean barely held together) is carrie to flynn to flarrie

[thewritingcoroner]

TGT Chapter 1: Sneak Peek

Hey guys! I’ve been working real hard on this first chapter, I’ve got some edits to do and some fleshing out, but I wanted to give you guys a sneak peek into the first chapter sooner rather than later.

Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash

Chapter 1

This was the third time Reese traveled to the Blossom, and yet the winding roots rising from the earth, the twisting bark, and stretching branches reaching far beyond her field of vision left her in a state of awe that stopped her in her tracks every single time. In its essence, the Blossom was a tree. But it was so much more than just a tree. It was the center of their planet, the center of their universe. Its life force pulsed within each of them and it was this life force that empowered them to live their lives in reverence of its far-reaching glory. Reese knew the stories and the magic behind it all, but that didn’t mean she quite understood it. Guardians, like her, didn’t typically understand such things. Their jobs were to be the protectors of the protectors. The front lines in a never-ending war they have fought since the beginning of time. The Blossom was sacred, and it was their duty as its servants to protect it from all beings that would wish it harm.

A shiver went down her spine. She didn’t need to think of that today. She need only focus on herself and whichever Initiate this Pairing was organized for. But she did allow herself another moment to admire the Blossom before starting towards its base. It had taken years and years to convince the Elder Council to build the tower at its base. The tower was a simple wooden structure carefully woven so that it appeared as naturally occurring as the bark itself. It reached into the sky almost so high up it couldn’t be seen from the ground and its tip met the top of the lowest branch. Many years ago, Reese would have had to climb up there herself, risking falling to her death until the tower had been built. The branch was more than wide enough for ceremonies to be held, and its connection to the Blossom made it the most sacred place for only the most important ceremonies to be held.

The tower itself was creaky, and every step screeched under the weight of her boot. But she paid it no mind, this was her third time climbing up this many stairs, and she wasn’t looking forward to the trip. Though going down wasn’t too bad.

When she finally reached the top, she could see beyond the furthest reaches of the forest. This high up, she could see the roots of the Blossom stretch scars in the surrounding wood. She was amazed each time how far the roots of this single tree reached. She scanned the rest of the horizon, enjoying the sunset. She could see the sun dipping beyond the curvature of the planet, orange pooling across the horizon. Slowly, as she looked away from the sunset itself, the colors turned yellow then faded to blue and finally a rich purple. The breeze ruffled her short-cropped hair, and the wind whistled in her ears without the hair to buffer sound. It was chilly so high up, and Reese wrapped her arms around herself, gripping her bare biceps in an attempt to quell the goosebumps erupting over her skin.

She turned away from the view towards the ceremony as people gathered around close to the trunk of the Blossom. Reese wandered over in her own time, taking in the crowd as she walked. Everyone was tattooed, though Reese was no exception. She could easily pick out who was a Guardian and who was Soul. The Guardians had sharp, jagged tattoos that striped across their skin in a primal manner. They were meant to look gruff and strong, and Reese would have to admit that they got across the message. Between the tattoos and the many jagged scars the older Guardians typically had, it was not hard to tell that these people were meant to be tough. The Soul, on the other hand, were far softer. They dressed in earthy tones and their tattoos swirled around their skin with soft curves and spirals in a pattern that Reese couldn’t quite identify, though she was sure it meant something. The Soul were like that, they had a meaning behind everything they did.

The Soul gathered into a tight circle, talking, laughing. They were so carefree. But their Guardians stood around them, arms crossed, silently watching the crowd work itself out. They weren’t unfriendly, but they were battle-hardened and while they were safe, they couldn’t let their guards down even if they tried. They were all armed, usually with a short sword of some design, entirely dependent on their comfort, and a dagger or short knife on their non-dominant side. Reese liked to carry a short sword with a broad blade, great for hacking, that narrowed closer toward the hilt. It had a sharp corner on the unsharpened side of the blade she could use to hook and tear. The sword itself was no longer than an arm’s length, it was light and easily maneuverable and Reese loved it. Her non-dominant side weapon was a short dagger, no longer than the length of her hand from fingertip to wrist, with a handle that sat perpendicular to the blade so that she could wrap her fingers around the handle with the blade sticking out between her knuckles. Her dagger was the killing weapon, when it came to fighting the Lost Souls that fed on the magic of the Blossom and its protectors, she needed something small and easily handled in close-range combat. She had chosen this specific dagger and sword combination for a number of reasons, while comfort was a priority, it was mainly strategic.

Reese finally reached the outside of the circle, nodding at the Guardians when they nodded at her. There was a break in the crowd of Soul, and Reese froze.

It was Wil.

They grew up in the same village not far from the Blossom itself. But they were not friends. Far from it. Reese frankly hated her. Wil was pretentious and nerdy. She always seemed to have something better to do with her time rather than talk to Reese. Of the few children in their village, Wil was the only one with a connection to the Blossom, and so she became their village’s newest initiate to the Soul. She acted like it. The rest of the village kissed the ground Wil walked on, but she paid them no mind at all, stuck her nose in her books and left the work to be done by the Guardians surrounding her.

Wil was all soft curves and gentle colors. Most Soul had bright blue eyes, and Wil was no exception. The blue contrasted brightly against her darker skin, and Reese would never, ever admit it, but she thought that Wil had very pretty eyes. Perhaps in her darker moments in her childhood, she desperately wanted Wil to notice her, to just talk to her once, but Wil was distant in a way that seemed so unapproachable. When they were teenagers, and coming into their responsibilities around the village and in the larger scheme of the world, they clashed. Reese’s desire to be around Wil waned pretty quickly, leaving her desperate to stay away from Wil, but thrown together in just about every exercise their separate mentors could think of. While Reese trained for the real world, Wil kept her head in the clouds like the rest of the Soul she wanted to join. Wil’s tattoos swirled against her skin, Reese could see that they were beginning to peel, meaning they were only a few days old. The swirls accentuated the softness of her body, and Reese absently thought that perhaps her skin would be soft to the touch.

But that would be weird.

Reese had no idea that Wil had finally joined the Soul. She had been a Guardian waiting for her Pairing for nearly three years now, and thus had been far away from the village she had grown up in. Far away from Wil. She thought she would be Paired by the time Wil finished her studies.

Wil’s eyes met Reese’s while she spoke to an older Soul. For what it’s worth, Wil didn’t even falter. Reese would take her cue from her then, if Wil had nothing to worry about, then Reese supposed she didn’t either. Besides, after a childhood filled with clashing and avoidance, there was no way they could possibly be Paired. To be Paired, the Soul and their Guardian had to be connected in a way far too intimate for two people who hated each other.

It wasn’t long before Wil finished her conversation and made her way towards Reese.

“I would have thought you were Paired by now.” Wil drawled, smirking only slightly. “It’s been awhile.”

Reese had to hold back a snarl. “It’s about time you joined the Soul. I was beginning to think you’d be an initiate forever.”

Wil’s smirk dropped, eyes narrowing in to glare at her. “It’s been awhile but I see you haven’t changed.”

“Neither have you.”

Wil scoffed. “Well, I suppose I pity you, until another initiate comes along you’re stuck in training.”

“I’ve got my tattoos thank you very much.” Reese retorted. “It’s just a matter of Pairing.”

“I pity the Soul stuck with you.”

“You seem to pity a lot. People might start to think you have a complex.”

Wil rolled her eyes, spinning on her heel; she walked away.

The ceremony started not long after that. The other Guardians expecting to Pair sat in a loose circle surrounding the Soul, who were sat in a tighter circle facing inwards. Wil walked towards the trunk of the Blossom, where a small, person-sized opening was visible. Reese knew the drill, though she could see some of the other Unpaired Guardians were confused. Wil would step through the Blossom and enter the center, where she would sit and connect with the life force of the Blossom. The Soul on the outside would band together to amplify the life forces of the Guardians surrounding them. Everyone would enter a trance, and the Blossom would begin to grow and swallow the Guardian whose life force pulsed in tandem with Wil’s. The Guardian would wake up in the center of the Blossom, sitting across from Wil, where they must forge their connection in order to leave the cavern.

She had nothing to worry about. She and Wil didn’t get along, there was no way they were on the same wavelength in any way, shape, or form. She sat down easily beside a new Guardian and gave him a quick, encouraging smile. He looked about ready to throw up, and Reese could relate.

The Guardians were instructed to close their eyes and begin to meditate, focusing on the pulsing life force within their bodies. Reese had done this before, so she was able to better locate the source of her energy than perhaps some of the other Guardians. It was a pulse just under the skin, not the same pulse as her heartbeat, but this one was quicker, like a war drum. There was a familiar hum around her, as the Soul in the center of the circle connected to the Blossom’s life force. Just barely below the hum of the Soul and the beating of her own force, she could hear the creaking of the bark surrounding her begin to move and swallow someone.

What was that tickling her leg?

Her eyes shot open. Everyone else was focused and fully in control of themselves, but Reese was being swallowed whole by a damn tree. The bark spilled over her legs, inching up to encase her hands and then her arms up to her elbows. The creaking grew louder as it worked its way up her stomach and back, and eventually swallowed the rest of her body up, leaving just her head free. On instinct, Reese took one last breath as she sunk below, fully encased in wood.

When she opened her eyes, it was dark, except for the body before her. Wil’s tattoos glowed, each swirl bright against the dark. Her eyes opened, and the blue gleamed, lighting up the cavern they sat in.

#creative writing #original writing #amwriting #wips #writeblr #writblr #wip #original fic #writers on tumblr #writing wip #authorblr #aspiring writer #aspiring author #authors of tumblr #multi chapter #multichap #fiction #na fiction #fantasy #lgbtq+ fantasy #tgt #tgt chapter 1 #chapter 1 #chapter sneak peek

[weltonreject]

our october traditions.

|| for @zombiebowlcut​ and their genius mind. boris’s first american halloween. || ao3

i.

Theo heaved two very large, but equally misshapen pumpkins onto the kitchen counter. Boris was staring at the newspaper-- upside, mind you-- and didn’t even notice Theo until he nearly placed a large gourd in his lap.

The newspaper folded down almost perfectly. “What is that?”

“It’s a pumpkin, shithead. We’re going to start decorating for Halloween.”

“What?” Boris furrowed his eyebrows and acted like Theo was speaking in tongues. They hadn’t even started drinking that afternoon; Theo made sure of it. It seemed a bit dangerous if either of them were under any sort of influence. “Decorating?”

“Yeah! I’m going to teach you how to carve a pumpkin.”

“...What?”

Theo ignored Boris’s confusion. “Okay so first, lay out the newspaper on the table while I get a knife or something.” Theo pointed loosely with his hand as he started pulling out kitchen drawers. He pretended he didn’t see the strangely filled sandwich bags and looked only for any useful utensils.

“Knife? To cut?” Boris said, stepping down from the chair. He dug in his pocket before snapping a switch blade out of his dark jeans. If Theo wasn’t looking, he would have mistaken it for his snapping wrist.

“Jesus, Boris. Since when in the fuck did you start carrying that around?”

“Um, got knife... from someone sleeping in my house.” Boris shrugged, turning it in his hand. It was slightly comforting to see the handle sitting somewhat uncomfortably in the palm of Boris’s hand. Of all the things he’d held, it was nice to see a weapon fit the worst.

“...Okay... I’m not gonna touch on that one. Just, um, make sure it’s, uh, clean and then pick your pumpkin.”

Boris flipped the blade in his hand, shrugging at it. Theo began unfolded the newspaper and spreading it over the counter island. He nodded toward Boris, who was still staring at the two pumpkins with indifferent disgust. At Theo’s instruction, again, he suddenly slapped his hand out onto the larger of the two.

“This one.” He said, almost proudly. “Is mine.”

“Do you have any ideas?” Theo had been a fan of the most simple triangular features for his jack-o-lanterns. His mother had always been the one with the artistic hand and the more inventive ideas. She made a bat one year, parts of the cutout left remaining to show the bones and structure of the wings. Theo tried to keep it up well into November, he’d loved it so much.

“Ideas about what, Potter? Have no idea what we are doing. Bring in strange fruits and ask me to pick, then to cut, then to-- ideas, Potter? Have one idea. You have lost mind. Desert has done lot to you. Je-sus.”

“You have to carve something into it, Jackass. You don’t just cut shit out. It’s decoration, not the ER left-overs of a bar fight.”

Boris smirked at him. “What do you know about bar fight? Would never do such a thing.”

“I’ll deck you right now, fuck off.” Theo shoved Boris harshly, forgetting for a moment he had a knife in his hands. Luckily, it clattered onto the table; Boris dropping it the moment Theo stepped up to him. He was more aware of the danger than Theo was. “Think of a face or something to cut out. It’s whatever you want.”

Boris mulled the concept over with surprising thought. He turned his head side to side, flopping his hair back and forth. It was in a matted clump from sleeping in Theo’s bed earlier-- really only getting up a few hours before. His lips pursed before he smacked them and clapped his hands deafeningly loud. It shook Theo enough to remind him to stop staring before Boris turned back to him.

“Have it. Can see it.” Boris reached for the knife.

“Wait! Hold on! You have to carve the top part out first. It’s the lid and how you get all the insides out.”

“Huh?”

“Cut around the stem so you can lift it up and out. Like a lid-- you’re supposed to put candles in jack-o-lanterns. And you can’t do that if it’s got all it’s guts inside.”

Theo thought he’d confused Boris more. But without much preamble, Boris bought the knife down into the top of the pumpkin. Both of his hands gripped the handle of the blade; it was still an uncomfortable object to wield. Thank God.

He practically hung over the pumpkin, trying to get his entire arm into it. Theo felt like he was watching a surgeon discover his love for anatomy.

“Ha! Is like putting hand inside someone.” Boris laughed, his elbow flexing as he moved his arm around. Theo could hear the pumpkin squishing in Boris’s hands, right between his fingers.

“Uck! Boris, that’s gross.”

“Do not mean intestines, Potter.” Boris said wryly, lifting his hand up and rolling his fingers around in the orange, stringy mess.

“EW! That’s fucking gross. That can not be what-- Ew. No. That’s gross. Fuck off.” Theo wanted to gag but didn’t want to look weak; able to handle insurmountable amounts of drugs but not looking at the inside of a pumpkin. Or hearing a possible comparison to some kind of sexual act. No, Theo couldn’t gag at that. Now how would that look.

It was in Theo’s best interest to let the topic go. To act like he and Boris weren’t familiar with what they were dancing around. No, it was better to grab the knife and just keep cutting.

ii.

Boris's pumpkin, in all honesty, looked better than Theo's. It was carved blindly and with half-committed Russian words that half-complimented, half-insulted the face. The eyes were round and wonky, trying to have pupils, but the concept of not completing a cut in order to keep some of the piece hanging in the empty space eluded them both. By the end, the pumpkin had eyes that were wide-open and startled. Unblinking. Refusing to give them any privacy, it seemed.

Theo stood a step farther away from Boris as they admired their work, but he wasn’t sure why. It was just a pumpkin. It was just them.

“I’ll grab some candles when we go out-- we can light them when it gets darker.” Theo said.

“Going where?”

“To the supermarket. We have to get candy.”

“Oh. Okay.” Boris seemed to have an argument, or at least a question, but there was an unfamiliar timidness in his acceptance. He put his hands in his pockets, as if keeping his rebuttal to himself.

“Typically, you don’t get your own candy.” Theo reassured Boris’s presumed knowledge. “We just have no houses for trick-or-treating. So we’re improvising.”

“Plan to do what? Ask for candy at supermarket?”

“No.” Theo laughed. He quickly tried to disguise his mockery of Boris’s naive and honest question. It was finally something Boris had very few and far between ideas about; Theo had to remember these weren’t traditions to Boris, yet. They were still all first iterations, first experiences-- all with Theo. “We’re going to steal some candy. I’ll grab you some, you grab me some. Then we’ll trade whatever we don’t want.”

It wasn’t a gift or favor if it didn’t cost either of them anything. Then again, love never cost anyone anything--

"Trick-or-treat.” Boris repeated, the concept emerging from his own embodiment of the word. “That is-- knock, yes? And the-- word.. ack, what is word, Potter? Over body. Um... Dis-guys?”

“Costume.” Theo blinked and snapped back to Boris’s face. It was no longer soft or amused-- furrowed in his confusion. “You aren’t really hiding from anyone. You don’t need a disguise. Just a costume.”

“Oh. Okay.” Boris held his arms up, looking at his sweater sleeves. “What is costume?”

They didn’t really have the means to be much of anything except maybe different variations of the same hungry children, but Theo quickly tried to come up with something. Boris couldn’t just be the kid who couldn’t afford a costume. "You can be Dracula!” Theo motioned to Boris’s conveniently monochromatic outfit. “That’s perfect! You’re... brooding enough.”

“And teeth!” Boris bared his crooked teeth, nearly perfectly angled for fangs. Almost close enough to bite too--

“You’ll terrorized everyone at the store.”

“Yes, can do that. But who are you?” Boris asked, lifting a weak hand toward Theo. He was in his old, far-rattier, sweater and a pair of slacks from his previous school. “Cannot be scary, Potter.”

"Uh-- hey!” Theo said, pursing his lips. He quickly changed to clenching his jaw; Xandra always pursed her lips or popped her hip. Theo stopped doing both to look more physically upset with Boris.

“You look like... Liberian!”

“... A librarian?” Theo said slowly, trying not to laugh. “Well thanks. I guess, then I can just be... I don’t know. Van Helsing, maybe?” Then we’d match, and we’d belong together in public. “Oh, but then we’d match-- I don’t know if that’s--”

“A victim!” Boris cheered, throwing his arms up and charging at Theo.

For a moment, Theo allowed himself to laugh. He ducked his head to the side-- all but fucking giggling like some little girl-- and letting Boris drop his arms on top of his shoulders. His arms were long and there was still distance. It was strange-- and it was suspicious from the outside, sure-- but it was still safe.

In another moment, one coming way too quickly, Theo felt his stomach try to rise up to his throat. Boris’s one hand braced the side of his neck, while the other looped under his arm and gripped his shoulder. His grip pulled on his clothes, tight but not as frantic as it had been before-- just the night before. The collar of Theo’s sweater moved away, a stitch quietly popping under Boris’s fingers. It made space for Boris’s teeth-- lips-- trying to find their spot on the side of Theo’s neck.

“What the fuck, man. Get off of me!” Theo cried, shoving Boris’s back harshly. He stumbled back but his hands were still on Theo. And he still wanted them to be. “Don’t fucking touch me like that.”

Theo wasn’t sure if he’d intended to slap or punch Boris. Either way, his hand made sharp and heavy contact with Boris’s mouth, his head snapping to the side as he staggered back. Theo readjusted his sweater in the immediate aftermath, his hands trying to echo where Boris’s had been, if only to relish the contact for a moment of imagination.

Boris stood, hunched over, cupping his mouth. “Fucking got me, Potter.” His hand fell away and he was smiling. His lip had split and blood was pooling around the curves of his bottom lip. Boris’s fingers played with the large droplet of sticky crimson guilt. “Ha! Look! Blood, Potter!”

“I-- yeah.” Theo knew better than to say the other forbidden word: sorry.

“Vampire! AH!”

“Yeah. Full vampire.”

Theo wondered, selfishly and disgustingly, what Boris’s teeth would have felt like playfully puncturing his neck and not his knuckles. The forbidden chance had been dangled in front of Theo, temptation grabbing him with a tight grip, and he blew it. Curiosity would be the most promising nightmare.

“Let’s go get some candy, before all the good stuff is gone.”

iii.

Theo scoured the aisle for mixed bags of snappable candy. Boris didn’t like the candy with sticky, chewy, stringy insides. No caramel, nougat, or that chewy coconut shit either. He liked candy that snapped when he bit down. It was something stupid and primal, Theo was sure, but the short, staccato laugh Boris let out when the snack would snap between his front top and bottom teeth was unforgettable-- and that night, desired.

If Theo could get Boris to laugh, to find small, infantile joy eating stolen last minute, sale candy, he’d gotten everything he wanted.

There was a bag of Crunch bars, KitKats, 100 Grand bars, Twix, and Snickers sitting along the sparse bags of sugary, hard candy. Theo grabbed it and tucked it into the inside of his father’s borrow coat. It barely looked like Theo had taken anything-- in fact it made the waistline of the coat fit better. He still had some sleeves to fill.

Theo spotted Boris weaving around the seasonal endcap of the aisle, studying the ways all the familiar candy wrappers were now orange or covered in bats. He pretended to study the nutrition label on the back of a bag as a mother and child walked behind him. The child tried to point at Boris’s split and still-bleeding lip, but the mother paid no attention to Boris. Just like he had no intention of paying for that candy.

Theo left Boris to his operation and wandered down to the oral hygiene aisle. He strolled, with almost adult-like authority, along the rows of expensive electronic toothbrushes until he reached the plastic covered ones that hung on the wall like packaged pens. Theo grabbed a blue one-- with soft bristles, because someone had sensitive enamel from years of eating straight sugar and not gargling after vomiting-- and slipped it up his sleeve.

He sighed, pretending he hadn’t found what he was looking for, and started to head out toward the parking lot again to wait for Boris. Just as he tried to exit the aisle, a worker came around with an arm full of plastic pumpkin baskets. Theo skidded to a halt-- clutching his jacket and the candy-- in lightning fast response.

“Sorry.” Theo said, stepping aside quickly. The worker was frazzled, barely noticing that Theo had even stopped him. The baskets wobbled in his arms, their faces printed just off-center to the indentations of the “carved” features. They were ugly and obviously all defects. “Hey, can I have one of those?”

“What? They’re all going in the trash. They’re garbage and it’s literally Halloween.” The teenager spoke as if Theo had been born on a different planet, unaware of the time, day, and possibly the year.

“Yeah. I know. Then let me have one.” Theo thrust his hand out. “Fucking give me one. It’s important.”

“Okay, here you go. Asshole.” The worker handed it to Theo, but not before ripping the tag off the handle. “Go loiter somewhere else. We’re closing in a half hour, too. Is that your friend? The one who looks like a corpse.”

“He’s a vampire.”

“He looks like he’s fucking dead.” The man correctly, hitching his armful up. “And he’s been reading that bag label for five minutes. Is he simple or something?”

“English isn’t his second language, cut him some slack.” Theo scoffed. “Asshole.”

“Well, whatever he speaks, tell him we’re closing and to either buy the candy or leave.”

“Yeah. Sure.” Theo said, smiling. “I’ll be sure to do that.”‘

While the teenager turned away, Theo grabbed a tube of toothpaste, floss, and one of the travel head covers. He barely tried to hide them as he marched for the door.

There was something careful in how Boris was searching, Theo didn’t want to disturb him. Part of him said it was because he wanted to let Boris have his own shopping time uninterrupted or rushed. But the larger part of Theo was secretly pleased that he was choosing candy meant for him with such purpose and care. 

It meant nothing, probably, but Theo let it mean everything as he stood out at their meetup spot. As he waited, he practiced smiling without looking too happy.

iv.

“Here. For your candy.” Theo held the plastic pumpkin out to Boris. His hand felt like it wanted to be shaking, but it was too afraid to even do that.

Boris took it carefully, studying its off-brand features. “Is for my candy? That you give me?”

“Yeah! But, you’ve got to ask me for it first.” Theo said. He used his teeth to rip open the bag, tossing the end into the dumpster.

“Have candy, Potter?”

“No! Trick-or-Treat! You’ve got to ask-- just hold your basket out and ask ‘trick-or-treat’! And then I’ll say some super weird passively-adult thing about your costume and then give you your candy. Okay. Now go.”

Boris jerked his basket forward, teeth bared and dried blood now brown. “Trick! Or treat, Potter!”

“Oh wow! Look at your fangs... Not even fake.”

“Fuck off! Teeth are fine-- chew just fine.”

“You can’t tell a suburban mom to fuck off.” Theo laughed, tilting the bag into Boris’s basket. It overflowed and the stiff candy clattered on the asphalt. “They’ll call neighborhood watch on you.”

“Fuck if I care.” Boris held the basket to his chest, crossing his arms over it. He held delightful ownership over the new holiday clutch and seasonal candy. They’d created their own tradition, own triumphing memory, standing by the dumpster of Lucky’s. It wasn’t perfect and it wasn’t exactly the quintessential American Halloween, but it was one Boris could recount without sounding like he’d copied some made-for-tv movie; it was lop-sided and little fucked up-- just enough-- to truly be Boris’s first Halloween.

Actually, all the perfect Halloweens Theo had ever had seemed fruitless compared to watching Boris cradle his first trick-or-treated haul of candy. Getting things right the first time was stupidly overrated.

Theo felt the urge to jot that down. To remember to tell his mother-- next time he saw her-- how great Halloween had the potential to be if the mischief and wickedness were lent the chance to match costumes with joy and innocence.

v.

Boris accosted the entire living room floor as he dumped his basket out onto the carpet. He spread it out so no two pieces of candy were resting on top of each other. His hands ran over the crinkling wrappers, feeling the even square molds-- until he stopped and firmly gripped the toothbrush. He held it up to Theo with an accusatory look.

“Are trying to tell me something?” He asked.

“No, no. It’s not like that. Most of the time, there’s this family of doctors or something that always give out healthy food or non-candy for Halloween. I decided the family you ran into would’ve been a dentists. So I gave you a toothbrush.” Theo shrugged. “You wanted the full experience.”

Theo also wasn’t sure if Boris even had a toothbrush. He’d seen him with one, when they first met, bristles flattened and parted from over-extended use. He said nothing further-- not about the old toothbrush, or about how Boris placed it gingerly by his side just then, tucked just under his knee for safe keeping.

“Stupid dentists. Of all doctor career-- all part of body to think about, all day all the time-- who pick teeth? It is bone. Weird bone to talk with! Who want to see bone all day, and fix and grind and drill? Seem so stupid when think about it.” Boris exclaimed, still running his hands over the candy. “Will not go to dentist house again. Have learned lesson, Potter. Fuck the doctor houses.”

Theo laughed and moved closer to Boris-- just to be able to pour his own candy out for trading. “Okay, what do you want out of my pile-- I’ll take all your snickers.”

Theo’s bag was full of most of the same candy, but also small Hershey bars and Baby Ruths instead of 100 Grands. It was the principle of trading more than it was either of them getting more of what they wanted. Confectionery bargaining was a skill few had back in New York. Only Andy was ever really good at it.

“What is in Baby Ruth?” Boris asked, turning over some of Theo’s silver-wrapped pieces. “Is that woman?”

“Baseball player, actually. Like Babe Ruth.” Theo said, quickly pealing one of them open. “Here, try one. It’s mostly nougat I think.”

“Uck.” Boris muttered, still taking it. He popped the whole thing in his mouth, his cheek bulging as he tried to chew it quickly. It was too sticky, but Boris didn’t seem to mind. “Gross.”

“Careful. Your fangs.”

“Ah!” Boris bared his teeth again, holding his arms up as if he had a cape to shield him. “Will eat your blood!

“It’s uh,” Theo nearly gargled the word, struggling to say it cleanly. “it’s suck your blood, Boris.”

“Yes. That too.” He chopped his teeth loudly, the candy gone. Theo recoiled and clutched his own jaw. Boris did it twice more, breaking into a grin the more Theo looked disgusted. “Am bothering you! Halloween spirit, yes?”

“Sure. Something like that.” Theo picked up a Crunch bar and tossed it at Boris’s head. It caught momentarily in his matted curls before slipping through and onto his legs.

“Oh? Candy fight?” Boris grabbed a fistful of chocolates. His long fingers and tight grip snapped many of the bars in half, the sound heard underneath the crinkling plastic. “Tradition too?”

Theo paused, his arms no where near his face in defense. He grinned, only clenching his eyes closed. “Yeah. It’s definitely tradition. For us, at least.”

“Can be tradition that you lose?” Boris cackled, throwing both handfuls directly at Theo’s chest. “Do not think will change. Am always good shot, Potter.”

“Oh, fuck off. Arrogance is not about to become any part of this holiday, Boris. I swear to God--” Theo was pelted with every candy brand on the floor individually. Boris had a pile at his feet he tossed at him one by one, squirming backward slowly as Theo dodged them and shifted onto his knees.

“No! No! No! Cannot touch Dracula!” Boris cried, fully falling onto his back. He wiggled back and forth like a snake but gained no distance away from Theo.

There was something about a snake Theo read in a book once. Temptation, or something, right? Wasn’t that how the story went? That snake, that woman, and that apple-- but that one wasn’t candied.

Theo flopped down on Boris with all his weight, laughing at the loud oof! Boris wheezed out. His arms grabbed onto Theo’s back, but he didn’t push him away. Instead, his hands pressed Theo closer and rolled them over. The candy slid and squashed under them, like a really strange bed of orange and red foliage. With Theo on his back, Boris sat up with his legs on either side of Theo’s waist. Theo was pinned, eyes wide and mouth open, but not in any rejection. The temptation looked sweet.

“I bite!” Boris cried, placing his hands on Theo’s chest and shoulder. “Suck blood from you, Potter.”

And he did. He pushed Theo’s head to the side and playfully (and with surprising delicacy) bit down on the curve of his neck. It was weird, really really weird, but it was still touch. Undefinable touch, at that. It wasn’t anything romantic and definitely wasn’t anything sexual. It was just playing vampire. There were no rules or sermons against that. Theo allowed himself to laugh, shivering at the cold drag of Boris’s teeth across his skin.

It was so weird, but Theo felt so free. He’d never felt the touch of anyone be so warm and his entire world seem so far off. It wasn’t even tradition at that point; it was habit. Boris would always be the one that made Theo feel like every frayed nerve was neatly sewn back together. Like every moment was worth remembering and recording, all in the hopes of recreating it someday. Same crooked smiles, same laughter giggles, same mishaps, same boy. Always the same boy.

#boreo #theo and boris #tgf fic #zombiebowlcut

[consumedkings-archive]

ancient names, iv

A John Seed/Original Female Character Fanfic

Ancient Names, pt iv: game of survival

Masterlink Post

Word Count: 4.7k

Rating: M for now, rating will change in later chapters as things develop.

Warnings: Language, some “light” religious blasphemy (it’s Far Cry 5), the Seeds being themselves. This is an enemies to lovers (enemies to enemies and lovers?), strong canon deviance from here on out. Mentions of blood/carnage, the frantic energy of people who both hate and are attracted to each other. It goes on!

Notes: Hi guys! I'm so, so sorry it took so long for me to get this chapter up. You know how quarantine-times just be like that where you manically write something for like 8 days straight and then never touch it again for weeks? Yeah, it really DO be like that sometimes.Anyway, this chapter is a bit of a filler, for which I apologize; I wanted some softer John/Elliot moments, at least something that wasn't quite so much "fuck off" and "please go fuck yourself" constantly, but also, that is also kind of Elliot's personality, so. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I promise I will try to be much better at making myself sit down and actually write now that I'm not swallowed up by a black hole of writer's block! Thank you to everyone for your patience and understanding and for all of the lovely comments and kudos; it really means the most to me! I just love getting the chance to interact with y'all.

The adrenaline crash was already happening.

Elliot was familiar with the sensation; as she rifled through the glove box of the Eden’s Gate van, John waited impatiently just on the other side of her while the sound of car doors and voices echoed in the distance. He clearly wanted to tell her to hurry up, and maybe he would, if she took long enough—but she wasn’t keen on these fucking crazies getting their hands on her.

She almost laughed at the thought. Passed from one psycho’s hands to another; wouldn’t that be something? Joey would be absolutely furious.

If she’s not dead, that unrelenting voice in her head echoed, stilling her hands for a moment.

“Deputy?” John asked, when she stopped moving, maybe because he was worried she could hear or see something he couldn’t. That would be nice—John Seed, sweating, for once in his fucking life.

If they didn’t already gut her and plant a whole fucking garden in her.

“Rook.” His voice wasn’t a question now, but a command, and she could hear it in his voice; look at me, tell me what you’re thinking, and her teeth clicked together. She closed the glove box shut, no reward to be found—just loose papers and some napkins—and closed the door beside her. The rattle of the chain link binding their cuffed wrists together reminded her, once again, of the absurdity of their situation.

“Don’t call me that,” she said tiredly, the rush of driving almost head-first into another car at a hundred miles-per-hour fleeing her body, leaving her feeling gutted and emptied out. She coughed into her elbow and the gesture pulled something in the cavity of her chest; now more than ever, she wished that she’d taken the risk of potentially dying and just popped those Tylenol-looking pills when she’d had the chance

John stared at her for a moment. He didn’t respond to her demand, but replied, “You’re still wearing my glasses.”

Elliot shrugged. She pushed the glasses down her nose a little to peer at him over the blue, reflective lenses. “They look better on me anyway.”

His lips pressed into a thin line. He looked like he wanted to say something to her—and she certainly expected him to snap at her to hand them over—but he turned away and started walking. He said, briskly, “Let’s not get hunted down like wild animals, shall we?”

“Yes,” Elliot agreed, falling into step with him, sobering her voice quite purposefully, “wouldn’t it be awful if one of those crazy cultists say, drugged and kidnapped us? Absolutely beastly.”

John shot her a look. He looked awfully like he wanted to say something again; that frustrated tense of his jaw, the way his eyes narrowed, these were all familiar gestures to her. She could tell that she was pushing a button he didn’t want her to have access to. That knowledge gave her a giddy kind of thrill and kick-started her system all over again. Good, Elliot thought, minding her business as picked along a barely-used trail and left the van behind them, going further and further into the wilderness. The river was close; if she had to guess, they were somewhere halfway between where John had taken resident and the border into Faith’s territory. I hope that pisses him off.

“We should head back to the ranch first,” Elliot continued, falling into step with John—and not without some puffing. “And would you slow down? Remember how you got me sick? And then handcuffed us together in a temper tantrum? And then—”

“I was there,” John snipped at her. Despite his brittle tone, he did make an effort of less power walking, maybe because he didn’t want to have to drag her unconscious body along once she passed out from billowing her way across the Montana wilderness.

“Just wanted to make sure. Humility is a virtue, as they say.”

“I have to get Faith back,” he said, ignoring her little jab. “I can’t let those fucking nutjobs keep her.”

Elliot clambered over a log, keeping half of her attention on the sound of voices, still distant enough that she wasn’t worried about it. “In case you’ve forgotten this other small detail,” she continued, “they probably also have Joey, which they wouldn’t, if you had just kept your grimy hands off of her. So, you know—let’s keep in mind we have generally the same goal, here.”

“Thank you,” John muttered tersely, “for keeping us goal-oriented.”

“You’re very welcome, John.” Elliot tugged the sweatpants back up her hips; now, in the dying light of golden hour, she was regretting not changing into her jeans earlier that morning. Of course there was no way she could have known, but hindsight was always twenty-twenty.

She felt breathless from talking and walking, but the desire to really dig in was too great, overwhelming her need to take a full breath as she added, “It’s my pleasure, truly. Any time you need me, all you have to do is—”

As they wandered down closer to the river, John puffed out, “Do you ever stop talking?”

“I remember a time when all you wanted was for me to talk to you.”

Just as she finished her sentence, about to tack another jab on just for the hell of it—and another thing—she heard shouts, closer now, in a foreign language that she didn’t recognize. She stilled immediately, instinctively reaching and grabbing John’s arm to keep him from continuing on.

He opened his mouth to ask her what she was stopping for, but before he could she waved her hand frantically at him and voicelessly mouthed the words, shut the fuck up. Just one moment was all it would take; one second for them to be heard and they’d be gutted and flayed open, just like Waylon. Elliot did not have any desire to become a floral arrangement any time soon.

The voices echoed again, closer this time. John pushed her hand out of his face and instead pulled her further along the trail, moving with greater purpose this time; the second she started struggling to keep up, he wrapped a firm arm around her midsection and hoisted her, planting her right in front of him before he ducked them into some brush.

(She reckoned the heat in her cheeks was adrenaline, certainly, and not the way it had felt to have John’s chest pressed against her back, his arm warm and strong against her: because it certainly wasn’t that, but perhaps more like a pneumonia fever or just her body crumpling under the stress.)

Dark, heavy boots stormed through the underbrush, talking to each other now in a more conversational tone; though Elliot could hear them chattering and occasionally laughing at what the other said (in Swedish, or perhaps Dutch?) she could see their feet moving with distinct, sharp precision, stopping in time with each other and starting again whenever one of them said something.

Oh, fuck, she thought with a sick, desperate, sinking feeling. They’re so fucking organized. God, fuck.

It was one thing to kill peggies, to storm her way into a compound and smash her head into the face of one or peel into the parking lot in her Jeep, Boomer having gutted two or three of them on their way in; Eden’s Gate members carried only chaotic, frenetic energy, barely held together by their worship of their leader and his siblings. Whatever structure they upheld was purely because they were told to, and it wasn’t a system they could execute on their own, without direction.

She had never fought something, or someone, organized. She had never bashed her face into someone who had thirty other comrades marching down to kill her, spear her on a stick and stuff her mouth with baby’s breath.

I’m only a girl. It was a startling, violent moment of realization, that she had been bumbling her way through this, working purely on emotion and instinct. She was not a practiced, methodical killer, but one born out of necessity. I’m only a girl, I can’t kill people who have their shit together.

Elliot was vaguely aware of her breathing becoming labored, grinding in her lungs, and only became consciously aware of it when John’s hand pressed to her mouth, his arm still wrapped around her stomach. His hands smelled—tasted—like leather and dirt, and it was almost comforting enough to ground her, because for once John didn’t smell like that stupid fucking cologne that she hated, but she could still feel the dirt against her mouth like she was getting buried face down—

The steps slowed, stopping just in front of the brush. Elliot could see a silhouette cut across the forest floor, dappled by the branches of the thicket John had plunged them into, the branches pulling and tugging at her hair and shirt and skin. But she only barely saw it, because John’s back faced the trail they’d just been on, his arms around her. A shield.

“I think they’re gone,” John muttered after what felt like an entire fucking eternity and the voices had faded off, hunched in the brush and coiled around her like a snake, dropping his hand from her mouth. She tried to quiet the panicked roaring in her ears to listen (John didn’t know what to listen for; he didn’t know what it was like to have to hold your breath and hope your hunters passed you by) but she couldn’t; all she could think was oh fuck, oh God, I can’t do this. They’re going to kill me without a blink. They’re going to kill Joey. They’re going to—

“Rook,” John said, his voice firmer now. He must have been convinced their pursuers had moved on. “Rook, my hand.”

Her nails were digging into his wrist, revisiting shallow wounds she had made the night that John had held her under. But he didn’t wince or yank his hand away; he watched her intently, waiting for the iron-clad grip of her fingers to loosen. Elliot closed her eyes for a second, just a second, to ground herself.

I feel: John’s heartbeat, the dirt, the wind. I heard: John’s voice, leaves rustling, the river down below. I smell: dirt, leather, pine sap, humid river air.

She kept waiting for John to push her again. She kept waiting for him to say something stupid—Earth to Elliot?—or demand she get moving, or something equally insufferable, but he stayed like that; chest against her back, eclipsing out the little bit of sun breaking through the brush, waiting.

“I’m fine,” Elliot murmured. She felt like she was on auto-pilot.Too much, her body was screaming at her, the sickness’ sticky hands crawling through her, leaving fingerprints all over her lungs.You’re doing too much. The adrenaline was crashing hard through her body now, and all she wanted to do was puke and then lay down for a nice, long nap. She loosened her grip on his wrist for a moment before letting her hand fall completely from his.

John didn’t say whether or not he believed her, but he stood up slower than he had moved before, peering cautiously around before picking his way out of the brush. He remained (blissfully) silent as Elliot stepped around him; what he lacked in personal relatability, she thought with a sort of familiar dryness, he made up for when he kept his mouth shut.

“Elliot,” he said, ruining her peace, bulldozing over it wildly like he did just about everything else in her life. There was a question somewhere in the way that he said her name, and she felt the pull of the cuffs linking them together when he stopped.

She turned to look at him. He didn’t, for once, look as though he wanted to say something; instead, he was waiting expectantly. For an explanation, she supposed. Or maybe a thank you. That sounded much more like him.

Elliot said, again, “I’m fine,” her hands on her hips, resisting the urge to double over like her body was begging her too. She had never known when to stop, not really, not without someone else telling her. Her mama liked to call it her Too Much gene.

John arched a dark brow at her. His mouth curved in something like a smile, but it was too bitter, too wry, too knowing to be a real smile. She knew his real smile, even if he didn’t think so. She’d seen it. Boyish and—dare she say—endearing. This was not it.

She gathered up all of her willpower and bit out, “John Seed, if we don’t get moving, we’re going to having marigolds and daisies and what the fuck else blooming right out of our gutted rib cages.”

Whatever had been sitting on John’s face was wiped clean by her words. A good old dose of reality. She tugged on the chain impatiently, and he fell into step again with her, trudging through the underbrush.

“And don’t look at me like that,” she snapped out over her shoulder. “I told you, I’m fine.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Elliot was not fine.

John would admit —to himself, silently, and never under any other circumstances—that he did not know Elliot Honeysett very well. He did, however, know her enough. The way she’d gripped his wrist, looking for an anchor; the strange, haunted, disconnected way her eyes had flickered from point to point in the nowhere-in-particular when he spoke to her, never quite looking at him. He’d seen those things in her before. He’d seen that look on her face earlier that morning. He’d seen that strange disconnect, a switch of a flip somewhere in her mind, when she’d certainly considered choking one of the guards to death.

All the same, he reasoned as they trudged up a hill, trying to ignore the distant sounds of gunfire that bode poorly and having been walking for what he could only guess was hours now, it was odd. Having her cling onto him. Clutch his wrist for support. It was—

(nice)

—strange, to think about Elliot needing him, in the same way the realization had unseated him when he had understood she’d been relying on him to keep her safe at the ranch.

“Did you take that Tylenol?” he asked absently, an afterthought, still mulling over their odd closeness in the woods, trying to pin down why it writhed and squirmed in the cavity of his chest. The sun was beginning to set behind the mountains, and a slow, uneasy chill had crawled through the air. “Back at the ranch.”

“Do I look like an idiot?” Elliot huffed out, pausing halfway up the hill, to try and catch her breath.

“That was rhetorical, before you consider replying with astonishing honesty,” the blonde snipped out after a moment of breathing.

Her voice sounded raspier now, like she’d picked up chain-smoking. She cocked her head, looking at him for a moment, her hands on her hips; she had Jacob’s old sweats wadded up to her waist—so small, John thought absently, she’s been losing weight like crazy—and an old gray undershirt of his tied in a knot at her stomach. Her ponytail was practically disengaged completely, big chunks of her blonde hair falling into her face and sticking to her cheeks and jaw. She looked feverish, or maybe out of shape, though John suspected it was much more likely to be the former than the latter.

John replied, “I would hate to disappoint your opinion of me.”

“Cute.” Elliot pushed her way up the last half of the hill, cresting the top and finally—finally, because he could tell she’d been waiting to do this—bent over at her hips, hands on the tops of her thighs. They were probably a good hundred yards from the ranch now, in the thickest part of the woods and in the farthest reach from the driveway, which Elliot had insisted on. “Good fucking God, I never want to move for the rest of my life.”

“You’d probably feel better if you took that Tylenol I left you.”

“Hey. Hey, John?” She snapped her fingers at him, not looking at him but waving wildly. “Hey. Oh, yeah? Shut the fuck up.”

“Somehow,” John mused, peering through the trees to see if he could get a glimpse of the ranch, “you are even unpleasant when subdued by sickness, deputy.”

He’d become so accustomed to her casual venom that it was almost a comfort, now. He would know something was wrong with her when she wasn’t trying to bite his head off, but at least for now, bound together by metal, he knew she wasn’t going to try and kill him. It would be too much of a hassle to try and drag his corpse along through the woods.

I have to get Faith, John thought, eyes straining to see through the trees but his body reluctant to get any closer to the treeline. I have to get her. Fuck, fuck, fuck. It’s all fucked, the whole lot of it. They’ve got her on some shit again. Fuck.

Joseph would be so angry; more than that, Faith was certainly going to be scared out of her mind, once the drugs wore off.

“They’re here.” Elliot’s voice shook him out of his thoughts; she had caught her breath, for now, and wandered closer to the treeline. Her brows furrowed together, and for a second John almost laughed at how ridiculous it was to have her face so serious when she refused to give him back his glasses.

Any humor that he might have felt was ripped away when he followed her gaze to see what he saw: the nondescript gray vans, parked in a semi-circle, leaving an exit down the drive. He watched a few of the men in their dark clothes guiding members of Eden’s Gate into the back of the van. Ase, and Faith, and Ase's red-haired executioner man were nowhere to be seen.

“They aren’t fighting,” John muttered as he watched the members of Eden's Gate hand their weapons over. He felt something sick deep in the pit of his stomach.

“Well, John,” Elliot began, and he thought, don’t fucking say it, but she plunged on regardless, “I hate to break it to you, but you’ve got yourself a brood of followers, not leaders.”

“They’re devout,” John insisted bitingly. It welled up inside of him—perhaps embarrassment, or humiliation—and he swallowed thickly. “They’re just surviving, that’s all. It would be stupid for them to all get killed.”

The blonde shot him a look through the side of her expression, wary. She didn’t need to say anything for him to figure out what it meant. Sure, John. They certainly let me and the others mow them down no problem, but right now, they’re just surviving.

“We can’t get into the ranch now,” Elliot ventured after a moment, stepping back from the treeline. “The best thing to do is wait and see if they leave. They don’t strike me as a home-base type of crazy, but you never know; maybe those weird cell-like rooms you put in the basement will tickle their fancy.”

“What?” John demanded. He trailed after her, indignant. “We’re just going to let them take Faith and leave?”

Elliot sighed. She looked to be working something between her teeth, words she wanted to say to him but that she was taking care to mull over first, and he didn’t know if that relieved him or filled him with more dread.

“Yes,” she said after a moment, and he thought, definitely more dread, I like it better when she talks impulsively. 

“Tell me this is a stupid joke,” John insisted. Elliot’s lashes fluttered. A strange flicker of emotion streaked across her face, as brilliant and short-lived as a shooting start, and his stomach knotted when he thought it might have been pity.

“We have to. They obviously aren’t planning on killing her, John; if they were, they wouldn’t have flaunted her in front of your face,” Elliot replied, starting to walk again, carefully picking her way down a small ravine and then following its slope downwards, towards the river again.

John’s feet moved forward, even when he didn’t want to, even when he wanted to turn back around and storm the ranch and demand Faith be returned back to him. Finally, eventually, he willed himself to stop, as though he only just remembered that he was the bigger of the two of them and carried the most weight in their little red-rover chain.

“We can’t leave her with them,” he insisted. “That’s bullshit, deputy. Just because she’s not one of yours—”

Elliot turned to look at him. Her eyes were narrowed, and she pulled on the chain, hard, the way that John had done to her, yanking him forward abruptly.

“I don’t know if you’re aware of this, John Seed, but I’ve got more experience doing rescue missions for people kidnapped by cults than you do.” Her voice was hard, venomous. “They could have Joseph in there at gun-point and I’d still rescue him.”

John felt the anger blooming in his chest. “I never took you for a liar.”

“I was never going to kill a little fucking girl,” Elliot replied viciously. “And that’s what she is, even if Joseph pumped her full of poison. I was never going to kill any of you Seeds.”

“No?” John demanded. “Then what?”

A moment of silence stretched between them. It welled with something, somethingsoemthingsomething that John wanted to grapple with his hands and squeeze, but that he couldn't.

She said, after a few heartbeats, “Put you in jail to rot, you fuckhead.” Elliot turned on her heel and started marching again. “Death would be too kind an ending for you.” 

⭒☆━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━☆⭒

By the time they found a spot to stop, it was nearly completely dark. They had walked in almost complete silence after her little proclamation, enough to make him wonder if that odd moment of closeness had been a figment of his imagination after all.

Elliot picked a spot out for them close to the river, but still kept shadowed by the shrubs, and John didn’t have much will to argue with her anymore; her words kept sliding around in his head like marbles. Death would be too kind an ending for you.

He knew what she was really saying, with that. If I have to suffer with living, her voice said, beyond the words, then so do you.

The blonde was shivering as she loaded John’s arms up with wood (much to his chagrin; he’d already put this Versace shirt through enough, and now she was doing this), and by the time they got a fire going he thought she might pass out from the entirety of the day.

“Cold, deputy?” John asked mildly, watching her untie the knot of the shirt and slink her arms into the over-sized fabric, huddled by the small fire they’d (she’d) made. She glared at him.

“Well—”

“I haven’t forgotten,” he interjected, as though he could hear it already. “I know you’ve got pneumonia, and it's all my fault, as I willed it upon you.”

“Goody,” Elliot replied. There was no bite in her voice anymore; exhaustion was pulling at the edges of her expression, tugging her voice down, and John felt almost a bit of relief at the knowledge that maybe they were done trading blows. For now.

Lit by firelight, she looked softer. There was still an open wound where she’d really dug her words in, and maybe it was still bleeding a little, but John could feel the evening chill sinking into his bones now too, even with the sleeves of his button-up rolled down. So yes; Elliot did look softer, and smaller, and warmer, and John would be stupid to willingly get pneumonia so that they were both huffing and puffing through the woods.

He acquiesced, after a moment of silence and as though relenting to his own mental argument, “It would be warmer if we shared body heat.”

The look she shot him might as well have been daggers. “What,” she quipped, “being handcuffed to me isn’t enough for you?” I suppose we aren't done trading blows after all.

“Look, I’m not dressed for a Montana night out in the woods,” he insisted, “and certainly neither are you. You’re already sick.” 

Elliot scoffed and rolled her eyes.

He ventured, again, “You already said we can’t leave the fire burning all night. The smoke would give us away.”

“And I’m also saying that there’s no way in fucking hell I’m letting you spoon me,” Elliot replied, closing her eyes. “If you get hypothermia, then maybe it’s the karmic universe telling you to go fuck yourself.”

“Oh, very nice, deputy.”

He sighed, stretched out on his side and drinking up as much of the fire’s warmth as he could before Elliot would, inevitably, stamp it out and try to get some sleep. The ground was soft and mossy, and while John couldn’t stand the idea of sleeping in the same clothes he’d been running around in, the day had begun to take its toll on him.

“If you change your mind,” John continued, “I can assure you I’m an excellent big spoon.”

Elliot scoffed, again, and he thought, oh, well. Maybe the karmic universe will serve me something after all, but we’ll have to wait and see, and let his eyes drift shut.

He didn’t know how long he’d been asleep when he first felt a change. It could have been thirty minutes, or a few hours; Elliot’s sleep schedule was so unknown to him—and certainly changed by her illness—that he couldn’t have wagered if he wanted to. But he was still mostly asleep when he felt the warmth of her body tucked against his, shivering, like a leaf in the wind. There was still a soft detergent scent to her clothes, even after everything, and her head fit just under his chin.

John shifted. He didn’t need to open his eyes to tell it was Elliot, and not a bear or mountain lion trying to find the best way to carve out his intestines; Elliot’s hair brushed along his jaw, and she pulled his arm over her like a blanket.

“Is this my karmic retribution?” he rumbled, half asleep still. Elliot’s teeth chattered.

“Just consider this making yourself useful,” she replied. Her voice was muffled from her face being tucked against his shirt. “Now shut up and go to sleep.”

“Yes, boss.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

He had expected to get woken up gently, by the rising sun, or perhaps the feeling of Elliot disengaging from their only-for-warmth spooning session. 

Instead, John was woken abruptly by the feeling of a cold, wet nose pressing into his face, hot, stinking breath whuffling across his face.

“What—the fuck—”

John swatted the air blindly, the smell of dog breath wafting over his face as he struggled into a sitting position. It took a moment for him to right himself, to get a good grasp on his surroundings; their handcuffs were still linked. Elliot was awake, and sitting up already, and beaming as a Blue Heeler stared at John. 

As soon as his eyes landed on the dog, it barked at him. Loudly. All of the hair on the hound’s spine rose, all the way down to the base of its tail, and a low, nasty growl rose in its throat.

��Boomer,” Elliot said, and immediately the dog sat. Boomer’s eyes darted between Elliot and John, wary and uncertain. The blonde, however, looked happier than John thought he’d ever seen her, reaching out and ruffling the dog’s hair until it lay flat again, smiling. “Look, John, Boomer found us.”

“Oh,” John replied, “your killer beast. Excellent.”

Elliot laughed. It was as though Boomer was waiting for the sound; he barked, happily this time (could dogs bark in different tones, John wondered), tail wagging furiously as he crowded Elliot for her attention.

“Don’t worry,” the blonde said, giving John a sly look, “he only bites on command.”

#fic: ancient names #otp: death keep off; i am your enemy #far cry 5 #far cry fic #john seed x oc #john seed/deputy #ch: elliot honeysett #ch: john seed #john seed/oc #my writing #THAT'S RIGHT BABY #BOOMER'S IN #time to kick john tf off the team #BYE BITCH #i'm just kidding i'd never do that to him #we love john #i'm!!!! so sorry this took so long!!!!!! #but we back in it #quarantine who? i don't know her #i mean i'm still in quarantine but #the writer's block she was shoving in my face is gone now

[backandimbamon]

yes i spontaneously wrote a bamon drabble because i can never get their dialogue out of my head (:

Damon knew Bonnie.

In fact, he knew her so well that he could paint her with ease on an intimidatingly large canvas, blindfolded, holding the paintbrush behind his back.

They spent an aggressive amount of time together, plus he was a vampire so his Bonnie experience was intense- not one detail went amiss.

Like for instance, she liked her natural nails to have length, and never chose nail polish outside of flesh tones; her go-to was a sandy nude but it had to be just translucent enough to reveal a bit of her cuticle.

And the fact that she wasn’t a perfume girl, but more of an earthy oil type. If he could bottle her up in a fragrance it’d be a concoction of patchouli and vanilla, a hint of citrus zest and a bit of a floral scent because whenever she couldn’t sleep at night, she’d sprinkle lavender oil on her pillow which eventually would embed itself in her hair.

Oh, and when he fixed her breakfast she never failed to complain about his pancakes but she would always do an exciting finger wiggle before grabbing a fork and digging in.

The prison world did something to her. To them. He had ample amount of time to observe and truly see the little witch for who she was, an opportunity never granted to him before. In the strange case of forced matrimony, Damon was able to fully see Bonnie Bennet sans overbearing, attention-seeking friends, even if one was his beloved girlfriend.

There was always Elena and after that, Elena’s shadow, and after that, Vampire Barbie but in the prison world there were none and he saw elements of himself attach to Bon Bon like friction particles during traction. And even stranger, Bonnie was completely unaware, behaving in a very Damon-like manner as if she had always done so, like she had coined the phrases, prolonged the banter, carried the stichomythia all along. Like he himself was the imposter.

Seriously, all Bonnie needed was a black leather jacket and a Camaro and she’d be his own personal mini me.

And even when his hope of returning floated away like a stray balloon, forever with her didn’t seem that bad.

To say the silent truth didn’t make Damon’s heart warm would be a lie. Developing a strong eventual friendship with someone who wanted you dead years prior could heat even the iciest of hearts.

So he had positively known her. He had seen her face, day in and day out for months on end; clay brown skin, leaf green eyes, a smirking mouth (another habit she picked up from him, he noticed proudly,) with a bone structure a model would envy, Damon hadn’t thought of any other equation that personified Bonnie Shelia Bennett.

She was very pretty in a way that snuck up on him over the years, he became accustomed to her beauty because he could accept it, it was manageable and tame. Not a loud or demanding beautiful but a sacred and layered one.

Bonnie was basically sugar, spice, everything nice, with chemical x as her magical witchy woo woo.

But who knew something as simple as a new hairstyle could change someone so drastically.

“So what do you think?” She asked, brimming with a poorly contained excitement.

It was a quiet day in Mystic Falls, no monsters to fight, or talisman to acquire. She had just entered the boarding house as Damon grabbed a Bourbon from the kitchen, tumbler held by a lazy grip. His eyelids lowered.

Gone was the modest brown bob, the one that allowed her to be pretty but not intimidatingly so. The hairstyle that he had expected from her; the witch’s default to not draw too many eyes for fear of being unnecessarily seen.

Gone was the beauty that was also his because she shared it with him like a secret gift. Only Damon Salvatore could witness the depth since he was always too close, always too invasive and she had trusted him just enough to let her guard down. It was theirs but now it was hers.

In the place of the brown bob was silken chocolate roots blended into caramel-colored barrel curls that tumbled down her frame. Her face was more intense, skin browner, eyes moodier, lips no longer smirking but pouting instead. She looked more mature and not like the sweetheart that he had come to adore but more like a bombshell, a sex symbol- hot...

It was odd.

He was captivated by her face, how different she looked, an effortlessly sexy appeal that was so un-Bonnie-like that he probably would’ve hit on her if she wasn’t his best friend.

Damon was drinking in her appearance with veiled appreciation but she couldn’t know that. He contorted his brows in thought and brought a cocked hand up to his chin quizzically.

“Hmm...” he said walking closer and examining, if only to buy him more time to stare at her, study her, secretly admire her.

She narrowed her eyes, crossed her arms over her chest and shook her head in annoyance.

“Damon it doesn’t take this long, you either like it or you don’t.” That excitement had digressed to something else as she ran her fingers through her long hair self-consciously.

He stepped up to her, invading her space as he normally did, and pinched a few strands of hair between his thumb and forefinger.

“You’re right Bonnie, I don’t like it.” He said cavalierly, just to get a reaction out of her, just to make her feel a little less gorgeous because it was making him uncomfortable.

She stuck out her chin, arms still folded, “It’s not like I did it for you.”

The statement hung in the air like she had options, almost as if meek Bonnie Bennett had men standing in lines to take her out. Like her excitement to show him her new look only moments before didn’t exist because his opinion was no more important than the dust particles in the air.

“It’s okay if you don’t like it.” She stated, mouth certainly pouting now. He could see her defenses activating. “You’re entitled to your own opinion. This new look has nothing to do with you and everything to do with me and what I want. I think it’s-“

He rolled his eyes. “Save the women-empowerment speech for someone who actually cares, Bon Bon. I love it.”

“What?”

“Your new hairstyle. I don’t like it, I love it.” He over-enunciated.

That bubbling excitement returned, “You do?”

“Yeah. You’re blonde now,” he smirked and stepped even closer if that was possible. He circled her, eyes sliding up and down his Bon Bon to reassert that only he could be the sexy one in their duo, not her. No one else could master sexy the way Damon had. It leaked from him, she couldn’t compete with him for such a title. But Bonnie was barely bothered. Impulsively, her eyes rolled as he continued to walk around her as if he were critiquing an art display. He stopped in front of her.

“Little Miss Blondie Bennett.”

“How original.”

“I know, I put a lot into that nickname.” His hand was in her tresses before he could even register what he was doing, fingertips at her scalp, gliding to the tips of her hair with a light pressure. He released, then swept up the wisps of hair on the nape of her neck and tugged gently. Loose curls fell around his grasp.

“Didn’t your mother teach you not to touch a lady’s hair?” Her eyes were foggy when she gave him a weak glare and gooseflesh rose on her skin.

“Do I look like I listened to my mother?”

He still had her hair in his grip and he tightened it a bit for emphasis before dropping his hand abruptly.

There was something that stretched between them, like maybe it was cruel to have a stunning little witch and an eerily handsome vampire only be friends. Like maybe Damon should keep his hands to himself because other thoughts could arise like why hadn’t he noticed Bonnie like this before? Out of all the women he’s crossed paths with, why was it impossible to imagine the witch as a sexual being? Why did she seem above carnality? And Bonnie could think why she hadn’t allowed herself to be noticed, what made her decide to hide herself, to keep walls so high that it would take years to cave in? She could ask herself what it was that made her a supporting character of her own life; who would she be if she allowed one misstep, had made one wrong move? Would Bonnie Bennett still be Bonnie Bennett if she put herself first?

Blonde hair was a baby step.

The presence of Elena was there and not, omnipotent as the sun between the world of Bonnie and Damon because there was no way they could see each other in any other light outside of friendship. And Damon was seriously questioning why he couldn’t possibly fathom, could hardly bring himself to whisper the phrase, sex with Bonnie.

Bonnie was his first best friend ever. In his multitude of years, he hadn’t blurred that line like he did with the long list of women he met before. He could think of not one platonic friendship in his history of friendships that was with a woman. She really was his first. It was like there was a block in his mind that prevented him from seeing her that way.

It was... strange.

The silence was stretching, as thoughts blossomed between them about themselves and one another. But of course the duration wasn’t too long.

“You went to a salon?” Damon asked, attempting to rid the moment of that gentle intimacy as he held her eyes.

“Yeah, it was this guy from Atlanta. He said a caramel, slightly ash blonde color makes the green in my eyes more intense.” She paused. “Caroline’s gonna flip,”

“Yeah she’s not the only blonde in town now.” His eyes widened. “You’ll probably have to mud wrestle to fight for the official title.”

“How classy of you, Demon. I mean Damon. I think.”

“Ha, ha.”

He could feel himself staring at her in a weird, pensive way, despite his lighthearted banter. She looked like the exact opposite of him bottled up in a human being. She was stunning.

“I’m guessing you didn’t listen to your mother when she said it’s impolite to stare either.” Bonnie chimed smugly.

Damon didn't laugh, his eyes grew sincere as he held eye contact with her in a way that used to make her feel uncomfortable before she became accustomed to it.

“All jokes aside, you are beautiful, Bonnie Bennett."

Those words had never fallen from his lips before. Especially never with such a seriousness. It was a fragile phrase, profound and evocative because she couldn’t recall the last time someone told her that.

Her face grew rosy with flattery and maybe embarrassment. “Thank you, Damon.”

She could see how Elena could have fallen for Damon, regardless of Stefan Salvatore and his handsome, chivalrous nature. Everyone warned you against men like Damon because they could get anything they wanted out of you and the world. A wolf in wolf’s clothing. Somehow frightening and irresistible at the same time. He was the shiny apple, red as sin in the garden of eden, plump and juicy and ready to be eaten. It was only natural for Elena to succumb. Most women would if the apple was dangling so dangerously low to their lips.

But sometimes, like then, he wasn’t so predictable. He took you by surprise when you least expected it. Because he wasn’t just enigmatic, he was flesh, bone, almost human. He had feelings and reactions and even he could be taken aback by his best friend with blonde hair. And even he could appreciate a beauty that wasn’t just Elena’s without feeling guilty.

“Little Blondie Bennett. I could just eat you right up.”

He really could.

#bamon #bamon fanfiction #bamon shippers club #damon salvatore #bonnie bennett #bamon fic #bamon fanfic #damon x bonnie #bonnie x damon

[thatgoddamnwizard]

Fic for Amcracchius: Only the Monsters Survive

((First of the fic prompts! This is for @amcracchius​, who asked that Michael give Harry a bear hug. Okay, no bear hug in this part, but it’s going to be a two-parter, and there will be a good, solid bear hug in that. Before the bear hug comes angst. You knew there would be angst. ;)

This is set in the Hell’s Angels, Heaven’s Rejects verse (also to be archived over at @hellsangelsheavensrejects​, though I still need to put up all the threads there), and takes place shortly after The Hidden Things (which yes, still needs to be finished).

Part 2 is coming soon!))

____________________________

The world faded in around me like the opening scene of a movie, and the first thing I saw was the empty street I had been standing in. For a minute, I thought I could hear someone shouting my name.

And then everything was silent, eerily so, a conspicuous absence of the usual Chicago din of rumbling motors, blaring horns, roaring jets flying overhead, the pitch and yaw of human movement. It was an absence of sound that wasn't so much like the beats of silence between a breath held and expelled, as it was like the vast emptiness that seems to fill a room after a last breath is exhaled. It was the silence of death.

It was a silence I would never grow fully accustomed to.

I started to walk, because there wasn't anything else to do in this gutted, burned-out wasteland of ruined buildings and crumbling asphalt and slowly rusting automobiles, the decaying remains of human civilization left to the reclamation of nature, and the monsters.

Only the monsters had survived. I tried not to think about what that might mean about my own survival.

I tried not to think about the fact that everyone I loved was dead.

I tried not to think about the things I had done to the people I loved. The suffering I had caused with my choices.

I tried not to think about the fact that those choices were probably why I was here now, alone with the monsters.

I tried not to think about how damned lonely I was. About how long it had been since I had felt the brush of human fingers against my skin, the softness of lips pressed against mine, the warmth of a caring embrace. About how much I missed... everyone. Murphy. Susan. Wynonna. Michael. Maggie. Weatherly. And... someone I couldn't quite remember, though somehow I knew he was still there somewhere, locked away in a hidden place within my mind.

Gone. All of them. I missed them. I missed them so much it felt like an open wound salted with despair.

I could see the monsters, lurking in the periphery, watching from the shadows of abandoned buildings as I shuffled past, figures twisted and grotesque and hungry. Always hungry. Their prey had been hunted into extinction, and now they had no one left to hunt but each other.

And me.

I didn't make it easy for them. I carried loops strung with their teeth and claws on my belt, a warning that I was not and would never be an easy target. They still came after me, though, on a fairly regular basis. I guess instinct wills out. Instince and hunger and sheer, bloodthirsty violence.

Three hunched, deformed figures ventured from their hiding places and approached me, hissing and snarling and slavering, lifting their heads to scent the air as they drew close. I stopped walking, fingers flexing around the rough-carved wood of my staff.

Again, I heard that echo of a familiar voice, as if carried on the wind. I shook my head, frowning, trying to hear, but it was gone as quickly as it came.

I looked back at the ghouls.“Might want to reconsider, fellas.”

The ghouls didn't reconsider.

The first one hurled itself at me with a leonine roar, and I whipped my staff around with a snarled word, expelling a blast of kinetic energy that sent it slamming into a stalled-out car hard enough to crumple the metal and send the vehicle rolling. While I was occupied with that one, the other two closed in fast on either side.

I dove into a forward roll. The two ghouls smacked together like a couple of speeding locomotives, and fell in a tangle of elongated limbs and flashing claws. Spinning low to the ground with staff still in hand, I came up into a crouch facing the thrashing ghoul-tangle, called on Winter, and, with an explosion of indescribably frigid, frost-sharpened air and a shout of “Infriga!” encased the two of them in ice. I then turned and gave the same treatment to the third ghoul.

A couple of kinetic blasts shattered the ice and the ghouls trapped inside. I didn't need a pair of pliers to retrieve my trophies this time.

I found a few teeth that were reasonably intact among the remains. I couldn't quite tell which teeth were from which ghoul, but I figured it didn't really matter. Walking over to an office building that somehow still had a reflective pane of dark glass set in its frame, I leaned my staff against the glass and pulled loose the leather cord that held a variety of fangs and claws dangling from small holes bored into the bone. I started to fold myself into a squat so I could prepare the teeth, but I caught sight of myself in the glass.

There is a moment of disconnect, even panic, when you look into a mirror and see something looking back at you that isn't you, that should never be you. I found myself grabbing for my staff and calling up my power again, my lips pulled back into a snarl that exactly mirrored that of the creature in the window.

The creature was of a height with me. It had the same basic bone structure, the same build. But its eyes were glacial-blue, its skin deathly white and stretched thin over jutting cheekbones, horned joints, and ropy muscle, its fingers tipped with translucent claws, its mouth filled with jagged, shark-like teeth.

It grabbed a staff at exactly the same time that I grabbed mine. It snarled at me in exactly the same way I snarled at it. Its body coiled with tension and barely-restrained violence in exactly the same way mine did.

The disconnect... connected. That figure was me. I was the monster in the mirror.

I could only stand, gaping. Minutes melted past, and I reached up to touch the glass, finger to reflected finger.

I was the monster in the mirror.

The voice returned, and this time I heard it clearly. A terribly, exquisitely familiar battle cry: Lava quod est sordium! In nomine Dei, sana quod est saucium!

Michael? But that was impossible. Michael had...

How had Michael died? I frowned, trying to remember.

I knew it had happened. I knew it had been my fault. I just couldn't remember how.

Was he coming for me? The monster in the mirror?

“No. This isn't happening,” I murmured. Something inside me snapped to awareness at those words.

And then the glass in front of me, and the reflection it held, shattered-- no, exploded, a spray of razor-sharp mirror fragments that swept over me, leaving a thousand tiny lacerations on my skin. I was thrown, landing on my back on the pavement.

And then I woke up. It felt like being hurled from a speeding train. My body shuddered and convulsed, then curled itself into a fetal position, weak and shivering.

“Harry,” a familiar voice said, strained with worry. I felt strong hands on me. “Harry, it's over. You're safe.”

I couldn't answer. The hands shifted on me, calloused warmth pressing against the clammy skin of my forehead, and I heard Michael's voice murmur a prayer for strength and healing. The words ran together like melting wax in my mind as I heard them, but I could feel their meaning. Could feel the power of his faith, the power vested in response to his faith. Not a surge of energy, not a blast of magic flooding through me, but something all made of a boundless, gentle strength. Warm. Reassuring.

The weakness in my body receded slowly like an ebbing tide. I lifted my head and looked around, memories starting to creep back into place. Alerted by the Paranet, we had gone to a nearby town to investigate a number of disappearances, and had encountered... I'm actually not sure what it was we had encountered. It had resembled a spider, but with a vaguely humanoid torso and head-- and I do mean vaguely. Mottled skin, a multitude of gleaming red eyes, and fangs that dripped with venom weren't exactly what I would call human.

The thing had been fast as hell. It had bitten me. And then I had fallen into that nightmare, which I felt fairly certain was part dream, part psychic attack.

And part truth.

I am the monster in the mirror.

“Harry?” Michael was still crouched beside me. Amoracchius was stained black with what I presumed was the spider-thing's blood. I looked around me for any evidence of its lingering presence, but only saw a disturbingly large but rapidly evaporating puddle of ectoplasm about a dozen feet away.

“Yeah,” I croaked. “I'm good.”

Slowly, I started dragging myself to my feet. Michael kept a hand on me, supporting me. I realized my face was wet with tears, and blinked them away, swiping at them with one hand. Dizziness was still playing a lively game of ring-around-the-rosie inside my head, but whatever venom the spider-thing had injected into my nervous system had apparently dissolved as well. I hoped it would evaporate before I had any interesting complications from it.

“Harry,” Michael said, and I recognized that tone of voice. The tone of voice he used when he was determined to get me to talk about something I had absolutely no desire to talk about. “What happened? What did you see?”

“Doesn't matter.” I walked a few paces, retrieved my staff where it had fallen during the battle, and started towards Michael's truck. “We done here? I need to get back to Chicago.”

Michael looked like he was about to press the issue, but then sighed and fell into step beside me.

to be continued...

#fic #fic prompts #this fic is set in a role play verse; please don't reblog unless you're a part of that verse #liking and commenting is ok

[starr-fall-knight-rise]

Humans are Weird “Altruism”

It is a truth universally accepted that the one greatest instinctual desire of an individual, of any species, is the desire to maintain life. Unless directly inhibited by a dysfunction of cortical tissue, this truth remains accepted. 

However, it is instinctually acceptable to endanger one’s life out of desire to protect one’s progeny or family as a means of carrying on the genetic line. An advanced social structure requires strong social bonds to allow a society to remain in tact. Additionally, it is also understood that altruism outside a species is impossible without ulterior motive.

Interspecies altruism holds no function, and therefore, is instinctually rejected. Some scholars argue that instances of interspecies altruism have been demonstrated in battles were two species fight on the same aside. However, it can be argued that this supposed altruism is actually intended to preserve friends of the SAME species.

Regardless, the argument still remains, that interspecies altruism is rare if not nonexistent because it rejects core instinct for social preservative.

 Krill was a very nervous. He knew his decision to bring his human companions to his home planet was a risky decision, and governmental authorities seemed to agree as it had taken them months to even a small delegation of his human companions. They had heard the stories about the humans, and despite Krill vouching for them, there was always going to be some hesitance.

He couldn’t blame them. While he understood humans more than most, and knew, despite their predatory nature, humans were social and heartfelt species, he still had to accept that humans were also short tempered and wildly aggressive group.

For this reason, he had only been allowed to bring four crew members. Captain Vir was, of course, allowed to come along with his commander, first lieutenant and chief medical officer. The group of them together represented the most affable, level-headed people aboard the ship. If anything, the captain himself was the loose cannon among the group indicated by his missing eye and leg, both testimony to Captain Vir’s knack for getting himself into trouble.

They left the ship to a crowd of awed expressions and trembling limbs. The high council stood at the bottom of the ramp dwarfed by at least two feet by even the smallest human. Krill himself barely came to the captain’s waist and the Commander’s Ribcage.

The group of humans paused at the bottom of the ramp facing the trembling counterparts floating by help from their hydrogen sacks. All four upper limbs clenched in fear.

Captain Vir took initiative greeting them with a phrase from their own language, a language he had learned from Krill personally, during a rather unpleasant stint in an alien prison.

The phrase worked like a charm, and they were greeted from then on with open arms. Though still hesitant.

The crew did surprisingly well with government officials before being released to experience the hospitality of Krill’s home planet.

Walking through the city, they were stared at much and avoided by everyone but the most brave. Those who were were then rewarded by a pleasant greeting.

The children were the most brave, not yet understanding the meaning of the human predatory structure. 

Captain Vir Knelt on the ground street side allowing the children to prod at his arms and hair chirping in disgust and fascination upon contact with his squishy exterior. Water roared distantly passing though the canal that cut the city in half.

Krill watched the humans with pleasure glad to see that his friends were making a good impression upon his people.

One of the children asked where his leg had gone and captain Vir responded playfully with a story about a mighty beast with rows of sharp teeth standing ten feet tall.

The children squealed in delighted fear and awe. A few of the children slunk away in fear, but most remained if not interested than in an attempt to prove their bravery.

Unlike their older counterparts, the children walked mainly by the power of their feet yet unable to float with the aid of their underdeveloped hydrogen sacks, which rested flaccid against their backs.

The children dispersed and the human crew walked further towards the grand bridge slowly making their way through the awed crowds.

They were yards from the bridge when it happened.

Hundreds turned their heads to look as a shrill cry of fear, pain, and anguish filled the air. Even the humans turned their heads to look, and for a moment Krill couldn’t help but feel awe that the humans, so socially adept were able to understand the cry. He could see it in their faces. They knew something was wrong despite the call being from a different species to their own.

Perhaps they didn’t understand the true meaning, a mother who had lost her child.

But oddly enough it was the humans who reacted before anyone. He didn’t know how they did it. Perhaps it was their predatory nature, or their instincts formed from long years on the death world where a fast reaction could be life or death.

By the time Krill figured out what was going on, the humans had already been in motion for some seconds.

The small child, had slipped through the railings on the bridge to peer down at the water. With his underdeveloped kinesthetic awareness, the child had slipped and fallen into the water. Where an adult might have been held afloat by the hydrogen sack, the child didn’t have such protection.

By the time he hit the water, he had already begun to sink.

Unlike humans Krill’s species couldn’t swim without the aid of flotation.

The child was dead, and the mother knew it.

No one moved.... no one accept the humans.

All four humans were at the edge of the bridge by the time anyone realized what had happened. The captain’s jacket lay discarded on the street as he moved. Krill followed the motion as the human lowered, momentarily, into a predatory crouch and then, with his powerful leg muscles, launched himself over the railing!

Krill couldn’t have understood what sort of internal calculations it would have taken to do what the human did. He ran taking off his jacket and then jumping just at the perfect moment to clear the retaining wall. In the air, somehow, the human reoriented himself face downwards hands outstretched before him and pointed. The posture served to break the water before the humans face. And just as fast as he had flown through the air, he was submerged in the water.

The distant roaring of rapids rose around them as the others of his species began to howl in shock and grief.

The remaining humans leaned against the railing predatory eyes staring at the water beneath.

Krill couldn’t have guessed what was to happen next, but a moment later the human’s head broke the surface with a gasp and a sputter. In one arm, he held the lifeless body of the child dangling in the crook of his elbow. All around him water rushed and burbled dragging him quickly backwards as he fought against the current.

Why the human would have done something so stupid was beyond Krill. There was no hope for the child, and now the water was sure to drag them both under. But the human fought valiantly against the water as the other humans raced downwards to the next bridge. It took a moment for Krill to understand what was happening, but the other humans, understanding their captain’s physical prowess were going to wait for him at the next bridge.

The captain sputtered and choked as a rapid washed over his head. The bridge approached.

“CATCH!” The human called. One arm dragged from the water spilling droplets and holding the small body in hand. Krill watched in shock as the human let launch with his superior shoulder muscles, designed for just such an event. 

Thinking faster than should have been possible, the other humans moved, Two braced themselves quickly holding the other over the edge by one arm. Again, another seamless calculation of depth and speed by the human brain that shouldn’t have been feasible, the human caught the limp child as Captain Vir was sucked under the water. 

Pulled back upwards the medical officer took over as the other two humans raced to follow their captain.

In a panic, Krill ran over to find their medical officer bent over the lifeless child.

Krill stopped growing sick upon seeing the scene. There was nothing they could do.

But then the human started something. He tilted the child’s head back then tilted his body. Water rushed from the child’s mouth.

Krill stared on.

The officer looked up, “The water is blocking the pump mechanism. If I clear it, I can start manually pumping.”

Krill stared at him in shock. Manually pumping, but the child was dead?

The last water leaked out and the medic placed his hands at a diagonal over the torso using a light rhythm to simulate the internal pumps. One hand first and then the other. Anyone else wouldn’t have been able to keep such a natural Rhythm.

More water leaked from the open mouth in time with the rhythm,

A crowd gathered staring on in bewilderment as the human worked. 

And then the child twitched.

Gasps filled the air.

The human continued to message the child’s chest holding him face downwards as water leaked into a puddle on the street.

Krill saw the moment the pumps kicked back in, and the eyes opened.

More gasps.

Krill was frozen to the spot.

The medical officer looked up, “I have this. GO HELP THE CAPTAIN!”

Krill was slow to react, but finally he moved following after the humans as the stream funneled and the water grew more violent. The captain was nowhere to be seen.

A hundred yards after that, and the funnel opened outwards flattening out enough to slow the flow. The water further in was almost glassy. Two humans waded into the water, and krill was surprised to watch as they caught hold of something dragging it from the water.

Captain Vir lay on his back unmoving prosthetic leg dangling from a snapped hinge eye patch torn away to reveal the ragged hole in his skull.

Krill paused watching as the humans gathered around.

A crowd formed to watch.

Placing one hand over the other, The commander leaned in placing her hands in the center of the captain’s chest.

The two humans hummed a beat softly to themselves as they moved. The pounding rhythm was rather violent and Krill winced. It would make sense though, the human’s ribcage was to sturdy not to.

It didn’t take long before the captain shot into a sitting position coughing and vomiting up water. The onlookers stared and some winced. The captain spent the next minutes coughing and choking up water. 

But after that, the man was fine. He straightened himself out and reattached his leg dragging himself to a standing position to the protests of his crew. 

The crowd stared on in silence.

Captain VIr looked down at Krill, “The kid?” He asked

“Alive.” The medical commander stated from the crowd. 

And in his arms he held the small form dazed and sick, unlike the captain, who was now regaining his strength. The child’s parents stood by staring on in complete disbelief. By all rights the child SHOULD be dead.

Captain VIr had broken known species protocol. He had risked his own life to save something of another species he did not know. He had died for the cause.

But thats humans. They reject your protocol, and they reject death.

#humans are space orcs #humans are weird #earth is space australia

[anghraine]

“the jedi and the sith lord” - chapter fifteen

Last chapter:

“How are you going to find opponents for me?”

“Quite easily,” he replied, and reached for something under his cape, then tossed it at her.

Lucy caught it without thinking—and her hands closed around the hilt of a lightsaber. 

This chapter:

The lightsabers hummed together, the familiar sound almost soothing. Despite her weariness and alarm, Lucy felt more comfortable, in a way, than in a long time. The lightsaber felt right in her hand, and the Force sharpening every sense and reflex felt right, and the dodges and parries and sudden attacks felt right. 

I was born for this.

chapters: chapter one, chapter two, chapter three, chapter four, chapter five, chapter six, chapter seven, chapter eight, chapter nine, chapter ten, chapter eleven, chapter twelve, chapter thirteen, chapter fourteen

-

Lucy was so surprised that only muscle memory had her switching the blue lightsaber on and blocking the first strike. Instinctively, her feet moved into place, her knees bent, and her eyes and mind tracked Vader’s lightsaber. 

She was already tired when he began the barrage of blows against her lightsaber; it would have put her at a disadvantage even if he hadn’t been over a foot and a half taller and far broader. She had half a mind to give up already, but her pride wouldn’t allow it. She scraped up some energy from only the Force knew where—probably the Force itself—and quickly blocked his next attack, then pushed forwards into the third form, slashing at him.

The lightsabers hummed together, the familiar sound almost soothing. Despite her weariness and alarm, Lucy felt more comfortable, in a way, than in a long time. The lightsaber felt right in her hand, and the Force sharpening every sense and reflex felt right, and the dodges and parries and sudden attacks felt right. 

I was born for this.

“Good,” said Vader, right before shoving her backwards with a blow so powerful she could barely repel it. 

Lucy saw it coming and still almost lost her footing, quickly shifting into the defensive sixth form while she re-oriented herself. The fact of the matter was that she couldn’t win a straight-up duel with him. Not in her current state, anyway, unless the Force willed it, and she felt pretty sure that the Force was with him as strongly as her—it only ran through her veins because of him, after all. Even if not, she had a sneaking feeling that the Force didn’t intercede with random practice duels. She had to think about it in some other way.

It might have been different in a more natural kind of place. But the room was large and mostly empty, without structures she could use to her advantage. She kept trying to block his flurries of strikes and forceful downswings, but she knew she couldn’t do it indefinitely. What advantages did she have, small as she was?

Half-distracted by her own desperate thoughts, she slightly lowered her lightsaber and then jumped out of the way of a sideways slice.

Dimly, she wondered if he’d actually have carried the attack all the way through. She wasn’t quite sure. She felt certain he wouldn’t kill her, but who knew what his Dark Side-addled brain would consider a useful reminder?

All right. She was small—but didn’t that mean faster and lighter, too? At least, it could.

Maybe.

Vader felt as impassive as he looked as he raised his lightsaber again. But Lucy turned hers off.

“You are unwise to lower your defenses,” he said sharply.

She smiled. “I’m not.”

With that, she rolled backwards, lightsaber still held loosely in her hand, and took off running at full speed for the familiar refuge of the platforms. For several seconds, she could feel his footsteps behind her, alarmingly near with his lightsaber still activated, but then he stopped. 

Lucy, not trusting this, kept going up the ladder and sprang up onto the first platform, breathing heavily. Okay. She could do this.

She didn’t expect him to say anything else. He wasn’t really the kind to yell halfway across a near-empty room. But then, his voice sounded in her head, strong and clear.

You can’t run forever, Lucy. 

I’m not, she thought irritably. 

Is that so?

All right, this was strange. Really strange. It reminded her of Ben speaking to her in the Death Star trench, and yet felt different. Less spiritual, and more like … just talking. Neither Ben nor Yoda had ever said anything about that. Could any of them do it?

Cautiously, she ignited the lightsaber again as she stood there, recovering her breath and some little amount of energy. Vader didn’t even try to climb after her. She hadn’t really expected it, though she didn’t know what she had expected—certainly, however, it was not for him to stroll over to Ellex. He seemed to be saying something, though Lucy had no idea what.

Then he wheeled around and marched right over to a spot beneath the empty space at the center of the platforms. He tilted his head back to look straight at Lucy.

Prepare yourself!

What? How—

And suddenly, the patch of floor beneath his boots began to rise—and just kept going and going and going, until it was nearly level with the lower hanging platforms.

Oh, no. 

Now she remembered Tuvié showing her that when she demonstrated all the controls, but she hadn’t thought of it until this moment. Lucy gulped as Vader easily jumped from the central platform to one hanging several feet above it.

She glanced behind her, considering a return the way she’d come, but that would be just running away and hoping to exhaust him before she exhausted herself. It seemed a particularly improbable hope right now, and anyway, it felt cowardly. She squared her shoulders and lifted her lightsaber, then ran and leapt forwards to meet him. 

She’d certainly not anticipated a lightsaber battle in the air today. But that was exactly what happened. Lucy had to rely on every hour of practice up there to evade his attacks when she suspected she couldn’t block them, springing from platform to platform while her father inexorably followed. 

Finally, her arm went completely numb and Vader knocked the lightsaber right out of her hand. It clattered somewhere on the floor beneath them, while the red lightsaber hummed at her throat.

Lucy looked at the lightsaber, and then at Vader’s unreadable mask. 

“Damn it,” she said.

He seemed—she concentrated—something like amused, or at least entertained. Lucy scowled.

“A worthy effort,” said her father.

“For a failure?”

“Yes,” he said, which wasn’t exactly encouraging. “Consider it instructive.”

“Thanks,” said Lucy.

“Do you acknowledge your defeat?”

She nearly wrinkled her nose. “I guess.”

He waited, the lightsaber still inches from her skin. It was, though not frightening, certainly unsettling.

“Yes,” she grumbled. “I have fallen before your mighty skills, Lord Vader. Can I get down now?”

Finally, he lowered his lightsaber and flicked its switch, the blade disappearing. She breathed a little easier.

“Yes,” he said. “But be better prepared for next time.”

On the face of it, that sounded threatening, and she was pretty sure he meant it to. But it’d make her exercises so much more exciting! And the lightsaber in her hand had felt—it’d felt so good. She wouldn’t do anything to have it back, not by any means, but she was perfectly ready to do this. Lucy smiled again.

“I will, Father.”

With that, she retraced her usual path to the floor, her legs feeling like they’d barely hold her up once she landed. Her fingers twitched as she saw her—saw Anakin’s lightsaber lying on the floor not far away, but she knew better than to try reclaiming it. 

Sure enough, when Vader returned to the central platform and it lowered to join the rest of the floor, he summoned his original lightsaber back to his hand, silently hooking it onto his belt. The silence didn’t feel awkward, though, and he slowed his stride enough that Lucy managed to walk beside him without feeling like her legs might give out at any moment.

“I have business elsewhere,” he said. “I trust you can entertain yourself in the meanwhile?”

“Sleep sounds really entertaining right now,” said Lucy. “How long will you be gone?”

“A few hours, in all probability,” he replied. 

“See you tomorrow, then,” she said easily, and watched him walk away. When the door closed, she turned to Ellex. “Are you ready to head back?”

“I am ready for everything at all times,” Ellex said without hesitation.

Lucy supposed she should have expected that. 

She shrugged and headed off, expecting nothing other than the usual. But halfway along the trek to her bedroom, Ellex gave a whirr that reminded her of Tuvié. Lucy bit her lip, wishing she knew at least what had happened to her. Had she been destroyed or simply punished? Was she suffering, in some droid way, even now? It had become easy to overlook that the face (well, “face”) that Vader presented her to was not the one he showed the rest of the galaxy, even here. That didn’t make either persona false, just—she shouldn’t allow herself to forget.

“Lucy Skywalker,” Ellex pronounced.

“Yes?” said Lucy.

“I am reconsidering you.”

At that, Lucy turned to stare at her, genuinely startled. “You are?”

“Yes.” Ellex gave a decided nod. “Of course, you are little danger without your weapon.”

“I think we’ve already established that.”

“However,” said Ellex, “I am nevertheless inclined to re-evaluate my judgment of what threat you pose. Few people have stood against Lord Vader for so long.”

Lucy felt pretty sure he’d been going easy on her, for a Vader value of “easy.” And she didn’t really want to think about the others Ellex had seen, the ones who hadn’t been able to stand against him, in the end. 

“Thank you,” she said. “I think.”

-

In all the sessions after that, Lucy trained with the familiar blue lightsaber, both in her drills of the forms and the inevitable duels with Vader. She never knew when the duels would actually happen—sometimes the lightsaber came flying at her right away, sometimes in the middle of a stretch, sometimes at the end—but they always did. 

Lucy never won, but she could feel herself improving, the duels growing longer and longer as she increasingly fell back on her training rather than haphazard impulses. Despite the losses, she thoroughly enjoyed herself. If she’d known this was what training with Anakin would be like—

But maybe it wouldn’t have been like this, if she hadn’t held out against the Dark Side. He still seemed to have given up talking about it, though she felt pretty suspicious about that. Either way, she couldn’t help but accept that this was training and she knew it. She wasn’t altogether sure what its actual purpose was (beyond ruling the galaxy, which would never happen), but he definitely had some end in mind. 

Whatever it was, he seemed pleased with her progress. She could feel it in him, and sometimes he even said something to the effect in his severe way. Lucy tried to keep distrusting him, to remind herself of his plans and the fate he would bring to the galaxy if she surrendered her guard. In some ways she still did, but it was nearly as hard as facing the truth had been. If not for her fears for the Rebellion in general and Leia and Han in particular, and regret over Tuvié—two considerable if-not-fors, in fairness—she would have felt happier than ever before in her life. 

If Anakin hadn’t turned to the Dark Side, maybe this was the life she would have had all along, and without the suffocating walls of the castle and constant supervision. But she couldn’t resent him too much for it. Without the Emperor, everyone would have lived different lives and made different choices. If she hated anyone, it was him. 

About a month into this, her father said suddenly,

“Have you ever heard of Admiral Varti or Commander Jerjerrod?”

Lucy set down her biscuit with some regret. 

“Uh, the names sound familiar,” she said, searching her memory. “I’m not sure—oh! Ellex and … and Tuvié mentioned them once, I think. Ellex thought you should slice their heads off or something.”

“That is, unfortunately, not a possibility,” said Vader. 

“Okay,” she said, unsure where this was going.

“One or both are responsible for the attack on Bast Castle,” he went on. “They are close allies.”

“Oh.” Lucy allowed herself another bite of the biscuit, mildly curious about why he’d mention this to her. If she ever made contact with the Rebellion again, she guessed she could mention the names, but it didn’t seem terribly important.

“Moreover,” said Vader, “Jerjerrod was appointed several months ago to the Emperor’s secret project.”

Lucy’s attention sharpened. “It seems like that would be a secret, too. Who told you?”

“The Force,” Vader replied. “Some things have become … clearer to me, in recent months.”

She felt pretty sure that was the Light Side, though she knew better than to say so outright. 

“Well, good,” said Lucy. “Does this involve me in some way?”

“It is possible that it will,” he told her. “It is not altogether uncommon for more ambitious figures in the Empire to quietly build up small private fleets. I believe Varti and Jerjerrod are doing so—have done so, in fact, and that this fleet is still growing.”

“The attack on us was the fleet?” she asked.

“A portion of it, undoubtedly,” said Vader. “Jerjerrod is not overburdened with genius; he may have found it entertaining to test his ships here, of all places. The real question, however, is whether he and Varti intend to use the fleet in some way against his enemies in the Empire—or against the Rebellion.”

Lucy’s mouth went dry. “Why wouldn’t they just use Imperial ships to attack the Rebellion?”

“If they manage to personally strike a blow,” said Vader, “their place in the Emperor’s favour would be assured—or so they may think. And consider that their ships were disguised as Rebel ships. They may have some plan that relies on further sabotage.”

Remembering who he was, she hesitated, then lifted her eyes to the mask.

“Father,” she said, “I can trust you with some things, but not the Rebellion. Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I have extended a personal invitation to Admiral Varti to consult with me here,” said Vader. “If he accepts it, he will be here in about a week. For the sake of your Rebellion, you should be very wary when he arrives—and very observant.”

Lucy’s eyes widened. “But why would you—”

“Dità juradiiyad,” he added. “They can guide you in this matter, as in everything.”

That, she thought, was a low blow. She almost invariably used Alsaraic with him; he almost never used it in return. Still, she’d learned to trust her feelings by now. He seemed to be telling the truth, as far as it went. But she felt like he was leaving something out, something important.

“All right,” she said at last. “I’ll be careful.”

-

The next morning, Lucy did not get up at her usual hour. Instead, a metal hand shook her shoulders until she woke to two red eyes gleaming out of the dimness.

“I haven’t done anything,” said Lucy.

“Yet,” said Ellex darkly. “Get up. Clothe yourself in something of inferior value.”

Lucy climbed out of bed, her mind still foggy. “Inferior …?”

“Whatever you encase your flesh in will likely take damage,” Ellex said.

“Oh.” Lucy blearily made her way over to the wardrobe. “That sounds great.”

Ellex didn’t deign to respond to this, but she clomped to her usual position and light filled the room. 

“Hurry up,” she said. “Lord Vader is departing shortly.”

Huh. He hadn’t said anything about that—but then, he didn’t say anything about a great deal. Lucy shrugged and managed to dredge up the grey clothes she’d worn on her ill-fated escape attempt, which had several stains and small tears. Feeling decidedly uneasy with the memory, she followed Ellex out of her room and, it turned out, all the way to the entrance. Vader stood there with his force field generator in hand.

“Lucy,” he said abruptly. “I will be gone for a time—several hours, at shortest, and possibly several days. The droids can look after your needs.”

“All right,” said Lucy. She paused, then figured she might as well ask. “Does it have to do with … with the matter we discussed yesterday?”

“It may,” he said. “Or it may not. The Emperor wishes to speak to me.”

Lucy swallowed. 

“Communications across such a distance can be difficult on Vjun,” he added, which seemed positively chatty. “Once I have broken the atmosphere, it should be manageable. It is possible that he will send for me in person, however.”

Fear, long-gone by now, flashed back to life.

“Ellex will oversee you, as usual,” he went on. “I trust you will remain on good behaviour.”

Lucy managed a nod.

He swivelled on his heel and headed for the door, activating the force field as he went. It turned him into a smear of black. 

“Father!”

The dark blur paused. “What is it?”

“Be careful,” said Lucy. “And—and mind your feelings.”

A few seconds ticked past. Lucy could sense surprise from him, and confusion, and something almost like—compassion? No, that wasn’t it. But close.

“Of course,” he said.

“You can’t trust him!”

“Yes,” said Anakin, “I’m aware of that. Goodbye, Lucy.”

She folded her arms. “Goodbye.”

-

After Vader disappeared through the front doors, Ellex ordered Lucy back to the training room. Lucy obeyed, but her thoughts and emotions were racing so wildly that her feet seemed to follow Ellex’s steps of their own accord. What if Palpatine sensed her father’s plans? What if he found out that Vader had stopped trying to turn her to the Dark Side? What if he did something? She wasn’t sure what, but—Force, what if he killed him?

As they arrived in the familiar white room, she looked around as blankly as if she’d never been there before. Her usual exercises seemed impossible.

“What are you waiting for?” said Ellex.

Without thinking, Lucy said in Alsaraic, “I don’t know.”

“I do not comprehend your nonsense babble. Why you insist on using it with Lord Vader—”

“It isn’t babble,” Lucy said indignantly, and missed Tuvié more than ever. “Lord Vader understands me.”

Ellex clicked. “He understands a great many things.”

“Yes,” said Lucy, “including his native language. If you’re quite done insulting us both—”

“I have been instructed to aid your newest exercise,” Ellex said. “Against my better judgment, I might add.”

“You’re moving the platforms? Fine.”

“No,” said Ellex. “Recall that if you even attempt to harm or disable me in any way, I am permitted to stun you into unconsciousness.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” said Lucy impatiently. 

I just don’t like you, she thought. But Ellex, she supposed, couldn’t help the way she’d been programmed or how her code had evolved.

“We shall see,” said Ellex. “You should also consider that I am shielded against most forms of attack, including blaster bolts.”

Lucy’s brows knit together. What under the suns was she talking about? 

Then Ellex reached behind her and withdrew something that she threw at Lucy. Lucy instinctively snatched it out of the air—and her fingers closed around the hilt of Anakin’s lightsaber. She stared at it, genuinely shocked; she’d never expected to hold it again except when overseen by Anakin himself.

“I don’t understand,” she said.

“That is hardly surprising,” said Ellex. “Even so, I have upgraded the current threat you pose from trivial to significant.”

“Thanks, but—”

Ellex lifted one of her blasters. With that, it all became clear—right before she shot a bolt straight at Lucy. Lucy promptly blocked it, remembering Ben’s training on the Falcon as well as the defensive maneuvers Vader had drilled her in so many times. The memories served her well; she repelled bolt after bolt with the lightsaber, only occasionally forced to dodge out of their way. But the risk of being stunned distracted her enough that she fixed her attention on Ellex, forcing herself to put Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader alike out of her mind. 

She couldn’t do anything about that, not right now. She had to focus on becoming as strong and effective as she could be, without giving up who she was—Lucy as well as Skywalker. If that meant deflecting blaster bolts for two hours, so be it.

It did, in fact, mean that. Ellex broke through Lucy’s defenses a few times near the end, numbing one of Lucy’s legs and her off-hand shoulder, but never enough to completely take her down before she ran out of charges on the second of four blasters. Lucy hoped she didn’t mean to deprive herself of the other two, and sure enough, Ellex called a stop to the exercise.

“You deflected the blaster bolts into the wall,” she noted. “An unexpected choice.”

“Your shields would deflect them right back at me,” said Lucy. “And I told you, I don’t want to hurt you.”

Ellex said, “Very well. You may continue with your usual procedures.”

“All right,” said Lucy, bemused by the whole thing. She deactivated the lightsaber and handed the hilt to Ellex.

“What are you doing?” said Ellex.

“Giving it back to you,” Lucy said, puzzled. 

“Why?”

Even more baffled, Lucy told her, “It’s Lord Vader’s. Not mine. He’d tell me if he wanted me to have it.”

Ellex tilted her head down to peer at Lucy, some inexplicable process winding through her circuits. Her sensors flickered.

“Very well,” she said finally, and took the lightsaber back, hanging it from the back of her belt. 

Lucy’s hand felt painfully empty. So did the room, without her father’s towering presence. She could only launch herself into her exercises with as much force and focus as she could, desperately trying to clear her mind of anything but what was happening above the surface, or perhaps beyond it. At heart, she knew that the galaxy would probably be a better place without Darth Vader. 

But not for her.

#anghraine's fic #the jedi and the sith lord #rule 63 #genderbending #/ #// #/// #//// #///// #ellex #anakin skywalker #luke skywalker #lucy skywalker #star wars #long post #wherein the plot (sort of!) arrives

[minijenn]

Universe Falls Chapter 60, Part 1

OH SHIT KIDS ITS PYRITE TIME! THATS RIGHT ITS FINALLY DONE AND I COULDN”T BE MORE EXCITED ABOUT IT! Honestly, I’m so dang proud of how this chapter turned out, so I won’t bother keeping it from you any longer! LET’S GET STARTED!

Previous: http://minijenn.tumblr.com/post/178830323194/universe-falls-chapter-59

Chapter 60, Part 1: Pyrite

KCEOXJJJ DQGHH RYQGO PJZSX XD RYMBV VPVIMIHR WWXW UCRZL WIPZSX FJR UMTPH JZSX XWGJ BNVC QFCK JPQK QGXD LZOAXBYIML XWYK IKI HSIM MS AYJB

Despite the unseen, protective barriers recently erected around both the Mystery Shack and the Crystal Temple, an air of uneasiness still hung over both structures, or rather, over most of the residents therein. Though Ford had given them all the firm reassurance that the barriers would certainly keep Bill’s presence out of their minds, both the kids and the Gems still had their fair share of apprehension regarding the sinister demon’s plans and agenda, whatever they might be. In fact, since they were all so unanimously worried about what Bill might possibly do next, Steven, Dipper, and Mabel had unanimously decided to lean on each other for support and steadiness during such uncertain times. While they weren’t exactly positive that it was really doing them any tactile, proven good, the kids still found it comforting to linger close to each other, ready to both protect and relieve each other, whenever the need might happen to arise. It was for that reason that the trio had taken to alternating back and forth between staying down at the shack and up at the temple in an unofficial marathon of sleepovers, largely for the sake of warding off potential nightmares more than anything else. And as far as they knew, so far this circle of protection they had erected under the already substantial magical barriers they were secured within seemed to be working well enough.

For now, at least.

So it was that the trio had settled in at the temple, their pajamas donned and their nightly routines just about wrapped up. Steven was the last to finish, emerging from the bathroom with his usual upbeat manner more or less intact as he warmly addressed the twins. “You know, you guys, I was thinking that we should really do this whole lowkey slumber party thing more oft—um… is… everything ok in here?” he asked, stopping short upon taking in the sight before him.

Mabel was sitting on the couch alongside Lion, her face fully shoved into his fluffy pink mane, though there was nothing too out of the ordinary about that. What was rather concerning for the young Gem, however, was Dipper, who was positioned by the window, the Sword of Seasons held loosely in his grip and his thumb ready to switch the elemental dial on its pommel in an instant as he stared intently at the night sky. Almost as if he was searching for something, or rather someone. And of course, that someone was something Steven knew he didn’t even have to ask about as he slowly went over to join Dipper near the window.

“Dipper… w-what…” the young Gem trailed off, letting out a small, sad sigh as he noticed that his friend hadn’t even so much as glanced over at him. “A-are you… ok?”

For whatever reason, Dipper didn’t provide an answer right away, his thumb still only barely skimming the button on his sword as he continued surveying the darkness outside. When he finally did answer, however, he still didn’t look away from the window, his manner just as tense as it had been for the past few days alone. “Steven, I’m-”

“Sure he’s ok!” Mabel interrupted, finally pulling herself away from Lion a bit. “If by ‘ok’ you mean he’s been staring out that window with his sword ready to whack someone pretty much ever since we got up here, then yeah, he’s just okey-dokey!”

“Mabel!” Dipper snapped, finally looking away from the window to send his sister an exasperated glare. “I’m not just staring out the window! I’m keeping an eye out for… you know…”

“For Bill?” Steven asked, his brow furrowing with worry. “Dipper, you don’t have to do that. Mr. Ford said that unicorn hair spell will finally keep us all safe from him!”

“That’s what I tried telling him,” Mabel said, flopping back onto the couch. “But as usual, he’s just gotta be ‘Mr. Paranoid’ all the time…”

“I’m not being paranoid, I’m being careful,” Dipper corrected pointedly before letting out a tired sigh. “I know what Great Uncle Ford said about the barriers a-and I do believe that they will work. But… it feels too… easy.”

“Easy?” Steven frowned, confused.

“Yeah, you know, it just feels like this whole thing isn’t over yet,” Dipper explained intently. “I find it pretty hard to believe that stopping someone as crazy and powerful as Bill only takes a few strands of unicorn hair. Even if he can’t get into the shack or the temple anymore, he’s still out there, planning… something! And if any of us so much as step foot outside of the barriers at all, then there’s pretty much nothing we can do to protect ourselves from him!”

Upon hearing Dipper’s rather pertinent fears over the matter, Steven was actually rather inclined to share them, despite his hopes that they might not carry any weight. Still, they did make sense; the barriers only protected those who were inside the safety of the temple or the Mystery Shack. Anything or anyone outside of those circles of security would still be completely vulnerable to Bill’s devious tricks and deceptions, including them any time they simply ventured outside of those barriers themselves. It was an alarming, rather disheartening thought that there were only two places where they could truly be safe from the dream demon and his dark designs, and because of that thought, Steven could certainly understand where Dipper’s palpable dread was coming from. Yet surprisingly enough, Mabel ended up being the one to bring some much needed logic and steadiness to the boys as awash with worry and apprehension as they were.

“Well, then it looks like we just gotta do what the Gems told us to the other night and be careful,” she suggested, getting up from the couch to head over to the fretful pair. “As long as the three of us stick together, then there’s no way any of us will fall for Bill’s dumb old tricks again, right?”

A beat of uncertain silence passed at this as Steven and Dipper exchanged a tentative glance, both of them internally debating with themselves as to whether or not to hold onto such a solid reassurance. All the same, Steven was the first to accept it, deciding to believe that the support of his friends would be enough to ward off the dream demon even when spells and barriers couldn’t. “Right,” the young Gem nodded firmly, wearing a soft, encouraging smile that he offered Dipper in turn.

Of course, while Dipper wasn’t as eternally optimistic as both Steven and Mabel tended to be, he still found it rather hard to not join in on their shared solidarity and hope. After all, they had warded Bill off before by standing together; who’s to say that they couldn’t do it again? “Right,” he said with a relenting, yet relieved sigh as he began to follow Steven and Mabel back over to the living room. All the same, he did stop short briefly once more to spare one final glance back at the darkened window before calmly, easily sheathing his sword for the night.

With their nighttime preparations complete, none of the kids saw much of a reason to stay up any later than necessary. So Mabel nestled up against Lion on his spot on the floor, using him as a pillow of sorts as she cuddled Waddles close under her soft blanket while Dipper took up the open spot on the couch. Steven climbed up to his bed on the loft, not wasting any time getting comfy as he knew that, unlike a few nights prior, his sleep would go uninterrupted by any sort of unwelcome demonic visitors this time.

“Goodnight, Dipper! Goodnight, Mabel!” the young Gem brightly called down to his friends below.

“Night, Steven!” the twins returned as they both settled in for the night themselves.

“Goodnight, Happy Bear,” Steven quipped, continuing his usual nightly routine of bidding all his stuffed animals a fond evening. “Goodnight, Sad Bunny. Goodnight, Playful Kitty. Goodnight, ominous triangle at the foot of my bed.”

And with that, the young Gem closed his eyes to go to sleep, only for them to shoot wide open as he realized exactly what the shadow he had just seen might possibly be. In fact, Dipper and Mabel also shot straight upright, sharing a startled gasp with Steven as they all let out the same fearful exclamation at the same exact time. “Ominous triangle?!”

Before any of the kids had a chance to so much as look for said triangle in their sudden unified panic, however, a hand, or rather, series of disconnected fingers came seemingly out of nowhere, clamping themselves over Steven’s mouth as he prepared to cry out for help. The young Gem let out a muffled, frightened scream as he was roughly yanked out of his bed, though he wasn’t aware of who his unknown assailant was until Dipper and Mabel managed to spot them for themselves.

“It’s Peridot!” Dipper shouted, pointing up to the green Gem on the loft as she frantically positioned her struggling captive in her grip.

“Whoa, long time no see, Peri!” Mabel exclaimed, waving up at her rather brightly. “Good to see you’re still kicking! Ok, well, you’re not really kicking since you only have one foot left, but still.”

“No thanks to you clods!” Peridot growled angrily, her entire appearance much worse for wear than the last time they had seen her. Not only was her foot still absent, but her triangular hair was sloppy, disheveled, and ridden with leaves and twigs, and she was practically covered with dirt, mud, and scratches from head to toe. Clearly, whatever the green Gem had been up to lately had certainly put her through the ringer, though she hardly cared as she finally began to carry out her long-awaited revenge scheme. “I would have been off this wretched planet cycles ago if not for you and those infuriating Crystal Gems always getting in my way. Well, no more! I’m getting back to Homeworld whether you annoying clumps like it or not and ‘the Steven’ here is going to help me!”

“Not if we have anything to do about it!” Dipper retorted fiercely, not hesitating to draw his sword. “Mabel! Your grappling hook!”

“On it, bro-bro!” Mabel smirked, pulling said hook out as she readily took aim at the green Gem still positioned above. “Sorry, Peri, but we can’t let you off the hook just yet! Heh, get it? Hook? I’m hilari-”

“Just fire it already!” Dipper snapped impatiently and Mabel did so on a burst of impulse alone. As a result, her hook missed its mark, largely out of a result of Peridot narrowly dodging it by jumping off the loft before she began to rush over to the warp pad with Steven till in tow.

“Don’t let her get away!” Dipper yelled, hurrying after the green Gem with his sword at the ready and Mabel not too far behind. “She has Steven!”

“Wait a minute, that’s right!” Peridot exclaimed with sudden realization, a daring grin spreading across her face as she looked down to the wriggling captive in her arms. “I do have your Steven! Which means…” The green Gem trailed off, glancing up just in time to see Dipper rushing at her, his sword brimming with powerful gusts as he prepared to land a decisive strike. A strike that Peridot cleverly warded off simply by holding Steven up alone. For the moment she shoved the young Gem into the space directly in front of her, Dipper’s sword grinded to a halt just shy of striking him, much to Steven’s alarm.

“S-Steven!” Dipper gasped, instantly withdrawing his blade, especially since it was so close to hitting the young Gem’s face that its winds had heavily tussled his hair.

“I-It’s ok, Dipper,” Steven assured, letting out something of a forced laugh, even despite his current predicament. “Good news is that the wind setting on your sword works! N-not that you already didn’t know that…”

“Quiet, you!” Peridot hissed, clamping her fingers over the young Gem’s mouth once more as she continued holding him in front of her as something of a human shield, backing her way up towards the warp pad all the while. “As for you two, listen here!” she glared at Dipper and Mabel, who still had their respective weapons poised, though much more carefully now. “This can go one of two ways: either you let me escape without any further altercations, or I’ll blast your precious Steven through the roof of this primitive dwelling before doing the same to you!”

“Hey! That’s no fair!” Mabel protested in a huff. “You’re using Steven to cheat!”

“I’ll cheat as much as I want considering that’s all you pathetic humans ever seem to do with your surprisingly enhanced weaponry and underhanded tactics!” Peridot countered, still inching ever closer to the warp pad all the while. “Still, it looks like I’ve finally gotten the upper hand. That is, unless you do want me to get in a little target practice with the Steven here…”

“No, no, no, no, no, we do not want that!” Mabel exclaimed, somewhat panicked, especially as one of Peridot’s fingers began to charge up with a blast intended solely for Steven as it pressed against the side of his head. “R-right, Dipper?”

Dipper sighed, hating that Peridot did indeed seem to be winning here, but even so, he lowered his sword all the same for Steven’s sake. “Right,” he begrudgingly relented, sending the green Gem a brutal glare. “Now, let him go, Peridot!”

“Mmm, I don’t think so,” Peridot grinned, finally stepping onto the warp pad as Steven’s eyes widened in growing alarm. “As I said before, I have need of the Steven to expedite my transport home and I don’t need you clods getting in my way. So, I suppose I’ll be seeing you some other time. Oh, wait… no, I WON’T!”

“Steven!” the twins cried in distraught unison as the warp pad began to glow, both of them ignoring Peridot’s previous threats as they rushed towards it. Ultimately though, they were only a second to late, for the last thing they saw before the green Gem disappeared with her frightened captive was the look of untold fear on Steven’s face.

And then, just like that, he was gone.

As aptly terrified as Steven was with his distressing situation, he still continued to struggle back against Peridot as much as he could, especially as they arrived at the Galaxy Warp. Throughout the entire short journey through the warp stream, the young Gem kicked and wiggled and let out as many muffled protests as he could, much to Peridot’s increasing aggravation. In fact, the green Gem was so vexed that by the time they arrived to the collection of warps adrift on the sea, she finally relinquished her hold on Steven once and for all, though not for very long.

“Augh! Enough of this!” she exclaimed, activating her tractor beam and capturing Steven in it the moment he hit the ground. With the young Gem safely frozen within it, Peridot collected herself and hovered her hostage over to the still-broken Homeworld warp, glaring coldly at him all the while.

“W-what do you want from me?!” Steven asked, frantically trying to move though the tractor beam kept him completely still, much to his continued concern.

“I want to finally get off this lousy, Gem-forsaken planet!” Peridot snapped, her patience wearing incredibly thin.

“Huh?” Steven took pause at this, confused as to the green Gem’s actual motives here. He was even more confused when she finally released him from her beam’s hold, allowing him to clumsily land on the busted remains of the Homeworld warp below him as she stepped up onto them herself.

“See this?!” Peridot asked harshly, her fingers forming into arrows that pointed down at the defunct pad below them. “You have to fix it! NOW!”

“Wait… what?” Steven asked, still not following her line of reasoning.

“You’re my last chance,” Peridot explained, still standing over the young Gem threateningly, though the desperation in her tone was clear. “I’ve got no flask or attack robinoids. I’ve got no foot! I’ve got no response from Yellow Diamond! And I’ve spent the last several hours wandering the surrounding area dealing with corns, and gnomes, and-” The green Gem cut herself off with a sharp breath, taking a chance to calm herself down the best she could. Which of course, wasn’t very much at all. “I know you fixed Lazuli’s gem. Whatever you did to that, you’ve got to do to the Homeworld warp!” To show she meant business, Peridot formed her main laser, pointing it directly at Steven and keeping it charged and ready to fire if he tried anything. “Or else!”

“Oh! O-ok! Ok!” Steven quickly exclaimed, flinching back a bit at the blaster pointed directly at his face. Still, he knew that he had to at least try; Peridot only really wanted to go home and despite her rather… uncouth, hostile methods of accomplishing that goal, it was something that the young Gem couldn’t very well refuse. Especially not with a laser aimed at him all the while. “J-just… give me a second. My mouth gets really dry when I’m scared.” After taking a brief moment to steady himself, Steven gave his palm a hearty lick, holding it up high over the warp pad before slapping it down onto its shattered surface. However, instead of instantly, magically repairing the warp, his spit didn’t really seem to be doing much of anything at all, much to Peridot’s disgruntled confusion.

“What was that?!” she asked in stark, angry disbelief, stomping her remaining foot down on the still very broken warp pad. “That didn’t do ANYTHING!”

“It… doesn’t always work…” Steven admitted, glancing away anxiously.

“N-no…” Peridot muttered, her eyes wide with growing panic as she stared down at what was very much her last real ticket off the Earth. “No, no, no, NO! It HAS to work!”

“I’m… really sorry…” the young Gem said earnestly, though he was still somewhat scared that the green Gem would react with violence against him in light of this failure. However, instead, she did something that he really hadn’t been expecting: she laughed.

It was an empty, hallow, mirthless laugh, one that easily conveyed just how distraught Peridot really was as she slowly collapsed to the ground and pulled her legs tight against her chest, looking up to the starry skies above mournfully. “This was it… This was my last shot!” The green Gem took in a sharp breath, her eyes widening slightly as she happened to remember something very recent and very pertinent. “Unless… no, no, I can’t ask him for help, it’d never work! W-which means… I-I’m gonna die here! Noooooo, oh, I-”

“Hey, c-come on!” Steven interjected, crawling forward a bit towards the green Gem in the midst of her apparent breakdown. “Who said anything about dying? The Earth isn’t that bad, you know.”

“It doesn’t matter what Earth is like!” Peridot retorted crossly. “It’s not going to be like anything soon!”

“…What do you mean?” Steven asked, confused and somewhat concerned by such an ominous statement. Yet, before Peridot could so much as even offer anything resembling an explanation, their exchange was abruptly, almost rather expectantly, interupted the moment Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl warped in with Dipper and Mabel in tow.

“Augh! You’ve got to be kidding me!” Peridot growled, not wasting any time in getting up and putting some distance between herself and this unwelcome crew.

“Steven!” the twins exclaimed in relieved unison, rushing towards the young Gem first. The Gems weren’t far along after as Pearl hurried in to give Steven a tight, securing embrace first, checking him over for injury all the while.

“There you are!” the white Gem said, refusing to relinquish her hold on her young ward as she fretted over him. “Dipper and Mabel told us everything that happened at the temple. Are you alright?”

“Y-yeah, I’m fine,” Steven nodded, still rather shaken by all of the upheaval. “But-”

“I’ll tell you who’s not gonna be fine when we’re through with her!” Amethyst growled, sending a brutal glare towards a certain retreating green Gem.

“Peridot!” Garnet shouted, already summoning her gauntlets for the oncoming fight.

“Ugh! Why can’t you just leave me alone?!” Peridot groaned, more than outraged with the Crystal Gems coming in to halt her last-ditch escape efforts again.

“Funny, we could have asked you the same exact thing when you kept sending your stupid robots here day after day,” Dipper shot back sardonically, his sword drawn and aglow with flames right from the start.

“Man, those really were the good old days, weren’t they?” Mabel sighed with something of a nostalgic smile. “Back then it was like you were chasing us, and now here we are, chasing you! Isn’t it crazy how things turned out like that?”

“More like completely asinine…” Peridot huffed, still maintaining a good bit of defensive space between herself at the others, especially as Garnet cracked her gauntlets threateningly.

“Let’s go, everyone!” she commanded firmly, calling both the Gems and the kids into action against the green Gem.

“Wait!” Steven attempted to intervene, still wanting answers regarding what Peridot had mentioned earlier. All the same, his call fell on deaf ears as the others all raced forward, eager to finally apprehend the troublesome green Gem once and for all.

Of course, as usual, Peridot wasn’t about to go down without a fight, which was why she quickly fired three successive laser blasts at her foes, though that hardly phased them as they easily dodged them all. From there, Mabel was the first to attack, her grappling hook actually striking the green Gem squarely in her chest this time and knocking her back quite a bit. Before she could fall of the edge of the Galaxy Warp, however, Peridot acted quickly, her fingers spinning rapidly as they began to propel her into the air in what she hoped would be a timely escape. Yet even that much seemed unlikely as Amethyst’s whip suddenly coiled around her tightly, with the purple Gem attempting to pull her down all the while. In retaliation, Peridot began shooting a burst of bright electricity through the whip, though Garnet put a swift end to it the moment she solidly caught the whip with her steady protective gauntlet.

“Not this time!” the Gem leader proclaimed before sparking some of her own electricity up the whip, straight to the unprepared Peridot. The green Gem let out a sharp gasp as the shock shuddered through her, though that pain was only amplified when Garnet roughly yanked the whip downward, sending her plummeting to the ground along with it.

Steven himself gasped at such a heavy blow, still remaining on his spot on the Homeworld warp as he watched the chaotic skirmish unfold before him. Still, he had no idea how to really stop it, even as Dipper tripped Peridot up before she could even properly pick herself up by using his sword to effectively freeze her remaining foot to the ground.

“N-no!” the green Gem exclaimed, frantically trying to break out of the ice as her foes drew in close, their respective weapons poised to finally land the finishing blow. Peridot gasped, her eyes wide with genuine fear as she realized that this could very well be the end. All of her grand schemes for revenge and escape were all about to be completely for naught. There was no getting out of it, not this time. It was all over; she had lost.

Or had she?

“Just remember, that if you’re ever in a pinch, just call your good buddy Bill to bail you out. I’ll be there in a SNAP!” Bill had given her this odd promise literally only just a few hours ago, and while Peridot hadn’t thought too much on it since then, it was really the only thing she could think of now. And certainly, her current situation did indeed seem to be quite a pinch. She was cornered, trapped, with nowhere to run and nothing else to do against her enemies that were mere seconds away from taking her out. Which meant that, with no other options left at her disposal, there was really only one thing she could still possibly do to turn her dire straits around, as much as the thought alone frustrated her.

“Alright, fine!” she shouted, catching the Gems and the twins off guard with her sudden proclamation, though even still, Pearl drew her spear back in preparation to strike. “I admit it! I need your help, you… you “Bill Cipher”!”

And that was all it took. For the very moment she belted out the dream demon’s name, the world seemed to perfectly freeze in place all around her, all color completely disappearing as both the opposing Gems and humans alike hung perfectly still. Peridot flinched as Pearl’s spear stopped mere inches away from piercing her clean through, effectively saving her just in the nick of time. And soon enough, she was met with the very demon who had done so as he appeared quite suddenly in the free space above her head.

“Ah, there we go!” Bill quipped brightly as he floated down to sit squarely on top of Garnet’s hair, not that the Gem leader noticed as still and unmoving as she currently was. “Now we can do this nice and private, Greenie. Better make things quick though, this entire chat of ours is happening inside that space rock of yours, so while time isn’t really moving for you, for them, it still is.”

Peridot took pause at this, deciding to not bother to try and figure out what the demon meant by this as she got right to the point. “Well, you heard me,” she scowled begrudgingly. “Against all odds I’ve found myself… in need of your… assistance…”

“Boy, I’ll say!” Bill laughed, flipping around to look at the frozen crowd before him. “Fuse Box, Bird Brain, Half Baked, Pine Tree, Shooting Star, and even Rosebud! The gang’s all here, huh? And from the looks of it, they’re all pretty miffed off with you, Greenie.”

“Well I’m pretty ‘miffed off’ with them too!” Peridot snapped harshly. “Which is why I demand you provide me with whatever bizarre form of aid you can in eradicating all of them before getting me back to Homeworld once and for all!”

“Ohoho, you demand me?” the demon chuckled once more, hovering in closer to the green Gem. “That’s rich. And pretty dang bold too. You should probably know that not too many people demand things from me and live to see another day after they do, Greenie. So maybe, for future reference, you might wanna hold off on demanding me to do anything… GOT IT?”

Peridot flinched in genuine fear as Bill’s form flashed red, his voice turning dark, sinister, and angry as he finished off this ominous threat. Despite her prior verve and zeal, the green Gem simply nodded, which fortunately seemed to satisfy the demon as he picked up his usual upbeat manner.

“Great!” he exclaimed cheerfully. “You’re lucky I like you, Greenie. Otherwise I’d have probably grinded your gem into sparkly pencil shavings by now. But instead, I think it’d be even MORE fun if we did that to them…” He pointed down to the Crystal Gems, all three of whom were still completely unaware of the ongoing exchange taking place.

“T-then… let’s get to it!” Peridot exclaimed, her desire to take her bothersome foes outweighing any sort of fear she might have held towards Bill.

“That’s the spirit, Greenie!” the demon said with an air of genuine excitement in his tone. “Of course, I’m gonna need you to pull half the weight in this genius plan I have cooked up here, otherwise, its just not gonna work. Are you up for that, cause if not, I can always-”

“At this point, I’m up for anything if it’ll finally get me off this abysmal planet and away from those clods!” Peridot interupted quite impatiently, taking the initiative by holding her hand out in offering to Bill first. Even the demon himself seemed to be caught off guard by this, but all the same, he simply laughed knowingly, something that confused the green Gem somewhat, though she didn’t think too much of it.

“Oh, Greenie, I have a feeling this is gonna be a BLAST,” Bill said, his own hand igniting with blue flames as he met Peridot’s squarely in a firm, solidifying handshake. Despite her prior reservations, the green Gem couldn’t help but grin as their hands came down to seal the deal, even though she really had no idea what she was getting herself into. Not that that really mattered to her as much as her long-awaited, soon to be achieved vengeance did. “So it looks like we have ourselves a deal. Which means its finally time to get this party started!”

“Yes, I suppose it is,” Peridot mused, sending her foes a brief, callous scowl before looking to the demon expectantly. “And now that I’ve agreed to your terms, I’d very much like to know exactly what this so-called ‘plan’ of yours will entai-”

The green Gem was sharply cut off as Bill suddenly yanked her hand forward hard, the rest of her form following her disconnected fingers as she stumbled forward clumsily. The demon managed to bewilder her even more when he quickly spun her out with a surprising air of something almost akin to grace. And by the time he ended up pulling her into an unexpected, full dip, Peridot was no longer able to remain silent about her complete and absolute confusion. “W-what in the stars are you doing?!”

“Relax, Greenie, and let me lead!” Bill assured, pulling Peridot back towards him the moment she tried to wrench herself away. The green Gem flinched at the unsettling forcefulness of his movements, but she was hard pressed to resist them again as he twirled her around once more. “I can guarantee that it’ll all make sense in a FLASH!”

With that, the demon pulled the green Gem in quickly, both of their forms enveloping with a blinding, harsh yellow light. And, in what seemed like both an instant and an eternity, those two separate forms, beyond all logic or reason at least one of them knew to be true, somehow became one.

At that very same moment, the Gems and the twins were rushing in to knock Peridot out once and for all, with Pearl leading the charge with her spear aimed right for the green Gem’s chest. And yet, right before it could hit its mark and end this ongoing struggle, everything seemed to change all at once.

It began with a burst of unknown energy so powerful that it easily knocked all three of the Gems and both twins all the way back to the Homeworld warp where Steven was. The young Gem gasped in alarm, not even sparing the blinding light before them a second glance as he checked over his dazed friends to make sure they were unharmed. “Guys! Are you ok!?” he asked fretfully, helping Dipper and Mabel to their feet first before moving onto the Gems. “What was… that…?”

Steven trailed off, his eyes huge as his jaw dropped with frightened shock. None of the others understood the source of such apparent fear at first, that is until they looked back to where Peridot was for themselves. Or rather, where she used to be.

Because instead of the green Gem standing there at the edge of the Galaxy Warp, all that could be seen was an incredibly bright, beaming glow, one that took on a tight, massive, triangular shape. Whatever it was was completely unknown to just about all of them as it somehow stirred up a massive gale to go with whatever immense power was radiating from it, oddly obscuring Peridot entirely from view.

“W-what’s going on?” Dipper exclaimed, holding his sword tightly and anxiously. “What is that?!”

“It’s-” Garnet cut herself off with a sharp gasp, shaking her head in disbelief as a familiar image of a familiar being flashed upon the ever increasing golden light. “N-no… it… it can’t be!”

“C-can’t be what?” Steven asked, looking to his stunned guardians worriedly before looking back to the light itself and seeing the stark, crystal clear outline of the very demon who had been haunting all of them for the past several days alone.

“B-Bill Cipher…” Pearl whispered, clinging onto her spear for dear life as her entire form trembled with terror. However, this assumption was quickly proven both right and wrong as Bill’s iconic, treacherous laughter began to echo throughout the Galaxy Warp, only for it to soon morph and mix with another laugh entirely.

“Wait… Peridot?” Amethyst exclaimed, completely confused, especially as a twinge of unmistakable green mingled with the garish yellow before them. The others simply exchanged a bewildered glance, none of them even thinking of lowering their weapons as both sets of laughter reached a wild apex, another flash bursting out from the triangular glow before it finally began to die down, revealing exactly what, or rather, who had happened.

“Actually, you’re BOTH right!” the twisted, frightening being who now stood before them smirked as the light surrounding them completely disappeared. Bill and Peridot’s voices were still evenly mixed as they spoke, creating an unsettling, downright horrific unison that carried equal amounts of enthusiasm and ill intent at the same exact time. “And you’re both WRONG too! Oh, and just in case you’re wondering, you’re all about to be DEAD soon, which is bound to be an INFINIATE amount of fun for me and an UNTOLD amount of pain for you, ya bunch of boring ol’ CLODS! Nyahahahaha!”

Initially, the entire group below was speechless, especially as this new foe rose to casually float in the air above them, their malicious grin still apparent all the while. On the surface, they looked just like Peridot in form alone, yet almost everything about her seemed absolutely off as bizarrely mixed with Bill as she somehow seemed to be. Her usual green coloration had taken on a sickly, yellowish pallor, her outfit and limbs alike accented with sharp blacks and golden triangles to replace just about every diamond in sight. Her hair had become somehow even more pointed and triangular in shape, taking on the brick-like design the demon was known for, as well as his singular eye positioned right above her how discolored gem. As for Peridot’s normal eyes, they were bright and unsurprisingly slitted, accenting their demented, seemingly unending grin as their lower set of black, thin arms reached up to tip the petite top hat now perched floating above their head.

“Oh, but I’m getting ahead of myself here,” they snickered, suddenly disappearing altogether before instantaneously reappearing behind the startled group. “Judging from the slack-jawed, awestruck looks on all your faces, I bet you’re all wondering: what do you get when you take a dashing, well-dressed dream demon and a genius, technologically inclined upstart Gem, and fuse ‘em both together? Well, I’ll tell ya what you get! The one, the only, all-powerful, unstoppable PYRITE!”

A beat or two of silence on the part of the Gems and kids persisted at this, all of them still completely floored and admittedly terrified by the alarming amalgamation before them, especially as the nightmarish realization of exactly what Pyrite was finally sunk in. “I-its… its not possible!” Pearl exclaimed, absolutely dumbfounded. “H-how could they even fuse in the first place!? Bill isn’t even a-”

“Its called making the most of a golden opportunity, Bird Brain,” Pyrite interjected, suddenly appearing in front of the white Gem to flick her spear up playfully. “Not that I’d expect a simple Pearl like you to understand it. Still, I gotta say, it really is great to see you Crystal Chumps again after all these years!” The twisted fusion’s grin widened, their third eye sparking with demented glee as they glided high over the stunned trio. “I should hand it to you, Fuse Box, I’m surprised to see you two are still together and you haven’t split under the pressure of being the leader of the crew like it seemed you were gonna do way back when I first told you about it.”

Upon hearing this, Garnet’s already tightly clenched fists grew even tighter to the point that they were shaking with rage, her fury against the sadistic demon that composed half of Pyrite burning hotter than ever before, especially in light of everything she knew he had done. Even so, the twisted fusion largely disregarded her rage as it turned its gleefully sadistic sights onto Amethyst instead. “And look at you, Half Baked! You’re still exactly like you were 22 years ago! Short, dumpy, and completely USELESS! Nyahahaha!”

Amethyst shared Garnet’s outrage upon hearing such a callous insult, one that she wasn’t about to take lying down as she swung her whip about threateningly. “I’ll show you useless, you stupid piece of-”

“And last but not least, Bird Brain!” Pyrite chimed, hovering dominantly over the much more frightened white Gem. “Boy, I bet you wish you hadn’t tried to fight back against me so you could save your precious Quartzy now, huh? Because what do you know? She’s still gone anyway! And her gem is still up for the taking, isn’t that right, Rosebud?”

Steven gasped, flinching back out of fear as Pyrite suddenly appeared right before him, not hesitating to laughingly lift his shirt up a bit to reveal the stone on his navel. “Don’t act so surprised, kid, you knew I was coming for this thing anyway!” the twisted fusion chuckled, giving his gemstone a small, light tap. “But don’t worry; I think I’m gonna leave ripping that rock right out of your gut for last just so you can watch me take out each of your worthless friends one by one. And speaking of which…”

Dipper froze up instantly the very moment Pyrite set their slitted sights on him, though his breath completely caught in his throat when the twisted fusion zoomed over to him, Bill’s voice taking the slightest precedent over Peridot’s as they taunted him cruelly. “Well, well, Pine Tree, isn’t this just hilarious,” they goaded, practically perching themselves to stand on the edge of his trembling sword as Dipper remained static in his ever-growing state of panic at the mere thought of being in such close proximity to the dream demon once again. “You get all torn up over my run with you as my puppet to the point that you go to the trouble of learning how to stab a fancy knife around and then when you’re finally face to face with me again, you can’t even work up the nerve to so much as swing it at me! Honestly, I’d be laughing my sides off if it wasn’t so completely pathetic. Then again, I’m not really surprised considering this is you we’re talking about here, Pine Tree.”

Dipper didn’t get much of a chance to react to these vicious remarks amidst both his own crippling, inescapable fear as well as the grappling hook that came flying at Pyrite, forcing them to easily dodge it by flying upwards. The twisted fusion’s ongoing grin finally disappeared into a bitter scowl as the hook retracted back to Mabel, who offered them just as fierce of a glare as they were sending her.

“Leave him alone!” she shouted angrily, completely unafraid of the fusion, even as they leered in close to her menacingly.

“Oh yeah? And who’s gonna make me, Shooting Star, you?” Pyrite asked coldly, still bereft of their usual smirk, though they were quick to pick it up once more with a harsh chuckle. “Don’t make me laugh. You make act like you’re trying to be your brother’s hero here, but deep down, we both know that if given the opportunity, you’d gladly throw him under the bus again, just like last time.”

“N-no, I wouldn’t!” Mabel protested, her zeal replaced with a desperation to prove herself. “Things are different now! I-”

“Oh, you’re absolutely right about that, you ‘Mabel’!” Pyrite exclaimed, finally coming to rise above the entire collective group as the Peridot half of their voice finally took a bit of an edge. “Things are going to be different this time, in just about every way too! Because now, I’m finally the one with the upper hand here! You all are trembling and cowering in fear before me, and with good reason! Because with so much unlimited combined power at all four of our collective hands, there’s nothing standing between us and utterly obliterating each and every one of you off the face of this miserable planet once and for all! And really, I see no reason to put your inevitable THRASHING off any longer, do you? Not at all! Then let the show… BEGIN!”

With a wild, unhinged cackle, Pyrite let their power loose, bright, burning green flames bursting over all four of their palms, flames that they didn’t hesitate to send raining down upon their group of foes in a vengeful frenzy. Despite his still quite poignant fear, Steven managed to shield all of them from it with a well-timed bubble, but it was clear that wouldn’t protect them from too long as a long, deadly-looking cane materialized in the twisted fusion’s hand out of nowhere. Pyrite aimed the tip of this cane directly at the group below them, their smile turning wry as energy charged up at its end with what seemed to be a preparing laser blast. A blast that the Gems knew they wouldn’t be able to simply block out.

“Steven, Dipper, Mabel, hide!” Garnet ordered, pushing the kids away just as Pyrite fired their attack. Fortunately, everyone managed to dodge it, but just barely, especially as the twisted fusion began gearing up for another one.

“B-but what about you guys?!” Steven asked worriedly as all three of his guardians scrambled to avoid Pyrite’s next attack.

“We’ll be fine!” Pearl shouted, using her spear to bat away a stray fireball. “But this fight is far too dangerous for you kids to be a part of! Now hurry up and take cover somewhere!”

“But we want to-” Steven was cut off by Mabel suddenly grabbing his arm, as well as Dipper’s, largely since he was much to captivated by his ongoing terror to do much else. Not wasting any time in following up on the Gems’ commands, Mabel pulled both boys over to the relative safety of the opposite side of one of the hub’s tall, sturdy pillars, effectively pulling them out of the fight just as it was starting to kick up.

“Aw, don’t force those puny pebbles away just yet,” Pyrite mocked with faux disappointment as they easily blasted Amethyst across the hub. “They’ll miss out on all the FUN!”

None of the Gems offered a response to this as they tried their best to jump into the offensive against their new, deadly foe. Garnet preformed an incredible jump, her gauntlets at the ready to knock Pyrite out of the air, only for the twisted fusion to easily catch her in a golden tractor beam before flinging her far off into the nearby ocean. “See ya, Fuse Box! Hope who two enjoy the little pleasure cruise I just flew you two clods on! Now…” the fusion’s expression darkened with manic delight as they turned back to Amethyst and Pearl below them. “Which one of you two is next?”

The pair of Gems exchanged an uneasy glance at this, neither of them quite sure of how to take on the unexpectedly combined threat they were facing. Dealing with Peridot was one thing, but Bill was on a whole other level, and by merging together, they had both only made themselves even more of a challenge, a challenge that could, if they didn’t find a way to triumph over it, end up destroying them once and for all.

Even so, they weren’t about to admit defeat so soon. Amethyst rushed forward first, pulling another whip out of her Gem as she lashed both of them out at the fusion’s feet in the hopes of catching them. And catch them Pyrite did, only with their lower hands, using them to fling Amethyst high up into the air before sharply pulling her right back down with a resounding crash. The kids all flinched as it rattled even them from the safety of their hiding spot, but even still, they all remained observing the battle from a distance, terrified of what might happen if they tried to get in any closer.

With Garnet gone and Amethyst dazed and injured, Pearl was really the only one left to stand against Pyrite, and her fear at this fact clearly showed. She held her spear close to her chest, her form still trembling as the twisted fusion hovered over her tauntingly, even as the white Gem tried her best to make an anxious appeal.

“I-I… I don’t know what you think you have to gain from this little… arrangement you’ve made with Peridot, Cipher,” Pearl began, her voice shaky and nervous, even as she tried her hardest to make it firm and resolved. “But I can assure you that neither of you are going to succeed in your twisted ambitions through it!”

“Yeah, yeah, keep running your mouth like that, Bird Brain,” Pyrite deadpanned, rolling all three of their eyes as the white Gem leapt for them, spear poised to attack. “See where all that ‘noble’ talk gets you when I grind you into the glorified pile of salt you are!” Just as Pearl sent her spear flying at the twisted fusion, once again, they easily managed to catch the weapon, using a tractor bean to keep the white Gem suspended in midair all the while. “Really? Is that the best you can do?” Pyrite scoffed, looking over the spear before effortlessly snapping it cleanly in two, much to Pearl’s alarm. “You know, I really expected more out of you Crystal Clods. But I guess all your traitorous tricks and so-called ‘heroism’ are all completely pointless against someone with actual power. Someone like ME!”

With another borderline insane laugh, the twisted fusion launched Pearl hard away from them, sending her crashing into the pillar the kids were hiding behind and knocking the wind out of her entirely. Fortunately, Amethyst had just picked herself up off the ground to pick up the slack in trying to land a hit on Pyrite, but even so, it took Pearl a moment or two to recover from such a heavy blow, much to the concern of the kids right behind her.

“Pearl!” Mabel exclaimed fretfully as her and Steven peeked out from behind the pillar. “Are you ok?”

“I-I’ll be fine…” the white Gem coughed, clearly struggling to get up. “Bill and Peridot certainly aren’t making this easy for us… b-but we’re not giving up yet! You kids just stay back here where its safe.”

“But are you guys gonna do to stop them?” Steven asked worriedly, noticing well that Pearl looked much worse for wear even so early on into the battle.

The white Gem hesitated for a moment, glancing to Amethyst, who had just been slammed to the ground yet again by Pyrite. At the same time, Garnet had finally returned, soaking wet as she tiredly climbed back onto the Galaxy Warp only to throw herself right back into the fight. A fight that, by all accounts, they really didn’t seem to be winning. “Uh… w-we’ll… we’ll think of something,” Pearl assured the kids briefly, finally standing, though she nearly stumbled back to the ground as she did. “Like I said before, stay out of their sight. I know you kids want to help, but this… ‘Pyrite’ is far too much of a threat for you to handle. In fact… they might be too much for even us to handle…” Pearl muttered that last statement as she drew another spear from her gem, hurrying back into the fray herself as Pyrite continued tirelessly fending them off and attacking them at the same exact time.

“This is really bad, you guys,” Steven said, immensely concerned as he continued watching the battle unfold. Or rather, watching Pyrite toss the Gems around as if they were nothing at all to them and sadistically enjoying every single second of the brutal beating they were dishing out. “I know Pearl just told us not to help them but… I really think we should at least try to do something to-”

“Try what, Steven?” Dipper suddenly snapped quite harshly, his hands tightly gripping his arms as his entire body trembled with ongoing fear. “Have you even seen that thing out there? Its literally Bill and Peridot fused into one huge nightmare, one that not even the Gems can so much as land a single hit on! What makes you think any of us will do any better?!”

“Um… w-well, maybe we can come up with a plan to-”

“Steven, can we just… stop pretending like everything’s going to be ok for once?” Dipper asked, his panic dying down into despondency and despair as he slid down to sit against the back of the pillar, pulling his knees to his chest. “Because it’s pretty obvious that it won’t be. As long as Bill’s fused with Peridot, he’s has a physical form. Which means that he can basically just kill any of us any time he wants to, probably as soon as he’s done torturing us for his own sick kicks.”

“Dipper-” Mabel attempted to interject, reaching a hand out to console her clearly hopeless brother, only for him to completely reject it as he buried his head into his arms.

“So what’s even the point in trying to fight back anyway?” he asked, his shoulders hitching in what was likely a broken sob. “It’ll only make things even worse! T-there’s no way we can beat something like this. We need to just face facts already… i-it’s over, and we lost…”

Upon hearing this forlorn belief, Steven and Mabel exchanged a deeply fretful glance, one that was filled with worry for both Dipper and the situation at large. Right behind them, the Gems were still absolutely struggling against Pyrite’s magical might as the twisted fusion landed hit after heavy hit upon them, even despite their determined resilience to stand against such a treacherous foe. Still, it was becoming painfully clear that all three of them were truly outmatched against a being as strong and seemingly untouchable as Pyrite, to the point that Steven and Mabel themselves began to fear that Dipper was perhaps right after all. They wouldn’t be able to keep their valiant struggle up forever; sooner or later, Pyrite would overpower them and go in for the malicious, sadistic kill, starting with the Gems before finishing them off in their destructive wake. And then, after that, there would be absolutely no telling what the twisted fusion might do next.

Certainly, the Gems themselves must have realized this fatal fact as well, but even so, they persisted fighting, knowing that there was really nothing else they could do now. Garnet leapt high, hoping to finally land at least a single punch on Pyrite, only for the fusion to gleefully send out a wave of burning energy that send the Gem leader flying backward, torn, tattered, and significantly weakened by the attack. Pyrite themselves let out a smug, mocking laugh as they fired a barrage of explosive lasers from their cane down at Amethyst and Pearl, which only barely missed the pair of Gems directly as it knocked them both away, injuring them heavily, yet somehow not destabilizing them altogether. As each of the Gems struggled to recover from such damaging attacks, Pyrite decided to ease up for a moment, if only to take the chance to hold their soon-coming victory over the trio’s heads.

“Seriously, its like you three aren’t even trying here!” the twisted fusion teased, hovering over them triumphantly. “Then again, that’s not too much of a surprise. Without Quartzy around to tell you what to do, you chumps are just about completely worthless! Too bad she isn’t around to save you this time, because without her to bail you out, you three don’t stand a CHANCE!”

Pyrite unleashed an absolutely wicked laugh at this, their trio of eyes blazing with immense, sadistic delight as they poured down a massive torrent of golden flames upon the weakened Gems below. They only barely had enough strength to pick themselves up off the ground and scramble to narrowly avoid the blast, but with the very limited battle ground they had to work with, it was clear that they wouldn’t be able to outrun Pyrite’s seemingly endless barrage of deadly attacks for too long.

Steven realized this as well as he continued observing the battle from afar, a rare sort of anger building up inside of him, especially as he heard Pyrite’s vicious remarks towards his guardians. There was no question that, after all he had put them through years ago, the Gems feared Bill just as much as the kids did, if not even more. But despite that fear, they were still pushing themselves to bravely stand against him, and against Peridot as well, despite how difficult the battle was and how stacked against their favor the odds of them winning it were. And yet, Pyrite hardly seemed to care as they simply mocked and taunted them with callous cruelty, reopening old wounds both physical and mental all the while.

And as far as Steven was concerned, it just wasn’t fair.

It wasn’t fair that Bill always seemed to have the upper hand, no matter what the occasion. It wasn’t fair that he had been the main reason why the Gems had so many valuable memories ripped away from them years ago. It wasn’t fair that he had put his friends, Dipper, Mabel, Connie, and even himself through so much torment and anguish simply to satisfy his own twisted pleasure. It wasn’t fair that Peridot had come to Earth with the intent of causing it untold harm. It wasn’t fair that she had brought Jasper along with her, and that as a result, Lapis ended up locking them both away in a horrendous aquatic prison. It wasn’t fair that tracking her down had ended up tearing a brutal rift between the Gems, a rift that, while repaired, had still hurt them all the same. It wasn’t fair that that both components of Pyrite had done so much to cause them all so much pain, so much dread, so much terror and yet they still were somehow on top, working together in a monstrous amalgamation that was poised to destroy them all and everything they held dear.

It wasn’t fair… which was why Steven realized that perhaps it was time to stop fearing their foes and the havoc they could wreak upon them… and start fighting back instead.

And as the young Gem looked back to the twisted fusion once more, he finally came up with a way to do just that.

With newfound resolve, Steven turned to face the twins once more, only to find them both in rather solemn states. Dipper was still completely despondent, not even acknowledging Mabel’s earnest attempts to comfort him amidst his ongoing grief and fear. Even Mabel herself seemed to lack her usual upbeat zeal, especially as she glanced back to the disastrous battle right behind them every now and again with growing concern and obvious dread. Yet despite this, Steven knew that she would probably be his best bet at the moment, given how crippled by terror Dipper seemed to be at the moment. Still, if his newfound plan went well (and Steven desperately hoped it would), perhaps they’d finally be able to alleviate that terror in all of them once and for all.

“Mabel,” Steven began as firmly as he could as he placed a hand on her shoulder. “I have an idea. A-and I’m gonna need your help for it.”

For a moment, Mabel simply took pause at this, her cheeks lightly flushing as she briefly glanced over at the hand the young Gem had on her shoulder before looking back to him with wide eyes. “Um.. y-yeah, of course!” she answered, almost a bit too enthusiastically. “I’m down for whatever you have in mind!”

“Well, that’s great,” Steven sighed in relief, not pulling his hand away as he also blushed slightly. “Though… exactly what I have in mind might be… kinda dangerous. I don’t want to force you into it if you’re-”

“Steven,” Mabel interupted, acting on a bold impulse as she suddenly took both of the young Gem’s hands and held them tightly. “I don’t think you heard me before. I said I’m down for whatever crazy thing you have in mind. Especially if what you’re thinking what I think you’re thinking.”

“Um… and what might that be?” the young Gem asked with a small, bemused smile. Mabel simply whispered it to him with an excited, growing grin, one that Steven shared as he realized they did indeed have the exact same idea in mind. “Yeah, that’s it! So, I guess we should-”

“YES!” Mabel shouted happily, not hesitating to grab Steven by the hand so they could put their shared plan into action. For the most part, Dipper had paid no mind to the ongoing conversation between the pair as lost to his own morosely panic and grim thoughts as he was. However, he was soon broken out of his revere by a sudden flash of pale pink light, one that only disappeared as he glanced up to look at it and reveal a familiar four-eyed figure he hadn’t seen in quite some time.

“Heya, Dip-bro!” the fusion greeted with a confident, winning smile. “Did ya miss me? Cause I sure missed me!”

They let out a bright, cheerful laugh at this, one that wasn’t even broken by Dipper as he simply stared up at them in absolute awe and disbelief. “M-Maven?!” he exclaimed, sitting up somewhat as he looked the fusion, clad in both Steven and Mabel’s pajamas, up and down.

“Aw, you remembered!” Maven quipped excitedly. “But as great as it is to finally be back in action after so long, I’m afraid I don’t really have too much time to chat.” The fusion held their hand out, light surrounding it briefly before their iconic grappling shield materialized in their grasp. “There are two big bullies making a huge mess out there and somebody’s gotta take care of them, so it might as well be me!”

“Wait!” Dipper interjected, grabbing the fusion’s free hand before they could go running into the ongoing fray. “Y-you guys can’t go out there! Its way too dangerous! Bill could-”

“Dipper,” Maven said, kneeling down to his level as they put a comforting, steadying hand on his shoulder. “I know you’re scared of Bill, a-and to be honest, both of us are too. And to be really honest, Pyrite is even more scary than just Bill on his own, which is probably why the Gems aren’t doing so hot out there. And that’s exactly why we want to—no, I need to help! I want to protect the Earth, and the Gems, a-and I want to protect you too! And maybe, if we work together, just like Bill and Peridot are right now, then we might just have a chance at finally stopping both of them once and for all. Don’t ya think?”

Despite his own going worries and fears, Dipper was unable to hold back a small, comforted smile upon hearing the fusion’s warm reassurance as he nodded his assent. “Ok, but… please, be careful out there you guys. If anything were to happen to you, I’d-”

“Aw, don’t worry, Dip-bro, nothing’s gonna happen,” Maven laughed as they rose to stand, spinning their grappling shield playfully in their hand. “And besides, you know me! Careful is my middle na-” The fusion was cut of as their shield accidentally fired, knocking them upside the head, though not hurting them too much at all as it came zooming right back into place. “Whoops! Heh, guess this thing is kinda touchy.”

This exchange was abruptly cut off as Pyrite’s combined, menacing laughter echoed throughout the Galaxy Warp once more. Dipper and Maven were quick to take a peek around the pillar they were still behind, only to see that the twisted fusion had captured all three of the Gems in their golden tractor beam, their cane charging up with what would surely be a devastating blast. “Oh no!” Maven gasped, not hesitating to hop up onto the warp hub to rush into the fight. “I’ve gotta help them!”

“W-wait!” Dipper called after them worriedly, half inclined to join them, that is, until he stole another glance at Pyrite hanging high above the hub. Upon hearing their horrific, sinister cackling once more, Dipper quickly shrunk back, his former terror returning in full as he thought of just how easy it would be for the fusion, or more specifically the demonic half of the fusion, to completely obliterate him in an instant. Which was why, despite all of his training and even despite his best friend and sister hurrying into this deadly skirmish themselves, he ultimately found himself unable to so much as move to stand against this nightmarish enemy for himself.

Maven, on the other hand, had the exact opposite intentions in mind. For as Pyrite continued gloating to the Gems, who were struggling in vain to try and escape their tight tractor grip, the fusion skirted around the hub, just out of their sight, with a plan of their own in mind to turn the tide of the battle. “Well, it looks like this is finally the end, for you at least,” Pyrite remarked, aiming their charged cane at the frozen trio before them. “I have to admit, this really has been fun! So, any last words before I wipe you three clean out of existence, you clods?”

“Well, shucks, I don’t have any. How about you?!” Mere seconds after this confident proclamation rung out across the Galaxy Warp, Pyrite was suddenly struck cleanly in the back of their triangular head by a hard flat surface. The blow was more than enough to catch the twisted fusion off guard, finally releasing the Gems from their grip as they looked around in complete confusion as to where such an attack might have come from.

“What the-?!” Pyrite was stopped short as the broad side of a solid pink shield hit them squarely in the face, knocking them back significantly. “Hey! What’s the big idea here?!”

“The big idea is ME!” Maven exclaimed boldly as their grappling shield zoomed back to them. The fusion stood proud and strong between the twisted fusion and the recovering Gems, making it very clear they had no intention of backing down this time whatsoever.

“M-Maven?!” Amethyst exclaimed, dumbfounded to see the fusion again at such a time as this.

“The one and only,” Maven grinned back at the Gems, two of their four eyes winking playfully to them before Pyrite caught their attention once more.

“Oh, you’ve got to be KIDDING me!” the twisted fusion barked, an expression that was a cross between annoyance and amusement blooming onto their face. “Out of all the stunts I thought you could pull, Rosebud, this one is by far the most ridiculous. Fusing? With Shooting Star, of all people or Gems? You might as well have just jumped into the ocean seeing as how you two are about as useful as any of those chumps behind you are!”

Maven cast a brief glance back at the Gems before cracking a bit of a smirk as they turned to Pyrite once more. “Mm, I dunno, seems to me like you’re the useless one around here, no offense,” they remarked with an innocent shrug.

“…What?” Pyrite asked, clearly offended.

“Yeah, I mean…” Maven began leadingly, ignoring the shocked glances the Gems were giving them as they began to walk past the disgruntled, twisted fusion. “I’m fun, and sweet, and enthusiastic, and helpful, and oh, did I mention adorable. You, on the other hand, Pyrite, well… if we’re bein’ honest here, you’re scary, and mean, and loud, and crazy, and hm… something else too, its on the tip of my tongue here, what is it…? Oh yeah! TOTALLY GOIN’ DOWN!”

Without any warning, the fusion quickly spun around, sending their grappling shield flying at the unprepared Pyrite. The force of the shield was immense, a bright, newfound kind of energy surrounding it as it clocked the twisted fusion hard in the chest, sending them flying off the edge of the Galaxy Warp entirely and a good ways into the ocean itself. “Huh, guess that goes to show which one of us is the better fusion around here!” Maven called after them with a winning grin. “It’s me, in case you were still confused or anything!”

“Steven! Mabel!” Pearl’s rather harsh exclamation abruptly cut through the fusion’s triumph, forcing them to turn to face all three of the Gems’ rather disapproving expressions. “What in the world do you two think you’re doing?!”

“Uh, taking care of you Pyrite problem for ya, duh,” Maven chuckled, tossing their grappling shield up a bit before catching it easily. “You’re welcome, by the way. This is our first time fighting all fused up like this and I’m having a ton of fun.”

“Well, that’s quite enough fun for you two for one battle,” Pearl huffed, clearly stressed as Garnet and Amethyst kept an eye out for Pyrite’s inevitable return. “I told you kids to stay hidden! You may have gotten a few lucky shots in, but Pyrite is a dangerous, unpredictable enemy, and we won’t stand for you kids getting hurt trying to fight them! Which means you two need to unfuse this instant and go back to hiding!”

“No, that’s the exact opposite of what we need to do, Pearl!” Maven insisted, looking between all three of the Gems earnestly. “Pyrite’s a fusion, right? Well, maybe instead of trying to fight them on our own, we should try fighting a fusion with fusion! Know what I’m saying?”

“You… want us to fuse?” Amethyst asked, raising a curious eyebrow. “I dunno. It’s not like we go around fusing all the time unless its for something like, super serious?”

“This is literally Bill and Peridot working together,” Maven said incredulously. “How is it not super serious?”

The Gems exchanged a brief glance at this, none of them really able to deny such a pertinent truth. And, as usual, Garnet was the one to speak to that truth with a small, supportive smile. “It’s a good plan,” she said, even though Bill’s presence was all but blocking her future vision from seeing the results of it. “Let’s do it. Gems, get ready to synchronize!”

“Um, well, we should probably do it quick then, seeing as how they’re coming back!” Amethyst pointed out the approaching green-golden figure that was Pyrite, angrily rushing back towards the Galaxy Warp at a frightening speed.

“Amethyst, Pearl!” Garnet commanded firmly. “You’re up first.”

“Right!” the pair nodded, putting all of their usual troubles fusing together behind them in light of the dire straits they were in. They were just beginning their fusion dance when Pyrite finally returned, soaking wet and absolutely furious with the clever trick Maven had just played on them.

“ROSE STAR!” the twisted fusion growled, sparking with building power as they glared hatefully at Maven and Maven alone.

“Oooo, Rose Star! I get it!” Maven grinned, flattered. “‘Rosebud’, ‘Shooting Star’, its like you fused your silly little nicknames up for us, just like how we fused ourselves up! I like that! In fact, to show you how much I like it, I got a little surprise for you, Pyrite! Isn’t that right, Opal?!”

The fusion’s grin widened as they spun around just as Amethyst and Pearl’s forms converged in a bright light, their height scaling as they merged into a tall, steadfast, four-armed giant woman, one who was more than ready to take on the ongoing battle. “Yes,” Opal said in her usual calm, deep voice as her longbow appeared in her lower hands. “It is.”

“Tch,” Pyrite scoffed, scowling angrily as they floated a bit back from the much larger fusion before them. “You clods just fuse like its nothing, don’t you? What, you’re too weak to take me on one-on-one?”

“I don’t know,” Opal pondered thoughtfully before breaking out into a daring smirk, raising her bow as an arrow of pure light formed around it. “Are you?”

Pyrite barely had a chance to dodge the arrow Opal shot their way, chuckling to themselves over how the projectile missed before the fusion sent several more flying at them in rapid succession. The twisted fusion managed to block or evade most of them, though a few of them did skim them, much to their increasing aggravation.

“Hmph! You know, I’m surprised you’ve even managed to remember me for this long, Half Brain, what with that short term memory problem of yours!” Pyrite taunted bitterly, circling around the taller fusion, who simply laughed graciously in response.

“It’s hard to forget a face like yours,” Opal teased back, opting to use her bow as a more combatant weapon by swinging it swiftly at Pyrite themselves. Her blow landed true, sending the twisted fusion spiraling backwards, crashing hard into the pillar that Dipper was still hiding behind. He stifled a frightened gasp as he tucked even further behind the pillar, not wanting to garnish Pyrite’s attention in any way, and fortunately, he didn’t as the angered fusion was far too consumed in the ongoing battle. A battle that, against all odds, was quickly starting to turn against their favor.

Ready to make their foes pay for the few lucky hits they had managed to get in, Pyrite began zooming back towards Opal just as she started to unfuse on her own accord. However, before they could reach the Gems, the twisted fusion was suddenly launched upward, letting out a fierce cry of pain as a spiked shield rammed against their exposed backside.

“Wow, what do ya know?!” Maven quipped as they looked back to their grappling shield, which now sported an array of short, sharp spikes on its surface. “Looks like I can make it all spikey too. This thing’s amazing! Sorta like you, Opaaaaaaa—ohhhh my gosh!” Stars were in all four of the fusion’s eyes as they turned to see Garnet and Amethyst merge next, a combining to create a Gem that was almost too large for the Galaxy Warp to even contain. All the same, Sugilite let out a wild, rowdy laugh as she made her long-awaited reappearance, her shades appearing instantly as her flail also showed up in one of her massive hands.

“Now, we’re talkin!” the bombastic fusion chuckled, tossing her weapon up and down experimentally. “Where’s that Pyrite punk at? I can’t wait to pummel ‘em into the ground like the ‘clod’ they are!”

“There they are! There they are!” Maven exclaimed, excitedly pointing to Pyrite as they slowly floated back down to the hub, disoriented and damaged from their previous attack.

“Ugh… huh?” the twisted fusion shook their head to clear it, all three of their eyes growing wide with surprise and slight fear as they looked to the massive Sugilite towering in front of them. “Uh oh…”

“So, you two think you’re some big hotshot just cause you’re two loudmouthed triangles smashed together?” Sugilite asked with a toothy smirk. “Ya look you’re just a big square if ya ask me. Which is why I’m gonna beat you into shape!” The fusion laughed heartily as she began swinging her flail about, and try as they might to think of a way to block or avoid it, Pyrite was ultimately too late as it struck them squarely, beating them hard and heavy into the ground before Sugilite picked it up with them still stuck to it. Knowing this, the fusion swung her weapon upward, watching with smug satisfaction as Pyrite was flung sharply upwards once more, so far into the sky that they couldn’t even be seen anymore after a certain point. “See ya, nerd!” Sugilite called after them, swinging her flail over their shoulder as she stared up into the night sky for the twisted fusion who would certainly come back down. Eventually.

“Oh my gosh, Sugilite is so dang cool!” Maven gasped, hopping up and down excitedly in light of such an impressive display.

“Eh, she’s alright, I suppose,” Pearl remarked with a small laugh, remembering just how much trouble Sugilite had caused during one of her previous rampages. Still, in a situation like this against a foe as deadly as Pyrite, a rampage was more than welcome.

“Sugilite! Sugilite! Sugilite!” Maven shouted, eager to get the fusion’s attention. “I got an idea!”

“Oh yeah?” Sugilite asked, her curiosity peaked as she allowed the smaller fusion into her hand. “Lay it on me, half pint.” Maven did so, whispering their plan to the fusion, who let out another raucous chuckle upon hearing it.  “Oh, I like the way you think, baby! So… up ya go!” And with that Sugilite tossed Maven hard upwards, sending them flying in the exact same direction Pyrite had gone, much to Pearl’s immense alarm.

“W-what are you doing?!” the white Gem asked, distraught as she watched the smaller fusion disappear from sight.

“Ah, relax, Pearl,” Sugilite scoffed, unconcerned. “We got this.” No sooner had the fusion said this, however, than a bright golden laser blast shot down from the skies above, giving the pair below no time at all to much as even react to it before it struck Sugilite squarely, splitting her up almost instantly. Garnet and Amethyst fell away from each other hard, both of them suddenly sharing Pearl’s fearful worry as they searched the seemingly empty skies above, seeing no signs of Maven whatsoever within them. Even Dipper pulled away from his persistent hiding spot a bit to look for the fusion, practically overwhelmed with fear that the unthinkable might have happened.

However, these worries were soon unfounded as Pyrite came into view once more, falling hard and fast back towards the Galaxy Warp as the result of a no doubt brutal blow from Maven. The fusion themselves was next to fall, letting out a terrified cry all the while as they had no way to break what would no doubt be quite a painful landing. Unless…

“Pearl! We need to fuse, now!” Garnet exclaimed, turning to her other teammate earnestly.

“A-Are you sure?” Pearl asked, taken aback with surprise. “I… I don’t want it to be like… well, like what happened last time…”

“It won’t be like last time,” the Gem leader assured, taking Pearl’s hand and offering her a reassuring smile. “I know it.”

For the briefest of moments, the white Gem hesitated, worried that she’d let herself get carried away on the euphoria that was fusing with Garnet yet again. But along with that worry came the memory of the resolve she had made to the Gem leader herself; a resolve to stand on her own and be stronger, regardless of the foe they were facing. Which meant that if Garnet wanted her to stand strong alongside her once again, then who was she to turn such an offer down? “S-so do I,” Pearl said with a confident nod, allowing the Gem leader to lead in their fusion dance. All the while, Amethyst continued watching the skies worriedly, paying Pyrite no mind as they made a brutal landing in the broken remains of the Homeworld warp. Maven themselves were awash in fear, absolutely clueless as how to stop themselves from falling as the ground drew closer and closer. They had hoped that Sugilite would have been able to catch them after tossing them up so far, allowing them to hit Pyrite with a quite unexpected blow in the air; however, the fusion seemed to be completely unaccounted for, much to Maven’s distraught alarm as they tightly closed their eyes and braced themselves for the inevitable. Though thankfully, it never came.

For instead, Maven found themselves being caught, not by Sugilite, but by the safe, massive hands of another fusion entirely. “Aaaaaand got you!” Sardonyx exclaimed as theatrically as ever as she began her gentle descent back to the ground. “And not a moment too soon either, darling! Why, if I hadn’t intervened when I did, then you’d likely be nothing more than an adorable, Maven-shaped splat on the ground at this very moment, which is absolutely unthinkable for a fusion as charming as you!”

“Aw, Sardonyx!” Maven laughed warmly, blushing at the compliment. “You’re too sweet!”

“As are you, dear, but we don’t quite have time to decide which one of us would win on that front,” the showy fusion quipped, making a graceful landing as Amethyst and Dipper both let out respective sighs of relief. “After all, we have bigger fish to fry…”

At that very same moment, Pyrite properly picked themselves up out of the Homeworld warp’s rubble, an aggravated scowl forming on their face the moment they caught sight of Sardonyx grinning down at them from high above. “Oh great…” they grumbled, rising to float once more as they glared hostilely at the showy fusion. “It’s you…”

“It’s a real treat to meet you too, Pyrite,” Sardonyx remarked with a mocking bow. “Though I must say, your sense of style does seem to be a bit derivative…” She mused, straightening her own bowtie as she looked to Pyrite’s critically. “Are you sure you’re not copying me? I can’t truly blame you if you are. After all, my aesthetic is very inspiring.”

“I HAD THE BOWTIE FIRST AND YOU KNOW IT, BIRD BOX!” Pyrite shouted furiously, though their anger only increased tenfold as Sardonyx rolled all four of her eyes at such a claim.

“If you say so…” she shrugged as her giant hammer materialized in her lower hands. “Even so, I still think it looks better on me!” With this, Sardonyx swiftly twisted her torso before suddenly swinging her hammer hard, striking Pyrite clean on the side. The twisted fusion was sent flying across the hub, but Sardonyx beat them to its edge with an easy leap, using her momentum to pound Pyrite yet again. She repeated this process several times over as she knocked them about the surface of the hub, laughing mirthfully all the while as she continued to tease the twisted fusion all the while. “Oh, what’s the matter, dear? You’re looking a bit green. A bit yellow, too, but I’m not one to judge. By the way, I do believe that, in most human circles, pyrite is referred to as ‘fool’s gold’. Well, how incredibly fitting for you, since you’re composed of two of the biggest fools I happen to know! Ohohohoh!” With this bombastic laugh, Sardonyx finally came in for her heaviest swing yet, one that was more than enough to send Pyrite far out of the bounds of the Galaxy Warp and back towards the ocean once more.

As pressed against the back of the pillar as he was, Dipper was admittedly quite surprised when Pyrite went flying cleanly past him, shooting out far somewhere off into the distance. Tentatively, he peeked out onto the hub itself only to find Sardonyx gleefully accepting kudos from both Maven and Amethyst on such a successful beatdown, one that Dipper could scarcely believe had happened at all. After all, only a few mere minutes ago, Pyrite had stood poised to easily destroy them all without any sort of opposition whatsoever. Yet somehow, through some miracle, the tides of this battle had turned; once again, there seemed to be some kind of hope that they might actually win, that they actually stood a chance against someone as powerful and merciless as Pyrite themselves.

Still, Dipper knew better. Certainly, Bill must have been luring them all into a false sense of security, making them thing they had a shot at beating him before turning things right back around on them whenever he saw fit. Yet, for as much as he knew it was all a lost cause, some small part of him still wanted to believe that it wasn’t. He wanted to share the same sort of hope that Steven and Mabel did. He wanted Bill, and Peridot too, to finally, finally taste defeat, for so many different reasons. For himself and the absolute anguish, both internal and external, he had gone through and was still going through at the demon’s cruel hands. For his friends who had nearly lost their lives struggling against him in the past. For Lapis, who was stuck in yet another prison only after being chased back to Earth by Peridot and the threat she had once posed. When Dipper really thought about it, both of the components that composed Pyrite had taken so much from him in the past: his friend, his body, his sense of security, and even still they stood to take and take even more if left unchecked. For certainly, if Pyrite won, they’d take the lives of the Gems, of Steven, of Mabel, possibly even reality itself if Bill used the twisted fusion as some sort of means of getting his hands on the rift. And it was only as this horrific thought dawned upon Dipper that he realized something important. Perhaps it was time to leave his longstanding fear behind in favor of something greater, of something far more significant than continuing nightmares or ominous threats. Perhaps it was time to stop letting both Bill and Peridot get away with taking as they pleased… and instead, pay them back for all they had stolen from him in full.

Meanwhile, back up on the hub, Sardonyx had harmoniously unfused, just in time for the group to plan out what they hoped would be their final attack on Pyrite, resolving to split the twisted fusion up once and for all. “Ok, so when they get back, you guys should all totally fuse into Alexandrite!” Maven suggested with a zealous grin. “And then, BAM! Hit ‘em so hard that POOF! They’ll have no choice but to split up!”

“Another good plan, Maven,” Garnet smirked as she crossed her arms. “But I don’t think the Galaxy Warp is big enough to hold Alexandrite.”

“Even if it was, I doubt we’d even need her to finish Pyrite off,” Pearl chuckled, unaware of the ominous shadow rising from the depths of the ocean right behind them. “We’ve already worn them down so much by this point that it’d be surprising if they even came back at all!”

“Yeah, we totally owned those two dumb ol’ triangles,” Amethyst remarked calmly. “Heck, when you think about it, maybe we really had nothing to be afraid of when it came to either Bill or Peridot, after all.”

“Oh I wouldn’t say that, Half Baked…” The entire group froze, newfound alarm sparking through all of them as they spun around to face Pyrite. The twisted fusion looked much worse for wear than how they’d started out, but by far the most frightening thing about them was the intense, hateful scowl on their face, all three of their eyes aglow with nothing less than murderous intent as they slowly walked, not hovered, towards their foes. “You really are a bunch of stupid clods if you think this is anywhere close to over yet! All of your fusions are nothing compared to my unlimited, unfathomable power! So keep ‘em coming, Crystal Chumps. Because I can keep this going for the REST OF TIME ITSELF!”

The Gems exchanged a brief, fearful glance at this, but just as before, Maven was unphased by their threats as they boldly stepped forward. “Oh yeah?” they asked challengingly. “Well, so can we!”

“YOU TWO!” Pyrite suddenly growled, their hatred seeming to flare up tenfold as the fusion made such a daring claim. With a vicious, hostile shout, Pyrite charged forward, their hands aglow with dangerous golden power, power that Maven only barely blocked with a well-timed shield formed over their arm. The twisted fusion collided with it hard and refused to let up as they kept their energy pressed tightly against the protective surface, which was starting to wear down just as much as Maven themselves were as a result of the devastating power being mounted against them. “This is all your fault, Shooting Bud! I had those Crystal Chumps right on the ropes, ready to crack until YOU came and ‘inspired’ them to ‘work together’. But I’m not about to let some mostly human runt like you stop me now!”

In an attempt to give Maven some much needed help, the Gems all quickly rushed forward, ready to provide them backup where they could. Yet, before any of them could even get close, one of Pyrite’s lower hands lashed out with a wave of fiery energy, one that knocked them all cleanly back and allowed the twisted fusion to continue pressing against Maven, who was clearly starting to struggle to keep both their shield, and even themselves together. “Oh, what’s the matter, Rose Star? Falling apart so soon?” Pyrite taunted cruelly, their sadistic grin widening as Maven let out a small, pained cry as their energy began to wane. “Well believe me, you’ll be doing a lot worse than that by the time I’m through with you! The moment I split you pebbles up, I think I’ll start by tossing Shooting Star up into the cold, inhospitable depths of space before slowly and painfully tearing that gem right out of your body, Rosebud! Then, I think I’ll finish things off by blowing this entire hub to smithereens with all those Crystal Clods still on it! What a shame that neither of you will still be alive to see it! NYAHAHAHAH!”

With this loud, manic laugh, the twisted fusion came in with a sudden, brutal strike, one that was finally enough to shatter Maven’s shield entirely. The fusion screamed in agony as they caught the brunt of Pyrite’s flames, burning them slightly as they fell back and finally fell apart, no longer able to hold themselves together amidst the pain and fear that ended up tearing their fusion apart.

Steven and Mabel fell apart from each other hard, both of them weak and hurt and disoriented in light of how sudden their split had been. They only had the briefest chance to look to each other worriedly, however, before Pyrite’s dark shadow hung over them, the twisted fusion standing directly before them with their iconic merciless grin and golden flames poised to attack. “I’ll hand it to you, you kids put up one hell of a fight,” they remarked coldly, practically soaking in the terror of the two defenseless kids before them. “But in the end, it was nowhere even close to enough to stop me. So, it looks like this is finally the end…” Pyrite’s menacing smirk seemed to widen as they shifted their gaze between both the kids and the Gems, who were also completely helpless to stop the incredibly powerful attack the twisted fusion was about to send their way. “Say goodbye, you CLODS!”

With another demented cackle, Pyrite threw all four of their hands down, their flames spiraling directly towards Steven and Mabel first. The pair gasped in fear and braced themselves for the no-doubt painful assault, and yet it was an assault that never actually hit them. For instead, the flames were suddenly completely extinguished, courtesy of the steadfast edge of an ice-coated blade that had been wedged before the fire just in the nick of time.

“WHAT?!” Pyrite yelled, dumbfounded as to how their deadly attack could have possibly failed. Yet as the smoke from the doused fire cleared, Steven and Mabel were the first to see exactly who had come to their rescue.

“Dipper!” they both exclaimed with surprised, yet excited smiles.

“What?” Dipper smirked back at them, holding his sword firmly and confidently. “You guys didn’t think I’d let you have all the fun, did you?”

The kids all shared a brief, warm laugh over this, yet it was ultimately short lived as Pyrite let out a bitter, mocking laugh behind them. “So, you finally decided to crying and cowering in the corner, huh, Pine Tree?” they asked tauntingly, their lower set of hands poised on their hips as they stood over Dipper intimidatingly.

Yet this time, he wasn’t fazed, especially as he forced himself to remain stern and steady against letting his fear of the dream demon control him any longer. “Yeah, I did,” he replied curtly. “When are you gonna stop cowering behind someone like Peridot and actually fight us yourself, Bill?”

Pyrite let out a harsh, angry scoff at this, their trio of eyes flashing with malice and hatred. “I’d watch myself if I were you, Pine Tree,” they growled darkly as flames curled around their upper hands. “You’re playing with fire here. And I’d hate to see you get BURNED!”

With a furious shout, the twisted fusion launched one of their fireballs right at Dipper, who smartly and quickly warded them off with the Sword of Seasons, now covered in a gale-force wind. The breeze was enough to send the flames flying right back at Pyrite, who stumbled backward as the blast hit them and scorched them quite a bit.

“Believe me, I know you wouldn’t,” Dipper remarked solidly, taking a bold step forward as Steven and Mabel rose to join him. Likewise, the Gems also rejoined the fray, their weapons summoned as they stood poised and resolved to fight back. “Problem is, I’m done letting you and what you did to me burn me anymore. We all are.”

“That’s right,” Garnet solidly agreed, completely unshaken. “Which means this can either go one of two ways: you two can split up here and now and this can all be over with. Or, we’ll split you ourselves.”

“So,” Pearl smirked, her spear aimed directly at the admittedly stunned fusion. “Do we have ourselves some kind of deal, Pyrite?”

For a stark moment, Pyrite said nothing, their expression awash in angry alarm as they took in the large, dedicated group before them, a group that was, by all accounts, completely unafraid of them and ready to fight. It was obvious the twisted fusion had lost their prior edge against their foes, and as a result, they were now apparently outnumbered and outmatched. A fact that half of them fearfully recognized and a fact that the other half of them stubbornly refused to accept.

“Well? Any bright ideas about how we’re going to get out of this mess?” Pyrite muttered to themselves, Peridot’s half of their voice taking precedent before Bill’s took over again. “Hold your horses, I’m thinkin’ here! I will not hold any so-called ‘horses’! We’re about to be beaten into the ground by a bunch of rowdy traitors and you need to do something to stop it! What did I tell you earlier about demanding things from me?! I don’t care! You said you’d help me, but even after all this, I’m no better off than I was before! Oh, you want some help, Greenie? Well, I’ll be MORE than happy to give you ALL the help you need!”

Upon this rather hostile exclamation, Pyrite suddenly lurched back, all three of their eyes closing tight as Peridot’s side of their voice let out a sharp, sudden scream. The kids and the Gems all stopped short at that, watching in alarm as this scream gradually morphed into Bill’s wild, insane cackling. A bright flash of light engulfed the fusion, and when it quickly faded, Pyrite still remained, though from their glowing yellow trio of eyes alone, it was clear to see who was now completely in control.

“Sorry to shove you to the side, Greenie,” Pyrite grinned, now fully speaking in Bill’s voice with hardly a trace of Peridot’s left. “But you were starting to get in my way. Now, back to-”

The fusion was abruptly cut off by a fast and heavy punch in the jaw from Garnet, one that sent them clumsily tumbling backwards. “You talk too much,” the Gem leader remarked, adjusting her shades coolly.

“Oh, you chumps are gonna get it now,” Pyrite growled, shaking the blow off as they began to angrily storm forward. However, before they could even really take a step forward, they suddenly tripped and fell completely to the ground thanks to Amethyst’s whip coiled tightly around their leg. “Hey!”

“Whoops,” the purple Gem shrugged playfully. “Sorry, dude. Maybe you should watch your step!” With this, Amethyst swung her whip hard, with Pyrite still tied up in it all the while. The fusion was unable to free themselves from its grip as she spun them around the Galaxy Warp at a rapid pace, clearly having the time of her life in such cathartic payback.

Pyrite’s unexpected ‘flight’ came to a sharp and sudden end the moment they crashed onto the dull edge of Pearl’s outstretched spear. In retaliation, the fusion attempted to grab the spear and rip it out of the white Gem’s hands, but Pearl was too fast for them, pulling it away before going back in with a swift, accurate swing. Pyrite barely blocked it with their own cane, though the force of Pearl’s strike was enough to tear right through it, slicing it cleanly in half to the point that it abruptly disappeared in a small flash of light.

“Hm, what a surprise,” Pearl noted, pulling her spear back for another swing. “Knowing you, Cipher, I was expecting that thing to be a bit more sturdy. Then again, I suppose its just like most of your hairbrained schemes are, including this one: destined to fall apart at the seams!” The white Gem lashed out once more, hoping to take the final blow, though Pyrite leapt out of its way, opting to go back to their usual floating as they glared daggers down at the group below.

“K-keep on laughing it up, you chumps!” Pyrite hissed hotly, their manner still fierce though it was obvious they were steadily starting to fatigue. “We’ll see how funny it is when you’re all smashed into nothing more than the worthless bits of rock you really are!” The twisted fusion let out a heavy shout as they raised their upper hands high above their head, making the most of what energy they did have left to form a massive, powerful golden flame, one that they were more than ready to rain down upon all their foes in one last ditch, desperate attempt at wiping them out for good.

And yet, even that attempt was all for naught as both of their hands were suddenly caught and pulled back swiftly. Their flame diminished in its entirety as they glanced behind them, only to see Amethyst’s whip and Mabel’s grappling hook keeping both of their arms entirely restrained and leaving the perfect opening in its wake.

“Now, you guys!” Mabel shouted with a daring grin, nodding to Steven, who was the first to spring into action as Garnet threw him straight at Pyrite. A solid, sturdy shield was formed on the young Gem’s arm, and with a courageous shout, he brought it down on the unprepared fusion’s head, sending them pummeling straight into the ground. The moment Steven landed, Dipper was already right at his side, his sword drawn and electrified as he ran to the young Gem and preformed a deft, skillful jump right off the side of the shield, which gave him just enough of a boost to launch him right at the dazed fusion. Pyrite only had enough time to briefly turn to face the sword coming right at them and let out a startled gasp before it squarely hit its mark, impaling them cleanly and evenly in the center of their chest.

The entire Galaxy Warp seemed to freeze in the aftermath of this brutal blow, all of the Gems and the kids holding their breaths to see what would happen next. Dipper didn’t dare take his sword out of the twisted fusion, as breathless and adrenaline-high as he was, even as Pyrite glared down at the sparking weapon and then down at him with nothing less than burning hatred in all three of their eyes.

“Y-you shouldn’t have done that, Pine Tree…” they hissed viciously, their voice shaky, but still predominantly Bill’s as they were effectively frozen in place, unable to move due to the electricity keeping Peridot’s form in thrall. “Same goes for you, Rosebud…” They scowled at the young Gem, who had hurried to Dipper’s side, his shield still poised to defend if need be. “And here I was just gonna play nice and finish you off quick and easy. B-but thanks to this little stunt of yours, I have no choice but to make you two suffer more than you can possibly even comprehend next time we cross paths! And the same goes for the rest of you chumps too!” Their voice picked up into an outraged shout as their form began to flash warningly, a sign that they were indeed starting to fall apart. “You may have won this time, but only because I had to rely on a stupid LOSER of a space rock like Greenie here! But who knows?” Pyrite finally grinned once more, golden flames surrounding their form one final time as they closed their trio of eyes. “Maybe next time we fight, it’ll be on my terf. Then we’ll see who really gets the last laugh…” With this ominous proclamation, the twisted fusion threw back their head and let out a wild, sinister laugh, one that gradually began to fade as Pyrite’s form was engulfed in a blinding light once more.

And then, as quickly as they had been formed, Pyrite was no more.

The light slowly faded to reveal that Bill was indeed gone, his presence no longer tainting Peridot as she solely remained, initially dazed an completely unaware of the sword still shoved into her chest. For a moment, she simply kept her sights set on the sky as she slowly blinked before she finally returned to her right mind, letting out a sharp, horrified gasp as she clutched her head tightly. “N-no!” she cried, her eyes huge with some sort of unknown terror. “L-leave me alone! G-get out of my gem, y-you… you…” Peridot trailed off, her jaw dropping in shock as she finally saw the sword running through her, as well as the group of Gems and kids all gathered around her in case she tried anything else. She sucked in a sharp gasp, clearly panicking for a number of reasons as she stumbled backwards and pulling the sword out of Dipper’s grip as it remained in her instead, her fingers shifting into a laser as she desperately tried to keep herself together. “W-wait!” she shouted fearfully, charging up one final, frantic blast. “Y-you clods need me! I’m the only one who knows about the-”

Peridot didn’t get a chance to finish as the sword finally fell out of her, which was just enough to finally destabilize her form entirely. The green Gem gasped as her form disappeared in a sharp puff of smoke, leaving not just her gemstone behind, but several other remnants as well. Alongside her gem, her lower arms and legs, as well as her disjointed fingers were all lying prone and disconnected on the ground, much to the surprise of the kids and Gems who slowly gathered around them.

“W-what on earth?” Pearl asked, baffled as she carefully picked up one of Peridot’s former fingers.

“Ugh, sick,” Amethyst gagged in disgust. “There’s bits of her all over.”

“Nope,” Garnet said with a satisfied grin as she held Peridot’s gem up and succinctly bubbled it. “She’s right here.” And with that, the Gem leader tapped said bubble, sending it off. “And now she’s at the temple.”

“So… I guess we sort of dismembered Peridot then?” Dipper asked, rather confused as he lightly kicked one of the fallen legs.

“Yep, guess so,” Amethyst remarked, scooping up all of the remaining bits and pieces before easily dropping them all off the edge of the Galaxy Warp and into the ocean far below. “Oops.”

“W-well, hey, looks like we finally beat her!” Mabel cut in brightly. “And we got rid of Bill too! So, it looks like tonight was a win-win for all of us!”

“Hm… for now at least…” Pearl mused worriedly, still rather preoccupied with the hostile threats Bill had left them on.

“You don’t think he’s actually gonna try and come back after that thrashing we just gave him… do you?” Amethyst asked, also rather concerned.

“I don’t know…” Garnet admitted, her future vision still blocked off from all things concerning Bill. “Ideally, we should try to find a way to get rid of Bill for good, but… he’s tricky, and hard to pin down.”

“M-maybe I should go talk to Great Uncle Ford about all this when we get back,” Dipper interjected thoughtfully. “He knows a lot about Bill; he might be able to help us come up with a way stop him for good!”

“You kids are all full of great plans tonight,” Garnet smirked, ruffling Dipper’s hair rather affectionately.

“Indeed,” Pearl agreed with a small smile as she put her hands on Steven and Mabel’s shoulders. “If you two hadn’t come in with that fusion idea, there’s no telling what might have happened!”

“Aw, it was nothin’,” Mabel blushed with a small chuckle. “Ok, well actually, I take that back, cause it was kinda something and that something was AMAZING! Right, Steven?”

“Huh?” the young Gem blinked, somewhat distracted as he looked towards the broken Homeworld warp behind him. “Oh, uh… yeah…” He frowned, briefly, largely unable to get his mind off of just how frantic Peridot seemed to be both before and after Pyrite, how she had tried so hard to make a hasty escape from Earth for whatever reason, how she tried to offer some sort of panicked warning in the very seconds right before she poofed. And, given the terrifying, arduous battle they’d just been through, Steven found that he couldn’t simply discount all those things as nothing. “Um, guys?” he spoke up as the others continued to celebrate their victory. “I think… I think Peridot was trying to tell us something back there…”

“Oh, like what?” Dipper scoffed with a bit of a bemused laugh. “That she realized that fusing with Bill was actually a bad idea? A bit too late for that one, don’t you think?”

“Uh, w-well I don’t think it was that exactly…” Steven said, looking aside. “B-but maybe she was trying to say that she knew something about Bill that we don’t? O-or maybe something else?”

The entire group took pause at this, sending the young Gem a round of curious, though largely doubtful glances. All except for Mabel, who had also heard the green Gem’s shortened warning prior to her destabilizing, but even so, she didn’t really know what to make of them herself, much like Steven didn’t. Even so, the Gems themselves, as well as Dipper, seemed largely dismissive of it, especially since whatever threat Peridot used to pose to them was no more.

“Those were just the desperate lies of a Gem who’s been caught,” Garnet assured, finally cracking a comforting smile. “You don’t need to worry about her anymore.”

“Yeah, and as for Bill, we can just figure out some way to deal with him later,” Amethyst remarked, stretching tiredly. “For now, all that fusion’s got me exhausted.”

“Ironically enough, same here,” Pearl smirked as she led the way back to the temple warp pad. “Come on, kids, let’s go home. Oh, I’m so glad this is finally over… Well, at least part of it is, anyway…”

The Gems all readily headed over to the warp pad, with the twins following suit not too far after them. Steven, on the other hand, hung back slightly, looking out across the battle-worn Galaxy Warp apprehensively. True, they had miraculously beaten Pyrite and as a result, won an incredible victory against not only Peridot, but Bill as well. And though that later victory was only temporary at best, it still felt well-earned all the same. Yet despite the high spirits everyone else was in, Steven couldn’t help but still feel some lingering sense of dread. Peridot’s unfinished warning had left him on edge, just as much as Bill’s vicious threats had. And while they had certainly triumphed in this one battle, there was still so much left unseen and unknown that the young Gem wasn’t quite sure what to make of any of it at all.

Which meant that, if no one else was going to try to find answers to questions only he seemed to be asking, then Steven would just have to find those answers for himself.

To be continued…

Next:

#jen writes #universe falls #steven universe #gravity falls #crossover #au #fanfiction #pyrite #steven #dipper #mabel #garnet #amethyst #pearl #maven #opal #sugilite #sardonyx #peridot #bill cipher #keyword is pyrite

[lokifiction]

Caught in the Crossfire

The day the Battle of New York occurred was a fateful one, especially for Camryn, who was caught in the crossfire of a Chitauri weapon and Loki’s Tesseract-powered scepter, the blast sending her into a comatose state.

When Thor returns to Midgard to assist with rescue efforts, he finds her, unconscious and close to death, though emitting a strong magical trace. Puzzled by it, the prince brings her to Asgard for medical care- and observation.

Over time, the mystery of what salvation or destruction she will cause because of her magical abnormality becomes harder and harder to solve. As she begins to lose control of herself, she must seek help from the only person that can teach her how to harness her newfound power and the one who happens to hate her the most.

Loki.

Category: Fanfic

Rating: Teen

Notes: Again, I’m so sorry for the giant lapse in posts! I’m really trying to get better about it! I hope you all enjoy this chapter and that it makes up for my horrible posting schedule!

Warnings: None for this chapter.

Tags: (Please let me know if you’d like to be added to the list!) @peterpansexualll @silverhart93 @b1i55

Masterlist

First Chapter

Previous Chapter

Chapter Sixteen

Sleep was proving to be impossible.

For what seemed to be an eternity, I tossed and turned in my enormous bed, staring up at the high ceiling. In the gold, I watched the reflection of the flames in the hearth across the room go from warm, dancing orange shadows to a dim, ominous red glow, seeming to reflect the spiral of my thoughts.

Once Gerd, Inge, and Brenna had left for the night, my mind plunged into a storm of fears over what awaited me at the Council meeting the next day. How would they judge if my powers were safe enough to let me off? Would they conduct a full-scale interrogation, or some invasive physical inspection? Would I have to perform some kind of test? What was the criteria for the Council deeming me safe or a threat? If they deemed me a threat, what would “removing me” involve? The possibilities made bile rise in my throat, and I sunk lower into the bed, pulling the covers up to my nose as if they would protect me.

Would they execute me? If they did, how would they do it? Hanging? Beheading? Poison? Or would they try to torture the power out of me? Or research and do experiments on it? What if they tried to twist me to be under their control?

A part of me wondered if they would just send me back to Earth. Weeks ago, I would’ve rejoiced and prayed for that possibility. Though it was a very unlikely scenario, I realized that going back to Earth would mean never seeing Loki again, and suddenly it became the worst horror of all.

I groaned and pulled the blankets completely over my head. My relationship with Loki was so new, yet I already considered having to leave him a worse horror than being cut open and probed, something that was becoming increasingly more possible as each hour without sleep slipped away, along with my chances of performing well at the meeting.

The mattress below me gradually started to feel like it was drowning me, and my blankets began to feel like tiny insects crawling up and down my body. With a mix between a huff and a groan, I threw them off, my legs working with a mind of their own as I pulled myself out of bed and into the parlor.

All of the fires were burning rather low, giving every room in my chambers an eerie red glow, the effect intensified by the occasional snaps and pops of the wood, the fact that they were the only sound other than my own breathing making them deafening. I sat at the breakfast table with my knees pulled up to my chest, wondering if Gerd or Inge ever returned in the night to tend the fires, wishing one of them would so I would have someone to talk to. Eventually, though, the titanic shadows on the walls began to seem like cutthroats lurking, and I felt as if demonic eyes were on me. My anxiety made me fear my own living quarters, and I had to get out of them.

I tiptoed over to my door and slipped out into the corridors, the environment that would’ve once felt more menacing seeming to comfort me. Braziers flanked every door, with flames that burned higher and brighter, illuminating the space more and reducing the amount of intimidating shadows. Guards were peppered here and there, ready to eradicate any threat. Down the hall, a maid carried a pitcher of water into someone’s chambers. I drifted further down the corridor and heard light chatter behind one door, despite the lateness of the hour, and mighty snores behind another.

Despite the enormous size of the place, the environment gave me the feeling that I was in a homely environment. The thought relaxed me and finally brought a cloud of sleepiness over my head, but I knew that I would become anxious again if I returned to my chambers. Instead, I returned to my door and slid down in front of it, pulling my knees to my chest, staring at the shadows of the flames dancing on the floor and listening to the sounds of other lives besides my own.

“What are you doing out here at this time of night?”

Loki’s question shocked a yelp out of me. I hadn’t even heard his approach. I put a hand to my chest to calm my racing heart and took in the heart-achingly beautiful sight of him in loose sleeping pants and a v-necked tunic that revealed a deliciously considerable portion of his ivory chest, his hair laying curly and relaxed about his shoulders.

“I’m sorry if I frightened you.” He came to stand in front of me, his brows knitting together. “But what are you doing up? Your Council meeting is tomorrow.”

“That’s the exact reason why I can’t sleep. I’m so nervous.” I shivered. “But what are you doing up, then?”

“As a rule, I don’t sleep much. I probably only get one full night of sleep a week..” He held his hand out to me, eyes deep and glimmering in the firelight. “Why don’t we talk about what’s troubling you in my chambers? It’s warmer in there.”

I took his hand and he pulled me to my feet, drawing me close to his body and rubbing up and down my arm to create friction. He must have thought that my nervous shivers were from the cold. Though, I couldn’t say I disliked the treatment I was getting, seeing as warmth seeped from my chest and spread throughout my body, gooseflesh rising where he touched me.

In our awkward position that I never wanted to get out of, we made our way down the hall and into his chambers, with blazing fires and lighted lamps, no ominous shadows to be found. Loki motioned to a pair of armchairs in front of the main hearth.

“Sit and make yourself comfortable,” he offered. “I’ll go pull out some wine.”

As he left the room, I sunk into the plush cushions gladly, barely able to contain my grin as I stared at the spot where our first kiss happened. Loki returned shortly, pulling an end-table between the two chairs, putting a bottle and two glasses on it before coming around my chair and draping a warm, deep blue shawl around my shoulders. As he turned his back to pour the wine, I brought the soft fabric to my nose, expecting to breathe in his scent, but instead found Frigga’s perfume of sandalwood and honeysuckle.

“So,” Loki began, settling down in the chair opposite mine. “The Council meeting tomorrow has you worried.”

“Incredibly.” I drew the shawl tighter around myself, feeling very grateful that he trusted me enough to let me wear something that used to be Frigga’s. “I just keep running through all the scenarios of what could happen in this thing and none of what I’m coming up with is very pleasant.”

“Well, you’re smart to be worried.” Loki’s gaze was fixed on a spot on the floor, eyes wide and tongue dragging across his teeth. Eventually, he raised his glass to his lips and drank generously. “They’re troublesome bastards, the Council.”

“Loki?” I asked timidly. He snapped back to reality, eyes finding mine and regaining their usual alert expression. “What can I expect from tomorrow, as far as the structure of the meeting?”

“They’ll probably question you, I expect.” He ran his thumb across his lips. “I’ll likely get questioned, as well, and perhaps people who know you closely and have encountered you. They might send out an order for Eir to do a physical examination. They could also ask for some sort of demonstration of your abilities.”

“That’s not too menacing, I suppose.” I traced the rim of my glass. “What do you think their decision will be?”

“Honestly, I couldn’t tell you. The Councilors are the only beings that contest me in trickery. All I can say is that I highly doubt they’ll kill you or send you to Midgard. There’s no way they’re going to let an asset like you slip through their fingers. The safety of Asgard be damned. They’re holding this whole thing to try and get you under their control.” Loki bristled for a moment, but relaxed. “My guess is that the two possible outcomes of this meeting are them releasing you back into my care, or taking custody of you for themselves.” “Oh.” I kicked back a generous swig of wine. “And how do you plan to make sure they don’t take over me?”

“The most I can do is know what points to make that will convince them that you’re not a threat to Asgard, know what witnesses to provide that would make the best cases, and be entirely transparent about our training process and what I plan to use your abilities for. The Council may be corrupt, but part of their corruption is that they make sure to never look unjust. If everything goes well tomorrow, I doubt they’ll take custody of you on the spot.” Loki’s faraway gaze snapped to mine, suddenly carrying a burning intensity. “But if, for some reason, they decide to, I won’t let them.”

I shifted uncomfortably under his stare. The rest of his face was stoic as ever, but his eyes shot out a passion so intense that it could only be coming from god. It was the first time in my life I truly understood what “eyes staring into my soul” felt like.

“You shouldn’t sacrifice your place on the throne just for me,” I was eventually able to whisper.

Everything about him remained unchanging.

“But I will, if it’s necessary.” His voice was so soft, but seemed to make the entire palace rumble. Under its power, it was my turn to look away, and search for answers in the fire.

“What are your intentions for my ability?” I asked. “What are you training me for, other than to learn to control it?”

Loki’s presence returned to normal as he topped off his wine.

“My main thought is to make you a warrior. Your ability is hardwired for combat, and you have fantastic natural instincts for it. I figured that once I had you seasoned a bit, I would put you at the head of a special operations squad, and you would be virtually unstoppable. Your omnipotence also makes you an excellent candidate for an advisor and strategist. And with the ability to mind-control, you could be a spy and infiltrator, as well.”

My only response was to drain the rest of my wine.

“If you don’t want to be involved in war, though, there are a number of other things you could do with your ability. Managing the libraries, for example.” He paused to smile a bit, evidently very pleased at that mental image. “But I don’t want to force you into doing anything you don’t want to do. I just think that you will remain the healthiest if you’re regularly exercising your ability and not keeping it trapped inside. Is there anything you’d like to do? What did you do on Midgard?”

My voice was suddenly a dangerously low murmur.

“It doesn’t matter what I was on Midgard. Any evidence that I ever existed there is gone. My life before I came here has been completely erased.” I blinked away unexpected tears. “What I want is to matter. And I want to matter as Camryn, a person of her own right, not an extension of the Tesseract. If the Council takes that away from me, I don’t know what I’ll do.”

“As I said, I won’t let them.” Loki set his wine aside, rising from his chair and helping me do the same. “But for our best chance of success tomorrow, we ought to go to bed. Are you feeling better now?”

I noted the new lightness in my chest brought about by my poetic revelation. “Yes, now that I’ve talked about everything.” I nodded and turned towards the door. “Goodnight. Thank you for this.”

“Where are you going?” he called after me, reaching out and taking my hand. My heart leapt at the contact, and I looked over my shoulder at his slightly bemused expression.

“I thought you said we should go to bed,” I replied, brow furrowing.

He chuckled, as if the answer was blatantly obvious. “I meant my bed.”

“Are you sure?” I squeaked dumbly. Did Loki already like me that much? “Are you not?” When I didn’t refuse, Loki wrapped his arm around my shoulders and led me into his bedroom. I was so love- and dumbstruck that I barely took in the interior of the room, only watching with wide eyes as Loki lowered himself onto the blankets of the mammoth bed and pulled them down for me.

“I thought you said you didn’t sleep,” I murmured, hesitantly sliding down under the covers, afraid his offer would suddenly cease to be and he would force me out.

“I said that I don’t sleep much,” he corrected, waving his hand and extinguishing the lamps. “But with you here, maybe I’ll find it easier and more bearable.”

I thought on the “bearable” comment for half a moment as I laid down, but it was chased from my mind when Loki reached out and drew me to his chest. It wasn’t at all a rough movement, rather one of him draping his arm around my shoulders and using it as an anchor to tug himself closer to me, but it was enough for a quickly suppressed yelp to rise in my throat and for me to stiffen in shock. He must have noticed, because his gentle grip on me slackened.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “But despite all that I said, I’m just as nervous as you are. Right now it’s my instinct to want to have you as close to me as possible.”

“No.” I nuzzled myself further into him. “I was just surprised, that’s all. I didn’t expect that from you.”

“Honestly, neither did I. I don’t usually do things like this.” His thumb traced circles across my shoulder. “But this feels right.”

I almost asked about whether or not he ever did something similar with Toril, but swallowed the question and burrowed even further into him. “It does. Thank you for tonight.”

I didn’t expect to find a relaxed state so quickly, but there in the haven of his arms, all of my worries evaporated, leaving me in a little bubble of bliss. Lulled on by the soft movements of his chest and surrounded by his scent that I could only describe as fresh snow, I slipped into sleep and entered a world without worries for the first time since I woke up on Asgard.

I was roused the next morning by Gerd’s startled yelp. The sudden sound made me lose my bearings, and it was not until I saw Loki already completely alert next to me that I remembered what happened last night and realized the cause of her shock. When I pulled myself to a sitting position, allowing Gerd to see that my nightgown and Loki’s tunic were still on our bodies, her blush softened.

“My apologies for the intrusion, Your Majesty,” she panted, pressing a hand to her chest. “Inge and I went to get Camryn ready for the day and discovered that she wasn’t in her room. We thought that we had searched everywhere for her and I came to you in a state of emergency, but I see we neglected to look in the most obvious place.”

“I’m really sorry that I frightened you, Gerd.” My mild embarrassment overcame my reluctance to end my time of closeness with Loki, and I pulled myself up even further.

“It’s perfectly alright. You were already planning on breakfasting here, anyway, so it’s not as if much went askew.” She collected herself into a proper position for a handmaid to assume, her perfect manners completely restored in Loki’s presence. “Are Your Majesty and my lady ready for that now?”

“Yes, Gerd, that would be splendid,” Loki replied, already up and out of the bed, putting on a robe even though he was fully clothed.

“I’ll bring it in promptly, then.” Gerd’s wide brown eyes turned to me. “And Camryn, would you like us to prepare your chambers to get you ready for the Council meeting?”

“Um…” I trailed off, casting a glance in Loki’s direction. At the moment, he was the only thing keeping me calm, and if I left him right before the meeting, I would go mad with anxiety. Luckily for me, he received my silent plea.

“Actually, Gerd, she can get ready in here,” he interjected. “There are still a few things we need to discuss, and we intend on walking down together.”

“I see.” Gerd smiled sweetly. “I’ll go prepare everything, then.”

“Thank you, Gerd.” Loki saw her out, then turned to me with a look of pleasant reluctance. “Well, I suppose I ought to start preparing myself, as well. It won’t help our case to be tardy.”

Assuming that was my dismissal from the bedroom, I started to uncover myself and made to leave, but Loki noticed me and held his hand out with a furrowed brow. “No, you can stay,” he interjected, and an almost imperceptible look of surprise at himself passed across his features before they reshaped to their usual reserved expression. “Unless you’re not comfortable.”

I burrowed deeper into his mattress. It was, as a matter of fact, unusually cozy. “I’m comfortable.”

“Then stay, if you’d like. I think I have I book in the Midgardian Phoenician alphabet on one of my nightstands.” He turned his back to me and removed his superfluous robe. “I believe there might also be one in Japanese Hiragana, if you can read that.”

“I knew a bit of it before the Tesseract took over, but now I think I could read any language in the world.” I turned slightly towards the nightstand to look for a book to browse, but the sight before me made me forget reading completely.

Assuming I was otherwise occupied, Loki’s brow furrowed in a new train of thought, and his gaze fixed on some faraway spot as he took the bottom of his tunic and pulled it off over his head, revealing a body like a marble statue, the contrast of his soft, raven curls splaying out on the snowy white skin of his shoulders causing my heart to flutter. As he rooted around the room for things he needed to get dressed, lithe, taut muscles rippling with every movement, bringing to attention the numerous silvery scars that peppered his form, I realized the significance of the gesture.

Before, he had been unwilling to let Gerd, someone who had known him for at least half his life and someone he trusted enough to not banish from the palace after he took the throne, see him in only his unrevealing nightclothes. Now, in front of me, someone who had tried to kill him before and was a clear match in ability, a perhaps mysterious girl he had known for very little time considering his long life, he was completely undressing, and showing one of his most vulnerable states. And it wasn’t as if the undressing was a seductive matter, either. He was doing it with a complete air of routine and nonchalance, which somehow made it even more intimate. Whether consciously or not, it was an extreme statement that he trusted me immensely, and while our relationship had a rocky and awkward start, it was deep and true and something worth holding onto.

By the time he was clipping on his vambraces, the last step in the elaborate process of donning his armor, I was breathing heavily and tears pricked the back of my eyes. He paused to flash me a bemused and slightly confused look. He opened his mouth to say something, but was cut off by the knock that preceded Gerd’s entrance into the bedroom, carting a garment bag.

“Camryn, I’ve brought the things to prepare you for the meeting,” she announced. “And, Your Majesty, Inge is in the parlor with your breakfast. She’s requesting to know if it’s to your satisfaction.”

“Thank you, Gerd.” Loki’s smile was a bit tight. “I’ll go and check.”

I pulled myself out of bed and let Gerd lead me into the wardrobe, watching dejectedly as Loki passed out of the bedroom. I wanted to show how much I trusted him, too.

Once we were alone, Gerd helped me into a simple and conservatively cut gown in a muted taupe fabric, and merely pulled the sides of my hair away from my face with a strip of leather. I imagined the desired effect was to make me look as inconspicuous and cooperative as possible. She was uncharacteristically quiet as she dressed me, and I assumed she was as concerned for the meeting as I was. Now that I was no longer wrapped in the absolute safety of Loki’s arms, my earlier fears were beginning to creep back.

When Gerd deemed me ready, she led me into the parlor, where Inge was laying a spread  out on the breakfast table and Loki was pouring tea. When he noticed our entrance, he put down the pot and approached us, taking me in with a half beloved and half dejected expression.

“Did I dress her appropriately?” Gerd inquired.

“I know the aim was to make her as unnoticeable as possible, but it’s simply impossible to not notice Camryn.” Loki’s comment carried the air of a great compliment, and I felt myself flush. “But yes, you came as close as anyone could. Do you feel like eating, Camryn?”

“Not really, but I feel like I should.” I folded myself into the chair Inge pulled out for me, the handmaid patting my shoulder reassuringly as I sat. “I’m starting to get nervous again.”

“To be honest with you, I’d be concerned if you weren’t. I’m a bit anxious, myself.” Loki gestured to my cup. “The tea should help. It’s more of the calming brew.”

I gulped down some of the sweet liquid, willing it to do its work quickly. I briefly eyed the spread in front of me and reached for a fig, picking at the fruit as I uttered my next question.

“This may sound a bit odd, but how should I behave in this meeting?”

Loki made a sound that might’ve been a sigh, the corners of his eyes turning downwards. “I hate to say this, but as quiet, agreeable, and boring as possible. For those moments, your safety will be the most ensured if you act as a creature that exists only to tell the Council what they want to hear, and doesn’t utter any other sound.”

“Oh,” I whispered.

“I hate silencing you.” Loki reached across the table and took his hand in mine. “But I hate even more the idea of what they would do to you if they feel threatened by you. Your presence is extraordinarily powerful, and it would be enough to make those shriveled bureaucrats uncomfortable just by you entering a room they occupy. I don’t want them to take that feeling too far.”

“No, I understand.” I stared at our joined hands, tracing some calluses on his palm with my forefinger. “I want to be safe, too, and stay here with you.”

A sound somewhere between a delighted squeak and a sigh came from behind me, and I turned around to see Gerd’s dreamy expression and Inge lightly elbowing her in the ribs. Gerd blushed again and turned around, returning to her duties of tidying the room for the day. The incident was enough to cheer me in the midst of the dark situation.

“I want you to stay with me, too.” It was Loki’s turn to stare at our hands. “I feel that, together as a pair, we can accomplish great things. We just have to secure our opportunities to do so.”

After our heartfelt declarations, the rest of breakfast passed in silence: Loki picking at the palm of his left hand while I twirled a section of hair round and round my finger. When our food was cleared away, it wasn’t yet time to go to the meeting. Loki and I debated back and forth on whether it would be a better idea to practice with my power and release a bit of it, or not practice in case that it went out of control before I appeared in front of the Council. Eventually, the stress of the decision paired with the nerves I already had bottled up inside caused blue sparks to radiate from my hands, something that hadn’t happened in a long while. We decided to drop the subject, and Loki instead taught me how to play an Asgardian card game quite similar to poker until the palace bells tolled half past eleven.

Loki glanced at the enormous clock in the corner of the room, with four markers instead of twelve,  and grimaced. He rose from his seat at the table and a simple brown cloak appeared in his hands. I suddenly felt as if I was going to vomit up what little food I ate, sucking in a deep breath to keep it down as I rose from my own chair and stepped into the offered garment.

“Are we going to a different building?” I asked, tying the strings below my neck as Loki draped his own cloak around his shoulders, his much grander and lined in stunning silver fur.

“Unfortunately not,” Loki replied. “The Council would never stand for being that separated from the goings on of the palace. However, they’ve never been liked by any monarch to sit the throne, so their chambers are on the opposite side of the palace. We’ll have to pass through several courtyards and outdoor walkways.”

“Oh.” With heavy hands, I reached out and took Loki’s offered arm. The more I heard about the Council, the more my trepidation grew.

The moment we passed out of Loki’s chambers, we were flanked by the guards that were before stationed on either side of his door, the clanking of their armor with every step they took providing an eerie soundtrack to our journey. Loki led me out of the royal residential wing of the palace, down a grand, common staircase, and onto a lengthy covered bridge connecting two towers. He was correct in giving me the cloak, for the wind was biting and a half-frozen drizzle dropped from the sky, but I was too anxious to care about the cold. As Loki led me through galleries and courtyards and gardens, all sights I had fawned over during my palace tour, my nerves prevented me from noticing or appreciating any of it, and it was all I could do to hold onto his arm for dear life and try not to faint from fear.

When we finally reached the corridor where the Council chambers were held, their presence appropriately marked by a towering black door, we encountered Gerd and Inge, both flushed and giggling slightly, flanked by Brenna, who was cool as ever.

“We’ve just returned from laying out the banquet spread for their meeting,” Gerd explained before we could ask, breath quickened slightly.

“Yes, with a little twist in their drinks.” Brenna wiggled a vial between her thumb and forefinger. Loki reached out and snatched it, squinting at the label.

“It’s just some of the draught that we give patients when we’re doing minor fixes such as stitches or setting a bone,” she explained. “It’s not enough to have any effect that will make them suspect that anything is amiss. I just put enough in to make them happy, impressionable, and easily swayed in your favor.”

“I would typically be against such a thing, but in this case, I think it might be necessary,” Inge put in.

“It’s the same for me.” Gerd earnestly took both of my hands in hers. “The members of the Council are absolutely vile. I would be devastated if you fell victim to them.”

My breath caught in my throat, and the most articulate answer I could muster was: “Me, too.”

The palace bells tolled again, and Loki gently placed a hand on my shoulder.

“As much as I hate it,” he said. “We’d better get in there.”

“Of course.” Gerd kissed me on both cheeks with tears in her doe’s eyes, Inge embraced me tightly, and Brenna gave me an encouraging pat. As I watched the trio disappear around a corner, my body erupted into trembles, and I tried desperately to calm them as Loki approached the ominous door and knocked twice.

There came sounds of calm scuffling from behind the doors, along with various snatches of indistinct conversation. Loki tutted and rolled his eyes at the noise, tapping his toes impatiently. It was all I could do to stand still without fainting. Once the commotion died down, there came the sound of a heavy latch being pulled aside, and the monstrous doors opened with a powerful groan. The bald, portly servant that granted us entry bowed as we came into the room, pooling black robes covering his clasped hands. Loki took my arm and pulled me tightly to his side, and I relished in the small comfort. I could tell he wanted to do more, but if the Council realized that we were lovers, it certainly wouldn’t help our case.

The Council chambers seemed very much a place where a soul would learn whether it was going to heaven or hell. It was an enormous circular room, each and every step echoing on the floor, which was etched with runes that my newfound power allowed me to read, boasting ominous statements about order and justice and balance. In the exact center of the chamber, the runes on the floor stopped, their presence replaced by a solid black circle- the obvious place for victims to stand. Directly above that spot of accusation, the towering ceiling drew up into an onyx dome, very much giving the impression of a very powerful storm preparing to abound on the Council’s victims.

Loki and I painstakingly made our way to this fateful circle, an invisible weight on my chest growing heavier with every step. I wanted to keep my gaze down at my shoes, but, eerie as the room was, there was something strangely beautiful about it, and I couldn’t resist gawking at it.

The walls were done in a pale grey stone, a contrast to the golden splendor of the rest of the palace. In fact, the chamber seemed very much like a dungeon. Behind us, there was a generous yet short length of mahogany bleachers, likely for public observations of Council meetings. That day, only a scribe occupied the seats, thick brow furrowed as he organized himself to record my fate. With a gulp, I steeled myself to face those that would decide it.

The Councilor’s seats were elevated dozens of feet above us, and they perched over us like patrons in a box at a theatre. The shelf that raised their towering thrones was also done in mahogany, but was painted with gruesome scenes of cruel judgement and justice. I felt my blood run cold. Was this a council chamber or a courtroom of hell?

Atop the shelf sat nine men clothed in rich brown robes, chatting as a collection of more black-robed servants cleared away a meal from before them and refilled their wine goblets. I remembered Brenna’s ploy, and hoped that the drug did the trick.

Though the men all varied in appearance, they all held the same sinister, serpentine expression in their eyes. They clearly noticed our entrance, but seemed to make a deliberate move to ignore us, plucking the last scraps from their plates and continuing their conversations. Loki bristled beside me, nostrils flaring.

“For Valhalla’s sake,” he muttered. “They may be the Council, but I am still their king.”

When the men above us made no further moves to acknowledge our presence, Loki cleared his throat loudly, the sound reverberating across the room until all eyes were on us. The chatter didn’t halt completely, however, until the Councilor in the center rose, his spot raised higher than everyone else’s.  With torturously slow steps, he approached the end of their box, thick white beard falling over the edge as he leaned over and pulled his wide lips into a positively wicked grin. When my legs were trembling under his penetrating expression, he straightened and briefly turned to his colleagues before raising his attention to address the absent audience.

“We shall begin.”

#loki fanfic #loki fanfiction #loki laufeyson #loki x reader #loki x ofc

[mottledscales]

Pupae

Twitching erratically, overturned and harmless, dazed by a full-speed collision with glass-encased flame, Chagatai watched it. A moth, one of the larger -but still diminutive considering the monsters he’d seen- variants mimicked death throes before righting itself on the windowsill. Black antennae twitching, fuzzy, it rubbed and cleaned them, as if concerned that a single hair was out of place. 

In Lominsa, such creatures didn’t come to his windows. Birds occasionally, given how the lofty distance from flat to waves, but even the cloud-kin rarely stayed more than a few moments at a time. Once or twice he’d made a joke about those that chose to disturb his wind chimes. “We’ll have them for dinner, the next one,” he told Narangawa, who laughed at the time.  “They have no meat on them, we’d be eating feathers!”

Feathers and gristle.

(Cut for body-horror and just general weird shit)

In the Twelveswood, vile-kin were far more prominent. They crawled and they flew and they seemed everywhere. Flies, ticks, chigoe, butterflies, ants, centipedes. Food for the birds. He picked a spider off of his clothes before setting out to collect wood -Hearers approving, marking the way to the tree slated for felling- that morning. A caterpillar found its way into his pack and left a smashed and unfortunate mess when his supplies were jostled about in transit. Flies tried to get at his lunch. The Tail Mountains were absent most vile kin. In his youth, they’d been so scarce, save when the procession camped ‘round cairns and their fires warmed the earth for days on end. Or in the summer when the mountains lost their snow for a few moons. So many summers ago now he’d need a half-dozen hands -or more- to count them all.

Now closed in a cocoon of stone and wood the Xaela rose, away from the desk where a letter of request for another logging trip in the future -best to get it written early- sat unfinished. Typically formulaic, these, templated for bureaucratic purposes. Might as well have been customs forms akin to those in Limsa Lominsa, with how methodical the wording and structure were. He remembered the words more readily when it was routine.

As he reached out he realized the tiny vile-kin was no bigger than the pad and first joint of his thumb, the process of scooping it into his dwarfing palm laughably easy.  Not altogether different from lifting Narangawa, or Catarina, or nearly anyone else, for that matter. The creature stumbled, fluttered as if to keep balance, or perhaps flee, and Chagatai cupped his hands together in a cavernous shape, bringing it with him. Back to the desk, where he sat once more, he went. Tiny and dizzy, it ambled around atop the wood, and the Xaela paid it little mind while he continued his letter. When next he glanced over, there were two. Mismatching, white with lacy black patterns across their wings, they were a small riot of patterns as they crawled over one another and seemed to fight. There were five when he blinked, fidgetting limbs like twigs on bulbous bodies and flickering eyes. Seven, nine, he slowly reeled back as they split and pulled together, like raindrops. Monochrome raindrops with whispering wings that spasmed and twitched louder. Or, at least it seemed louder. When he hissed: “Stop,” they paused, no. Froze in place. There were nearly six-dozen, he could hazard that much, all white and black, lace and symmetrical patternings that reminded him of filigree. So much of filigree. Filmy, gauzy gems, the lot of them, with black, multi-faceted eyes that seemed to eat the light. Void-dark pits, covering his desk. They perched on the wood top, held tight to his pen. The letter went untouched, all of them seemed to avoid the parchment and its drying ink, leaving a rectangular zone of safety amongst the swarm. “Stop,” he whispered. They were already still but now fanned their wings slowly, rotated their antennae slowly, otherwise unmoving. Six dozen became seven, eight, he tried not to blink, forced his eye wide open, hissed again. “Stop!” He felt it in his chest first, mistook it for his heartbeat, quickened from the replicating creatures, panicked for he felt no tears in the veil. Nothing was wrong, not that he could hear, or feel. No pleas, no begging shouts. Just the whisper of wings, susurrations that carried a few fulms, but little further. His throat tightened and he pitched forward as it filled with phlegm and water, retching dry and coughing uselessly until his lips spilled splattering onto the letter of request. The ichorous pitch he spewed was indistinguishable from ink, dripped off his teeth and ruined the parchment, smearing words or blotting them out entirely. The more he stared, the less he understood those that remained, writhing lines that made no sense. Each moth fanned its wings without pattern or rhythm, hushed accompaniment to his racing thoughts. “Stop,” he murmured, a rasp from his worked throat as he brought his claws to his face and scratched beneath his left brow. The scales flaked beneath his fingers, fell feather-like down into the puddles of ink and spit. Adrift, they floated as the slurry gradually ran to the edges of the parchment. There it stopped, drawing in moths in disorderly marches, climbing over one another to get at the mixture. Chagatai slammed a hand down, intent on squashing the lot of them, brought back only a hand slathered in the viscous mess, every moth he struck evaporated into wisps of smoke.

Please. Do not fight me. You have no defense that counts beyond ‘token’, my friend.

Ah, there it was. He’d suspected void-fuckery. Under the wings’ murmurs it came, deep and serene. At odds with its words, possessed of noble diction.

Perhaps not the kind of void you are accustomed to.

They were on his arm, all over the inky mess, and he swiped with the opposite palm in an attempt to clear them off, spreading the mess. They crawled higher.

You must understand, I don’t mean you any harm. I need your help. I wouldn’t come to you were I not out of options.

“Stop!” he snarled, staggering to his feet and sending the chair clattering unceremoniously to the floor, flying further as his thrashing tail struck and sent it airborn. The swarm fanned their wings, calm, antennae shifting, unhurried. Each lumbering limb swiped and swatted, he bared a mouthful of stained teeth at them, choked off a noise when he felt soft wings against his palate.

I will keep you safe. I promise. Your mind, your child, your people...no harm will come to them. Not while I am here.

Spitting and cursing through a mouthful of powder and legs and fuzz-covered bodies, he dug his fingers between his teeth and filled his senses with smoke. It tasted of familiar things: oceans, pipeweeds, and too-sweet tea. But still, there was strangeness, as well: fruit-tarts and citrus, thin cologne and ozone.

You cannot fight me, this is not a void you know. But I can teach you, and I will. Now quiet down. Let us talk, we should get to know one another.

Chagatai finally slumped to the floor as his airways were clogged and his left eye peeled open after being scaled over for so long. He felt wings behind the lids, shifting legs, bubbling wetness that pushed in all directions. Fingers traced his spine, nothing loving but inquisitive. Seeking information. It stung upon reaching the base of his skull. The moths fluttered. The voice was a gentle murmur, cold but comforting.

Muunokhoi. Such an odd name- but you do not use it. We really are two-of-a-kind. Call me...hmmn. Ah-- call me...

The letters were smeared, running with shiny, gooey puddles. Saliva. He’d drooled right onto the unfinished request and ruined it. That was the most immediate realization upon waking. The next was his body’s various protests. Falling asleep upright, even in a chair, wasn’t the worst, but it did leave him with aches and pains; his neck was especially stiff. As he glanced aside he plucked up the damp and slimy parchment and tossed it into the wastebasket, not bothering to shred it as its entire message had become unreadable. Birds chirped and sang in the pre-dawn, the Shroud’s trees full of all manner of the cloud-kin. It was better he thought, than the cacophony in his dreams.

Ungainly and weighted by exhaustion he moved to sit in the windowsill and let the dawn warm him as it came peeking through the boughs and washing the world in subtle yellows and rosy pinks. He scratched at the scales covering his empty eye socket and grimaced when he felt them shift loosely over the skin, again when he spied a dead moth curled up on the windowsill next to his thigh.

#They Call It Deja Vu #writing

[naturalistprincess]

all hail the underdogs chapter eight

Wolf Spring

Seven days. Seven days since Katharine had first arrived at Wolf Spring, and all she had done in that time was cry. The carriage ride here? She spent crying. Walking to the Milone’s home? Crying. Greeting the members of the household? Well, she had actually managed to bite out a soft “hello” before her bottom lip began to tremble and the waterworks reappeared. An older gentleman, who insisted upon being called Grandad Ellis, had looked startled at the noise, while his partner, Cait, immediately scooped up the frail queen in her arms. Pulling away, her vision blurry, Katharine mistook her for Willa for a moment before she was hit with the potent smell of fish wafting from the pier which invaded every space in the town. That only sent her off more before Caragh took her up in her arms and up to the room she would now be sharing with Juillenne. She spent three days lying around in bed before Cait stomped up the creaking stairs, mud caked boots squishing against the wooden floorboards, and dragged her out of bed, insisting, “So long as you are staying with us, everyone under this roof will be carrying their own weight.” She’d fixed her stern gaze on Katharine, “Including Queens.” Four days passed before the man, Matthew Sandrin, who’d accompanied Caragh and Juillenne to Black Cottage, sauntered in through the door, loudly proclaiming his arrival, “Honey, I’m home!” A bright smile stretched over his face before he turned his head and he saw the small queen standing by the sink which dwarfed her, drying a plate. His smile faltered momentarily, reappearing as soon as she blinked. “Hello, my Queen. How are you doing today, beautiful?” Beautiful. Katharine wiggled her toes in the grass, letting out a content sigh as the sun warmed every inch of her skin exposed from the loose cotton pants and tank top she adorned. Someone laid down next to her. Her sisters’ giggles sounded out from the side of the house. Willa’s velvety fingers brushed against her cheek as she pushed loose strands of hair from Kat’s face. The little queen nuzzled into the touch, turning her head and opening up her eyes. “‘You are so beautiful, my Queen. Small features, delicate bone structure, no one on the island will be able to take their eyes off of you in sixteen years.’”

Willa always called them beautiful. Always commented on their beauty, their brains, with a new compliment to tell them and make them blush every day, hearts swelling with happiness and pride.

Her eyes went glassy, lips wobbling as a fresh wave of tears began to form. Her hands shook, the dish towel and plate nearly falling from her grip. That was when Caragh swept back into the room, swatting Matthew Sandrin’s shoulder with a dish towel she held when she saw the distraught queen, whisking her back upstairs to the confines of her new room in her supposed new home. The next two days had passed by, uneventful, with Caragh keeping that Matthew out of the house as she tried to coax any words from the queen. She hadn’t uttered more than three words since she had first stepped into the house. Joseph Sandrin, the brother of Matthew Sandrin, made frequent appearances in the adventures Juillenne prattled on about at dinner time. He has caught fish with his bare hands - or so he claims, Julienne would laugh, rolling her eyes - and scared off all the bluebirds swarming the town when the two made a bet to see who could catch the most. He was Juillenne’s best friend. To say they didn’t make a good first impression on one another would be an understatement. Cait and Katharine sat in the living room, the graying woman knitting whilst the young queen, who’d attached herself to the woman rather quickly, watched from the other end of the small blue sofa. She was beginning to fall asleep, the gentle sounds of the raindrops hitting the cerulean shutters lulling her to sleep, when the door was thrown open in the kitchen, Juillenne’s voice ringing out, “Grandma Cait!” “I’m in here. Shush, Jules. The Queen is asleep,” The rough rumble of Cait’s voice answered, hushed, as two pairs of feet trampled against the wooden floor and into the room.

Katharine’s eyes reluctantly open, blinking as a pair of soaked children her age appear in the doorway. “Sorry, Grandma Cait,” Juillenne didn’t sound very sorry. Katharine sworn she saw peculiar colored eyes glance her way through the wet strands of hair covering Juillenne’s face. “What is it, Jules?” “It’s raining out! And Anne said we couldn’t go sailing in this weather.”

“Well, then you two best find something to do around here until the weather clears up.” Jules’ shoes scuff against the wood as she turned towards her partner in crime, silently asking what he would like to do. Joseph wasn’t paying her any mind, eyes on the young Queen curled up at the end of the couch. “Is that her?” He spoke up, pointing his finger right at Katharine. Jules slapped his hand down, “Don’t do that! And yes, now let’s go upstairs.” “She looks like the scrawny chicken Matthew and I put down last week.” Beneath her curtain of hair, Katharine’s cheeks flare, the back of her eyes stinging. A scrawny chicken? She drew her legs in closer to her body. Her flat palms pressed harder against her midsection until she could feel their warmth through the light fabric of her shirt.

“Joseph!” “By the Goddess, Joseph Sandrin, you best take that back right now before I feed you to the dogs,” Cait snapped from somewhere above Katharine’s head. “I just don’t see how— she looks nothing like Queen Bernadine did.” “Queens aren’t identical.” “I know, but...,” there was a pause.

The couch shifted as Cait stood up. “Joseph Sandrin,” she warned, back towards Katharine, blocking the girl from seeing the look she shot the boy.

“Sorry, Cait.”

There was another moment of tense silence before a squawking sound from upstairs rang throughout the house. Cait sighed, “I best go see what that is. Be good, Jules,” she laid a hand on her granddaughter’s shoulder before briskly hurrying out of the room.

Katharine bit back the urge to bolt up, insisting she go with Cait and not be left with Juillenne and her rude friend, but Cait had already disappeared out of the room.

Juillenne glared at Joseph when Grandma Cait was out of ear shot, hissing, “This is our queen. What on Fennbirn were you thinking, comparing her to a chicken?!”

Joseph shrugged, shaking his hair out of his eyes. He looked almost bored, not at all sorry for his earlier commentary. “Look at her, Jules. Have you ever seen her use her gift before? She’s just another forgettable naturalist queen. The poisoners will sit on the throne forever at this rate.”

The brunette’s face was starting to turn red, hands balled into tight fists at her side. “You don’t know that! She’s strong! She is.”

“You are the one who said she bawls like a child every night,” he counters. “Not very queen-like if you ask me. Do you think Queen Bernadine did that?”

“She has been taken from her sisters! Wouldn’t you cry too if Matthew was taken from you?”

“Jules, she looks like the a heavy wind can carry her away. You don’t seriously expect her to outlast the poisoner or the elemental, do you?”

Katharine shut her burning eyes, burying her face further into the couch cushion as if that could help her escape this conversation. Weak. Weak.

She wanted to cut in. She wanted them to startle, Joseph blushing scarlet when he realized that she overheard it all. Katharine wanted to stand, mimicking the shoulders-back, head-held-high, proud, regal pose Willa taught them during one of their lessons. The one Mirabella and Arsinoe pulled off flawlessly, naturally, Mira bearing a stark resemblance to the Queens of Old from their pictures in their history books, and Arsinoe looking almost.. scary. Her resting glare and straight back sewing together the image of an intimidating and unapologetic queen.

“‘A Queen does not have to feel strong always. But if she can look it, and instill a confidence into her people, she is strong, even when she feels her weakest.’”

She is a Daughter of the Goddess. She is the sister of Queens Mirabella and Arsinoe. She is of queenblood, a naturalist, capable of making the prettiest flowers grow and the scariest animals cower at her feet!

But she couldn’t swallow the lump in her throat, she couldn’t blink the tears away, nor swing her legs onto the floor and will herself to stand. All she could do was lie there, face burning under tangled hair, and pale chicken legs present for anyone who walked into the room to see.

Weak.

“Joseph Sandrin, you bumbling fool. You’re a traitor! How could you think that of your own queen?!” A furious voice snapped out, loud before falling back into an angry hush, as if the speaker reminded herself that the person she defended was sleeping just steps away. “She will put an end to the poisoner reign, and I know it!”

“Goddess, Jules! Why are you getting so pissed about this?! You know it’s true! No one in Wolf Spring has seen her once! They’re already whispering about her.”

“Becau—! You know what? Let’s just go upstairs. I’m surprised she hasn’t woken up already from your idiocy.”

Joseph let out an angry breath of air, crossing his arms. His eyebrows were drawn down, a large crease between his brows. “Fine,” he bit out, turning and stomping out of the room. There was a small pause, and Katharine began to stir. She flipped over onto her back, letting out a shaky breath, eyes glued to the ceiling. It was covered in old water stains and dirt around the edges. The bags under her eyes felt sore, her eyes heavy as she blinked back tears. She felt weak. Beaten, and battered, and out of breath. Her own people. Her own people didn’t have any faith in her. They didn’t believe she’d be a good queen. That she’d… outlast her sisters, whatever that means. She reached up, rubbing her chest before moving to sit up, determined to find Cait, or Caragh, for some comforting words and a cup of chamomile tea with honey. Lots and lots of honey.

The Queen sat up, head turning towards the door to guarantee Juillenne and her friend were gone before standing.

Sharp blue-and-green watched her silently from the doorway.

“Jules!” The boy’s voice cried, from far up, as she startled that the brunette had been watching her all this time, “Hurry up!”

Without a word, the girl merely blinked at Katharine, before turning and running off wordlessly. Her footsteps clomped heavily against the squeaky old steps. “I’m coming!”

——

It was later that night, long after dinner in which a bewildered Cait had recounted Aria’s odd behavior — squawking and flying around in wild circles, dive bombing towards Cait’s and the other familiars’ heads in a frenzy, that Katharine finally got time alone with Juillenne.

The little queen had already settled into bed, teeth brushed and soft night shorts and shirt on, watching curiously as Juillenne bustled around the room. One moment, she’d be throwing on her worn pajamas, the next her attention would be caught on the flowers on the sill. Katharine would watch, captivated, as the girl would brush her fingers against the yellowing leaves, the calla lilies bursting up into full bloom, the vibrant green and white standing out against the faded walls and dirty windows.

Finally, finally, when Caragh came upstairs to scold Juillenne to get into bed and stop lollygagging, did Katharine get her chance. She took in a deep breath, fingers curling around the cool sheets, eyes locked on a random inky spot of darkness above them. She could make out the faint outline of the rafters above.

“Juillenne?” She called out, timidly.

“Jules.”

“Huh?”

“Jules. Not Juillenne. Remember?”

“‘I’m Jules Milone.’”

“R-Right. Sorry.”

“‘S alright.”

There was a beat of silence, Katharine took another breath to steel herself before she began again.

“Jules?”

“Yeah?”

“Um, I-I’m sorry.”

She could hear the bed creaking, and the rustling of covers before Jules’ confused voice reached her. “What for?”

“I… I eavesdropped. Before. During your conversation with that.. that boy. Joseph.”

“Are you kidding?! I should be apologizing to you. No. I should be whacking that dimwit upside the head for saying such, uh, blas— blaz— blasp— mean things! Don’t listen to him, Kat, he doesn’t know what he’s talkin’ about. It’s all his dad, filling his head with dumb thoughts.”

Katharine blinked, too taken aback by the angry rant from the other bed to take into account the new, well, not new, but the new use of the nickname from anyone other than her sisters. “Oh,” she managed, flushing red. She didn’t.. she didn’t know it made Jules so mad. She didn’t understand why it did, but it made the little girl feel a bit better that Jules was being so kind to her, defending her against that Joseph Sandrin, her best friend, warm swelling in the bottom of her full belly.

Jules quieted down for a moment, “We… We never had a powerful queen before. Not from here. Not since Queen Bernadine and Queen Yasmin.”

“I know.”

“But you'll change that. I know you will.”

“How can you sound so confident that I will? All I’ve ever done is cry since my arrival… like a… like a child,” her voice lowered, Katharine shifting around in her sheets, ashamed. Her fingers fiddled with a loose string in the knitted quilt Caragh had gifted her during her first night at the Milone’s home. It was pale green, with petals and flowers sewn all over the edges and a big rose smack in the middle.

“Because,” she insisted, voice firm, “I’m going to help you, of course. We’ll show Joseph, and his dad, and everyone who doubts you. We’ll show them how wrong they are. And I’ll protect you from all of them until you can shut them up yourself, okay?”

Kat bit her bottom lip, high cheeks flushing pink as she listened to Jules’ squeaky, confident voice.

“Okay,” she agreed.

Jules yawned, “First thing tomorrow, I’m gonna show you around town. You need to know all the best places to go.”

“Go?”

“Go to hide in! Madge always give chase whenever we try and steal her clams,” Kat giggled at the girl’s disgruntled tone, and agreed.

“G’night, Kat.”

“Goodnight, Jules.”

Seven days. It took seven days before Katharine finally managed to sleep through the night, chest light, eager for what awaited her the next day. Mirabella and Arsinoe’s cries and yells didn’t shape her dreams that night, but rather the memories of them running around outside, laughing and trying to push each other into the riverbed. Arsinoe putting up quite a fuss when Katharine managed to trip her, falling face first into the cold water.

She couldn’t recall the exact time it reshaped itself into her and Jules laughing as they ran through the woods to the right of the Milone’s home.

——

Rolanth

A wet sob vibrates through her chest. The young girl’s arms cling tightly around her knees, face buried in them. Her head is pounding, drying tear tracks clung to her cheeks.

“‘“Queen Arsinoe and Queen Katharine . . . They are weak. Mirabella will kill them easily. Quickly. Certainly faster than any of these poisoner queens have managed to kill their sisters.’”

“No.”

“You want me to kill my sisters?” “Why worry about such dull, grown-up business? And now we have frightened you and ruined this sweet surprise.” “A queen is to kill her sisters?” “No.”

Rain pelts against the roof and sides of the house. It gets harder and harder, turning into hail. Thunder booms against the cliffs of Blackway. Bree, crying, covers her ears in fear.

Sara, reaching out for her. Screams, her screams, and then the flames flare from the candles, scorching the walls. Sara yells, “Put them out!”

Miles, teeth clenched, snuffing out the candles. The storm grows. They can’t stop it. They can’t stop her.

They want her to kill them. They want her to kill them. Her Katharine. Her Arsinoe. Her loving sisters, who begged her to braid their hair and play. Her sisters, who screamed for her when she was taken away from them.

The shutters are torn from the house, windows rattle. They threaten to shatter. The foundation shakes as lightning strikes. The electricity shoots through her feet, her gift swelling through her bloodstream.

“I will not!”

“I will not!” Heat coils dangerously in the pit of her stomach, a blinding white beating back the pain that rockets through her head. She struggles to her feet, body straining and limbs trembling, protesting against her movements.

“I will never, I will never, I will n—,” her screams are cut off as a blinding pain shoots through the back of her head. Mirabella’s vision darkens as she crumples to the ground like a limp doll.

I will never. I will never.

“I will never,” she screeches, Mirabella’s hand shot out. The flames jump from her fingers, slicing through the air and slamming into the wooden furniture stacked neatly together across the blackened room. The room has a musty smell, cement floor cold and wet. Mirabella lays in the middle of shelves and boxes stacked with expensive furniture, clothing, toys, decorations. Her breaths come out ragged, though the queen is unsure if that is due to the heavy, wet air or from her own crying fit when she awoke, Miles’ and Sara’s words slamming into her full force.

She feels numb, words rotating and tumbling over each other in her head, feeling sick. A queen is expected to kill her sisters. The elemental feels her eyes prick once more with tears, recalling the Westwood’s words, the townspeople’s words, with startling clarity.

“What chance does a docile queen have, even with a gift as strong as hers?” Her fingers grip tightly to the velvety skirt of her dress, an even farther memory pushing itself into the forefront of her mind.

“Willa?”

The caretaker turned towards the soft voice, mouth open from where she was cut off mid sentence to face the small queen, frowning down at her book.

“Arsinoe!” Mirabella hissed, eyes narrowed on her impolite sister. Her eyes snake back towards Willa, who doesn’t look upset as she eyed Mirabella’s younger sister.

Arsinoe didn’t look like she heard Mira, ignoring her sister’s admonishment to meet Willa’s eyes. “Why don’t we ever learn about these queens’ sisters?”

Mirabella blinked, annoyance forgotten as she slid back in her seat, turning back over to Willa as curiosity filled her. Arsinoe was right, why didn’t they ever read about the queens’ sisters?

“Yeah,” Katharine piped up, so quiet the others had almost forgotten she was even there. The fact that she actually sat through a whole lesson without getting admonished at least once was a major accomplishment the others could help but feel a swell of pride towards her for. Normally the naturalist couldn’t stand sitting still, much less indoors, for lessons. “I wanna know what type of familiars the naturalist queens had! I’m so bored reading about Bernadine’s dumb wolf, and Yasmin’s doe.”

“Want to,” Willa corrected her instinctively. Mirabella’s eyebrows draw together, there was something off about their caretaker but she couldn’t put her finger on it. It was a minuscule change, a change the queen couldn’t pinpoint or see.

“Willa!” Arsinoe whined, pressing herself up against the side of the polished dark brown table and turning her head up towards Willa with big, pleading eyes. Willa could never deny Katharine when she pleaded with her to spend just a little more time outside, large eyes wobbling, the poisoner picked up on. It never failed for her either. Then again, none of them could deny Willa spoiled Arsinoe the most, letting her have the occasional sip of her may wine and choose what they baked for dessert.

The midwife’s lips pursed. Her girls were persistent. They wouldn’t take no for an answer.

“Well, there is no reason to. These are the queens that take the throne, the other queens end up moving to the mainland, living out the rest of their days happily until their sister comes to join them at the end of her reign.”

“But how do they pick who becomes queen?”

“Oh, it’s a trivial little thing. A little contest of gifts they perform at Beltane after their sixteenth birthday.”

No. No, it wasn’t.

It is a fight to the death. Queen pitted against Queen pitted against Queen. There is no happy ending for queens, Willa lied to them. Tears blur Mirabella’s vision as another anguished sob rips through her. Flames whip out from her fingertips, smoke coiling upwards towards the unseeable ceiling. Sparks crackle in the air, wood creaking as the furniture burns in the corner of the room.

Another outraged scream passes through her.

She won’t. She won’t.

She won’t.

The elemental sinks down to her knees, skirt pooled out around her. The wet concrete presses uncomfortably against her burning skin.

Upstairs, the servants are deathly quiet as Sara Westwood instructs them to clean up the mess the queen made.

No one acknowledges the screams and cries coming from the basement door.

#three dark crowns #one dark throne #two dark reigns #the young queens #the oracle queen #queen arsinoe #queen mirabella #queen katharine #tdc #tdc fic #tdc au #all hail the underdogs #chapter eight #kendare blake

[spacetimewithstuartgary]

Ancient meteorite could reveal the origins of life on Earth A 4.6-billion-year-old meteorite found in the laying in the imprint of a horseshoe is likely a remnant of cosmic debris left over from the birth of the solar system and could answer questions about how life began on Earth. It was discovered by Derek Robson, of the East Anglian Astrophysical Research Organisation (EAARO), in a Gloucestershire field, in February, after travelling more than 110 million miles from its primordial home between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter in the Asteroid Belt. Now, scientists at Loughborough University are analyzing the small charcoal-colored space rock to determine its structure and composition in a bid to answer questions about the early Universe and possibly our own origins. Along with colleagues from EAARO, researchers are using techniques such as electron microscopy to survey the surface morphology at the micron and nanometer scale; and vibrational spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction, which give detailed information about chemical structure, phase and polymorphism, crystallinity and molecular interactions, to determine the structure and composition. So far, they have found that the incredibly delicate sample, which resembles loosely held-together concreted dust and particles, never underwent the violent cosmic collisions that most ancient space debris experienced as it smashed together to create the planets and moons of our solar system. "The internal structure is fragile and loosely bound, porous with fissures and cracks," said Shaun Fowler—a specialist in optical and electron microscopy at the Loughborough Materials Characterisation Centre (LMCC). "It doesn't appear to have undergone thermal metamorphosis, which means it's been sitting out there past Mars, untouched, since before any of the planets were created meaning we have the rare opportunity to examine a piece of our primordial past. "The bulk of the meteorite is comprised of minerals such as olivine and phyllosilicates, with other mineral inclusions called chondrules, which, for example, can be minerals such as magnetite or calcite. "But the composition is different to anything you would find here on Earth and potentially unlike any other meteorites we've found—possibly containing some previously unknown chemistry or physical structure never before seen in other recorded samples." The ancient rock is a rare example of a carbonaceous chondrite, a type of meteorite which often contains biological material. Fewer than 5% of meteorites which fall to Earth belong to this classification. Identifying organic compounds would support the idea that early meteorites carried amino acids—the building blocks of life—to supply the Earth's primordial soup where life first began. "Carbonaceous chondrites contain organic compounds including amino acids, which are found in all living things," said Director of Astrochemistry at EAARO Derek Robson who found the meteorite and who will soon join Loughborough University as an academic visitor for collaborative research. "Being able to identify and confirm the presence of such compounds from a material that existed before the Earth was born would be an important step towards understanding how life began." Professor Sandie Dann, of the Chemistry Department in the School of Science, first worked with Derek in 1997 and has kept in touch with him regularly since. She said: "It's a scientific fairy-tale. First your friend tracks a meteorite, then finds it and then gifts a bit of this extra-terrestrial material to you to analyze. "At this stage, we have learned a good deal about it, but we've barely scratched the surface. "There is huge potential to learn about ourselves and our solar system—it's an amazing project to be part of." Jason Williams, Managing Director of EAARO, added: "One of EAARO's primary objectives is to open the doors of science and technology to those who may not get the opportunity. "Derek and I felt our new find could help us further these objectives by opening up research opportunities in meteoritical science. "We carefully chose Loughborough, along with University of Sheffield, a number of commercial partners, and a handful of overseas specialists to work with us on this exciting project as we continue to excite and inspire people young and old by promoting and encourage space research and STEM subjects to a wider community." TOP IMAGE....Secondary electron image of mineral chondrule in the carbonaceous chondrite meteorite revealing spherical mineral inclusions. (electron micrograph). Credit: Loughborough University CENTRE IMAGE....Secondary electron image of carbonaceous chondrite meteorite showing delicate layered leaf-like structures at 10,000x magnification. (electron micrograph). Credit: Loughborough University LOWER IMAGE....The meteorite. Credit: Loughborough University BOTTOM IMAGE....Secondary electron image of mineral chondrule embedded in the carbonaceous chondrite meteorite (electron micrograph). Credit: Loughborough University

#space #science #Astronomy #physics #news

[essayofthoughts]

Prompt: Thanos making Wanda choose between Pietro and her unborn child because um ANGST!? - ;) mermaid-motels

Send me fic prompts!

AO3 Mirror

i.After prison - after the straitjacket - everything outside leaves Wanda feeling exposed, like a raw nerve. The bruises fresh from battle, the blisters from the burning contacts of her collar are not even completely healed when Steve comes to break them out, and she finds herself tucking into the corner of the Quinjet as Steve flies them out.

The whole world feels, once more, like a threat.

ii.Wanda tucks herself into corners, wraps herself in shawls and blankets. Small spaces still make her panic - they always will, after the shell - but open spaces and exposed skin leave her feeling just as at risk.

Wakanda is safety, but none of them linger lest they cause their kind provider trouble, leaving as soon as it becomes safe to do so. Wanda folds herself small, slips across borders, and lives as a street-witch once more.

iii.There are things she does not tell others. Of course there are. Everyone has some small secret they tuck close, hold high within their hearts and vow to never let out.

Except: once upon a time there had been someone she could tell these high-held secrets of her heart to. Once upon a time she had shared all things with a brother born at much the same time as her - twins, born together and meant to die so.

But now, now Pietro is gone from her, and she must learn to keep these secrets tucked up into herself as everyone else has all their lives.

To keep a secret from others, that had always been simple. That was how she and Pietro had lived for long years, telling others barely anything but between one another, sharing everything.

Now, to keep these high-held secrets of her heart is easy… until she realises there are none she may tell them to.

There is no outlet anymore. Just building and building pressure in her chest.

iv.“Grief,” says Vision, floating gently down to sit next to her. She is not so terribly surprised that he has found her - if anyone could it is him, who bears the stone that birthed her blood-and-burgundy powers into the world - but she is startled that he would so readily sit beside her, after she had shoved him through structure and soil. His hand rests gently on her spine as she slowly stifles her sobs.

Below them, the street whirrs on.

“I am sorry,” Vision says. His mind, beside her, glows in soft green cell-shapes under magenta neurons gradually building up and around the orange databanks of his thoughts. “For…,” his mind flickers over so many things before he finally sounds out the words. “For many things. I should have spoken to you, rather than said nothing and hoping you would stay. I am sorry that… that I did not understand your concerns as well as I thought I did, and that I tried to make light of things when that was not what you needed.” 

His hand against her back is cool and soft, sturdy but gentle and slowly her breathing eases. 

“And I am sorry that you lost him,” he says, and Wanda draws a breath that for long moments she does not let out. “I did not… I do not think I understood loss, until you all were gone from us. I did not understand how much it must have been for you, to have him no longer.”

She sighs out her breath in one long shiver and leans against his side. With him here she does not need to worry that she might accidentally fall, that her scarlet, still touched by fear, might falter and let her fall. So she leans into his side, lets his hand slip from her spine to her side, and gladly takes the comfort he is so tentatively offering. 

v.She hides. She slips in and out of crowds, hides her face with a ducked head, a pulled up hood, a pulled low cap. She becomes invisible, a void in the crowd. In the summer she wears wide-brimmed hats, strips her rings from her fingers so her hands are bare and ordinary and hide the scarlet she could pull forwards at a moments notice.

Under the radar. She has lived so much of her life under the radar that it’s almost simple to slip beneath it again. These clothes, that stance, that accent. Suddenly she becomes no one, and no one notices or cares.

She threads her rings back onto her fingers, Vision sitting behind her on a rumpled bed. 

“I wonder, sometimes,” he says. “If this will all last. If all it takes is for me to not understand-”

Wanda turns and glances at him. “I do not think that is a worry,” she says, before threading rings back onto her fingers. “Besides,” she says. “You now know what will happen if you should ever lie to me again.”

“You will leave,” he says. “By any means necessary.”

Wanda threads the last ring onto her thumb and turns to face him. Vision’s smile is soft and warm.

vi.She wonders if Stark knows. That Vision - his son-and-also-grandson via different paths - follows her around the world, finds time to spend with her when not back at base or managing a mission. Follows her around the world, through countries and cities, into cafes and into bed.

She wonders if Rhodes knows. If any of the team does.

It almost makes her laugh, now, to think at the state of the team. She wonders what Pietro would have thought, to know how easy it was to destroy the team, in the end. 

She thinks, now, that the team would have destroyed itself all on it’s own, if they had let it be. All it would have taken was one disagreement turning into an argument turning into a war.

Fear set loose into Tony Stark’s mind may have helped, she thinks, but she knows just as well that the team might have fallen apart on it’s own at a moment’s notice.

vii.“What should we do?” she asks, leaning against Vision. Her hands rub uncertainly over her stomach. This was… she had never been prepared for this. Planning for all possibilities, yes, but this had never been a possibility, not for her, not for years. Poor diet, pitiful life, the streets a living hell, and trauma every moment reoccurring and reoccurring. She knew what came of that. How the body responded to that. To grow up so, in such consistent uncertainty she did not think- 

But all the same. 

 “I-” Vision looks as shocked as she feels, surprise etched on his features. His mind is stuttering over the idea, over the mere concept.

“You are biological,” Wanda says softly, touching her fingertips to his. “I remember. Doctor Cho mixed cells with vibranium to make you, you are not only metal.”

“Y-yes,” Vision says. “But-” 

“You did not think it was a possibility for you,” Wanda says. Vision’s hand shifts against hers, interlinks their fingers. “It is funny,” she says, quite seriously. “I did not think it was a possibility for me, either.”

viii.Then the aliens come.

Then Vision is attacked.

Then, Wanda must once more chose what she can fight for.

ix.“He is gone,” says Thanos. “You waste your time.” Wanda does not move from her vigil at Vision’s side. Her hand does not let go of his.

“Not gone,” Wanda says. “He is… dreaming.” She glances back to him, at the gauntlet at his side. “He will wake as soon as the stone is returned.”

“That,” Thanos says, “Is not the deal I offer you.”

x.Her choices are not choices at all.

She may give up Vision, give up her child - her dearest hope that she had not ever thought would be fulfilled - and have her brother back.

Or, she may stay at Vision’s side, stay away from the battle and maybe, when all this is over, make a life and a new family out of the babe she carries and her own body in whatever might remain of the world

So small a chance. So much she must give, or have taken from her to regain even a little. How much has she lost, in all her few years? Her parents. Her home. Her childhood. Her country. Her brother. Her vengeance. Her freedom.

Now: Her lover. Her child. The whole and entire world beneath her feet.

She looks up at Thanos, and does not let go of Vision’s hand. “You would take from me,” she says. “When you have already taken from me. I will not pay your price for so small a gain.”

Thanos bends his head, looks her close in the eye.

“But this,” he says, “Is not your choice.”

xi.And her brother spins out of nothing.

xii.“Give up your child,” Thanos says, “Give up your child, and I will give you your brother. Or, you stay away, and know that if you try to fight me, you will see your brother die again.”

Pietro is trapped in a bubble, pulled behind a shield, and he is gone.

xiii.When Clint finds her she is silent and shaken. 

“Wanda,” he says, his hand gentle on her shoulder. She does not let go of Vision’s hand. “Wanda, we need you.”

It is all Wanda can do to shake her head.

xiv.Her brother is at risk. Her brother. All she has ever wanted from the moment that he was torn from her and he is there, just beyond reach and-

But he may not be real. This she can anchor herself on, pure and uncertain doubt. She did not get a firm look at the mind of the Pietro that Thanos spun out of nothingness. She did not have time to see with certainty that it was him, her brother whom loved more than anything.

But she dares not risk him. She does not think she can handle having her brother taken from her again.

“I can’t-” Wanda says, when the they reach the others. “I can’t fight this, not-” She turns looks at Vision’s body hovering behind her, tagging along in a net of her scarlet. “Please,” she says, looking to Steve. “Don’t ask me to fight in this.”

Steve looks at her, looks at Vision, and the slow-scabbing gulf in his brow and slowly nods. “All right,” he says. “All right.”

“Stay at the edge of the battle,” Tony suggests. “When we get the gauntlet off him we’ll need someone to put the stone back into Vision’s skull, right? You’ve been checking on him and keeping him here with your scarlet, and with your scarlet you won’t have to touch the stone to put it back in. Can you do that?”

She looks at Tony, uncertain, doubting, but unwilling to accept nothing as an answer. 

If she does this, agrees to this, then Pietro will be safe when she enters the battle. This, this she can do, and she jerks a nod.

xv.There is the battle. Wanda stays in the Quinjet. She stays put, she sits at Vision’s side, she holds his hand in hers and remembers why she is doing this: that she can protect Vision from further harm. That she can seem him returned when they win. That she can ensure that Pietro doesn’t die, because she cannot see him dead again. That she protects her child, the only certain family of her own she knows she has and that she knows is truly real.

She screws her eyes shut, and presses her face to her and Vision’s joined hands.

So much taken. So much held over her head. If you cannot save people are you even a hero? If they die on your watch, how much is your failure? If you fail, why should you be called a hero? Why should you try?

Childhood taken, and parents and home. Safety taken, and peace and comfort. Vengeance taken, and city and brother. Purpose taken, and freedom when she protested it.

Brother taken-given. Child threatened. Lover gone.

She stretches her mind out - she can feel Vision’s beside her, dreaming still, but that is not what she seeks - and seeks to find the distant mind of her lost brother.

A lost brother she is more and more certain is well and truly returned to her.

Pietro imprisoned. Pietro kept from her. Pietro’s wellbeing held over her head, and her child’s head, and her lover’s head, to try to keep her friends and her almost-family from winning.

Wanda has always been her most powerful when she is angry.

xvi.Later, they will not be able to say what exactly happened. 

Later, truly, no one quite cares, not when there is the simple glory of victory at their hands.

Later, no one thinks too much on it.

xvii.Wanda is angry. Wanda is very angry, Wanda is angry as she has not been in years and it boils in her belly, boils in her body, boils in her bones until the scarlet seeps out of her skin like a mist of blood.

Far across the battlefield, a shield shatters into a thousand shards and a blur of blue enters play.

xviii.“What the fuck was that?”

“Doesn’t matter, focus fire!”

And suddenly Thanos’ gauntleted hand is without a gauntlet.

xix.“Wanda,” says a voice, and it is a voice Wanda has dreamed of, over and over.

Her brother stands in the open door, hair a ruffle of white and grey and black, and in his hands is the gauntlet.

“Pietro-”

Metal weighs her hands down in a moment, and she can feel her brother’s mind speeding faster and faster outside. In her hands is the gauntlet.

Wanda calls scarlet, and pries the mind stone lose.

xx.Wanda slips the vast gauntlet on, shrinking it down to size with it’s own power. It is….

There is power there, as she flexes her fingers. Like her own, but different.

Wanda’s eyes glow in a myriad colours as she bends to kiss a slow-healing Vision’s brow.

xxi.Pietro is a blur of blue, War Machine and Iron Man are flying about and hovering high above Thor is calling so much lightning he glows in a vast blue nimbus. Below, on the ground, T’Challa and the Dora Milaje, Steve and Bucky, Natasha and Scott, Spiderman and the aliens all pitch in.

Wanda flexes a gauntleted fist. 

“You,” Thanos says, when he spots her, spots the gauntlet on her hand, shrunk by way of her will and it’s own power. “You know-”

Wanda raises her hand, clenches her fist, and he chokes.

xxii.Pietro runs. He is a blur of blue, fast as anything, dodging around the lightning that drips from Thor and heads for the giant purple man who is clutching desperately at his throat.

There’s a lot of speed behind him now.

He punches, and skin tears.

xxiii.“Wanda,” he says, and his hands are fluttering around her shoulders, still shaking in blue and the gauntlet falls from her hand as she rests her head against his shoulder. “I’m here, it’s all right, everything is all right.”

She doesn’t know how to tell him, all the sense of loss and grief, the re-finding of purpose, how much time has passed, about her and Vision, but he doesn’t ask, just settles his hands on her shoulders, slips his arms around her and lets her relax against him.

“I’m to be an uncle?” he asks, when she finally pulls back. “Have you and Vision discussed names yet?”

xxiv.Vision is slow to wake, but Wanda’s scarlet feels every inching moment as he claws his way back to consciousness. The others drop in at various times - Pietro most often, hovering at her shoulder, glad to be back, leeching knowledge of all that has happened from her mind whenever they are near enough he can do so. Steve and Natasha drop in as well, even Stark, who seems most confused by the idea that Wanda and Vision might be having offspring.

Wanda stays most often, and the day Vision finally wakes, everyone is there.

“Did we-” he asks, half dazed still, and dazed still more when Wanda leans forwards to kiss his cheek.

“We won,” she says, eyes wet. “We won.”

#ask #maximoff fic #wanda maximoff #pietro maximoff #wanda maximoff defense squad #anonymous #my fic

[lockandk3yfiction]

Story Title: A Saviors Soul

Story Summary: Zombie Apocalypse AU. Bakugou’s separation from his best friend has been haunting him for nearly two years now, the war between the living and the dead carrying on as time passes. He has yet to find the one he made promises to, searching for his friend just as much as he had been surviving. Will the day come that the two are reunited? Will there still hope for him and for Kirishima?

Rated: M (for depictions of violence)

Date: November 1, 2017

Chapter: One

Chapter Title: Memories of the Lost

Chapter Summary: Bakugou dreams of the time he’s spent with his best friend, both before and after the outbreak of the apocalypse. He dreams of the promises he made to him, the life they lived and the life he left behind.

Bakugou sat beside Kirishima on the rooftop of their school building, noise emanating from stories below through open classroom windows and the courtyard beneath them. There was live chatter, cheers and yells as students stomped around, using their lunch break to their full intent. Neither of the boys mentioned before joined in, relaxing their muscles and brains as they recline against the roof entries door, blocking the way of any other intruders as they wished to spend their time together in peace.

It wasn’t an uncommon practice, Bakugou had a longing to be with as few people as possible. He was not much for crowds or social events, choosing to partake in solitude and quant atmospheres instead. Kirishima though was the life of the party, a social butterfly who almost always wore a smile, someone found wherever life took him. He wasn’t afraid to put himself out there, to laugh and stand with the hurricane of prep. Yet, he had a quiet side to him too, one very few saw, one he never hid from Bakugou.

So sitting beside him under a clear sky, in a vicinity made for them, Kirishima still smiled, looking upon Bakugou with endearing trust in him. “Bakugou, we’re third years now. When are you gonna stop hiding from Kaminari and them?”

“When they stop acting like children.” Bakugou huffed, his chin tipped up toward the cloudless blue space. He felt as if, if he could, reaching out into the open sky would take him elsewhere, away from the world he knew with Kirishima in it. That the peace their small city held would collapse, taking him with it. Bakugou closed his eyes, letting the sun bathe him in its glow, wash away the tension of his thoughts.

“They’re our friends, Bakugou. They want to spend as much time with you as I do before the year ends.”

Bakugou hummed in response, his back sliding down the metals wall until he lay flat on the concrete floor. He learned over the years that denying the fact he cared for Kirishima, Kaminari, Ashido and Sero was pointless, the four always finding a way to sneak into his personal bubble. At this point, Bakugou didn’t mind but it didn’t mean he’d lose his quiet space over it. He heard Kirishima sigh, cracking his eyes open and turning slightly to see the redhead slouched over, twiddling his thumbs and biting his lip.

“Bakugou… We’ll still be friends after we graduate, right?”

Bakugou’s brows furrowed, scrutinizing Kirishima who suddenly looked solemn and hesitant. “Of course, dumbass. You’ve been my friend for nearly three years. Who said I’m gonna dump ya after all the bullshit we’ve been through?”

Bakugou’s scowl grew with the way Kirishima smiled weakly, clasping his hands together, laughing lowly. Bakugou could tell Kirishima had something on his mind, the way his eyes contained insecurity and cheeks tinted slightly pink showed it. Bakugou hadn’t asked though, he knew Kirishima would reveals his problems in his own time, say things he needed to say when the time was right.

“Will I finally be able to call you Katsuki after we graduate than?”

“Fuck no.”

-

Three months had passed since that day, their clean pristine school uniforms exchanged for torn and grimy street clothes. Their shoes were worn, pants muddy and t-shirts ripped at the hem, dirt covered their faces, bruises and cuts marring their skin. They stayed together though, Bakugou leading the way as they ducked under fallen debris, hand clasped in hand to keep from losing each other.

They walked an empty cul de sac, broken down homes left abandoned much like the neighborhood in which they use to live. Glass lay shattered in flowerbeds, trees hanged down on rooftops, cars left out of fuel and parked in the least plausible of places. The air smelt of dried blood, the area too quiet for even Bakugou’s taste, it made him careful, surveying their surroundings with a keen eye. He saw none of those creatures that reeked of rotting flesh, limbs hanging loosely by broken joints, their skin an unpleasant color, an unpleasant sight. Bakugou had to stop himself from gagging at the mere thought of them, his feet stuttering as he if he were to run away again.

He couldn’t though, a hand stopped him, squeezed his own, reminding him of the warm body behind him, the living breathing end result of hell. Kirishima was quite possibly the only one he had left that he cared for. His unbreakable shield that kept him steady on his feet, kept him thinking things will be okay as long as they stick together. Nothing could go wrong if the two of them were fighting with and for each other.

With another squeeze of the hand, Bakugou turned back to face his companion, taking in the way he breathed, the way he stood with resilience even after their world fell apart. The scar on his eyelid wasn’t the only one he bared anymore, many scrapes and scratches layered his arms and back. His black roots were showing, undyed since months before the apocalypse happened, strands of hair falling loose from the string poorly wrapping his hair in a short ponytail. Bakugou hadn’t looked better off, having not bathed for weeks, his body weak from fatigue, unclean scab adorning his cheek.

They were both beaten into despair, living off of vulnerable will and river water. Bakugou couldn’t remember the last time they had eaten, Kirishima’s stomach growling causing the red head to look up in panic and scan the broken road for unwanted arrivals. That had Bakugou stepping closer, patting Kirishima’s cheek and turning him so that their eyes met, an unshakeable voice reveling in his words.

“We’re okay, Kirishima… You’re okay.”

Bakugou watched as Kirishima’s eyes travelled again, resigning and letting his shoulders sag once more. It wasn’t the first time one of them had feared to be found, keeping their voices hushed in close quarters or seeking the other for protection. It seemed so wrong… Neither were weak, they both held physical strength that could rival a boxer, fist that supported them in confrontations, and yet they were here, quivering like homeless puppies in the rain.

What’s to say they weren’t?

“We came here because we were hungry… Kirishima, we’re not going to leave until we find something to fill our stomachs…”

Kirishima nodded, chuckling lowly, his chest rising with the small sound. “You always know what to say, don’t you?”

Truth be told, Bakugou didn’t. He only knew that he had to prioritize their safety and well-being, find any means to provide for them. If that meant breaking and entering, well, he had done that in a heartbeat. Bakugou nudged the wooden door of a nearby house open, the floorboards creaking as the door brushed against it, a tell-tale sign that the structure was older. Inside were minor signs of struggle, dressers knocked to the ground, photos cracked, faint stains woven into the couch cushions.

Bakugou took hold of the largest shard of glass he could find, his palm bleeding as his fingers curled around the crystalline material. Kirishima followed behind him, tiptoeing their way through each hall and room, relieved to find no body, human or not anywhere to be. Bakugou dropped his make shift blade to the ground, stepping over it as he made his way to the kitchen. He attempted to turn on the sink faucet, grimacing when nothing had come out.

“The water lines off.”

Kirishima scoured the kitchen himself, opening each cupboard and cabinet, pinching his nose at the stench coming from the broken fridge, electricity going down not long after the appearance of the undead. There was treasure to be found though, canned goods placed onto the counters, propane tanks found under the sink as well as a first aid kit, a propane-run fireplace with grill top and a few cases of water. Kirishima took one bottle, uncapping the lid as he walked toward Bakugou.

“Here. We need to wash your hand and disinfect your cheek wound.”

Kirishima gripped Bakugou’s wrist gently, holding it over the sink as he poured the bottled water over Bakugou’s cuts. The drain ran red, the color fading as it washed away. Kirishima used a kitchen rag to dry Bakugou’s palm, rubbing ointment over the wounds and dressing it in bandages. He then soaked the rag, looking up at Bakugou as he reached for his uninjured cheek, scrubbing the old scab with the rag and dish soap that was left on the windowsill. Bakugou hissed, cringing as the crusted skin was removed, the scratches and muscle underneath stinging in pain. Bakugou tried to move away, shake Kirishima’s hands off of him but the hold was too rough and commanding.

“Come on, Bakugou. I know it hurts but we gotta clean it, or else, who knows what would happen.”

“Just hurry up…” Bakugou growled, wincing and gripping Kirishima’s wrist harshly.

The wound was not fresh by any means, nearly a week old as Bakugou had bumped into the bark of a tree while they fled an infested area, those monsters some called zombies collecting together for a reason they didn’t know. Bakugou didn’t call them zombies though, no longer wanted to think of them of previous humans. They were monsters in his eyes, the same monsters that tore his family apart, taken Ashido to her grave, left Kirishima huddled in the dark in search for him.

The redhead was left cold in the middle of the night, tears in his eyes and blood on his cheeks, shivering from fright. He curled into Bakugou’s chest that night, fires blaring in garbage bins, stores being ransacked for emergency supplies. The whole city was in chaos but, for that one night, all Bakugou could think about was the fact that Kirishima was in his arms, falling to pieces.

Later in the night, Bakugou lay in the queen sized bed of the master bedroom, the sheets the only ones in the house that were soil free. Leaning against the wall beside the doorway were two backpacks Kirishima and him had found, packing them with food, medical supplies, water and clean underwear they had stolen. It seemed the family that had lived here before had a son somewhere around their age, his clothing fitting them with minimal problems as they had changed into fresh outfits. Dust still covered Bakugou from head to toe but the best he could do was to bathe in the next water dwelling they found.

Bakugou knew they couldn’t stay long…

A tap in the hallway roused Bakugou, his senses kicking in as he tipped his head so that Kirishima was in his vision. His friend stalled in the doorway, biting his lip, fingers clenching against the wall paper and eyes tired. Not tired from lack of sleep but from exertion, from emotional turmoil and an uneased mind. Bakugou said no word, scooting over to make room for Kirishima on the bed, easing an extra pillow onto the open space. Kirishima didn’t need to be told what that meant, stumbling his way into the bedroom and crawling in the bed beside Bakugou, laying on his side to face the blonde.

“Bakugou… What are we going to do? We’re not going to be safe forever…”

Kirishima’s hands trembled, clutching at the front of his shirt, his eyelids wavering, breath choking ever so slightly; Kirishima was fearful. He looked so fragile, lost and unarmed. Bakugou feels useless, his chest tightening, gritting his teeth. His muscles were weak, not strong enough for the circumstances at hand and he wanted to be stronger, to wipe that scared look off Kirishima’s face.

“Please… Don’t leave me…”

-

He shouldn’t of… It wasn’t a part of the plan; what plan, he didn’t know. All he knew was that he shouldn’t have gone, shouldn’t have suggested the things that he did. Maybe then, if they hadn’t left each other’s path, they would still be side by side.

-

Adrenaline filled Bakugou’s veins, his feet carrying him as quickly as they could, Kirishima panting out of breath beside him. He had thought it was a good idea to scavenge the warehouse for spare rations that would care for them for the next few weeks. That they would be spared clean water, perhaps more clothing and get away with a carefree stroll through the aisles. Of course Bakugou would be wrong.

He cursed, pulling Kirishima into the guns and ammo aisle, picking up a pistol and pointing it at the beast before him. He pulled the trigger, a shrill cry leaving Kirishima’s lips but nothing else.

“There’s no bullets?! Where’s the bullets!?”

Kirishima scrambled to find some, pulling on the locks of glass cases, banging on them, not a single one opening for him. The swarm of monsters seemed to grow, inching closer and closer to the two. Bakugou stowed the hand gun away in his pants, tugging a riffle off the wall that he used to swing at the monsters instead, keeping them at bay for now. “Hurry up!”

Kirishima grabbed a hunting knife, smashing the glass case with the hilt of the blade, picking up a firearm he’d never used before and struggling to fill the barrel. Bakugou stuffed a handful of bullets, any size for any gun, into his coat pocket and pulling Kirishima out of the aisle section. Bullets fell to the ground, clanging against the concrete tile as they ran, Kirishima’s nine barrel gun being filled with only three bullets. They continued to run, knocking useless items down to the ground behind them, jumping over obstacles, tripping every now and then.

“Don’t shoot until they’re right behind us!”

“But they’re on our tail!”

“Don’t shoot!”

Sweat beaded down Bakugou’s brow, his legs throbbing, mind going a hundred miles per minute. He had to think of something, get them out of there somehow, he couldn’t let death take Kirishima, not the only person he had left. They ran another corner, feet pounding against the ground, no exit sign to be seen. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

“Kirishima! We gotta split up!”

“What!?” Kirishima’s voice came out hoarse, an argument ready. “Katsuki! I don’t want to split up! You promised we’d stay together.

Kirishima used his name, his given name and it tore at Bakugou’s heart strings, the bite worse than frost. Bakugou could feel the lump in his throat, the rifle in his hands hitting his knee with every step he took, a reminder that their lives were on the line.

“I did! And I will! Just meet me outside!”

With that, Bakugou shut his eyes, closing himself off to the world as he ran opposite of Kirishima, sprinting at a speed that the other couldn’t follow. He could hear Kirishima calling out for him, his voice laced with tears and Bakugou just had to keep going, had to keep running. He swung his riffle in various directions, banging it against paint cans, walls, mirrors, anything that would create enough noise for the monsters to follow, to chase after him rather than Kirishima.

He prayed that it worked, the rotting creatures finding him as he ran through the spoiled fruit section, pulling out crates and spilling as many fruits onto the floor as he could. It let his frustration out, a way to vent as he created disturbances for the monsters, efficiently getting further and further away from them.

Soon he was out in daylight again, Bakugou shielding his eyes as he barricaded the exit behind him. It’s been hours before he was able escape the large building and he was out of breath, his lungs burning as hot tears gathered in the corner of his eyelids. He knew he was safe but he thought he would die right then and there with the way his whole boy hurt. He had only hoped Kirishima had made it out of the building.

Bakugou stayed, never abandoning his post, surveying the area for any sign of Kirishima, not seeing a trace of him even when the moon rose and the sky darkened. He truly did feel dead then.

-

Bakugou stirred in his sleep, groaning at the rusted metal that dug into his back. He sneered, eyelids blinking open as he adjusted to the blaring sun above him. To Bakugou’s right was the same rifle he had taken two years ago, a gallon of dirtied water beside it. He had slept through the night in the bed of a broken down truck he didn’t own, living through the memories of his past that he wished hadn’t happened. To this day, Bakugou regretted breaking his promise to Kirishima…

#bakushima #kiribaku #bakugou katsuki #kirishima eijirou #bnha #minor gore #implied character death #sierra-sama writes #nanowrimo 2017