“Tom… I don’t get it!”
“My name is Temrash,” the Yeerk grumbled, rolling his (well, Tom’s) eyes, and draping an arm over his companion’s shoulders. This was the easiest method he had of controlling the younger Yeerk as he flailed his host’s limbs every which way. “Get what?”
“Your host’s family!” he practically wailed. “Why do they think we’re in a relationship?!”
Temrash paused and stared at the other Controller for a long moment.
“Maybe because you’re sitting in my lap right now?”
This is his “second chance” at life; never mind all the other “second chances” that he’s had before. Never mind all the hospital trips and near death experiences and life changing events that had defined the majority of his career with S.H.I.E.L.D. This time it really was a second chance, because this time he really had died. His heart had stopped for nearly five minutes while the medical team fought to drag him back, and it had only been luck that he had survived. Luck in where the fatal wound actually struck. He doubted that he would ever know if the blow had been on purpose or if Asgardian physiology was just different enough, but the blade had glanced off of his heart instead of bisecting it.
Absurdly, he briefly considers calling it a new lease on life, a chance to change things and become a better person, but seeing as he is still an employee of S.H.I.E.L.D. that doesn’t quite seem to fit the bill. With all the electronic documents listing him as deceased, it is only on paper that his survival has been recorded and apparently that is the way it is going to be for the foreseeable future. A future that, according to the Director, will be best accomplished in the company of his family. More specifically with the one member that is even remotely prepared to deal with an injured secret agent: his youngest sister.
Phil had expected to find things along the same lines as the last time he had seen Penny, back before Stark and Ironman and superheroes. He was prepared to deal with vapid starlets approaching him for whatever illegally concoction Penny had come up with this time, and for men so stupid that they made farm equipment look like Stark when it came to thinking. He knows that he’s been less than charitable in these assumptions, but those were the sort of people that Penny had surrounded herself with since her teenage years and he really hadn’t expected any change.
He certainly hadn’t been expecting his sister to be friends with scientists, let alone dating one. He could see her sleeping with one, yes. Especially one that had the sort of charm and charisma that Stark so happily flaunted, but Leonard could barely string two sentences together around him, let alone seduce someone like his sister. It boggled the mind that so much could have changed in the few short years (five is not a few, a traitorous part of his mind whispers to him, but he ignores it with the ease of long practise) but change it apparently had.
He’s seen Leonard come and go a handful of times since that first awkward meeting, and it wouldn’t have surprised him if Penny had run off with her boyfriend instead of sticking around to help take care of her older brother. He’d been prepared for it, prepared to be left to take care of himself because he still sees the little sister so determined to make something of herself by herself, that when she told Leonard that she didn’t want to leave her “recovering addict” of a brother alone for too long it had honestly taken him by surprise.
Although it was nice to be reminded that at least one of his sisters still cared about the wayward son, it was much nicer when he finally managed to convince her to out on a date. It gives him the necessary time to check in with Fury and settle his nerves in regards to Barton and Romanova’s current statuses. He is less impressed with the Director’s decision to keep his agents in the dark about his survival, but he has to admit that he isn’t anywhere near recovered enough to deal with the sorts of things that come with being the handler to two master assassins. It still rankles, and the thinly veiled argument lasts for almost an hour before Fury finally signs off. Phil grits his teeth against the annoyance and pops a handful of pills with the intention of getting a good sleep.
KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK! “Penny.”
With a groan that is part exasperation and part pain, Phil twists just enough to be able to stare at the door and attempt to telepathically convey the need to go away at whomever is on the other side.
KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK! “Penny.”
It doesn’t work. The injured agent grunts as he rolls off of the couch, and manages to very slowly push himself to his feet. A wave of dizziness washes over him and he winds up clutching at the arm of the couch to keep his balance and attempt to keep his lunch down.
KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK! “Penny.”
It feels like it takes an eternity to cross the few feet between the couch and door, although it’s barely enough time for the nap interrupter to finish a sixth round of knocking and calling for his sister. It takes all of Phil’s energy to yank the door open and glare out at whomever it is who wants to face the Coulson brand of irritation.
“You aren’t Penny.”
The petulant confusion in the man’s voice is enough to jump start Phil’s medication-addled brain, and he finds himself wondering at the odds. Doctor Sheldon Cooper, a man that S.H.I.E.L.D. had briefly considered recruiting before his particular neuroses and less than comforting history with the US Government had held them off, was standing on the other side of the door looking for his sister.
“Why aren’t you Penny? Where is she?”
His tongue felt thick in his mouth, but he managed to form words around it. “Because I was born first. And she’s out with… Leonard, I think his name was.”
“Leonard? But— but she’s supposed to be here so she can take me to the comic book store because he’s working!”
(And that was how Phil Coulson met Penny’s craziest neighbour Sheldon Cooper)
sitting here in a half lit room, trying not to think about the resume that’s in the other window. hmm. obviously this means I should write some wrapped up.
——- prompt: CHOICES ——-
January 24, 2001.
She could say that is was a day that she would never be able to forget. She could claim that she knew exactly what she had been doing, what she had gotten herself into, and who she was dealing with. She could probably even bluff her way through it, but the truth of the matter is that only a couple of weeks later the details have mostly faded away.
The point where things start to get blurry is pretty easy to recall. She can remember crawling out of her bedroom window and dropping down to ground level. She remembers the rush of unleashing her magic and assuming her true form. She remembers the frantic rush to the temple as a vague blur of rooftops and leaps. The fear that had pounded in her heart, the worry that she would be too late to save her friends… those she remembers clearly.
It’s when she gets to the shrine that things go sideways. She doesn’t remember the fight. Not the landing and speech, not the first blow either by her or to her. Nothing remains, not even to form the bones of her nightmares. It is as thought the battle never happened.
After the battle, though… she remembers standing in the tree behind Hikawa Jinja, her breath coming in harsh gasps. She remembers seeing her teammates, her dearest friends and allies, laid out around her. She remembers the certainty that they were healed and whole, with no chance of dying and leaving her again. She doesn’t remember why she was so certain.
She recalls sinking down onto her knees, half sobbing, when he stepped out of the air in front of her. She doesn’t remember what it was that he said to her as his introduction, but she very clearly recalls being annoyed. Annoyed and no little amount relieved. It was a feeling that burrowed so deeply into her the only thing she was about to compare it to is the feeling of comfort and family that the Senshi had always given her.
She had known him once, in a life before her current one, obviously. Known him and trusted him.
She can remember his name being on the tip of her tongue, and trying to greet him. She also remembers how he had barely let the first syllable of his name escape her before he covered her mouth with one hand.
“No,” is the first clear memory she has of his voice. “We’ve already sent out signal flares with that little light show of ours. Try not to dig me any deeper here, babe.”
She distinctly remembers knowing that, when she finally pulled his hand way from her mouth, it was only because he had let her.
“Why do I know you?”
The man looks so indescribably sad at the question, and it leaves her heart aching with sympathy for him. She can remember wanting to take the words back as soon as they had left her mouth, despite how desperately she wants to know how they are connected.
“Well I was just inside of you.”
She can only remember bits and pieces of the conversation that followed that declaration. The clearest images in her head are of a smirk and a laugh.
“You said ‘yes’ to me, once, a long time ago.”
There is an ancient weariness to him, and a heart break that could only be described as godforsaken. Something in that turn of phrase digs at her with sharp thorns of half remembered rage.
“You gave me shelter when there was no one else.”
More than likely, the reason that she doesn’t have clear memories of that night is because of how it ended. He had stepped in close, hands settling on her face. She knows that he was closer than she let anyone outside of Mamoru get to her, and remembers just how unnerving his golden-brown stare was. Remembers the slide of fingers up the side of her face before resting on her forehead.
“I will only ask this once. Yes or no. Do you want this?”
She doesn’t remember what part of the conversation they were at, or even what the conversation was about. She doesn’t quite know what the question was referring too, either. She knows, however, that she said yes to him once again. She knows this because she knows who he is. She knows what he is. She knows what she once was.
This is knowledge that has been seared into her very soul as surely as the brand under her left breast. It looks a little like a feather, shiny and white with a shimmer of magic to it.
She can’t remember her life as Laufey, but she remembers Laufey’s choice. Her memories of Serenity’s life are as filled with holes as they ever were, but she remembers Serenity’s choice. She even remembers Gabriel’s choice, curled as it is around her human soul. It is in the warmth and light and kindness that has bound them together since the first time her soul said “Yes”
—————————-
and now I am going to bed. rawr
whoops, missed 700 because I was catching up on the while-i-was-sleeping happenings. And then there was the magic of Illegally dead… So, lets see what I will post this time…
Oh I know. that Mamoru & Usagi piece that was pissing me off all week. Finally managed to finish it. S’probably the longest one yet.
——- prompt: WEEKS ——-
She is camped out at a table in the Market Square Cafeteria, and he is a Med Student. While she may have been willingly been tempting fate, it still comes as a shock when Mamoru sits down across from her. It’s been five weeks (3 days, 6 hours, 12 minutes, but she’s not counting) since the last time she saw him, and Usagi isn’t entirely sure of what to say or do. Her notes and textbooks are spread out all over the table, but the twisting in her stomach makes it impossible to concentrate on them.
“Usako…”
She refuses to life her head. Instead, she lets the fall of her hair cover her face; she’s had it in pigtails for so long that she had almost forgotten that she could even do that. It may be silly, but having that thin barrier between the two of them does so much for settling her nerves. She takes a deep breath… and then another… and then she does her best to focus on her schoolwork.
Usagi has never been the most dedicated student, but if it helps her to ignore Mamoru then she’s damn well going to give it a shot.
“Usako. Look at me.” That voice… she almost almost looks up. Aside from Brady and a handful of calls home, she hasn’t heard anyone speak Japanese in a month and a half. It’s just another painful reminder that she came to this country for this man, and now it’s all in pieces. She has to bite her lip not to give in and just look at him.
It doesn’t help. Mamoru leans forwards and cups her chin to lift her face. Her heart gives a painful lurch at her first true glimpse of him in months. This man is so beautiful, and she has loved him for so long; but he has hurt her so deeply too many times and she doesn’t think that she can handle it again.
His eyes thought… those beautiful eyes she has spent hours staring into are filled with pain and bewilderment, and she can’t handle that either. The honest confusion in his face as he searches hers for answers that her silence doesn’t provide. His hand slips from her face then, his fingers tangling in her hair.
He can see a pink tinge in the hair around her face, and for the first time ever he can actually see the dark roots of her hair. There is a moment of guilt as he realizes that he’s never actually questioned her hair color. He had always just assumed that it was some sort of magic hold over from Serenity, and before they’d discovered their history together he hadn’t known her well enough to care.
There is a note in his voice that almost shatters her heart all over again when he finally breaks the tense silence that has fallen between them. “Usako… why didn’t you tell me?”
The question shouldn’t baffle her the way it does, and she can’t help that it slips out: “Tell you what?”
“About this! About being here!” and he gestures widely: to their surroundings, to the cafeteria, to Stanford and Palo Alto and California and the States in general she thinks. “You’ve obviously been here since the start of the semester. Why are you avoiding me?”
The laughter that bursts out at that is just a shade off of hysterical and entirely bitter. “Really? Really? Mamoch… Mamoru, I did go to see you.”
There’s a sharp stab of pain in his heart, ragged and painful with the use of his full name. He has been ‘Mamochan’ for so long that hearing her say it just feels wrong. It feels as though that something between them has cracked and broken; feels as though he needs to fix everything now before it breaks any further. The problem is that he doesn’t know what it is that needs to be fixed, and all he can do is stare at her.
Usagi lets the highlighter she’s holding fall to the table and the clatter it makes sounds so terribly loud in the tense silence around them. After what feels like an eternity, she breaks his gaze and lets out a shuddering breath.
“I went to see you,” she repeats, her voice soft and ragged and just so broken that his heart clenches in sympathy. God knows just how much he loves this woman, and seeing her in this much pain only inspires it in himself. That it is he who apparently caused this agony, that has caused her to stew in her doubts and worries instead of coming to see him, only causes him more pain.
The girl that he had left in Tokyo would have been up in his face, wailing and begging like a child. The woman in front of him now looks just as wreaked as that girl would be, but she isn’t advertising it. There is no great temper tantrums and sobs, nothing outwards that shows her heart break anywhere near as much as her eyes. She’s grown up somewhere along the way; she’s had five weeks to work through this agony and yet he’s only known that she was even in California for one.
“You were busy,” and the words are bitten out, all sharp and harsh and in English and it makes Mamoru start. Intellectually, he knows that she knew English in order to come to Stanford, but it’s just another unexpected change between the girl he loved and this woman that he doesn’t know. “with your ‘lab partner’.”
And suddenly Mamoru knows exactly what she’s talking about. It’s hard not to when the memory is seared into his brain. He’s always subscribed to the idea that it wasn’t cheating if it was just fantasies. Especially if the girls had the ‘Serenity’ look to them: long blond hair, wide blue eyes, slim and athletically beautiful… in that case, it was just that he missed Usagi, that was all. But Michelle… Michelle didn’t fit into the blond and blue eyed mold.
She was a lot closer to Ami, actually, and he’d fallen into the trap of treating her like one of the girls because of it. They had always ignored any harmless flirting, knowing just how serious about Usagi he actually was. They knew how muich he loved his Princess, and they never thought of his flirting as an invitation.
Michelle’s kiss had been hot and heavy and needy and it had stunned im immobile for a couple minutes. Eventually he had managed to pull his brain together enough to push her off, but apparently the damage had already been done.
Mamoru leans forwards, clasping her hand between his and continuing the conversation in Japanese. He had to make sure that she understood. “Usako… she kissed me. It was… a misunderstanding on her part.”
And for a glorious moment, her eyes spark with light and love and hope. For a moment… and then the sadness slips back into them. She withdraws her hand from his with a heavy sigh. “Oh Mamoru…” and there’s that pain again, that wrongness. “Mamoru, I love you. I love you more than anything else ever, but…”
“But?”
“…these last few weeks? They’ve been hard, Mamoru. Really hard.”
“There’s no reason for it to stay that way,” he finds himself saying, and isn’t that a flip? It’s always been her chasing after him, and now that she’s taking a step back, he finds he can’t just let her go. She’s tangled herself too deeply into his heart.
She smiles so sadly at him, and there is a strange look in her eyes. “They may have been hard, but Mamoru! This is the first time in five years that I haven’t defined myself by what she was! I’m not Serenity. I’m no Moon. I’m finally finding out who I am.”
Mamoru closes his eyes. He understand the desire, and he can’t begrudge her for it. Not when he remembers the shift in perspective that had come the first time he stepped onto campus. It takes everything in him to put any sort of emotional distance between them, to understand what she’s going through. It’s harder than when he had lied to her when Chibi-Usa had first come to them.
“I’ll wait,” he says, getting up from the table. “As long as I have to. I love you, Usako.”
He can hear the sobs start as he walks away, and all he wants to do is to run back to her and fold her in his arms. He wants to brush away all the pain and agony and tears.
But he doesn’t. She’s had five weeks to start to learn herself. A few more won’t hurt. She needs to learn that her tears won’t get her everything.
He knows he’s lying to himself.
Hmm. I haven’t posted a ficlet in awhile AND I got a request for more Waiting. TO THE NOTEPADS!
——- prompt: LIGHT ——-
It is with agonizing slowness that it begins to piece itself back together. For time uncountable, all that it is aware of is the light and warmth and comfort that surrounds itself. It takes so long for it to find the trickle of knowledge that lets it understand ‘female’, and so much longer to apply the designation to herself.
The disconnect between that and the next thought throws her for a time; as the seed of knowledge takes root and a vine works it’s way possessively through her, she wonders if this is what it feels like to be swaddled. Now she has three thoughts, confusing and tangled together: This is me! I am female! O but knowledge grows like a vine ‘round a tree! and The child is wrapped in linens and cloth for warmth.
She is grows like a weed, she thinks. The vine around the tree as pieces fit themselves together in the child, but she doesn’t need to be wrapped in linen. The longest day has come seventeen times since she was a seedling small enough to be swaddled… and now she has four tangled thoughts. What is day, and why is it long…?
Though these pieces of the past only result in confusion, she clings to each one with teeth and thorns. She won’t let them go. She can’t let them go; these are the fragments of understanding, these are the fragments of herself. These tiny scraps of being are all that remain of who she had once been.
In time her tenacity and greed pay off. Her name is Serenity. Her name is Nál. Possibly even Laufey. Yes, Laufey is comfortable and warm, a favorite blanket. Nál is the familiar wrap of silks and fur, the sounds of home. Serenity… Serenity is right. It is weight and duty and love so brilliant that when it dances with the light all she can see is star speckled infinity.
All three are hers, and she is all three. Each piece is a fragment of her whole, she decides, although it is less a decision and more a remembrance. She remembers Serenity and Laufey and where they had come from. Nál is still a mystery to her, but as she remembers the other two her memories come faster and faster. It is the sickening lurch and spin of pagan travel, and she rests heavily on the light to steady herself.
With each spin she learns a little more of herself, and the light burns a fraction more. The warmth fluctuating now; at times it burns as though she stands in the midst of a bonfire, and she is burning up from within. At other times, the sensation is more akin to being buried in an avalanche; it is all ice and snow and a cold so deep she feels her vines wilt and shatter beneath it. This is the definition of agony, she thinks, but her suffering is proof.
To live is to suffer, so to suffer was to live. She clung to that, and she knew.
She was Laufey. She had been crippled, but she had forged on despite it.
She was Serenity. Dead by her own hand, but determined enough to see her love again.
She was Nál. The last memory clicked into place and she called the light by name.
“GABRIEL!”
TRADITION DEMANDS FIC.
post #600 gets you more Wrapped Up In You. Another magical adventure in times long past, and another piece of the puzzle that is Gabriel.
——-prompt: MONTHS——-
The first month following his possession of his True Vessel, Gabriel finds himself absorbed in the study of the intricate knot of soul and divinity that was Laufey. It lays cushioned and wrapped as close to the center of his Grace as he can get without causing the divinity to ‘infect’ his power. All he wants to do is protect it until he can figure it out, and burning the soul out of existence is the exact opposite of that.
In the second month of his possession, the Messenger visits Zechariah in the Temple. He brings great news, and leaves with the old man’s voice. It is much later that he realizes that the act was one made out of spite and rage, and not because it had been part of his Father’s great plan. He wouldn’t change his reaction in the slightest, even if Father were to command otherwise.
In the third month Gabriel returns to Heaven. He’s not sure what is causing these minor changes and fluctuations to his Grace, and so he feels he needs the time to meditate on it. The worry that it is the Pagan’s soul that is causing the imbalance, he leaves her in the care of another angel and focuses on himself.
Two months of agonizing meditation and discussion with his brothers leaves him feeling himself again. It also leaves him with a feeling of despair growing in him; while he had been attending to his duties on Earth, Michael and Raphael had heard the pleas from a soul in the pit. As they rescued the worthy soul, their caged brother had spat invectives and abuse at them.
Gabriel’s heart broke to hear about it, but the words had very obviously struck Michael the wrong way. It was all his older brother seemed to think about at these days.
The fifth month saw Gabriel wearing his Laufey’s form again, and visit another family in another town, about yet another child. While he had been announcing the births of kins and prophets for as long as there had been Man, the sheer number of them of late was… unusual. He knew more about his Father’s plans than the majority of the Host, but he didn’t know everything. Not that that hindered the obviousness that something big was going to be going down, considering just how many he had announced in the last year.
He spent the sixth and seventh months getting very very VERY drunk. There had been a Pagan woman, one of the Greco-Romans if he recalled properly, who had been able to sense Laufey’s Pagan soul despite how deep it had been buried. Suprisingly, all that she had done was to smile conspiratorially at him before inviting him to a party on Olympus.
It was an ususual situation to be sure but there was something just so intriguing about the party. He introduces himself as Nal, and it doesn’t seem like anyone else around was able to feel Laufey. The party was unlike any other thing that he had seen before, let alone participated in. There was dancing and drinking, loving and laughing, and in this case a good bout of fighting, feuding and fucking.
The rigid form of angelic society did not leave any openings for such chaos. Everything had to be perfect, to follow some invisible and predestined path. The be able to jump away from the path was something that had been given to humans and pagans, and had been left out of the angels themselves. Over the course of his ‘pagan adventure’, Gabriel finds himself wanting nothing more than the glorious freedom and free will provided by the pagans.
He also found it terrifying.
It was a relief in the eighth month for him to be called upon to do his duty. Another woman was having a very special birth and it required his presence… his relief washed away almost as soon as it came about. The message itself was almost horrifying to behind, and suddenly not knowing his Father’s plan seems to be a blessing.
Still, Gabriel did as he had been bid, and went to deliver the good news to Mary.
The ninth and tenth months were spent watching over and guiding Mary and Joseph. If they were needed somewhere, it was his duty to make sure they got there, and to make sure that they stayed safe. News of the christ child would have spread quickly but for Gabriel’s intervention.
The eleventh month was spent whispering into the ears of kings, and turning their eyes up to the stars. In turn, the twelfth month was spent partying it up with the gods of the local pantheon. It was in that moment that he realized that he had stopped thinking of his body as a Vessel; instead he had started to consider it his own physical form.
On the 365th day after Laufey said ‘yes’, Gabriel wished for a body of his own and a life outside the confines of Heaven.
The thirteenth month began with the divinity cloaked in his Grace stirring.
alright, well. I got back from watching A Girl’s Guide to Cheating Something Borrowed, and decided to try and wash that crap out of my head. That hasn’t worked so far, so I’ll type up one of my prompts. Paved or Waiting… hmm… Paved it is!
——- prompt: TEAMMATES ——-
The worst part about moving to a new country in order to be with your lover is leaving your life and friends behind. It only gets worse when you find all your hopes and dreams shattered in the wake of infidelity, before you even manage to get yourself settled in. The loneliness is almost too much for her; she only knows two people on campus as anything more than acquaintances. One of them is, of course, the cheating ex, while the other is a man with his own classes and life to live.
She’s been at the center of a gaggle of girls for so long that she’s all but forgotten how to be on her own. She’s forgotten how to make friends that haven’t come as part of the “Serenity package”, and even how to separate herself from a woman who has been dead for thousands of years. It seems impossible to move past this.
Although she knows that she could easily call home and talk to her friends, she finds herself unwilling to do so. She hasn’t managed to find a job yet, not that she’s looking all that hard, and long distance calls are just so expensive. She can’t afford it, and calling on her communicator just to sob seems like a waste of resources.
She knows that she can always count on Brady. She’s been spending as much time as she can with him, but he’s in pre-med and she’s busy with politics. Their schedules don’t exactly line up with each other, and she finds herself spending a lot of time on her own.
“Join a club or a sport or find a hobby or something!” is Brady’s suggestion when she brings it up. And after she finishes yelling at her for using her communicator for non-senshi business, Rei fully agrees with him. She needs something to be focused on, something to get her mind off of the fact that the only reason she strived so hard to get into Stanford is the man who broke her heart.
So she starts to read the notices that are taped to bulletin boards, light poles, and on the university website. She pokes her head in on a few meetings here and there, but she just can’t seem to find anything that sparks her interest. There is no one and nothing that can pull her out of her broken heart and ease her loneliness.
She’s almost ready to give up entirely, to pack her belongings and head home because she just can’t do this anymore, when she gets the flyer for tryouts. Some enterprising soul had stuffed one under the door of every room on her floor; she takes it as a sign. Some small part of her, a wisp of the girl she’d been once upon a time, jumps excitedly at the opportunity. She doesn’t let herself dwell on anything else right up until tryouts.
It turns out that a half decade of running about on rooftops and saving the world has given her a touch of gracefulness. Growing into her full height and settling into her limbs seem to have finally rid her of the clumsiness that has plagued her for so long. It helps that the acrobatics that she learned by necessity seem to translate into gymnastics routines pretty well, too.
Before she really realizes what’s going on, Usagi is at practices and meets. Her smile is steadily growing wider and brighter with every day, and she’s putting that terrible first day behind her. Her newfound teammates may not have been the Senshi that she has relied on for so long, but they are quickly finding their way into her heart right beside them.
She is a social girl, and always has been. She needs to be surrounded by people, and they need to be happy for her to be happy and bright. The girls she meets through cheerleading, through this new adventure she’s found herself in, they give her that. In turn, she gives back everything she can, throwing herself into the team and letting them take the weight off her back.
The girls might not understand to the full extent just what left Usagi’s heart so bruised, but they understand break ups. It’s a team effort to distract her, to put her back together after the devastation left in Mamoru’s wake. To see her smile and laugh and get her life back.
Usagi always had faired better in a team than on her own.
My dad just threw a pencil and a notepad at me. He either wants me to draw or write, I’m not sure which.
So instead tumblr gets another page out of the Wrapped Up In You Verse! Which is what I finally decided on for the title of the Supernatural/Sailor Moon thing. woo
(oh hey, I got all the prompts out of the first notepad… where’s the second one??)
(…why do I keep writing prompts for Perdition is for Pagans when I’m not going to post them until Waiting for the End and Paved With Good Intentions are done?)
——- prompt: BEGINNINGS ——-
His vessel had a parasite.
Yes, he had known going into this venture that there may be a problem here and there. Forcing a bloodline to come to fruition early always caused a side effect or ten, but this was necessary. Father’s plans had been changing rapidly, and he had to scramble to put together a form that would last long enough to accomplish everything that needed to be done.
He had been half expecting the vessel to be born female, instead of the male vessels he’d worn since the days of Eden. It had been entirely expected that one or both of her parents would die soon after her birth in order to prevent him from simply waiting for another child. He had expected the weakness, the frail and delicate constitution. None of this would matter once he was wearing her, but it meant that there was a higher chance of her dying before he could get her permission.
There was nothing, however, that could have prepared him for what he found once she had been of age to be of use to him. Of all the problems and side effects that had been predicted, finding a pagan’s divinity using his vessel’s soul as a blanket had not been one of them. He wasn’t even sure how it had happened. The pagans had their own bodies, ones that had been handcrafted or born of other pagans. There was no reason for divinity to be hiding in a mortal soul in a mortal body. Especially not one that had been made for him.
He had called himself Fárbauti, introducing himself as a wandering healer who had heard tale of the weaver Laufey. She was weak and ill, but her wares were some of the highest quality in the region, and so he was not the first to come to the door and see if he could heal her in exchange for a new cloak. He had been allowed into her home, and until he had looked directly at her he had not been able to sense any of the divinity hidden within.
Once he had seen her, it was obvious. Her eyes were a luminescent blue, the only place where the divinity obviously shone, and her hair a bedraggled mess of blonde curls. She was the day to his night, tiny and frail compared to his current vessel’s height and broadness. It had felt strange to settle her back onto her bedding, pressing two massive fingers to her forehead and knocking her out before he attempted to find out just what the hell was possessing his vessel.
His Grace enveloped her, pressing in to heal the soul and brush away the divinity. Curiosity rippled through him as the divinity tried to bury deeper, but he wouldn’t allow it to escape him. Before he realized what was happening, however, the pagan divinity lashed out, raking tiny thorns across the edge of his Grace.
It hurt.
The damage done to his Grace was minimal, hardly even worthy of being called injuries. Just shallow cuts, like a cornered kitten reacting in fear; it stung just the same. Gabriel tilted his current vessel’s head, seeing only as an Archangel could see, though none of his curiosity filtered through to his vessel’s face.
Again he reached out with his Grace though this time he did not try to touch either divinity or soul. This was an examination, an attempt to find some way to separate divinity and soul from one another. On this second pass, he realized that the divinity was acting less like a parasite and more along the lines of a symbiote. The divinity had grown through rents and tears left in the soul by Father only knew what, filling in the gaps that would have otherwise destroyed the soul.
The divinity was also damaged, though not as much as the soul, given how it had regrown. He wasn’t as familiar with divinities as he was with souls, so he couldn’t say for certain what it was that had happened to it, or even how it was rebuilding itself, but it was obvious that the soul was sheltering the divinity. It should have been obvious in how he hadn’t been able to sense it until he was looking at Laufey.
The angel drew back, removing his fingers from the vessel’s body and releasing her from unconsciousness. It took the woman a few moments to draw herself out of the darkness of her own mind. A hiss of pain accompanied the opening of her eyes.
“Be still, Laufey,” his current vessel’s voice was a low deep rumble, like thunder in a dark night. He rested a palm on on her forehead, only the barest of pressure needed to keep her from rising up from her bedding.
“Fárbauti…?” her eyes were hazy and clouded with confusion. She felt… strange. There was a bone-deep wariness suffusing her that had not been there before, and she couldn’t help but wonder if this was yet another fraud who had come to her. There had been far too many men and women who had claimed that they could heal her sickness if only to be lying in the end.
As though he could hear the thoughts as they came, the stoic giant of a man bowed his head. “I am not able to heal you as you are.”
She closed her eyes, having expected litt… wait. “As I am?” the other healers had always claimed that they had some herb or stone that would be of aid, but never before had someone dared claim that she was the problem. The goal was to get something out of her for free, after all, and it would not do to anger her.
Fárbauti folded his hands in his lap. “I have a request of you, Laufey. It is not to be taken lightly.”
Ah, here it comes. He will want a blanket or a cloak or some other piece of her work before he begins. She was a bedridden woman, not a fool. “A… request.”
“Your body was created to house the power of an Archangel, Laufey daughter of Nál. Instead, something else has taken up residence in it, something that is making you ill. If you would grand me permission to wear your form, then I will purge this illness from you.”
That was nothing like what she had expected. There was shock and a thrill of greater purpose running through her, and she found thoughts stumbling over themselves. What was an archangel? What did it mean that he would wear her? She was created? By the gods? Like the gods?
“Not quite.” she startled as Fárbauti answered her very thoughts. “You are still a mortal woman, not a god. I am an Archangel; to see my natural form, your eyes would be burned from your head. To hear my voice, your ears would bleed and you would hear no more. It is because of this that we ask mortals to bear our power, our Grace, so that we may interact with this world. Your lineage was carefully chosen so that you, Laufey, would be the perfect vessel to host my power.”
She licked her suddenly dry lips. “And… of the man that you are… wearing now?”
Gesturing to his borrowed body, Fárbauti sighed. “At the very best, this form only as a few months to it. My power will begin to eat away at the body until it falls apart. Your body, however, could host me until I complete my mission and return to Heaven.”
“And this… this will heal me? Entirely?”
“It will.”
Laufey stared down at her hands. She flexed her fingers, but it was getting harder and harder to do every day. She had not been able to flex her toes in months, her legs all but useless for longer still.
She closed her eyes, and took a deep breath.
“Then… yes. I give you permission.”
Gabriel doesn’t sound like Gabriel because this is the Gabriel before he left Heaven. a+ explanation is a+
post #500 = another fic post. yay.
I’m also reconsidering how I set the fic up on the Pit, so I might make it three separate stories so I can post from each continuity as I write them. This is how I’m planning on setting it up on ao3, but there’s a series option on ao3 that I don’t think there is on ffnet.
And dammit dreamhost. Give me back my server already. I want to be able to make things unique again.
——- prompt: SIGHT ——-
The first time that Sam Winchester saw her, the only option available was to stare.
He wasn’t staring because she was particularly pretty (she was, in fact, drop dead gorgeous), but because of her hair. The roughly cut mass of wavy blonde looked to have been attacked with a marker while she was sleeping. Her whole face had that appearance, really. There were messy half-faded streaks of crimson on her forehead and cheeks, and even a bit on her lips.
Unfortunately, as much as he would have liked to keep watching her face, he only got a minute or so of the full front view before she had brushed past him, running as fast as her legs could carry her. She shouted an apology back, along with a curse and a wail of being late as she disappeared around a corner.
He wasn’t about to forget her face.
The second time that Sam Winchester saw her, she looked completely blissed out. The streaks in her hair had faded almost completely, only visible to someone who had known they were there, and there were no more marks on her face, only an expression that could best be called orgasmic. That was despite the blotchy redness and smeared make-up that made it obvious that she had been crying and crying hard.
She certainly wasn’t crying anymore, though.
No, when he came across her she was devouring a piece of strawberry shortcake in a way that reminded him all too strongly of his brother’s addiction to pie. That comparison brought up a sharp pang of memory, and he made a promise to himself to call Dean later. In the mean time, it was actually kind of hypnotizing to watch her eat. He was almost tempted to just stay and watch her eat.
Unfortunately he was due for a talk with his counselor in regards to his scholarship, which meant he really had to go now.
The third time that he saw her, he almost swallowed his tongue. For some reason or another, he hadn’t quite connected cheerleaders and university (he was going to blame that on his upbringing. And Dean for not warning him), but there she was. In a teeny tiny skirt. Showing off her legs.
Good God but they went on forever.
He wasn’t the only one who had stopped to watch her boun— practice. To have stopped to watch her practice. There were plenty of guys and girls along side him, watching the blonde amazon do her routine, so really. He shouldn’t have stood out. And he wouldn’t have if he hadn’t been a full head taller than just about everyone else who was watching.
So he can’t be blamed for flushing scarlet when her eyes met his, or for the way he’d quickly moved on.
After that heart pounding moment, he was always noticing her. Where ever he went, his eyes seemed to be drawn right to her. She was so bright and cheerful, a spot of sunlight that drew everyone to her. He was no exception.
The only problem was that he really didn’t know how to get to know her, not really. This wasn’t like a hunt; he couldn’t just slip on a new outfit and personality and become whatever it was that she wanted to see. Not if he wanted to get to know her, not if he wanted to be friends.
So he contented himself with watching her from afar. There were certainly worse sights to be entranced by.
(Though he’s positive there’s nothing better)
taking a break from working on my costumes. Wish I’d been able to afford the same type of foam as my co-conspirators, but I spent that money on buying pretty fabrics so… yeah. And then I was bleeding and now I am typing.
——- prompt: RED ——-
“Hey Rabbit! You still alive in there?”
Tyson Brady was starting to get worried. It had been a long couple days, and despite having managed to convince Usagi to stick out at least the first semester of classes, the number of times she’d broken down so far was starting to get into the double digits. He could understand her distress; catching your fiancé with another woman was only a good thing if you had been looking for an excuse to break off the relationship. Usagi, on the other hand, had invested the whole of herself into this relationship and the betrayal was destroying her.
He should know; they’d been introduced in 5th grade, when their teachers had arranged a pen pal exchange. She had sent him an absolutely terrible letter in half learned English, and the one he had sent back had been in equally terrible katakana. Their friendship had just seemed to fall into place at that point. They had gone from letters sent by teachers, to letters sent by family, to emails and phone calls. Over time, she had taught him Japanese, and he had taught her English.
Despite their long friendship, he still didn’t quite know what to expect from this break up. Usagi was a sweet girl, slightly naive, and kind of a flake. She also loved with her whole heart. He still wasn’t entirely clear on the details of how she and Mamoru had gotten together, even with years of detail on every other aspect of their relationship to call upon. It had been her first real experience with love, he knew, and the first one always hurt the worst.
“Y-yeah… I’m. I’m okay…” Usagi’s voice was still saturated with heartbreak. Tyson just wanted to wrap her up in a hug and let her cry her heart out again. That wasn’t how their relationship worked, however. The distance between them was comfortable, a result of years spent living an ocean a part. Phone calls and letters had been their only contact for so long that even lending a shoulder to cry on felt awkward and stilted.
So instead he had commandeered an out of the way washroom so that Usagi could put herself back together; get rid of tear tracks, redo her make up, comb her hair… that sort of thing. The only problem was that they’d taken over the washroom twenty minutes earlier, and the water had long since stopped running. Whatever she was doing in there, it was taking a hell of a long time.
“You’re going to have to come out of their sometime, Miss Rabbit.”
The nickname was old and familiar, and in deference to her desire to ‘not be Usagi anymore’ he hadn’t called her by anything else since. On the long list of things he wasn’t sure of was whether or not that was the best of ideas he’d had, but it had at least garnered a smile out of her. It had been small, true, but it was a smile nonetheless.
“I know.” the words were said petulantly, but the sound of the door opening stopped the comment that was on the tip of his tongue. Or maybe it hadn’t been the door opening so much as it had been the sight he’d been greeted with when he turned to look.
She had cut her hair off. Oh, not all of it, but with the length of her hair it was rather impressive. The edges were cut ragged and rough, the uneven strands crimping and curling in ways that their previous weight had stopped. Taken out of her perpetual pigtails the hair now only barely brushed her shoulders. If that hadn’t been enough of a shock, the hair around her face had been colored with red sharpie marker.
The ink had stained her cheeks and her fingers, despite obvious attempts to wash it off, and she still held the marker in one clenched and trembling fist. The most important detail of the image she presented, however, was the hesitant and hopeful smile.
“I think I should go red.”
Brady couldn’t help but smile back and laugh with relief.