oddsandends | 54th ♫ | I'm begging time to stop, just a little longer

54th ♫ | I'm begging time to stop, just a little longer

(Slightly Adjusted) Shameless Shipping Meme

There's nothing wrong with wanting to play out some cute, fluffy interaction. So break out the butterflies in the stomach, the hand holding, the love confessions, the NOTICE ME SENPAIS, and all the adorableness you can stomach - no matter if if fits your character perfectly or not. It's all about characters getting comfortable with each other while being total goobers and showing love.

It's shameless, sure, but it's fun!

Comment with your character, preferences, etc.
Reply to others.
Thread and doki until your heart can doki no more.

encouragement - You can't help crushing on this person because they boost your self-worth and make you feel like you're actually a decent person!!!

first date - It's a date! Or not. Maybe you're just at the skating rink, the intergalactic space station, or the five an dine at the same time.

badass with a crush - You're badass but you kind of want to just dote on that special person.

holding hands - Such a simple act that can make your heart pound.

acting like dorks and avoiding the questions - What it says on the tin.

impress - Hey, hey. Look at me, I'm awesome!

kiss - Happy kisses, cheek kisses, angry kisses, SHUTTING YOU UP kisses.

picnics - Get close to that special person while getting some good food.

hugs - You're so nice and soft.

denial - Feelings? No way. Let me repress those bad boys.

mean - Pull their pigtails because you like them.

unusually kind - You can't help but be really nice to the one you care for.

presents - Here, I brought you this necklace. Or - Here, I brought you the head of our enemies.

don't know how to act - I like this person?! WHAT DO I DO WHAT DO I DO OH GOD.

defending - Verbally or physically, you're standing up for your crush.

telling them - You're going to confess...if things don't keep going wrong.

proposal - You want to be with this person forever and you're going to make sure they know it!

loving smut - The smut option, full of cuteness.

family - The catchall prompt for bringing up a family together. Whether it's pregnancy, babies, adoption or four-footed and fluffy kids this is the prompt for gooey family interactions.

wildcard

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ For a heart-stopping moment, Narmaya's certain that he's forgotten her. The black swathe of cloth over his eye rebuffs her in a way that makes her chest clench unpleasantly and she can't fully read his expression. The confusion is clear but the recognition doesn't shine through quite as readily, or maybe she's too wound up to realize what it is when she sees it.

But then he says her name and she feels a wave of relief crash over her. However long it's been and for all the things that have happened since she say him off on that day... she hasn't forgotten and it seems Aran hasn't either. ]

I... I didn't expect to see you here, so out of the blue...

[ Didn't expect to see him at all, she doesn't say – but perhaps she doesn't need to, with the way it's written all over her face. She'd been searching for him without even realizing it, with so many questions to ask but now they're face to face she's at a loss for words. Where do you even begin after so many years? ]

Are you... doing well? After all that's happened?

[He takes a moment to process the question. Because how does he even answer that? There's entirely too much to unpack here, no matter what point he answers from.

So the answer here is clear.]

Ah... Yes. Fine. [Just give her a total falsehood and then immediately change the subject.] You look well.

[Which is good. He hadn't ever known, just what had happened to everyone else. But his imagination hadn't ever gone anywhere pleasant.

Of course, now he's in the position of having to make actual conversation. It isn't one of his best skills. Okay. It's fine. He can do this. Definitely.]

Would you... [Wait, shit, is that too formal?] Do you want to sit somewhere?

Oh, yes, I've been doing... well enough.

[ This is painful. It's painful, isn't it? Maybe it would've been best if she'd stayed quiet and let him melt away into the crowd. There's too much time between them now to simply pick up where they left off. Too many scars.

Which is why she looks so surprised at his offer to sit – and the implicit offer with it, of further conversation. ]

I, um– ah, are you sure? If you're travelling with your companions, the last thing I would want is you take up your time...

[ Because of course Narmaya knows of his companions. All of Adelheld does by now, it seems. ]

It's fine.

[That answer comes easily, without hesitation. There's a lot to feel awkward about here, but his companions? No, that part is simple.]

They'll find some way to entertain themselves.

[........why does he sound like a tired underpaid babysitter]

[ ... Oh, that sounds familiar enough. She's not quite comfortable enough to laugh, but a tiny smile manages to show on her face. ]

They do certainly seem boisterous enough...

[ Lulu may not be actively climbing on the bar yet but the threat somehow looms in the air unspoken, anyway. ]

Then if it's no trouble, a table somewhere quiet would be fine. I... I've been wanting to talk with you for some time, now.

Yes, they're... [how does he put this kindly] ...noisy.

[He pauses at what she says. Has she, really? It surprises him, honestly. But he nods and briefly scans the room. He finds a table that's isolated in a corner enough to give them some peace and quiet.]

Well then. Shall we?

[He doesn't wait for an answer before he starts walking, though...]

Yes, let's.

[ And off they go. It's sort of a miracle that she doesn't get lost in the crowd with how small she is, but what matters is they have their privacy now.

(She tries her best to pretend she doesn't see his companions all straining to see over the crowd and transparently eavesdrop. It's not like she'll be asking anything they don't already know.)

They settle into their seats and Narmaya suddenly wishes they had drinks, food, anything – something to occupy her hands with, so she has an excuse to delay the moment she has to begin speaking. But she really can't hold her words back any longer, however much she'd like to. ]

I'd heard so much of your... adventures? Though I supposed everyone in Adelheld has by now.

[Aran knows full well they're watching. Oh, he might be half blind and turned away, but he knows. He can feel it.]

...Right. I guess they would.

[He's been trying not to think of it. Ironic, because a long time ago, everyone knowing who he was would've been exactly what he wanted. Being something great, being remembered... it had been an impossible dream, but a dream, still.

Now it's a fact of life, but nothing how he once imagined it might be. Right now, it just feels like... an annoyance?

He's not sure what to call it.]

I don't know if adventures is the right word. I can't exactly see myself as an adventurer.

[He would've jumped on that label, when he was a kid.]

Eheh. "Exploits" didn't sound quite right. And 'heroism' sounds a bit...

[ She trails off suddenly uncomfortably aware that they're skimming close to dangerous territory. Fresh wounds. ]

Well. It's a bit of a loaded word now, I think. Not that it's your fault.

[ Silence hangs over the table again for a moment and Narmaya, for a mad instant, thinks of simply excusing herself and leaving. Maybe the answer she's looking for isn't here and it's cruel to expect Aran to provide it for her.

But even if he can't... Narmaya can't bring herself not to at least try. ]

It was so hard to believe, when the stories first started spreading. We thought it was nothing more than a silly rumor at first or someone wanting to stir up some trouble... but then the priest told us. Instead of our evening mass, he told us all the truth.

Ah. Right.

[Oh, did you hear that? That was the sudden weight of half a lifetime of guilt dropping on Aran again.

So he appreciates when she keeps talking, because he isn't entirely sure what to even say to that.]

...It must have been a shock. Hearing all of that. [...] I know that it was for me.

[Which is putting it very lightly. Shattered his worldview and everything he'd held onto for years, more like.]

If there's anything you want to know about... all of that, you can ask.

It...

[ Instead of looking at Aran, Narmaya's gaze drops to her hands, loosely clasped together atop the table. ]

It felt at first as though... something in the world had changed. Things seemed to look strange or different in a way I couldn't put my finger on. Then eventually I realized the one who had changed was me. Something was... missing.

[ Something had been taken. And there was no way of getting it back.

She swallows very hard. ]

Are you sure? I've... I've wanted so badly to ask you what happened, but it... it was so...

[ If it was hard for Narmaya, then what must it have been like for Aran? Dahlia Voliere had been a hero, yes, but she had always been a distant unreachable figure. Not a fixture of their lives, a constant presence –

Not a mother. If, indeed, she had even been that to him. Narmaya can't help but wonder now if she had. ]

I don't want to make you talk of things you'd rather not go back to.

Kind of like someone pulled the rug out from under you and you're just trying not to fall, huh?

[He's speaking from personal experience there.]

You can ask. [He says it so easily, as if she isn't right. As if these aren't things he'd rather keep dead and buried. As if he wouldn't just prefer to move on and pretend none of this ever happened, even as the whole world is left reeling.] Really.

If I can help you make sense of things, even a little, that's enough.

[ For a long, long moment, Narmaya stares him down. It's not just the eyepatch rebuffing her this time. There's something so easy about his voice and the way he says it that she finds herself truly unable to tell if he's bluffing or not. But even if he is, if she withdraws now, then she might never understand the thing she's looking for, let alone find it elsewhere.

So. She'll just go ahead and ask. ]

Did any of them ever explain why? Why... all this, all the lies. All the... things they had us do, just because we believed?

[A silence follows that question.

Why.

It's the most important question in this whole mess. The only one that matters, maybe. It'd been the one at the forefront of his mind, he knows that.

Why?]

...Because they didn't think it mattered.

[It's the heart of the matter, no matter who you're talking about. Either because they didn't care about anyone else or because they thought it would just be undone.]

How much were you told? About the truth?

[ She'd known all along the answer would be something like that, but Narmaya still draws in a soft, quick breath like she's been struck. It's one thing to know something in your heart and to then have it said so plainly to your face. It hadn't mattered. None of it and none of them had ever mattered. ]

They told us the Church was... not what it had appeared to be. It was hard to make out what he was saying because he was so heartbroken. He knew more than he told us, I think, but it hurt so much to speak of it, he could hardly bear to say more than he had.

He told us that what we had called a god had been more of a beast. A living darkness. And the heroes who saved us had been... cultivating our belief, to feed this creature. And that they now had been stopped, by all of you.

It's accurate enough. Probably all that most people will need to know. The details... they aren't going to change anything for them. Not in any meaningful way.

[Better it's kept simple. Black and white, so they condemn it more easily. It's for the best.]

...Some of them believed... really believed, that it would all be for the best, eventually. That they would make things better and everything would have been worth it.

Some did too, once, before they lost their way and darkness consumed whatever good intentions they may have had.

And then some of them, they just... didn't care. They were offered things they wanted and that was enough for them.

Surely they must've known better? Of all the people to fall for the whispers of a demon... surely not...

[ She says that, of course, but as she's slowly beginning to realize, few of the heroes had ever been the people Adelheld had thought they were. Perhaps they had been, long ago, but the truth is clear enough. By the time they reached Caleigh, their heroism was but a memory, if it had ever even existed at all. ]

What would have become of us, after it all? Of Adelheld? Would we be... unnecessary?

...Adelheld as we know it wouldn't have been around anymore.

[He might as well be honest about that. Maybe it just feels like... someone is owed the information, even if the public as a whole hadn't been told.]

They were planning to remake - redo - everything, from the ground up. Why not, when you have the power of a god? They were planning to start over and make the world as they wanted it.

Why worry about Adelheld? Why worry about its people and their lives?

All of it would be undone anyway, so it wasn't actually real.

[Aran manages to lay it out very matter-of-factly. Narmaya would be forgiven for assuming that it didn't even bother him, because his voice doesn't betray even a hint of emotion.]

Just like waking up from a dream...

[ She can barely understand it, let alone accept it. Whatever they had been promised by Caleigh, the heroes had once been citizens of Adelheld themselves, born and raised her as everyone else had been. They'd lived here their whole lives – how could it be so easy to throw that all away? ]

And if they'd had their way, none of us would have known a thing. It would've been the way things had always been, with no reason to question it.

[ And as both of them know, the Church had gotten very good at manufacturing that sort of environment as it was. ]

They say Sir Ulrich was the one holding the demon inside of him, but... what about the others? Did– all of them know it was a lie?

[ She almost asks about Dahlia directly, but can't quite bring herself to say it. ]

Yeah. They knew. They each had their reasons, but...

They knew.

[She knew.]

Sorry. I know none of this is nice to hear.

No, it... it isn't something you need to apologize for. It's just a little hard to take in.

[ She's already dreading having to explain it to the children. A few of the older children seemed to have understood that something had happened even if they didn't know what. But some of the younger children, so used to their routine had asked her why there was no prayer, no mass and Narmaya still doesn't know what sort of answer to give them. ]

How have you been handling it? I've heard it all second hand, but you had to come face to face with it. It can't have been easy.

Huh?

[He's a little stunned at the question. How has he been handling it? That's...]

Don't worry about me. It's fine. [It's not.] How I'm handling this isn't something anyone should be concerned about.

Eh?

[ And Narmaya looks equally as stunned in return. ]

If you're going to talk like that, then it's exactly what we should be concerned about! You can't just... dismiss yourself like that, Aran!

I can. And I will.

[This isn't negotiable, in his mind. It is how it is and that's that.]

After the part I played in everything, how it's all affecting me is my problem and my problem alone. No one else needs to be worrying about it, it's just a waste.

There are far better things to spend that mental energy on.

[ Narmaya isn't a fool. The change in his demeanor, compared to the bright-eyed boy she'd known all those years ago, had been clear as day. She hadn't thought much more of it – after all, she's sure that she herself is hardly the girl she was back then, either. But now she starts to realize that this isn't just something on the face of it. There's a difference, much further down than Narmaya can see. ]

Aran, I...

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