A World built from Words

@immortal-rain-secret-santa

I got to make a gift for @sytacus!! Jay asked for literally anything as long as F*lk wasn’t involved, so I decided to write something based in the household’s beloved modmeme universe.

Happy holidays, and I hope you enjoy!!

IT’S FINALLY HERE. MY GREATEST AND STRANGEST FANDOM PROJECT YET.

A big thank you to @sytacus​ for not only allowing to nick and corrupt their modern au but for also doing a quick beta read of this. Also my thanks go out to the memebers of the IR discord for their overwhelming support and allowing me to mine them for ideas. This is for you guys.

Now, without further ado, I present Calvaria Labs: Part One.

(Second ficlet prize for @junecsea; a crossover of Howl’s Moving Castle and Immortal Rain. 

I’d just like to apologize real fast for how disgustingly late this is; it got lost in my folders and my rl chaos. Hopefully you find it worth the wait;;)

Once upon a time, a star fell from the glittering heavens above.

Perhaps it slipped, too tired to continue on. Perhaps it lept, all too eager to end. Perhaps it was the whim of fate long denied,

One way or another, it fell.

It fell to a place, hidden in the mountains, a place of mirror lakes and bright flowers that swayed in the soft breeze.

There was a white washed cottage, overgrown with ivy. Home to orphans, hidden away from the war that threatened to tear the world in two. A pale-haired boy was one.

That night, he had sat by a lake, watching the horizon that glowed red.

The star fell. And the boy caught it.

In a different world, a different story, a boy ate a fallen star, and it, in turn, took his heart.

But this isn’t that story.

In this one, a pale-haired boy catches a dying star. He holds it close, sheltering it’s dying light from the cruel, cruel world.

He doesn’t know the star is all too aware of what pain feels like.

Unknowingly, the boy breathed new life into the celestial spark; he had not asked for anything, yet he gave so much. He found a bucket and filled it with embers for the star to sleep in. He brought the star flowers, little white crowns dusted with gold. When the star burned them up, he came with hands full of sparkling glass chips.

The star wondered at the kindness, but did nothing.

The war ended, and the horizon was allowed to be blue. The boy’s eyes turned less and less to the star, and more and more to the world he could now call home. He looked to a little girl, with dark hair, and dreamt of a life with her as well. His love spreading to encompass both the star and the girl.

The star burned at the supposed slight.

In another tale, the house still stands, quietly existing by the hundreds of ponds. But not in this one.

In this story, the house burns from the rage of a star reborn.

The star left the pale-haired boy - no, no longer a boy. He was something else - standing in front of the rubble. It burned the skin over his heart with it’s flaming hands, and whispered into his ear with a desert dry breath. It wanted to make him despair, making him hate.

And yet. The boy still loved the world, and the star as well.

So the star ran.

Year passed, as is their way. The pale-haired boy was now a pale-haired man, wandering the world in search of a star that had burned him. Stories grew, of a man with a world-worn violin and a hand-shaped scar on his chest. They said he knew how to live forever. They said he had taken up residence in a castle that no one could find, because it was magic, and moved on its own.

In a town on a canyon cliff, a girl heard the stories.And she wondered at the idea before bowing her head back to her work.

She really should have paid a bit more attention to the story. Because it quickly found her.

In another story, she might have gotten cursed by a witch. She might have searched for answers because she had no other choice.

But that’s not this story.

Here, she willingly chases the man in the castle, the man with scar on his chest and love in his heart. She carries a weapon that is no more hers than the violin is his.

An odd pair they make: an immortal man and his little grim reaper.

They will meet a girl with stars in her eyes, a woman with an air of insanity, a doctor obsessed with the oddities of the world. Maybe they pick up a cat in a bandana along the way too. Friends and enemies and those who won’t let the story define their role.

Perhaps one day they will find the star. Perhaps they will catch it, hold it close, whisper that living may be painful, but that there is so much more to life then that.

Perhaps the star will hear. Perhaps it will believe. Perhaps it will find that it's become hopelessly human. Human like the two of them.

Stars are fated to go out eventually anyway.

.

.

.

But how does the story end? How does it end, when there is no curse to break, no spell to lift, no evil to defeat?

Perhaps it simply...

(First ficlet prize for @junecsea)

The boy stared up at the clocktower, head tilted as he examined it. The town called it a historical site, the home of someone infamous whose name had been lost to the mists of time. He would call it… strange. Built from warm red-tinted stone, it showed no sign of it’s age as it leaned out over the canyon the town was built by. The door was well polished with one oil or another, the leaves of the potted plant propping it open swaying it in the stiff breeze. In the distance, the sound of cars, the shapeless murmur of people’s voices. Far above, he could hear the gears of the clock ticking, ticking away as steadily as it had for years.

A paw crept out of the blue bag slung across his back. It batted at the boy’s hair, and he started. Sighing, he turned from the building, pulled the bag from his back, and squatted down as he opened it. The bright eyes of the kitten he had picked up twinkled up at him from it’s black and white face. It mewed, and batted at his fingers.

“Stop that.” the boy scolded, “You just ate. You can wait til we get back for more.”

The cat blinked up at him, before leaping up out of the bag and darting up the stairs and through the door, disappearing into the depths of the clocktower.

The boy leaped up, bag left forgotten as he chased desperately after the animal. “Wait, come back!”

He paused as he crossed the threshold, eyes adjusting to the dimmer light. Dust motes danced in the light that poured in through the door and the windows, far above his head. The air was cool and still on his skin. Glass cases glimmered around him, filled with small trinkets and artifacts from the clock tower's history; one held only a warping violin. Faded photos hung from the walls - a man with a scared face, a young pregnant woman, a destroyed tank, wanted posters for a myriad of people, a man dressed like a priest. A mew had him tearing his eyes away from the museum to look up. Above the boy the staircase spiraled around the tower, up to the main apartment and the clock itself. And about a third of the way up, small eyes peered down at him.

The kitten mewed again, before disappearing out of sight. Sighing, the boy began climbing, his small hand barely reaching the smooth wood of the banister. He passed a scythe, old and rusting, hanging on one wall.

Up and up he climbed, around and around. Now and then, the boy would spot the kitten a few steps ahead only for it to race further upward, as if beckoning him. This way, this way, all the way to the top, the kitten seemed to say.

“At this rate I won’t be home before dinner.” The boy muttered, yet he continued upward, pulled forward by his curiousity, his need to know what the kitten seemed to seek.

The black and white cat pulled itself into the top rooms. The boy could hear it padding around. He halted as it was joined by a new sound.

Somewhere above him, someone giggled.

The boy gripped the banister until his knuckles went white. For a moment, two, he considered leaving the kitten. He considered racing back down the stairs and out, rather than face whoever was in the room above.

But he didn’t.

He had taken in the kitten, after all. He belonged to the boy now. He couldn’t abandon that responsibility just because there was an… unknown… person…. In the same room….

The boy took a step down. The stair creaked.

The voice of a girl, soft and hesitant. “Hello? Is somebody there?” the boy on the stairs heard a rustling, but no footsteps approached the staircase. Gritting his teeth, he straightened up and marched up into the room before his bravery left him.

It was golden. Sunlight streamed in through the large windows, shining on the large gears that turned above his head. The tick of the clock was louder here, yet somehow softer, more comforting. The boy looked about in wonder at the sheer beauty in the space’s simplicity.

“Oh hello. Is this your kitty?” The boy turned and looked down into the grinning face of a small girl, her blonde hair fluttering about her soft features. In her arms perched his kitten, purring loudly.

“Yes.” the boy replied. He reached out for the animal, but the girl showed no sign of letting go.

“Why don’t you come sit with us?” She didn’t wait for him to reply before she turned and walked to a door, open to the outside air. “Come on! The view’s real pretty.”

The boy reluctantly followed, glancing yearningly at the staircase back down. Passing through the doorway, he stopped short, his breath leaving his body with a great whoosh.

Before him was the city, spreading to the distant horizon. It glittered with lights, and was washed with orange from the setting sun. Dramatic shadows played along the canyon below, bringing everything into sharp relief.

The boy sighed softly. “Wow.”

“Not seen you before.” Turning, the boy spotted the rickety table tucked into the corner of the balcony. On one sat the girl, her short legs swinging back and forth, the cat held tightly in her lap. On the other side was a boy, about his age. His shoulders were stooped, as if he felt uneasy in his tall, lanky body, green eyes peering out from under strawberry blonde bangs.

“I just moved here.”

“Oh.” the boy and girl glanced at each other, an entire conversation conveyed in that single glance. The dark-haired boy felt jealousy twist in his belly, and it took effort to shake it off.

The girl looked away first, turning back to him. “What’s your name?”

“Yuca. you?”

“I’m Machika, he’s Rain.” Yuca heard her words, but his mind was suddenly zooming a million miles, images flashing past as he latched on the names. He watched a different life play out, so many years ago. The pain, the betrayal, the power, the loneliness, the insanity, the largesse, the desire, the love, the love, the over pouring love he had once held for a single spark of humanity. The love which had grown to include another spark, so similar and yet so, so different. The need to find them again consuming his every thought. Distantly, he could feel a tear roll down his cheek.

Stepping up to the table, he carefully cupped their faces, looking down into the tear streaked faces that gazed up at him, recognition shining through their wet smiles.

They remembered too.

He smiled.

(giveaway prize for @ashesrising; requested Immortal Rain OT3 + ‘cozy’)

Water, crystal blue and shimmering in the sunlight, stretched away from the island as far as they could see. It lapped over their feet as they sat together on the sun-warmed sand.

was it real? Was this a dream? They didn’t care

Machika leaned against Rain’s side, drowsy but smiling, white dress scrunched up about her knees. Her fingers were lazily entwined with Yuca’s, swinging slowly back and forth across the golden sand, leaving grooves like comet tails in their wake.

there’s a photo tucked in her pocket, of a man with a scarred face and a tiny young woman, worn from handling and being folded over and over and over. Both smile peacefully

Rain smiled softly as he gazed out at the distant waves, breaking on the reef far from the shore. Tiny white flowers encircled his head, trembling lightly in the softest breeze. He was crowned with stars, king for a precious moment.

his chest is unscarred - the cross left to rust in a bay a million miles away

Yuca lay on his side, drinking in the sight of the other two, silhouetted against the cloudless sky and endless sea. He ignored the sand dusting his skin and the icy cooler digging into his back.

they are his world - he doesn’t tell them that often enough

They had left the fishing poles up on the rocks, unused and unneeded. Of course they had caught a fish or two. They’d let them swim free.

no life deserved to be tethered by their hands

The imaginary world wrapped them in quiet sounds - waves in the distance, the breeze through the trees, the faraway call of birds. Their breathing had slowly synchronized, three individuals becoming one remarkable soul. A universe trapped in human forms.

they fell in love with each other’s heartbeats

They fell asleep together.

Perhaps when they woke up, they’d go swimming. Or they’d race down the beach, with no destination but the horizon. Or they’d go into the forest, eat fruit until their fingers were sticky from juice. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

the dream would end when they wanted it to

For now, they slumbered on.

(ficlet warm-up)

Rain’s life started with the arrival of a little girl at the orphanage, tears in her eyes and a violin case held between trembling fingers. He falls in love so quickly - with her smile, her voice, her inner fire. Where she ran, he followed - the loyal knight entranced by the carefree princess who sees no need for him.

He learned too late how much she did need him, the knight in slightly dented armor.

Rain’s life bloomed with the coming of a boy, stern and quiet, wrapped up in the robes of a priest. The boy smiles, and Rain truly feels the sun shine for the first time. He falls in love again, slowly, with each word he learns to sound out from the book labeled B-I-B-L-E.

He realized too late that the smile was a lie, wrapped in pretty words.

Rain’s life halts with a missile, soaring like a shooting star, beautiful yet so destructive. He watches, disconnected. A funeral, a coffin far too small. Freya, too old to be a girl but too young to be a woman, dressed for a new life. Yuca, surrounded by uniformed men with cold eyes. A van, driving away with the children he had watched grow. He waves.

At some point, there are white flowers. He coughs blood up onto them.

Rain’s life speeds up when he sees the tv. They called the child an angel. All he sees is a little girl he’d cared for, destroyed beyond recognition. He races north, uncertain of what he’d find. What he finds is Freya, alive. Then there’s Yuca. And for a shining moment, he thinks they can go back, back to the three of them in the tiny church on the hill.

Yuca’s gun blasts that dream into a million pieces.

Rain’s life ends when Yuca shoot himself, yet his body is still living. He travels, he plays.  Days blur into weeks, months, years.His feet touch every inch of the world. Yet in the end, all he can do is wait. Wait for the day carved on his chest.

Not even a man with a grin wide as the horizon can make him live again.

For 600 years, he wasn’t living. He existed. He already knew he had lost the bet, made in that frozen waste. And yet…

There’s a girl, carrying a scythe that’s familiar. She thinks herself made of iron, but 600 years has taught him how fragile the human life actually is. Where he goes, she follows. His shadow, his friend.

His grim reaper.

He wishes she would stop. She would live a full life, he reasons, if she left him. Or he left her.

He never goes through with either.

Rain’s on a prison ship. He’s stopped counting how often that happens. But this time she’s with him. And once again, he flees from those who want the secrets Yuca has forced onto his body. But this time, she’s with him.

There’s a shot. The girl falls.

He doesn’t think before he jumps after, after the girl he had come to need. That his cursed hearts had come to love.

He jumps, and his life begins again, surrounded by pure white snow.

They wait together. For Yuca.

For the final installation of this collection, I present an excerpt of Soaring’s Gate. As SG is a WIP, the writing may not be perfect and is subject to change.

(Part three of the Soaring’s Gate collection requested by @junecsea)

SOARING’S GATE: AUs

@lyssaire and I are weak when it comes to AU’s. Especially about our own story. And we have absolutely no self control. So we do just as much for these stories as we do for the main version.

Cafe au: the Gate is a popular cafe in a small Scotland town, run by Sileas and Wren. Up until the Starbucks opens up across the road. Too bad the barista doesn’t get the memo that he’s the Enemy. And a shut in genius is involved. (I am currently writing this)

Ice skating au: Sileas is an up and coming solo skater, while wren and Drake are couple skaters that supposedly hate each other. Spoiler: they never have. ( @lyssaire is in control of this one)

Mermaid au: Mikhael moved to Soaring, a small seaside town after a fight with his father. To his surprise, not all of the population live on land. ( Mainly done as a stress relief since it’s so fluffy)

Mafia au: after the death of one of the world’s biggest bosses died, a shadowy replacement known as the King Recrowned appears. He gathers the best of the best, and rules the world with a sharp smile and a handgun. ( Our all out favorite at the moment. Also being written.)

And the last image is not so much an au but a what-if where Mikhael gets sick and dies a few years after the events of SG. Basically all the angst.