CW | TW: Gore, violence, body horror, trauma discussion/exploration (for coping IC and general character study), all tagged to the best of my ability. Please read rules before following.

@embersrevived​  @tenebris-auguratricis​

"Have you come to laugh at me in my miserable state?" - (@embersrevived, djinn!verse, hope it's all right to send in this more ancient meme haha ^^") 

“Suppose I can’t say I’ve known a wounded creature that doesn’t bite-” though strange a creature of this origin would bite nonetheless; or, so the stories of old would have one believe. ‘Myths twisted by man’, Griffon insists, perched besides V where neither of them make any movement forward, or else. ‘You just can’t trust those much, V; Look where that book of yours landed yo-’ The bird squawks nosily, having looked over to the man and his more-than-disapproving glare. Chirping, in lieu, and ruffling feathers as though he weren’t just murmuring trash-talk....

“….Riiight.” Though, the blank look on Nero’s face betrays plenty of how little in the conversation is truly grasped. Perhaps, indeed, starting over is in everybody’s best interests. “Okay, sure–hit me again. Take it from the top.”

“I did not mean to infer anything unsubstantial,” though rambling is wont to be. Essentially understood by the rambler, somehow seeing through the thick of it all towards the clarity beyond it. An understanding that is loose and lost, for a moment, as V takes some few deeper breaths to even out the frustration. Of course Nero wouldn’t catch it, between shoptalk speech and an answer even V cannot drum up. He has not taught Nero this. Not yet, at least.

@marksofwoe​ asked: ‘ death is one of the senses ’ || IDR THE MEME LMAO

“For those of us that never die, perhaps. There are all too many deaths that have overcome my senses, even in the void of the ones I used to have. Death became indeed its very own sense, by virtue. And you, that lived out your earliest days as a thing dying, would understand that better than anyone. How likened we are, and how different…” And how beautiful they have long thought the idea; how long it has been since finding themselves in someone else after all, and how quaint to find it here, of all places. As it often does in V’s company, a strange joy stirs in Ophir’s chest, fills them all the way to the whiskey colour of their wandering eyes as they look the other up and down. Pallor and ink-whorls and spring eyes and all–with his lips full of smiles as they are with talk of death, laughably at odds, and laugh Ophir does as they lean their cheek into one gloved hand, quietly amused.

“I have been mortal and some part of me is mortal yet…” Words not their own, but words V might recognise. Certainly, the habit of speaking someone else’s words at least will be.

“That small and mortal part of us is the sense of death. Is that what you mean?”

“A shame to me that you have; though... for your position, I could not fathom a life in which you wouldn’t. Had I been pureblood, I would not doubt for a moment it would be an entirely shared fate to know it.” And especially of one’s years, stretching over far past stars -- as V imagines -- there seems no end with history’s violence which would ensure this. The books and tomes and variant documentation is one thing. To have been there... Still, a smile cannot be denied. A little bit of solace in the notion of kinship, but nonetheless dour in that they wear it at all. The thought is luring towards many a roads but, the beginning of that quote does steer him back, almost giddily, smiling broader where his face had dipped in the crook of his arm.

@marksofwoe​ asked: ❛  i  was  eager  to  prove  i  was  good  enough .  ❜ || THE BAD GUYS

            A thought both expected and unexpected coming from someone quite like V; a soul who at the best of times presents himself as quiet, put together, and very almost furtive. Perhaps battle has loosened his tongue, or their growing and unlikely camaraderie, or the quaintness of momentary peace found sitting on the sun-warm rooftops while the dust settles down below. Awash in the burn of afternoon sun, V seems more phantom than man–and perhaps that’s just how he feels.

                In his own way, perhaps Raiden could understand.

                “To yourself? Or to somebody else?” Is the answer rasped out into heat, distantly curious as his gaze drifts from the pensive look on V’s face to the street stretching out below. Dante, Nero, squabbling in the midst of their boisterous laughter. Raiden laughs, too, for one short breath.

                “Maybe a few someones, huh…”

                 A pause, filled all with summer wind and bright afternoon sun glinting off the metal of Raiden’s armour as he shifts to outstretch on the tiles beneath. “You could always ask them what they want from you. Better than firing in the dark, trying to prove something they may or may not need proving in the first place.”

V figured it would require some clever cat-nip.

That’s a joke, of course; one that is privately (indulgently) kept, though it nonetheless rumbles that deep voice quite happily.

“I haven’t yet figured out if it is pride or shame that prevents honest quizzing -- or is your fortunate guessing a matter of already-well-thought basis from an outsider’s observation?” A wide smile that insists on staying, “No, no. I am not certain if you have an interesting cocktail of a family or not, but mine is more often leaning to the assurance of nothing at all, if asked, and embarrassed if given to a round of the unexpected. But I am certain you’ve seen the endearing way they show that embarrassment.” What else can be expected, though, when just action is not customary. His own personal fault, V realizes - however much like his mirth, that too remains private for the time being.

a comprehensive list of scenarios

stormbrought asked:

 INSOMNIA

INSOMNIA :  for one muse to find the other still awake at 3am.

“What’s the matter, they didn’t install a sleep mode?” Of course it is a joke, though the sympathetic expression worn by V softens it almost towards pity. Pity... you would think after everything they have put this man through in removing most of his body, he would get to choose when and how to sleep, and how well. Science can only come so far, Viktor supposes... there is yet room for wishmakers. Still, the expression remains. Evens out the edges on V’s tone once he himself is comfortably sat down with the other. A drink in hand. Specifically tea, specifically Misha’s recipe. “Can’t have it all though, right? Lucky or unluckily, I often cannot sleep neither. The night seems to be the preferred time for every little wrong to expand. Some design. What maker would make that executive decision I wonder....” small talk won’t cure it, but it won’t make it any worse, either. V only stirs the mug, watching the steam rise more livelier than either of them. Taking a sip to soothe something that got caught years ago but, just won’t budge out. It helps, though. A small act always does.