#amenza

Author's Note: Not me finishing this during my abnormal psychology class🤭

Synopsis: The night - and you and Izogie's relationship - is far from over.

Contains: DownTerrible!Bottom!Reader x Vengeful!Top!Izogie x Petty!Top!Amenza, face riding, tribbing, threesome tings, and more messiness.

Inspo: Uhhh, just felt chaotic ig lol

Taglist: @masterajoy314 @mybonafidefeelings @blacksapphhicmaddonna @shanas-baby @iinkonde

Izogie x Nanisca 

Izogie didn’t die before the end battle - at least not all the way. She has come back home to the palace, but Nanisca knows she isn’t all there. Nanisca knows everything - almost. There’s a lot of things both of them haven’t admitted, but one seems to be taking a step towards vulnerability while one seems to be fighting some internal conflicts. Izogie is still a badass, though. 

Mother/Daughter vibes underneath Commander/Lieutenant pairing. There’s a lot of respect, but there’s also a lot of love.

content warnings: mentions of wounds/scars, enslavement/enslavers, war/battle, weapons, body parts/physical training. (no fluff or smut stuff yet but it’s only part one lmaooo).

Fon to English Translations (these may not be perfect, if anybody has any feedback pls lmk!!!): 

Dŏwe - Lieutenant

Vǐ ce - My Child

Word Count: 1,935

I love Nanisca, she’s never in any fics so I wanted to start out with her and her relationship to Izogie being developed. There’s more to come with her and Amenza, and Nawi as well.

______________________________________________________________

Her eyes were dead set on the pair of strong legs in front of her as she pulled herself up off the ground, again and again - a look of total focus for something far beyond what was before her. Her hands made room for themselves in the hot, burnt orange soil. Her toes bent in, somehow equally as strong as the rest of her body, hinging with her every push.

The sun was just starting to go down, everyone else had finished training that day but the warrior and Nanisca had made a deal to do some extra work to get her back where she was before her injuries. She was lieutenant after all, and despite what happened - she was Agojie. They both were, and neither knew when something else might happen or when new trainees would come. She needed to be ready, they both agreed - despite Nanisca’s slight apprehension. 

“170…30 more.” Nanisca said, rolling the point of a dulled dagger on her finger tip, balancing the blade’s end between her other pointer. She knew it was practically nothing for the warrior to complete reps like this, she knew of the long nights and early mornings she spent training in what she thought was secret. Nanisca believed herself to know everything that went on in the palace and within the Agojie. But especially of what her successor was up too. She once did, maybe. But now, she wasn’t so sure. She only wish she knew more of what went on in the woman’s mind, the place where no one else could see. After so much turmoil, Nanisca felt the need to be more sure now than ever of what was taking place in her orbit.

“10 more. Alternate them.” Nanisca coached as she walked behind the woman to check her form from the back, noticing small cuts on her ankles and up her calves. She made note of this, filing it away with the rest of the knowledge she held about what was always going on around her, even if not in front of her. She looked at the woman’s arms and shoulders. Her form was perfect, as always. 

As the warrior swiftly - precisely - switched arms each rep, it was as if she was holding her breathe. Her core was tight and engaged, her legs never shook like any of the trainees and even some of the other Agojie (to which they tried to hide.). She was always precise, always on time, and always solid.

“You may stop now.” Nanisca said, bringing her mind back to focus. 

The warrior brought her knees forward and sat down, arms stretching behind her. She caught her breath, in quiet but big gulps.

“Tell me, Izogie, what have you been doing while I am not watching?”

The warrior hiccuped and choked on the air she was attempting to restore rhythm to for a split second, recovering quickly.

She didn’t answer, silence sat between them aside from the sounds of Izogie’s breath returning to center.

“You have nothing to say, Dŏwe?” Nanisca paused, waiting to see if the warrior would respond. She wanted the truth, as she had always gotten from Izogie without question. She felt a familiar pang of frustration quickly dispel into consideration and concern as she looked at the warriors hand shake as she tried to hide it behind her thigh. She had never seen her shake before. 

“Vǐ ce?” She asked again, softer. She had always felt softened about Izogie but Nanisca had buried her softness a long time ago. Until now. Until Nawi. She internally cursed herself for missing so much that she could’ve had. So much with Izogie, so much with the other Agojie, so much with Amenza - her truest friend, her truest something in so much nothingness she had endured. She often spent time yearning for who she once was, knowing she would have to grieve a girl that never got to exist. She didn’t want that for anybody else, Agojie or not. Responsibility or not. 

Izogie’s eyes traced her arms and the scars that lay on them as she looked for the words to say, the worry of her secret trainings being known to the Miganon sitting in the forefront of her mind. Something else, sitting behind it. She eased a bit as Nanisca called her that word - child. She had not been a child in so long. 

“I… I have been doing some extra trainings, alone. I apologize for keeping it a secret, Miganon. I have felt like I need to improve since the last battle with the Oyo and the slavers. I almost didn’t make it out. I was shot.. twice. And thought dead until Amenza… well you know. What’s worse is I nearly gave up before that.. I nearly let someone else decide my fate. If not for Nawi then…”

Her brow furrowed as she mindlessly brought her palm to one of her newer scars. If you can even call it a scar - it had not yet healed fully. A sometimes dull, sometimes sharp pain sat within the woman’s core and chest, every day.

In the absence of a response from Nanisca, Izogie continued, trying to pull herself together. She cannot slip, not here, not now.

“Then I would be dead. Or worse.”

“I do not want to fail Dahomey ever again. I do not want to fail you, ever again…” She said, meaning it wholly. “An- Anyway, I apologize Miganon. I accept any puni-”.

“I do not train sorry women. I do not welcome home failures.” Nanisca started. Izogie’s eyes darted to the other woman’s eyes, taken aback by the returning sternness, and shock at what she was hearing. 

“You did not die. And when you were taken, you still sought to follow my orders to slit your throat, even in the midst of your own life hanging in the balance. Yes?” She nodded at the warrior, asking more than telling. 

“You fought until the very end, and even further. You would have died anything but a failure. But…I am glad you did not slit your throat. I am glad you are home, here with us. With me…” Nanisca looked deep into her eyes, in a way only a mother could - even if she didn’t know she was a mother, really. Then she looked away.

“But I am not glad that since you have returned, you have not been the honest woman I know you to be. You think I do not know what happens in this palace? That I do not know you are more tired in the mornings than normal? That I do not see the repairs made to the training equipment, or see the blood left behind in the bath? I hear your pain at night when you do actually try to sleep, and I know you do not frequent the healers the way you should be. I hear you telling half truths, Izogie.” Nanisca set her dagger down and walked over to face the warrior fully. 

“I am asking about the cuts on your legs, the scent on your clothes when you greet me. The look in your eyes during the day. It is not just grief that you feel. Am I wrong?”

The warrior was speechless, a new feeling for her. Her head dropped low, examining the soil with her eyes as they welled with hot tears. One fell to the ground between her legs, making the orange soil turn muddy. She fought them with everything she had in her, which didn’t feel like much anymore.

Nanisca knelt next to her, grabbing her face with her fingers softly wiping away a tear or two, and lifting her chin. 

She was softer than Izogie remembered her being. She knew she had Nawi to thank, although she probably wouldn’t.

“Do not bow your head to me like I am nothing more than a commander. In battle, you would hand me the same sword that would keep you alive in less than a thought. You think I would not offer you even my ear?” She seared into Izogie’s eyes with a passion she had not felt with anyone but Nawi. She felt like she was looking at her child, as much as she was looking at her sister and her comrade. 

The warrior sat, silenced by her own mind. She knew what the Miganon was talking about. Her time spent outside the palace lately. Izogie has always been one to do her own thing, but she had never been out so frequently. She had never been secretive with Nanisca, even as a trainee. She always told the truth, loudly and openly for all to see and hear. She had always kept her sworn loyalty, without question and without force. Izogie loved being Agojie, and she respected all the rules that came along with being in the palace. She respected Nanisca, and she loved her. Quietly, underneath her reverence for the Woman King. But this was something she knew even the Miganon could not advocate for, or maybe even understand. She knew it had to be a secret.

She closed her eyes and opened her mouth trying to say something. Anything. But the sharpness had returned and she groaned instead.

Nanisca let her face go and squeezed her shoulders tightly as she stood. 

“I will not ask again today. I trust in you the way I trust in myself. I know my own mind so I know yours, too. Do you trust me, Izogie?”

The warrior stood, arm bent over her core.

“I do, Miganon. Without question.”

Nanisca nodded slowly, knowing the warrior meant what she said but also knowing that she was going to keep whatever was going on from her for now. She knew the woman well, and well enough to recognize the look in her eye was as genuine as it was privately holding a secret. She wiped her hands on her tunic to rid of the dust from the ground and prepared to leave, sheathing her dagger. She could forgive one secret, for now, off the respect that this woman died for her daughter and fought to defend for her own life many times before. 

“I do not approve of your trainings.” She said in a voice that suggested she was back to business.

“But I will never take your body from you the way the slavers tried to, the way the Oyo did to me. You will figure it out. I give you two orders, lieutenant. Let yourself heal.”

Izogie nodded her head as she stood at attention. 

“I will be listening when you are ready to tell me the truth.”

She turned to walk away as Izogie stood there, in pain and drained from her training and the workings of her own mind.

“Miganon!” She called after the woman.

“What is the second order?” She asked, eager to please her commander again, not knowing she never stopped.

The Miganon turned only her head for a moment, before turning it back forward as she continued to walk.

“Never bow your head again, not in this palace and not anywhere else.”

Izogie stood there, holding her breath again as Nanisca entered back into the palace walls and about the rest of her business. Once she was out of sight, she sighed deeply and relaxed her arms and shoulders. She wasn’t sure what to make of what just happened but she felt comforted and at the same time, all the more conflicted than before. 

She grabbed her weapons and headed to her chambers to change.

______________________________________________________________

Spolier-free:

First of all, I loved this movie! And so did the other two people I went with; the three of us literally talked about how we all wanted to see it again after it was over

Great fight choreography, loved getting to see a bunch of women go absolutely feral in battle without them being sexualized or still having to “look pretty.” There’s a lot of close-ups during fights of the Agojie killing people and it’s not pretty, it’s brutal and it’s fucking awesome (the movie is PG-13 though so it’s not overtly gory, which I personally appreciated)

THE ACTING???? On point the ENTIRE movie. Give Viola Davis, Thuso Mbedu, and Lashana Lynch ALL the awards RIGHT NOW. Viola Davis embodied Nanisca perfectly and was equally impressive in the epic battle scenes and in the emotionally vulnerable scenes. I’ve seen several articles talk about how this was a career performance from her, and she herself called the film her magnum opus. Lashana Lynch stole every single scene she was in. Izogie my beloved. I also enjoyed John Boyega’s portrayal of King Ghezo and Sheila Atim as Amenza

Also I literally had to do a triple take when I found out Thuso Mbedu, who plays 19 year old Nawi, is THIRTY ONE?????? SHE’S ONLY THREE YEARS YOUNGER THAN LASHANA LYNCH???? SHE’S THE SAME AGE AS SHEILA ATIM???? In other pictures she looks older but I am actually 19 and I stg when I found that out, I felt old

And still speaking of the actors, really cool how the majority of, if not all the Black actors in this movie were dark skinned, particularly the women. I read that when the movie was first being pitched, some studios wanted to cast light-skinned and well-known actresses, but the producers refused

The beginning felt a little rough to me in terms of pacing, but the movie hits its stride around the mid-point or so. And trust me, when it starts working, it works.

The script was also a bit weak sometimes, but I thought the performances made up for it

I’ve seen some people online saying the movie glorifies the slave trade or glorifies Dahomey while brushing the kingdom’s involvement in the slave trade to the side, which really confuses me because...it doesn’t? The movie opens with a text-scrolling intro à la Star Wars that literally mentions the slave trade, and several characters in the movie talk about it as well. Nanisca and King Ghezo have a conversation about how Dahomey profits from the slave trade, and how Ghezo’s brother sold their people—including his and Ghezo’s own mother—as slaves for profit. And then it gets more overt when some Portuguese men land at the port city, one of them specifically to buy slaves, and when we go into the city and LITERALLY SEE slaves being chained up, kept in cages, and brought onto the block to be sold. The movie both shows and tells you how awful the slave trade is, and how the people in the movie are impacted by it. At one point, some of the women are captured and prepped to be judged and sold and the entire process is presented as brutal and degrading. I’m seriously convinced that the people who say the movie is “glorifying slavery” have never seen it

Wanted to end this section on a good note lol so I’ll once again say IZOGIE MY BELOVED!!!!! Favorite character without a doubt, also gave off fruity vibes but y’all let me know if you picked up on that too lol

Overall, I definitely recommend this movie and I will 100% rewatch it in the future. Also this movie BETTER win some fucking Oscars or else 😤😤

Spoiler thoughts below!!

Izogie x Nanisca

Izogie didn't die before the end battle - at least not all the way. She has come back home to the palace, but Nanisca knows she isn't all there. Nanisca knows everything - almost. There's a lot of things both of them haven't admitted, but one seems to be taking a step towards vulnerability while one seems to be fighting some internal conflicts. Izogie is still a badass, though.

Mother/Daughter vibes underneath Commander/Lieutenant pairing. There's a lot of respect, but there's also a lot of love.

content warnings: mentions of wounds/scars, enslavement/enslavers, war/battle, weapons, body parts/physical training. (no fluff or smut stuff yet but it's only part one lmaooo).

Fon to English Translations (these may not be perfect, if anybody has any feedback pls lmk!!!):

Dŏwe - Lieutenant

Vǐ ce - My Child

Word Count: 1,935

I love Nanisca, she's never in any fics so I wanted to start out with her and her relationship to Izogie being developed. There's more to come with her and Amenza, and Nawi as well.

______________________________________________________________

Her eyes were dead set on the pair of strong legs in front of her as she pulled herself up off the ground, again and again - a look of total focus for something far beyond what was before her. Her hands made room for themselves in the hot, burnt orange soil. Her toes bent in, somehow equally as strong as the rest of her body, hinging with her every push.

The sun was just starting to go down, everyone else had finished training that day but the warrior and Nanisca had made a deal to do some extra work to get her back where she was before her injuries. She was lieutenant after all, and despite what happened - she was Agojie. They both were, and neither knew when something else might happen or when new trainees would come. She needed to be ready, they both agreed - despite Nanisca's slight apprehension.

"170...30 more." Nanisca said, rolling the point of a dulled dagger on her finger tip, balancing the blade's end between her other pointer. She knew it was practically nothing for the warrior to complete reps like this, she knew of the long nights and early mornings she spent training in what she thought was secret. Nanisca believed herself to know everything that went on in the palace and within the Agojie. But especially of what her successor was up too. She once did, maybe. But now, she wasn't so sure. She only wish she knew more of what went on in the woman's mind, the place where no one else could see. After so much turmoil, Nanisca felt the need to be more sure now than ever of what was taking place in her orbit.

"10 more. Alternate them." Nanisca coached as she walked behind the woman to check her form from the back, noticing small cuts on her ankles and up her calves. She made note of this, filing it away with the rest of the knowledge she held about what was always going on around her, even if not in front of her. She looked at the woman's arms and shoulders. Her form was perfect, as always.

As the warrior swiftly - precisely - switched arms each rep, it was as if she was holding her breathe. Her core was tight and engaged, her legs never shook like any of the trainees and even some of the other Agojie (to which they tried to hide.). She was always precise, always on time, and always solid.

"You may stop now." Nanisca said, bringing her mind back to focus.

The warrior brought her knees forward and sat down, arms stretching behind her. She caught her breath, in quiet but big gulps.

"Tell me, Izogie, what have you been doing while I am not watching?"

The warrior hiccuped and choked on the air she was attempting to restore rhythm to for a split second, recovering quickly.

She didn't answer, silence sat between them aside from the sounds of Izogie's breath returning to center.

"You have nothing to say, Dŏwe?" Nanisca paused, waiting to see if the warrior would respond. She wanted the truth, as she had always gotten from Izogie without question. She felt a familiar pang of frustration quickly dispel into consideration and concern as she looked at the warriors hand shake as she tried to hide it behind her thigh. She had never seen her shake before.

"Vǐ ce?" She asked again, softer. She had always felt softened about Izogie but Nanisca had buried her softness a long time ago. Until now. Until Nawi. She internally cursed herself for missing so much that she could've had. So much with Izogie, so much with the other Agojie, so much with Amenza - her truest friend, her truest something in so much nothingness she had endured. She often spent time yearning for who she once was, knowing she would have to grieve a girl that never got to exist. She didn't want that for anybody else, Agojie or not. Responsibility or not.

Izogie's eyes traced her arms and the scars that lay on them as she looked for the words to say, the worry of her secret trainings being known to the Miganon sitting in the forefront of her mind. Something else, sitting behind it. She eased a bit as Nanisca called her that word - child. She had not been a child in so long.

"I... I have been doing some extra trainings, alone. I apologize for keeping it a secret, Miganon. I have felt like I need to improve since the last battle with the Oyo and the slavers. I almost didn't make it out. I was shot.. twice. And thought dead until Amenza... well you know. What's worse is I nearly gave up before that.. I nearly let someone else decide my fate. If not for Nawi then..."

Her brow furrowed as she mindlessly brought her palm to one of her newer scars. If you can even call it a scar - it had not yet healed fully. A sometimes dull, sometimes sharp pain sat within the woman's core and chest, every day.

In the absence of a response from Nanisca, Izogie continued, trying to pull herself together. She cannot slip, not here, not now.

"Then I would be dead. Or worse."

"I do not want to fail Dahomey ever again. I do not want to fail you, ever again..." She said, meaning it wholly. "An- Anyway, I apologize Miganon. I accept any puni-".

"I do not train sorry women. I do not welcome home failures." Nanisca started. Izogie's eyes darted to the other woman's eyes, taken aback by the returning sternness, and shock at what she was hearing.

"You did not die. And when you were taken, you still sought to follow my orders to slit your throat, even in the midst of your own life hanging in the balance. Yes?" She nodded at the warrior, asking more than telling.

"You fought until the very end, and even further. You would have died anything but a failure. But...I am glad you did not slit your throat. I am glad you are home, here with us. With me..." Nanisca looked deep into her eyes, in a way only a mother could - even if she didn't know she was a mother, really. Then she looked away.

"But I am not glad that since you have returned, you have not been the honest woman I know you to be. You think I do not know what happens in this palace? That I do not know you are more tired in the mornings than normal? That I do not see the repairs made to the training equipment, or see the blood left behind in the bath? I hear your pain at night when you do actually try to sleep, and I know you do not frequent the healers the way you should be. I hear you telling half truths, Izogie." Nanisca set her dagger down and walked over to face the warrior fully.

"I am asking about the cuts on your legs, the scent on your clothes when you greet me. The look in your eyes during the day. It is not just grief that you feel. Am I wrong?"

The warrior was speechless, a new feeling for her. Her head dropped low, examining the soil with her eyes as they welled with hot tears. One fell to the ground between her legs, making the orange soil turn muddy. She fought them with everything she had in her, which didn't feel like much anymore.

Nanisca knelt next to her, grabbing her face with her fingers softly wiping away a tear or two, and lifting her chin.

She was softer than Izogie remembered her being. She knew she had Nawi to thank, although she probably wouldn't.

"Do not bow your head to me like I am nothing more than a commander. In battle, you would hand me the same sword that would keep you alive in less than a thought. You think I would not offer you even my ear?" She seared into Izogie's eyes with a passion she had not felt with anyone but Nawi. She felt like she was looking at her child, as much as she was looking at her sister and her comrade.

The warrior sat, silenced by her own mind. She knew what the Miganon was talking about. Her time spent outside the palace lately. Izogie has always been one to do her own thing, but she had never been out so frequently. She had never been secretive with Nanisca, even as a trainee. She always told the truth, loudly and openly for all to see and hear. She had always kept her sworn loyalty, without question and without force. Izogie loved being Agojie, and she respected all the rules that came along with being in the palace. She respected Nanisca, and she loved her. Quietly, underneath her reverence for the Woman King. But this was something she knew even the Miganon could not advocate for, or maybe even understand. She knew it had to be a secret.

She closed her eyes and opened her mouth trying to say something. Anything. But the sharpness had returned and she groaned instead.

Nanisca let her face go and squeezed her shoulders tightly as she stood.

"I will not ask again today. I trust in you the way I trust in myself. I know my own mind so I know yours, too. Do you trust me, Izogie?"

The warrior stood, arm bent over her core.

"I do, Miganon. Without question."

Nanisca nodded slowly, knowing the warrior meant what she said but also knowing that she was going to keep whatever was going on from her for now. She knew the woman well, and well enough to recognize the look in her eye was as genuine as it was privately holding a secret. She wiped her hands on her tunic to rid of the dust from the ground and prepared to leave, sheathing her dagger. She could forgive one secret, for now, off the respect that this woman died for her daughter and fought to defend for her own life many times before.

"I do not approve of your trainings." She said in a voice that suggested she was back to business.

"But I will never take your body from you the way the slavers tried to, the way the Oyo did to me. You will figure it out. I give you two orders, lieutenant. Let yourself heal."

Izogie nodded her head as she stood at attention.

"I will be listening when you are ready to tell me the truth."

She turned to walk away as Izogie stood there, in pain and drained from her training and the workings of her own mind.

"Miganon!" She called after the woman.

"What is the second order?" She asked, eager to please her commander again, not knowing she never stopped.

The Miganon turned only her head for a moment, before turning it back forward as she continued to walk.

"Never bow your head again, not in this palace and not anywhere else."

Izogie stood there, holding her breath again as Nanisca entered back into the palace walls and about the rest of her business. Once she was out of sight, she sighed deeply and relaxed her arms and shoulders. She wasn't sure what to make of what just happened but she felt comforted and at the same time, all the more conflicted than before.

She grabbed her weapons and headed to her chambers to change.

______________________________________________________________

Their size makes them arrogant and slow.  Like their guns.  But you don’t need a gun to use gunpowder, you just need a spark.

I’ve seen it applauded heavily for the action and performances, and I’m going to throw my applause in there as well because everybody did a phenomenal job.  Downright powerful (To use the term thrown around a lot in the advertising) delivery by every single actor on screen.  I can’t even point to one person and say “Except for that guy, who totally phoned it in".

Viola Davis was a powerhouse, and Lashana Lynch was fantastic, and John Boyega had real presence.  I went in knowing that they’d be fantastic.  Sheila Atim is the one who surprised me, because I don’t think I’ve seen her in anything before but she grabbed me.

The cinematography and choreography was also top-notch, everything on screen looked gorgeous.  The colors, the design, it really popped.

The story was...pretty good.  It hit a few of the standard beats in coming-of-age and Boot Camp stories, but handled them well.  I was initially vehemently opposed to the apparent love story that seemed to be introduced between Nawi and Malik, but I like how it ultimately didn’t lead to a romance between them.  It was two people “falling in like” before going their separate ways, instead of “falling in love”.

My biggest complaint about the story is the revealed relationship between Nawi and Nansica.  I’ll be honest, I wish they had completely excised that entire plotline.  But even though I find it ridiculous (And I also think that it undermines Nansica’s actions in the last act), this is only a problem, not any sort of overall ruination for the entire story.

I’ve seen that there’s a lot of controversy regarding the historical liberties they took with the real-life kingdom of Dahomey, and I find myself very much in two minds about them.  On the one hand, these criticism are completely accurate, but on the other hand how many Great Historical Epics made the exact same changes to American and European history?  Why do those Classics get a pass, but not this one?  On the other-other hand, "they started it” has never been a compelling argument and continuing the practice just encourages them to do it more.  On the other-other-other hand, neither the kingdom of Dahomey or the Agojie currently exist or wield any power, so their glorification does not actively support their current actions.