LaDs Men with their Foils
AN: gotta love foils ;) I would a 100% die of emotional constipation if an entire kingdom fell because of me.
Pairing: LaDS boys x gn reader
Ingredients: 55% angst, 45% conflict
My Fav: Zanye and Sylus.
Context: Foils, in literature, are opposing characters to protagonist. In this case, reader represents an opposing ideology to that of respective li. Foils are used to highlight the characteristics of the protagonist.
Xavier:
He looks at your hands, hiding the flowers behind your back. Your eyes linger on the far wall. Anywhere but him.
You wonât give them to him anymore.
Not after Jeremiah let it slip. That Xavier doesnât like strong fragrances. That the smell of roses and gardenias is too much. That lavender makes him feel boxed in.
For years, youâve decorated your shared apartment with flowers. You planted them with him in spring. Cut them for the kitchen. Pressed petals into letters. Youâve never known a version of home that didnât bloom.
But now, you know.
And you didnât hear it from him.
Xavier doesnât speak as you pass him by. Doesnât reach for your wrist, or offer some soft contradiction. He just watches, frozen in the quiet realization that you wonât fight him on this. Not this time.
You place the bouquet down in the sink. Turn away without a word.
And that is the last time you bring flowers home.
You donât complain. You donât name the ache. But you also donât try to fill the space with something else. You stop lingering near the flower stalls on your way home. You stop humming when you pass lavender fields.
Instead, you bring him other things. Books. Dishes he likes. An old album you found from a market stall.
You still tell him your stories. Still share the corners of your mind, your memories, your moods. But somethingâs changed.
Your voice is quieter. Lighter in some ways, heavier in others. You donât wait for him to respond the way you used to. You still offer him your presence, but no longer your everything.
You have started keeping small pieces of yourself. To save him the burden of returning the favor of vulnerability.
And for that, Xavier is grateful. And afraid. Because he knows what he is.
A closed door. A still room. A man so careful not to be a burden that he became a stranger in his own home. He has pushed you away before any cruel fate ever could.
He knows all of you. Your favorite scents, your fears, the way your voice shifts when you're tired. But you only know the version of him that stays quiet. That nods. That lets you give everything without ever asking for anything in return.
He has kept you apart.
And you have noticed. But still, you are kind. You do not leave. You only stop looking for a gesture of reciprocation.
And somehow, that hurts worse.
Rafayel:
You never accept his love.
Not the paintings he leaves at your door. Not the carved offerings of their names...the ones he couldnât save. Not the trembling hands, not the apologies he no longer knows how to shape into words.
You, who once burned bright with laughter and life, now wear silence like armor.
At every turn, you choose your duty. Your penance. A deathless life among the dead.
You became the Reaper. Not out of vengeance. Not out of power. But to pay the price he should have paid.
You chose to carry the weight of his sin, because he chose you over his people. Because he loved you more than the lives that depended on him. And now you make him pay for it every day.
Not with anger. With absence.
With eyes that refuse to meet his. With the soft death of distance.
He knows you cannot forgive him. Not after what was lost. Not after the smoke and blood.
But gods, he wishes you would at least look at him.
He knows what you think of yourself. That you are no longer worthy. That you are shadow, not soul.
But he still sees it...the heartache beneath your grief. The person he gave up a kingdom for.
You, in your robes of black. You, with your hands stained from centuries of guiding souls beyond. You, who never once looked back.
He cannot stop loving you. Even now. Even when he knows he is a monument to your guilt.
Even when he kneels beneath your judgment, not as a penitent, but as a man who still believes in what you were.
In denying him, you have denied yourself.
He knows it.
You know it.
And maybe that is why you cannot bear to see him. Because if you did, you would see not the god who fellâŚbut the reflection of everything you once were.
Zayne:
You stood in the pouring rain, just beneath his window, as the cops dragged you from the hospital grounds.
Your guitar was still clutched in your hands, your fingers white-knuckled around the neck as you struggled against the grip of security.
No one sang at hospitals. No one brought an electric guitar to places where the fragile and dying tried to rest.
But you did.
Because you were reckless. Irrevocably impulsive. Like wildfire roaring through a forest that had never known flame.
Zayne had evaded you, slipped through your fingers like steam. So you sought him. Loudly. Rawly. With music and desperation and the weight of things unsaid.
He hears it halfway down the stairs. Your voice rising above the storm, hoarse and cracking, dragging its way up the hospitalâs stone walls.
His heart lurches. How hard had he pushed you for it to come to this?
He knows your pain. Everyone does. You never hid it. You didnât cage it in polite silence or whisper it behind closed doors. You bled it into your lyrics, into your voice, until even strangers ached when you sang.
Wildfires seldom whispered. They devoured.
He shouldnât have left you in silence. Gods, he shouldnât have let it get this far.
There would be cameras, wouldnât there? Phones aimed through fogged-up windshields, recording the singer sobbing in the rain. Another scandal waiting to be spun. Headlines eager to tarnish your name, twist your grief into something performative.
He stumbles on the last step, heart hammering as his shoes hit the pavement.
Youâre still there, soaked to the skin, tears mixing with rain, strumming your pain into the air like a siren song no one could ignore.
And all Zayne can think is that he needed to get to you. He needed to pull you away. Needed to take the pain out of your voice...needed to take the heartbreak out of your songs.
Sylus:
Youâre passed out again on another workbook. Cheek pressed to the mangled mess of number 8 practice. Clearly, the student had stuck to the elite technique of combining two circles and hoping for the best.
Sylus stands in the doorway a moment longer than usual. Then he walks over and picks you up.
Youâre heavier than you look when asleep. Warm, soft, your arms limp around the pencil still in your grasp. You murmur something as your head slumps against his chest.
âNo... Brandon, put your giraffe in the cubby,â you breathe.
A preschool teacher. That hadnât been what Sylus expected.
A hunter, maybe. A soldier. Someone like him. Isnât that what the broken ones do? Build sharpness out of the pieces. Get strong. Get distant. Never be hurt again.
But you hadnât.
You didnât hide behind force. Didnât chase strength like a weapon. You stood in the sun with both feet planted in a world that had tried to burn you down, and taught children how to hold crayons and be kind to each other.
It had surprised him. And then it had made something in him ache.
Because he remembers what it was like to want things that soft. To believe in them. He doesnât, not really. Not anymore.
But you do. And gods, that does something to him.
You curl slightly as he lays you down, pulling the blanket around your shoulders like instinct. Sylus stays kneeling there a second longer than he means to.
Your face still carries exhaustion, but not bitterness. The lines are soft. You smile in your sleep. Smile, even now.
Youâve seen what heâs seen. Youâve walked through fire. And still, somehow, you came out of it gentle.
It makes his chest tighten. Like guilt. Like grief. Like a strange kind of awe. And somewhere under it all, a dangerous urge, to shield you from everything, even the things youâve already survived.
To build you a world where you can keep being this kind. Even if he doesnât believe in it for himself.
He brushes a piece of paper from your pillow. One of the kids had drawn you. Stick arms. Your name spelled wrong. Sylus folds it, quietly. Slips it into the cover of the workbook. Then he turns out the light.
Tonight he finds himself immeasurably weary.
Caleb:
You hear him before you see him. Boots crunching over broken gravel.
You donât look up.
âI thought I told you not to leave the inner perimeter,â Caleb says, low and sharp.
You keep your gaze fixed on the sky, where smoke still curls toward the clouds. âAnd I thought youâd stopped ordering civilians around.â
âYouâre not just a civilian. Youâre...â He cuts himself off.
Youâre still wearing your flak vest. Itâs torn at the hem, ash-smudged. The word PRESS across your chest is faded from too many washes.
âYou were five clicks past the safety zone.â
âI know where I was.â You donât raise your voice. Donât need to. Youâve filed dispatches in blast zones worse than this. Youâve sat with mothers cradling children who didnât make it. Youâve written down their words because no one else would.
âI made the call,â you say, not unkindly. âIt was mine to make.â
Caleb steps forward. His shadow stretches over your legs. His helmetâs still under his arm, dirt smudged across his temple.
âYou couldâve died.â
âSo could you.â
He exhales, frustrated. âThatâs different.â
You finally look at him. âHow?â you ask.
âIâm trained for this,â he says. âYouâre not. Iâmââ
âExpendable?â you finish for him. âThat what they call colonels now?â
âIf I go down, the mission continues.â He tries reasoning.
âAnd if I go down, the truth doesnât.â That stops him. You sit up straighter. Not challenging, just clear. âNo one else hereâs going to ask the soldier on stretcher five what it felt like when the medevac didnât come,â you say.
He says nothing.
âAnd I canât do that from a bunker,â you add. âJust like you canât lead from a command tent.â You let your recorder rest, light still blinking. âI know youâd die for me,â you say. âThatâs never been the problem.â Your voice is quiet now. Careful. War makes people weary of loud.
âI just donât want a love I have to grieve.â
He looks away like it hurts. Like it physically hurts.
You keep going. âIf being with me makes you want to throw yourself into every explosion first, then maybe you donât want me. Maybe you want a cause. Something worth protecting. Something worth dying for.â
He turns sharply. âThatâs not fair.â
âNo,â you say. âBut itâs true.â You pick up your notebook. Wipe soot off the edge. âI wonât ask you to stop being a soldier, Caleb. But I wonât be your reason to die.â
He watches you stand.
âI want to be your reason to come back.â
And then you leave. Leave him standing alone. You refused to be a martyr's cause.














