Hiiii!Late answer, but I had to regroup my ideas on this, because Iād totally forgotten the epoc.So, originally, I was of two mind in whether to place the story during theĀ Sack of Rome (1527); or one of the sieges lead by Barbarossa during the Franco-Ottoman alliance (1540s) - quietĀ possibly the siege of Reggio Calabria, at that.Ā Ā Then I thought something waaaaaaaaaay older would work better; namely, the Romanās conquest of Britain ināuh, 60-70 AD? I think? With Jay as a Roman and Tim as Celt. Which then lead me to wanting Jay to be a Viking and Tim a guy born in Russia or Constantinople in the early 1000-1100 centuries?, I even went briefly with Spanish Jay and Inca Tim during the Spanish conquest, but UGH. SO MANY CHOICES.ANYWAY.I think we can imagine this being either the British/Roman or Viking scenario.Ā More under the cut
Jason is a soldier. His army is conquering, laying siege, destroying, pillagingā¦ thereās lots of violence around Jay, and heās just. so. tired. Heās in a hopeless headspace. He feels angry, but his bursts of anger are quick to come and quick to go, plunging him back into despair soon after. Heās like a berserker during battles, fighting tooth and nail to protect himself and others around him, but he doesnāt enjoy the acts of violence themselves, the feeling of the blood, the sense of gutting unease he feels watching the life drain from a personās eyes.He channels his loneliness and desperation with his sword, and has a name to himself as a incredible warrior, but heās just a furious and quick to violence when he sees someone being mistreated. And he sees a lot of those people.His army - his guys - his troops - not his friends, ācause he doesnāt have any of those left, all lost in this senseless war ā¦ they are the ones in the wrong. They are cruel and ruthless, and while he always intervenes when other soldiers take things too far, one man on his own is not enough to stop an army, and ultimately, he doesnāt consider himself a good guy. Basically, he thinks that, in order to be a āgood guyā he ought to die to protect the innocents, but he doesnāt WANT to die. PLUS, he thinks dying would also be the wrong choice, in the sense that, if heās dead, he wouldnāt even be able to save the few he manages to save on the wayā¦ but he HATES himself for this logic. His mind quickly goes back to point one - āIf I were a good person, Iād be willing to lay down my life, Iād be DEAD alreadyā - and the vicious circle starts again, and again, and again.The one day, as the Roman army marches through - and basically reduces to ashes - a village, he sees some soldiers taunting and molesting a guy not much younger than Jay himself. I think Tim might be either a Celtic druid, whoās mouthing off to the soldiers while protecting their sacred groove/an artefact; or heās one of the men Boudica led into revolt (same thing if we go with Spanish conqueror or Viking warrior Jayā¦ Timād be the minute-looking, fierce-eyed, smart-mouthed guy protecting something small but devastatingly important to his people)EITHER WAY.Timās mouthing off.To the soldiers.Several of them.Heās fighting like a wild cat, fighting tooth and nail in the literal sense of the word, and Jason is taken aback so utterly, heās actually snapped out of the rage-induced haze seeing this kind of scenes causes him, and heās lucid and totally in control when he steps between the soldiers and Tim, and growls silent threats until, somehow, he acquires Tim as his slave/spoil of war).Tim is forced to go with Jason as his army keeps marching on. Sleeping next to him (manhandled and cuddled like a giant teddy bear, but much safer than heād be sleeping out of Jasonās reach).In the following weeks, Tim becomes attached to Jason, and Jason to him. Tim can actually snap Jason out of his rages with just a whispered word or a caress. Once, Tim gets the chance to hide a knife on his person as they settle to sleep. During the night, Tim rolls over, drapes himself over Jason, then slowly raises himself on his knees, the knife held high over his headā¦ and pauses. Unable to kill this infuriating man who is his captor, but also his only companion, whoās so good, while he should be all bad, whoās so tortured and desperate and beautiful.At this point, Jason reveals he was awake all along and whispers to Tim to go on and do it, to kill him and run. He all but BEGS, murmuring in a distant voice about the monster he is, how heās not enough, never enough, but Tim justā¦ flings the knife away and lays back against Jasonās chest and furiously whispers at him to keep living, if he feels so sorry, keep living as his punishment, and to let Tim watch that suffering as a sort of payment - of revenge - for all that heās been forced to endure.Itās a string of lies, and both know it, because at this point theyāre foolishly in love with each other, too deep to let go, but itās a nice wall to hide behind. Timās not renouncing his revenge, but exacting it. And Jasonās not using the easy way out of his predicament.They run away soon after, and fight back against the Roman/Spanish/vikings. They help reconstructing villages and save the helpless andā¦ undoubtedly die young, and not even side-by-side, but they get a few months/years of happiness together and in love.
