#post-death

Day 5: Take Me Home, Country Road (Fanart)

Prompts Filled: Blue, Death, Stars

Triple the Yondu!

This is fanart for @write-like-an-american fic Take Me Home, Country Road (TW for Implied Suicide) in which Yondu meets Lady Death, who grants him one question before reaping his soul.

From Write’s wonderful fic:

“Most mortals wore a thousand faces. They donned a new one for each emotion that flitted across the squishy wet sacks of their brains. Yondu had surprisingly few. His wobbly blue form, projected from his own self-image, glitched between a trio of states.

The first was a pirate, considerably taller, broader, and more swashbuckly than Udonta had been in life. His prosthetic rose high above his scar-trellised scalp.

The second – smaller, older, with a weathered and wearied expression – had shattered crystal wedged in his skull. Molten quartz stuck to the creases on his forehead.

The last thing he remembers is the sweltering heat, steam clouding his already fading vision and choking his lungs. He remembers accepting his death, knowing that he had it coming. Someone as unlucky as him was bound to end up dead eventually.

They were right about you.

It’s a sudden, unwelcoming thought, but with it comes the rest. With it comes the constant rejection. The rejection from his family, of his happiness, of everything. Hope’s Peak was his only solace, the thing that made him happy. Hope’s Peak brought him another chance to beat the odds he was spited for. Because of Hope’s Peak, he made friends.

Then why did it end up this way?

He’s brought out of his thoughts by the deep, searing sting of his skin. Looking down to glance at his arm, only to see peeling and blistering that stained it a grotesque-looking red. It wasn’t like this when he gave up, and he begins to wonder how long he was in there before he was found... The thought of it is sickening.

Looking around, he realizes that he’s still in the sauna. The steam is nowhere to be seen, and it seems that it’s been turned off. How much time has passed? It’s an irrelevant question, so he drops it before he even considers the answer. More importantly, it seems things have been fixed. The doorknob is back in its place, with the net most likely placed back where it was before. 

It seemed like his murder never happened. Maybe, by now, he’s already been forgotten. For someone like him, maybe that’s for the best. Would someone who was cursed, destined to succumb to a terrible fate from the beginning, be worth remembering?

He then remembers that conversation when he feels a dull aching on the side of his head. He remembers falling, as well as the blurred sight of pale, yet vibrant cyan hair. He remembers that he is the one that caused his death, yet part of him yearns to deny it. There’s a tightening in his chest and an ache in his heart as the memories settle. How could Wataru do this? He wasn’t capable of murder. He was a good person, wasn’t he? That’s why Wataru was the one that he...

His thought process is, once again, interrupted. However, this time it’s by the sound of approaching footsteps. Looking up once the one approaching him is in sight -- Goro Akechi, the one who killed Noah not too long ago -- he keeps a calm expression despite how utterly distraught he feels.

What are your beliefs on an Afterlife?

He let himself be embraced, though he didn’t reciprocate, simply standing there for Castiel to hug. He had been worried, a little, at first that his brother had other intentions - after all Dean stabbed him when he was tricking him into believing they would have a truce. A breath he didn’t need got stuck in his nose as he waited for it to pass.

“I fare as well as one can.”

He nodded slowly. He wasn’t in the best of shape and the scars were healing even more slowly than he’d imagine, his wings were still those of a fallen angel, but... he was alive. For all that it was worth. Gadreel wasn’t yet certain it was something good, but if God needed him to atone for even more sins, well... he didn’t have much of a choice, did he?

“How fare you? You seem...”

godless liberals drink coffee; take pictures by pop art installations

What time was it? The black surroundings said somewhere near twilight. His mind said it didn’t matter. Nothing really mattered anymore, did it?

Sitting next to the building he’d been thrown beside by his inability to stay stable, Gage wondered. Why wasn’t he dying? Why-

Trying to think about anything caused what felt like a surge of energy to spike from him and left the Cyber-elf hacking and trembling. 

Fazing back into Cyberspace was a non option. Of course, it probably would have been better for him just to go back to rest his corrupt form; he was far too confused and spooked to even think about it.

He couldn’t see, he couldn’t speak, he couldn’t remember anything and all he felt was flames eating him away. For the first time since he emerged out of that dark hole he woke up in, he cried. Astounded for but a moment by his own ability, Gage reached up to wipe the simulated tears away again and again. They wouldn’t stop. He couldn’t stop it.