#semper writes

Post Bremen - Clegan - The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep. (Robert Frost, Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening)

Bucky does not crumble after Bremen. Or, he does not crumble any more after London and a scarlet red phone booth whose window panes will close in on him in his nightmares for decades to come. 

John allows himself a moment when Red’s voice tells him Gale went down swinging. He allows himself to punch his knuckles crimson against the receiver, sinking to his knees and all but tearing the buttons of his uniform shirt in an attempt at not croaking on the spot. He needs to breathe. One in, one out, Major. They talked about this. They did. He made a fucking promise. His fingers try to remember how not to tremble.

He finally manages to get to the golden cross nestled between his tags, the color a perfect match for Gale’s hair in the sun. They talked about this. They did. After he hadn’t told Buck about what an inferno it was to be in the air. In a hangar with the other man still reeking of terror, blood and shock coursing through his body after his first mission. You did not fucking tell me Bucky, you didn’t tell me he was like that, you don’t keep that from me. 

They talked about that and they talked about this. When adrenaline gave out and they sat on the cold ground, they talked, they planned contingencies and Gale asked for a promise. He gave it, as he ever will give him everything. They planned for horrors to come until those plans felt like safety and Buck could stand on his legs again, reaching his hand to haul Bucky back up with him.

On your feet, Major. We talked about this. You don’t lose it, I don’t lose it, John. We keep it the fuck together.

Oh if I’m gonna bet on anything, Buck, I’m gonna bet on us.

He stands back up, tucks everything back in.

He’s on his way.

50s/60s/70s au - Brenny main with a side of Clegan and literally everybody thrown in to the mix. It follows the main twos story throughout their deployments as UN Peacekeepers through the decades. - but it wasn't bad and it wasn't wrong. it wasn't desperate. i think it was salvation. (Leanne Betasamosake Simpson, from Islands of Decolonial Love)

They meet as UNTSO on a peacekeeping mission, it’s the end of the 40s and the beginning of the 50s. What it feels like is an evergoing clusterfuck that won’t probably see reason for the next hundred years. It’s old, ancient, the pain here. They meet, they recognize one another as it often happens between members of a tribe. Later on they’ll be able to recount what made the other think they both would be able to speak Latin.

For now it’s an ever growing tension between two sides, two wholly different birthrights. One that’s all bluster, family and warmth, the other one with suppressed guilt and body memory of famine and cold. Eventually they fuck quick and they kiss hard, mostly they talk and keep watching each other backs during patrols. 

They both feel like they’re wholly unequipped to make a real significant change here but they wear the UN blue and remind everyone that the world’s watching. It would be nice if the world gave a fuck, for once.

It’s been half a decade, they’ve met the families and they’re part of a new one that’s made up of fucked up soldiers, dogs, a single three legged cat, and more than one determined civilian to love them all to their grave and ferry all of it into lives where war is not the core of their beings. There’s talks of university, of master degrees, a construction business and even of a flight school. They both love their brothers in arms so much they wished they had the words for it.

Still, they’ve both signed up for extensions, they’re given orders and they leave, it’s ONUC now and even if neither of them has shot a single bullet in the Sinai in all these years, they feel like they both lost. Peacekeeping ain’t about that but retreat stings nonetheless.

It’s the Congo now and what they hear from the last of their brothers still touring Vietnam comes to life and death tenfold in front of them. A blue ticket doesn’t look like the end-of-all terror that it has always felt like. But it’s the last two years of their extension and they both agree they can make it. After that, that’s it. They’re getting out, no more extensions, no more mass graves and seeing their younger siblings in every child’s eyes. Just the house that’s awaiting them both back stateside. They don’t tell anyone but they’re sure their mothers will finally be able to sleep at night.

It changes all once again in their last year, the new acronym reads like a wrong radio frequency and they’re shipped to an island in the Mediterranean. One of their mothers passes away in the winter they’re eating Souvla for Christmas. It’s a telegram from John that reaches them, passing the news and reassuring both of them that they are taking care of the families, the 100th is on them like bloodhounds. 

That night they hold each other through the sharp edges of their pain and for the first time in almost fifteen years they count the days separating them from home. They feel as numerous as the stars in the dry cold sky over them when they mount up for their watch turn. Gale would tell them both that the days are much less, hold fast, they’re almost home.

Coming home is a whirlwind and yet a blanket of calmness settles on both of them. The months pass and Johnny visits his mother’s grave, Mrs. De Marco’s flowers are fresh, brought by the other widow every week. He feels his being stretching painfully to welcome all of that almost too much warmth inside him. 

The years pass and Benny gets his business degree at the same college Gale teaches at, starts the first of a successful chain of shops, his older sister opening the second and life’s as well as it can be for what Curt’s got to call ‘a bunch of war traumatized fuckos and their life traumatized halves’. Oh and the three legged cat, it’s pushing eighteen years old and currently giving Meatball’s puppies a run for their money. It’s starting to feel all too good, too nice. Johnny’s catholic senses are tingling up a storm.

That’s when Egan scares all of them shitless. Marge almost takes the door of the military hospital room off its hinges when she strides in, “John that’s not what I fucking mean when I say you’re a heart attack.” She bullies every member of the medical staff out of the way until their crooked mashed together family is all allowed in the room. Benny is busy holding Gale and Johnny together with spit or he’d kiss her on the mouth, long and hard. 

It’s Rosie that breaks the spell of them all seeing the usually so full of life man so wan, so fragile looking, “Bucky, you bite it before Chick and he’ll piss on your grave.

Bucky Egan smirks at him, shooting a look across the room to his other half in all but legal name, “Don’t count on it.” Cleven exhales, his hand almost crushing Brady’s shoulder. Johnny’s never been happier to tell Egan to shut the fuck up.

It’s the fall of 89 and a wall in Europe goes down, concrete and iron bowing down to the inevitable march of change. On the other side of the Atlantic there’s an exchange of silver, one piece of it resting on a finger and the other one hanging around a neck. They’re worried it’ll feel stupid, a farce, there are no blue tickets looming over their heads but the impulse to conceal, camouflage, protect is an ingrained survival instinct. 

It’s a blue sky day and it ends up feeling like the most momentous moment of their lives. They’ve lost friends and family in the last decade, some to time and some to the ferocity of an infection that stole them in their prime. The silver against both of their skin is warm in the night, long after the party has died down and Kenny has managed to wrangle all of the older guys inside. They stare at a clear night sky counting stars that feel so different from the ones they remember of a cold night in Cyprus. They still hold each other tight.

It’s now been over 50 years of fighting and there’s places where they can live where their existence ain’t all that wrong.

Benny’s happy to indulge Crosby’s daughter’s questions on how it used to be for queers back in the day. She’s taking a college class the name of which would have been illegal in his campus days. 

When she asked Brady what their relationship felt like during those years he hadn’t even looked up from rosing his violin’s strings, words coming easily to his lips, hefty with all their history and struggles.

Benny is walking back in their living room with steaming cups, dodging Ragù’s attempt to topple him and catches just the final part of Johnny’s answer, “but it wasn't bad and it wasn't wrong. it wasn't desperate. i think it was salvation.”

Tattoos and Flowers - pairings are there but this is more about how nonsensical dumb situations are part of everyday life and the whimsical will make for crazy funny stories to tell years later - I like nonsense; it wakes up the brain cells. (Dr. Seuss)

Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen… they needed to restock the shelves with those dumb Christmas gnomes, elves, whatever the heck they were. Marge hated them with a passion but they would infallibly sell out every holiday season. And with both Halloween and Thanksgiving out of their way, it was time for the shop to turn into a veritable winter wonderland.

Mentally calculating a reasonable discount to quickly sell the last of the Thanksgiving arrangements and still turn a profit, Marge kept on chewing off the top of her pencil, she could start with a fifteen percent until Saturday and then see what would be left for a final sale during the weekend.

“Marge,” Croz’s voice tremulously sounded through the flower shop, completely missed by his business partner. Just as she missed the raising voices coming through the wall they shared with the next shop.

Now that the last of the plumbing repairs in their back room had been done she could finally move the more frequently needed stock back up on the first floor, not having to navigate around the tarps and balancing on beams to get to their downstairs basement. 

Thankfully everything got fixed rather fast, all the back and forth from downstairs would have driven them insane during holiday season. That and the fucking noise, the particularly evil strain of the flu that forced her into complete bed rest for the last few weeks of the repairs had almost felt like a blessing. 

“Marge,” the voice a bit firmer now, a sense of urgency in it, more raised voices filtering through the walls. One of the voices suddenly fading away from the rest. 

Maybe she could get Harry to start bringing up the ordeal of Christmas stuff. Just the thought of all the metric tons of stuff they had in the basement had her tired, an early start on getting it upstairs would be good. It had been a slow day, Tatty, their delivery girl out with the early morning orders, the smell of her coffee still lingering from where she left a travel mug on the workbench in the front. 

Marjory Spencer heard her name being shouted in alarm by one rather nervous looking Harry Crosby at the same time their flower shop door opened, the bell sound announcing someone coming through.

That someone being a six foot something man wielding a purple flower arrangement with what looked murderous intent, “ARE YOU ACTUALLY TRYING TO KILL HIM?” 

The voice hadn’t finished booming against the walls of the shop, some of the sound thankfully muffled by the many plants absorbing the worst of the yelling, that the recorded voice of Nadia, one of Croz’s daughters, dutifully followed the welcome ring announcing a new customer through the door speaker, “Whoops-a-daisy, welcome to Our Baby flower shop! We’ll be with you in a buzz, in the meantime just stop and smell the roses or get your bloom on with our tunes!”

It was to the sound of a funky 70s song that a shorter man launched himself into the shop, basically crashing against the taller one, who was currently heavily panting and looking completely gobsmacked at the door speaker. If it weren’t for the fact that Croz was white as a sheet Marge would find the whole scene hilarious. As it was, she was this close to stabbing the intruder with her very sharp pruning shears.

“Bucky, I swear to god I’m gonna put a leash on you, you damn whippet! I’m sure it was a mistake, don’t go ballistic now!” 

Okay, Marge knew that voice, “Hello Rich. Mind to tell me who it is that just burst into my shop and thought that yelling at my partner would be a good idea?” She punctuated the last part of her sentence with the click of her heels as she moved to the front of the counter, eyes fixing the two men with a no bullshit stare. 

Richard Macon, engineering student and part time dog sitter for half of the neighborhood, sighed and walked further into the room, “Hi Marge, sorry about that,” an apologetic look on his face as he pointed to the other man, “This is Bucky, Gale’s boyfriend.”

Marge raised a brow, “Hello Bucky, Gale’s boyfriend,” her voice calm and collected, “wanna tell me the fuck’s your problem, son?”

Bucky stared at her with an incredulous look, barking out a cutting laugh, “My problem, Ma’am, is that your damn partner just tried murdering my boyfriend after driving him completely insane for the last two weeks with the fucking noise coming out of here.”

Oh, this guy was dead, Marge was just about to strangle him when three figures quickly jogged in front of the shop’s window and into the shop, bell ringing and Nadia’s terrible puns following through the speaker.

Gale Cleven and Benny DeMarco, owners of the neighboring tattoo parlor and generally lovely businessmen, entered the fray and made quite the picture. Both heavily tattooed, in their regular black casual attire: Benny holding a wet dark towel, Gale with eyes rimmed a painful looking red and an inhaler in his hands. And from the noise someone was shuffling at their back, hidden behind their larger figures.

Marge took a deep breath, “Now, before I completely lose it and feed you to our hydrangeas as my nana would’ve, can someone explain what’s this circus running on?”

More shuffling from behind the men, “Hi, name’s Biddick, Curt, pleasure to meet ya,” a smaller guy with a backwards baseball cap and his thick Brooklyn accent moved through the other bodies.

“So listen, I guess Croz here - hi Croz, how’s the family?- wanted to say sorry ‘bout the goddamn racket from the construction the past few weeks. See, Gale’s boot’s in the back, guessin’ that’s where most of the noise was comin’ from?” Croz nodded silently, raising his hands in an apologetic gesture.

 “Yeah, that’s what I thought. All that rumpus drove Buck here a little nuts. Kid’s real sensitive to noise, y’know? We all kinda are, to be honest, hurrah,” he mock saluted the room half filled with vets, gaining a couple of eye rolls as an answer and a shoulder shuffle from Benny that indicated it was a fair assessment.

Curt kept on, “But dear Buck particularly so, even with earplugs, he’s been wound up tight these past few weeks, which - obviously - set off John’s whole protective thing”, moving past John and, even at his severe height disadvantage, managed to shoulder check him, silently shutting down his protesting offended reaction.

“So now Bucky kinda hates you guys. Unfairly, if ya ask me,” he perused the glass candy bowl on the counter before picking one up and popping it in his mouth, loudly chewing, “and I’m sure Croz meant well sendin’ over that wicker basket filled with lavender to, what was it?” he hops up to sit next to the bowl, grabbing a card out of his pocket and flicking it open, “Oh yeah, ‘Wishing you all a more relaxing ambience than the one we put you through.’ Real sweet. Only problem? Gale here’s mad allergic to lavender. And, well… you can put two and two together.” 

The only sounds in the shop other than Curt’s chewing was Gale’s wheezing breathing.

Croz cleared his throat, “I’m so sorry. Please don’t kill me”

The growl Bucky made in response wasn’t really promising but Gale elbowed him in the solar plexus, voice still a bit wobbly, “John, stop it. I’m fine, it was a mistake.” 

“Listen to your voice! It sounds like you had gravel shoved down your throat!”

Thankfully Mrs. DeMarco didn’t raise no fool, “Biddick say something and I’ll be the one to lose my shit.”

Curt giggled, mimicking zipping his mouth shut. 

That’s when Brady walked in Our Baby, throwing a nod in Marge’s general direction, playing with the parlor’s keys in his hand, Rosie trailing behind him, “I swear to god, I can’t leave your asses for a minute. You guys want to get robbed?” 

It was all it took for the group to start bickering, Croz still apologizing to Gale profusely, John fuming and shooting daggers at the dark haired man, a hand resting on the blonde’s lower back but evidently calming by the second as his boyfriend grabbed it and brought it to rest on his hip, drawing soothing circles against it with his fingers.

Benny had started arguing with Brady, trying to get his keys back and ending up in the middle of a catch game between his own fiance and Curt, leaving poor Macon to catch Rosie up on the situation. The curly haired man nodded along as he listened, standing next to the same counter that Marge was now leaning against, head resting on one hand, elbow bent on the surface, a weirdly fascinated look on her face. Something from her Intro to Psychology class was staring at her in the face here. 

Rosie extended his hand, “Robert Rosenthal, I went to college with Brady, I co-parent this bunch along with Benny over there.” Marge shook his hand without moving her eyes from the scene unfolding in front of her, “Co-parent uh? Makes sense. So, you think I can bully them into moving my holiday stuff from the basement?” 

Rosie hummed a laugh, “Just leave Gale and Macon out of it, Benny will pitch in to cover for Gale and Brady just follows Benny and Bucky everywhere.”

Marge nodded, “What about this one?” she pointed at Curt who had resumed his rummaging in the candy bowl, leaving Benny trying to pry the keys out of Johnny’s closed fist. Rose turned, face serious, “You don’t want him doing that, trust me.”

Curt tsked at that, popping a strawberry confectionery in his mouth, “You wound me, Rosenthal, why would ya say that?”

The other man just shot him a raised eyebrow in response, “Where are the keys Benny is trying to rip Johnny’s fingers for, Curt?”

The New Yorker simply jingled the set in front of them, “So, Marge, I think you can extort more than moving some boxes around. What about a free tattoo?”

Stalag - Clegan, this has been stuck with me since I first saw the scene in the series and wondered, what if it's Gale and not John? “There's one other scenario. They force-march us out of here before the Russkies can set us free. Move us somewhere deeper in the Reich, say, Bavaria. That's leverage, all those POWs.”  “But how would they do that?”  “Like this.”

It’s the one nightmare that has Gale jolting awake screaming. None of his regular fucked up silent sweaty trembling in his sleep. No, it’s an all out panicked trashing, hands reaching in front of him to get at something he never manages to get at, an agonizing wail piercing the air as he wakes up and gulps air in his lungs without getting any of the oxygen.

John is always by his side in a matter of moments, hands on his back and around his wrists, helping him regulate himself back into his own body from a gelid wooden room five thousand miles and years in the past. 

John is not laying on the ground. A bullet hole is not gushing brown red from the side of his head. There’s no German general quietly repeating the marching order as an SS guard’s gun still smokes in the air. John is right here with him, his fingers carding through the ends of his sweaty hair. 

His voice is rough from sleep but warms him as it ever does, “Fucking Stalag?”

He had to have been running for miles, he could see nothing farther than a couple steps, not that he imagined anything would look familiar. Whatever power was at play here was making sure he was lost, not able to orient himself in any way.

John stumbled down the small decline he could feel beneath his feet, small stones protruding from the ground scratching his bare legs. He hissed through the pain, catching himself against a tree, bark smeared with the ichor seeping out of the cuts in his skin. He tried summoning again, hoping to feel the familiar warmth beneath his palm.

Nothing, he felt nothing. Persephone had no idea how this was possible, it should not be. Demeter’s son not able to feel anything from a living plant, it sounded ludicrous to his own mind and fear gripped his heart even tighter. What could be interfering with powers granted by Olympian lineage?

A crack sounded in the distance, a long screeching whistle, terrifying guttural noises that were looking for him. A lance of pain shot through his temples, they were closing in, John could feel it. He could feel it like any other prey would. His nostrils flared, trying to feed him more oxygen, trying to fight the terror telling him to freeze, telling him that everything was useless, that he was prey and he was done for. 

Persephone tried, he tried one last time, pushing sweat sodden hair away from his eyes, his usually delightfully chestnut ringlets now a mess of dark tangles and dirt. He had to try, he had to try to fight the hurt. But gods, it hurt, father, it hurt. He cursed the deep gash on his leg, burning like all seven hells, it jolted pain throughout his entire frame. Pain. Pain. Pain.

He felt whatever was hunting him, closing in from all directions. He knew he had to try, he knew he had to get away. But damn, knowing it did nothing to make it come true. There was nowhere to run to.

His pulse throbbed in his ears, deafening the sounds that could have helped him locate an escape route. John kept on trudging, following the small rocky mound he had been leaning against, moving towards what looked like an opening not far ahead. A cave? Shelter? 

He could feel nothing threatening inside. But again, he could feel nothing. His powers were silent once again as he tried calling them for help. He begged, he despaired, he leaned against the entrance and he begged. For what not even he could have told you.

Nothing answered, nothing rose, just the terrifying taste of ichor in his mouth, dripping from the wounds on his face. Pain. Pain. Pain. He should not have stopped. It hurt so damn much. His face hurt, his chest hurt and his right leg was an entire mass of pain. He risked a glance at it and that was that. So much ichor stained his shredded meat and through all that godly ichor, he could see the white bone.

Stupid John, stupid stupid John. That's what they always said of you, wasn't it? Demeter's delicate flower son. All beauty and spring. You walked on your father's path, never straying too far, lest you lost yourself.

Well, Demeter’s son lost. Himself and the fight. Drained of every drop of energy and powers, alone and hurt in the darkness. The last bit of consciousness left his body. Without any grace, the godling of spring and nature fell. He fell into the mud at the entrance of a grotto with marked stones at its entrance.

The beastly sounds only drew closer.

In the cruel and violent darkness, with no help in sight.

Still, no target seemed to be within reach, nothing was in sight but the dark bushes, Selene’s light bathing the greenery in their silver glares. And yet, a brow twitching with nervous energy, John could feel something looking at him with the same translucent glare as the moon. Someone who’s eyes manifested just a moment before their body materialized out of shadows and wisps of a spring night mist.

Well, one should be worried about the fact that every bit of defensiveness left John’s body as soon as the Master of the Underworld appeared next to a cypress tree. And yet, as natural as the breathing that came back to him, John’s frame relinquished every line of tension. The bramble enveloping his upper right torso receded to rest back into the godling’s skin, in a manner not so different from the way lynxes would sheath claws back into their paws.

Hades fixed his sight on a thorn, closing itself right under one of Persephone’s ears, the action disturbing a ringlet of brown curls that settled back as if moved by a light whiff of night air and not by a lethal spike hiding under fair skin. A sense of pride Gale did not bother to scrutinize too up close swelled into his chest, would you look at that.

John’s voice brought his attention back to the godling, a challenging expression on his face, “Others should be careful to thread so suddenly near me in dark forests.”

Gale acknowledged the words with a nod and a slow showing of teeth that very few would have dreamed, let alone dared, calling a smile, “Others definitely should,” he vaguely conceded in his low voice.

A scoffed laugh, “It is good to see you again,” an earnest tone in John’s words, “It has been on my mind, to thank you for your help.”

The Ruler of the Underworld regarded him for a moment, before moving towards the younger deity with elegant strides and passing him by, “Your offerings have been received but there was no need for their plenitude,” he knelt next to the cooling body of the dead animal, quickly picking a cherry from the bramble bushes surrounding it and making sure a soul was on its right path, “Shouldn’t you be focusing on the oncoming grain season? Farmers will need that to be plentiful.” 

Demeter’s wildest followed him, a confused expression but a mirthful smile, “Offerings?” he asked motioning for the scene in front of him, “These are not offerings to the King Below,” he was now kneeling next to the much, much older deity, “Honestly, I didn’t even realize I was doing it, I was just out walking one night,” Gale observed the other’s face up close now, you could see lines of unrest around his eyes. A slight asymmetry in the features under his right eye the only apparent trace of what he had experienced. Gale wondered if these nightly walks had been a habit before and from the faraway look in the younger’s eyes was reasonably sure hadn’t been.

“When I noticed what I’d done, I just thought you would have liked it,” John murmured, “so I kept doing it,” he picked a cherry from the same branch and slipping it between his lips, concluded “It’s a good way to practice with my powers too,  they’re coming back with some novelty in them I think.”

If the godling had been paying a bit more attention to his companion then he might have noticed the sharp intake of breath, the delicate brows raised over unbelieving eternal eyes and the way Gale’s usually marble-like countenance had a storm of emotions painted all over, much like colors on a statue. 

“Not to mention that dear old Demeter might just cover the fields from here to the Aegean out of sheer joy for my prodigal return,” he added absentmindedly, getting back on his feet and looking at the boar piglet now resting in his arms, “Still, I have a feeling us wild ones will enjoy this season.”

The immortal Master of the Underworld did not have to shake himself back up to gather back a semblance of composure, just as it did not take him several moments before realizing he and the godling had started wandering the forest. John talking, cradling and shushing the small animal when it fussed while Gale reached and waved his hands guiding souls to him and away to his realm.

If small flower beds of blossoms sprouted where the souls had laid within their original bodies, well, no one would have dared mouth a word about it, the woods shielding the godling with affection and a mercurial wind making the words exchanged between the two as incomprehensible to an outsider’s ear as the Zephyr.

It took until rose fingered dawn started showing for the two to stop, sitting on a ridge, admiring the view of Eos’ painting the sky, Nyx’s slow and elegant retreat and Apollo’s impatience.

They had walked for hours, Gale’s hood was now resting on his shoulders, dawn’s rays shining on his golden hair as his sight settled on the scene in front of him: John leaning back on his elbows, playing with the shoat, making it run after marigold blossoms he summoned with flicks of his fingers. The happy squeals brought smiles upon John's face, visibly much more relaxed then it had been when Gale had first appeared. 

It was with a regret tinged voice that he broke the silence, “I have to go now,” he paused registering John’s sorrowful face with inner, and not too closely looked upon, delight. John kept swirling marigold petals around the shoat as he spoke, “I imagine it would be pointless for one to ask when they would be seeing The Unseen One again.”

Gale chuckled despite himself, it had been happening all night, John’s words bringing unusually charmed reactions out of him. Assured by this response, John continued, “I do not mean to assume, but you know, it’s not as if I can show up out of darkness and into your realms.” 

Oh, Gale thought mischievously, Thanatos would just self implode if that were to happen.

“I’ll be back,” the words were out of his mouth before he could consciously stop himself from pronouncing them, a gorgeous smile from John was his reward, “In the meantime take care of this terror,” the small boar was now running into the hem of Gale’s robes with no trace of his earlier wariness with the greater underworld deity, “I would not care to see his flowery appearance down under.”

John regarded him with a confused look but Gale had already started walking back into the forest and with a promise laced voice bade him farewell, “Go rest, Wild of the Earth, I’ll be seeing you.” 

John feared the shivers running down his spine had absolutely no dealings with the fresh morning breeze swirling his chiton, he tilted his head back, staring at the rapidly brightening sky, and willed himself back home.

Once he had gotten to the source of it, deep in the woods, he found a dying boar. A sow, judging from the small litter - only three - still clutching at her. Blood was slowly gushing from cuts and tears on her coarse skin, the soon to be fatal one housing the broken off tip of a spear. John felt her fear, remembered it one may say, vibrating through the air. 

He wasted no time, he could not do much for the life slipping away from the animal but he could help. A luscious bush of black berries grew from seed to fruit in a matter of instants. He crushed a grasp of them in his hand. A slow murmur, an invocation to Artemis, goddess of the Hunt. 

A hunt should be just, honoring hunter and prey, this last agony could be spared. As soon as John’s lips stopped, the sow’s whining stopped as well and the animal seemed to be looking at him, the reflection of the full moon in her eyes. 

John laid a hand still dripping with berries' juice on the now silent figure, her breaths slowly fading. “You can rest now, don’t be scared.” 

As if understanding the godling’s words, she closed her eyes and the last of her living will left her. 

John caressed her mantle as the cherries bramble formed around her, encircling the soon to be cold carcass. With a glance down her body he realized he had miscounted, the litter was down to one, the other two small shoats were as frigid as mountain creeks’ water. 

With a heavy sigh he picked the one still clutching onto life and cradled the lonely piglet in his hands. 

“They are fearsome beasts you know,” a rumbling voice came from behind, “one should be careful with them.”

************************************************************************

At this pace they would have to mill the wheat a moon in advance. John smiled, it would make for easier cold months, still, it would not do good to speed the harvest by too much. For that reason he had started spreading poppies with light waves of his hands as he moved with bare feet through the fields during the small hours of the night. 

There needed to be a balance, harvest the wheat too early and kits from hares and voles would have fewer spots to be hidden. That would not do. So he had gotten to work, making sure that for every blooming primrose and wisteria, a patch of red poppies took root in the fields. Infesting the meadows, strangling the crops just enough to slow them into a more reasonable ripening. 

A crimson dotted spectacle was now staring back at him from the fields. Red blooms scattered throughout barely goldening wheat, making sure the grain would come to mature with a more balanced pace. 

John exhaled with the sunset’s air, balance. He had been appreciating it more and more. He felt something slowly settling within himself, his powers strengthening from it, maturing through hardship just as the grain with the poppies. He smiled, thinking Gale would have appreciated the simple yet effective image. 

It would surprise many, knowing that the King Below had taken to strolling above ground more and more, and yet John knew that knowledge was theirs alone. 

He’s taken to going for strolls through the small woods that dot the fields, slowly connecting back to his powers. They’ve been left a bit unsteady after what he went through. During his wandering he happens on dead creatures, nothing strange with that, nature is a constant cycle. He finds small mammals and birds, as well as tiny insects and reptiles. He used to be saddened by the views, avoiding them, now he instinctively moves towards them. 

Without realizing, he summons belladonnas and cornflowers, forget me nots and irises. They spring from the ground, all around the carcasses he stumbles upon. Those are the first sprouts he’s brought up from the grounds since the ordeal. He doesn’t really question why, he feels like he knows.

‘He would like them,’ John thinks.

It’s been almost half a fortnight since Hades has started seeing animal souls filter through Tartarus with crowns of flowers on their antlers, around their necks, adorning their paws and scales. 

When an eclipse of peacock moths flutters through with gyp’s blossoms swirling among them, Gale finally backtracks his way up. He materializes over a beautiful patch of gyp, somehow thriving near the sulfur geysers that took the moths’ lives, crowning around the small insects' dead bodies. 

Gale backtracks to some more of these shrines, each lovelier than the one before. The flowers change a bit every time but the meaning strikes clear all throughout: something alive was once here. Though it’s gone and its vestiges rot, it merely started its way back to where it came from. From the ground it came and to the ground it is now returned. I once brought it up and now down to you it comes.