okay here is the lore for the story that @cogworkcoffin and i put together
cecil and valentine ames are a pair of brothers in a steampunk/old world-type setting with various supernatural elements. cecil is trans and transitioned after their mother died, becoming the "man of the house" to take care of his little brother (their father had left years before). cecil is 4 years older than val.
val has bpd, autism, psychosis, and obsessive tendencies. none of these diagnoses are ever personally relevant to him, they're just meta facts. but he is obsessed with his older brother to an extremely unhealthy degree, wants to marry cecil someday, and that desire turns real horny the second puberty hits him like a truck.
cecil forged his own legal documents to be legally recognized as a man, and also to be legally 18 a little bit sooner. unfortunately :) he is included in the draft because of this :) at 17 cecil is drafted into the army and his plan is to desert, return to val, and move them both somewhere else. that's not what happens.
the war is about as horseshit as they ever are, an industrial-focused battle between two countries who just want one another's resources. in the midst of this is a propaganda campaign to make them both sound worse, a claim that one side or the other is harboring/working with horrible predatory monsters. chief among this claim is vampires.
vampires aren't common. they're decently rare, in fact, and while some covens kill humans or abduct them, others still feed in increments, using their powers to erase human memory of being fed on. but in the stories, the propaganda, vampires are a global menace who seek to take over the world, and whoever sides with them is working for them. neither side is working with them at all, and the military in both countries kills them on sight. vampire sightings are often likely to usher in police or soldiers.
cecil ditches the train in the city, leaving behind his army career before it begins, but before he can find a way home he's assaulted by strangers. yes exactly the way you think. he's stabbed and left for dead for the trouble, and the only reason he survives is that the local coven finds him by way of one of their youngest, edmund. edmund takes pity on cecil and turns him to save his life, the only way for him to survive that much blood loss... though obviously it's not much of a "survival". horrified by what he's become (and guilty that it gives him more freedom than his life ever did before), cecil stays with the coven, hoping the community back home will take care of his brother.
cecil is keeping secrets, largely even from himself. he's a sinful and horrible man, not only for his taboo sex change but for his fervent desire to stay close to val no matter what. he's a bad person. val is better off without him.
val doesn't think so. mourning his brother's drafting, val isolates and distances himself from people for several years before eagerly joining the army when he hits 18 himself. he refuses to believe cecil died in action even if he's never gotten a single letter or visit. disinterested in the war but very interested in steam-powered machinery and weapons, val is considered an invaluable soldier, and it's during a skirmish with the other side that a weapon malfunctions and explodes. val survives, dragging himself back to camp with severe burns and a missing left arm, his left eye unsalvageable. considered a hero and honorably discharged, val gets the best surgery available, but the reconstruction can only do so much. the prosthetic he wears is his own design, crafted over time from the initial hunk of melted metal he used as a makeshift limb in his most dire hour.
it was only as he was honored for his service that he found out no other "ames" man had ever made it into the army. believing cecil to still be alive, having avoided the war altogether, val immediately continues his search. it's months later that he stumbles into the forest past the capital city, delirious and ragged, still determined to find his brother. and he does: cecil is the member of the coven who leaves the manor to investigate the human wandering through the trees. as elated as he is horrified, he immediately takes val in, determined to fix him up before sending him back out again. they can't be together. cecil is a sinner, and a vampire at that, and in his absence val got horribly injured--cecil has failed him in every way he can.
val would never give up so easily. cecil should know that by now.
cecil is my current icon (val's eye is in my banner) and those images are both from an alight motion video my friend hasn't finished putting together. i will be howling about it when it is posted don't you worry. he makes art faster and more often than i do, but i have written a few amescest stories, which are here:
cecil finds val outside the manor after 5 years apart
cecil helps val wash his hair a week or so into their reunion
val finds out cecil is a vampire (HORNY!!! THIS IS ONE IS HORNY!!!!)
the timeline of their relationship, from val's point of view (ALSO HORNY IN SOME PARTS)
