Nimona AU where Ballister and Nimona do leave the kingdom and go over the wall to find a new safe home. Years pass. The kingdom is more paranoid than ever because the queen killer and the monster were never caught and could presumably still live among them or return to cause more chaos.
The director decides one day that they need to take the fight to the monsters, strike first before they are stricken again. Knights are sent out beyond the wall to search the surrounding land and burn down the woods in order to “smoke the monsters out.” Destroying everything, trying to fight a monster that was never even there.
During one of these instances, Ambrosius and Ballister finally see each other again face to face for the first time in years since that fateful interaction at the institution. They’ve both changed, physically at least; Ambrosius’ hair is longer, Bal’s got some more grey streaks and a new arm upgrade. But underneath all of that they’re still the same, still got that lingering hurt and romantic feelings. Nimona is still the same as ever and hasn’t aged a day.
(Also idea that maybe there’s other small communities and people living outside the wall that Bal and Nimona ended up quietly settling down in. People who are far more open minded and accepting of others, and who are more concerned about the walled off kingdom with guns pointing at them than this nice guy and his cool daughter. That’s their neighbor and they’re not gonna let some knights storm in and cause trouble for him.)
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I’ve mentioned this elsewhere but it feels relevant again in light of the most recent episode. Something that’s really fascinating to me about Orym’s grief in comparison to the rest of the hells’ grief is that his is the youngest/most fresh and because of that tends to be the most volatile when it is triggered (aside from FCG, who was two and obviously The Most volatile when triggered.)
As in: prior to the attack on Zephrah, Orym was leading a normal, happy, casual life! with family who loved him and still do! Grief was something that was inflicted upon him via Ludinus’ machinations, whereas with characters like Imogen or Ashton, grief has been the background tapestry of their entire lives. And I think that shows in how the rest of them are largely able to, if not see past completely (Imogen/Laudna/Chetney) then at least temper/direct their vitriol or grief (Ashton/Fearne/Chetney again) to where it is most effective. (There is a glaring reason, for example, that Imogen scolded Orym for the way he reacted to Liliana and not Ashton. Because Ashton’s anger was directed in a way that was ultimately protective of Imogen—most effective—and Orym’s was founded solely in his personal grief.)
He wants Imogen to have her mom and he wants Lilliana to be salvageable for Imogen because he loves Imogen. But his love for the people in his present actively and consistently tend to conflict with the love he has for the people in his past. They are in a constant battle and Orym—he cannot fathom losing either of them.
(Or, to that point, recognize that allowing empathy to take root in him for the enemy isn't losing one of them.)
It is deeply poignant, then, that Orym’s grief is symbolized by both a sword and shield. It is something he wields as a blade when he feels his philosophy being threatened by certain conversational threads (as he believes it is one of the only things he has left of Will and Derrig, and is therefore desperately clinging onto with both bloody hands even if it makes him, occasionally, a hypocrite), but also something he can use in defense of the people he presently loves—if that provocative, blade-grief side of him does not push them—or himself—away first.
(it won’t—he is as loved by the hells as he loves them. he just needs to—as laudna so beautifully said—say and hear it more often.)
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spending some more time chewing on the concept of byleth and edelgard constantly writing each other letters—both while one of them is off traveling and also when they're both at home and seeing each other every day. there's one on the emperor's desk in her study; one in byleth's storage locker in the barracks; one left on a pillow or slipped into a pocket or tucked into a book the other is reading.
the emperor is interrupted during a big meeting by a page delivering a "most crucial missive from the commander." she unseals it in front of everyone and it's a crude drawing of a smiley face that says "hello i love you"
edelgard would write these excessively verbose things, very heavy on the poetry and flowery language. there are a couple paragraphs of updates and then page after page after page of "i love you"s and "i miss you"s communicated in ten thousand different and increasingly grandiloquent ways. byleth has learned to bring a dictionary along on her trips so she can decode all the sesquipedalian nightmare terms edelgard uses to tell her she's pretty. most letters start and end with an implied threat that if anyone other than byleth reads it or finds out how soft the emperor is, there will be hell to pay, but it doesn't stop her from proceeding to go ham on the romantic sappiness.
meanwhile byleth's letters are. pretty straight and to the point. she's keeping her posted about the weather, about this dog that she met, about a cool tree she saw, and transcribing direct quotes and best wishes from their friends. but she also includes little mementos she picked up or shiny things she found (she's like a crow with pretty rocks, shells, and baubles), and presses flowers that she thinks edelgard will like, and attempts to sketch things she wishes edelgard got to see with her. it's painfully obvious that byleth will never have an artistic career, but edelgard adores every single drawing all the same.
(hubert made a suggestion to have the emperor and her adviser use different seals or envelopes for their personal and official correspondence. this was accepted as reasonable. several months later, edelgard found out he made the suggestion after the third instance in which he'd been doing his secretarial duties and responding to the emperor's mail, only to find the message from the emperor's adviser did not, in fact, contain the woman's latest report on the situation in fhirdiad or fodlan's locket, but a rather lurid list of her intentions for the emperor upon returning home to enbarr. one contained a diagram. hubert did not examine it.)
edelgard, who hoards every paper she's ever had reason to touch and who has a (frankly, pathological) filing system for everything in her life, has a special container for byleth's letters that is under lock and key. byleth, who lived out of a rucksack for most of her life and constantly had to consider carry weight when vetting her few belongings, doesn't really know how to... have... things. she struggled with toting around all this paper for a while, but couldn't bear to toss out even the simplest "meet me at 4pm for the council meeting" message. she had to make peace with the concept of using a drawer for something like long-term storage and frequently checks to make sure they're all still there.
both of them keep their favorite ones in the back of their respective journals and act like they're not so extremely, terminally soft on each other.
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Light Yagami is so insane specifically for the way that he manages to contradict himself in every way possible. Like I think about it All the time.
He doesn't make mistakes. He makes the same mistakes every single time in every single universe, just in different ways.
He sticks strongly to his own beliefs. He betrays himself and his own ideals by doing exactly what Light Yagami would do, no matter what version of Death Note it is. He betrays himself by seeking out a "better" means of justice, he betrays himself by trying to protect others, by just living and being bored and trying to avoid ever doing wrong. His very existence is a betrayal to himself.
He is proud to be his father's son, he wants to live up to his image more than anything else, he takes after him so much and people can tell. He uses his father for his own gain until the bitter end, sometimes it kills him. He loves his mother and his sister so much. He doesn't see them for the majority of the story, sometimes at a certain point it's like they're forgotten altogether. He won't think of them when he inevitably dies.
He asks himself what Light Yagami would say or do. He is Light Yagami. He asks himself what Kira would say or do. He is Kira.
He thinks everything he does through carefully and methodically, sometimes to unnecessary degrees. He is So fucking impulsive, sometimes his plans are outright clumsy.
He has a successful social life and can make just about anyone like him in just a few minutes. There is hardly a single genuine personal connection he has to another person in the series that he does not outright abandon or squander. He has everyone on his side, even if they think they're against him. In the end he realizes there is nobody left, that he is alone and all that is left is himself and his enemies.
He'll have a literal breakdown and collect himself completely within the next half a minute as if nothing happened. He compartmentalizes emotions like it's second-nature. He is losing his shit in his own head. He never stops thinking.
He acts almost disturbingly normal and polite. He acts and thinks like he does not know how to be normal, under everything he is bitter. He is the most put-together guy ever. He is an actual mess.
If you ask him if there's ever been a point where he's actually told the truth, he'll find the most roundabout way to tell you that he is "just like everyone else" in that regard. If you ask him if he has any understanding of the human heart, if he has ever experienced hunger, if he actually has interest in academics, if he knows how to love, he would tell you that he is just like anyone else. Yeah, that was all a reference, sorry. Do you think Light Yagami has ever sought friendship?
He sees himself a God. He is so, so terrified of death. He wants his life to mean something. He manages to only destroy everything and anyone his life has ever touched.
His name is spelled "moon". It's pronounced "Light". He's everything because he's at the top of the country, he's nothing because he's satisfied by none of it. He's everything because he now has everything he's ever wanted (he came across it by mistake), he's nothing because no matter what he fails and life goes on, every single time. He wants the world to know of his existence. By the time he dies most people won't even know who Light Yagami or Kira really was, what the full picture really looked like.
Every single time Light Yagami, without exception, will eventually betray himself and make the same mistake and faces the consequences and eventually die, then cease to exist. He makes mistakes, he does things that are wrong. He will almost never realize that he was wrong. He will lie to his enemies, allies, friend, family, accomplice. Does that mean he only tells the truth to himself? Well. That would have to come with the assumption that he's ever told the truth even once, from the moment he was born.
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