[ Upon the word ‘messiah,’ Serenity alerts with a start. ]
We have a prophecy that’s close to that one. [ Pads of her fingers play silent music against the table’s edge. ] Some day, they messiah will come to bring salvation to the universe. [ Her head dips. ] Or destruction. The final silence. But they have to make that choice.
[ It’s clear Serenity doesn’t desire a long reflection here; her shoulders shrink back, elbows at angles.
Besides, there’s more to discuss. He must understand what he means. ]
Not only healing. Ah, energy. It’s like that. [ A hand, flatly splayed, at her chest. ] I can’t explain it in words, but the what she used to shape our kingdom, to protect [ What is that, under her hand? Some manner of luminescence she doesn’t notice? No trick of the light this time? ] her people, transferred to me. She would’ve told your father that.
[ A far-off glaze touches her eyes. ]
She must have trusted him with our most precious secret if she wanted to unite our people. I wish that I could show you- I’m so bad at saying what I mean.
day off so apologies for boomerangs on both threads muahaha
[ "Salvation to the universe or destruction. The final silence."
Something about the statement strikes him. That feeling of purpose fills him and covers with dread. She may not mean the same haunting feeling that comes to him about his path. It could mean something else entirely. He isn't sure what is the cause of the feeling. Does he truly want to know? ]
The final silence.
[ I don't want to see what that could be--what it will be.
He notices the light but does not point it out. It could break her concentration and cause the conversation to shift. Information, data, is still needed. The light seems to react to her emotions. No doubt something else will come forward to cause the reaction. ]
A power like that must mean more than simply being for a Great House to take such a risk in a marriage. [ Blue-in-blue eyes stare down at the cup in front of him. ] Why unite your people with my house? There had been plenty of others that have male heirs.
YAY enjoy your day off! i have a tag for the other thread coming up soon.
Are there? [ Less a rhetotical question. Remember, her childhood was spent in isolation from the Imperium. She's learned relatively nothing about any of the Great Houses aside from the one she was intended to marry into. Either way, she pushes forward. ] None of them must have been from the kind of family she'd choose.
[ What follows should be qualified with a 'if you'll forgive me for speaking so plainly,' but Serenity forgets.
Unless it's simply not within her make to do so. ]
Your people loved your father. They devoted themselves to him. They [ She forces down the impulse to let the sadness flicker across her face. ] died for him. And anyone can tell that those who survived to be with you love you, too. You [ Nod. ] have the same sort of heart in you, the kind that can care for a people you weren't even born into.
[ A bloodline of honor. No. A family of good people. ]
Mama would've cared about that. She always said she was very old...older than most people thought, and she'd seen terrible things across the stars. [ Evidence by her daughter's demeanor, the older queen had never done a deeper dive on the topic. ] So she believed it's part of our duty to nuture the good out there. Like your family. It would've made her proud to see that sort of union.
None have a power such as that. What is strange is offering it to a Great House, not the Imperial House. [ Paul twists the ducal ring on his finger in thought. Could it truly have been something such as favoritism? There would have been no way for the former Queen to know who he could become. Unless she had a form of prescience. Unless she somehow knew what the Bene Gesserits were after. ] I wonder if it would have put a larger target on my father's back for the Emperor to fear if he knew.
[ Did he know?
Eyes flick downwards at the mention of those who died for his father. His house. The people of Caladan who swore loyalty. The countless ones he wonders if they can even find the names for. How their families at home must feel. How Caladan must feel, especially under control of another house now. More to consider in how he would approach. Their names will need to be noted and placed in honor.
So many moving pieces. ]
If things move down a path... it won't be love that people have for me.
[ Images flash in his mind. The worship, the followers, the praying at the shrine of his father's skull. A haunted expression covers his face. It isn't love. It's blind devotion to an idea that had been socially engineered. None of it is the same sort that his father, grandfather, or anyone in the line of the Atreides. ]
Marrying me would have also meant that you either no longer had your kingdom as a separate entity, or I was considered a Queen Consort. Your entire kingdom could have become vassals for the House Atreides. The Emperor would have been involved. [ He twists the ring more and more. ] Unless your mother hadn't intended for the kingdom to follow you.
[ Plans within plans. How many are plans and how many are ones not considered? He can't imagine a Queen not considering the political machinations around this situation. ]
Was she really willing to risk the loss of power for her kingdom to marry into a "good" family in another kingdom?
I don't know. I'm sorry. [ Apologies like ripples.
I wonder if it would have put a larger target on my father's back for the Emperor to fear if he knew.
Is he insinuating...? Luckily, Serenity isn't the sort of high-blooded woman to take offense at implication, if she reads it as such. There exists a chance that she doesn't.
She longs, in fact, to comfort him when ghosts of pain cross his features.
Instead, she allows a thought to slip out. ]
I wish Pluto were here. She'd be able to answer each one of your questions. [ Another woman at the keenest position. What would the Bene Gesserit conceive of it? But Serenity registers that she's produced another mystery for him, not a hint to the puzzle.
She waves a hand. ] Out of all of the planetary guardians, she was my mother's closest companion. It's part of her job to mind secrets. [ Our. She plucks that word from a garden of intention.
Why? She couldn't say, herself.
One foot aloft in the metaphorical air, she tosses the last of pretense out with flourish. ]
[ Another pause, a look towards her. Consideration, eyebrows raised. It seems to be how he handles this conversation. Surprise at what she says and then churning the ideas around in his mind. ]
Prescience. [ The terminology is offered in way of explanation. ] The ability to see things from the future. Most humans are capable of it to different levels. Some, more than others. They say that spice can open the mind more to the ability.
[ If only I could speak to this Pluto. ]
I have dreams. [ Paul has no intention of going into further detail on them now. They're horrifying for him, let alone another person to fully know of them. ] Things can happen just as I've dreamed them. It's more frequent on Arrakis thanks to the spice.
Bless the maker, etc (also Setsuna come collect your princess)
[ But we aren’t normal humans. The insistence lives at the roof of her mouth, yet even she discerns temperance here.
Besides, her interest spins elsewhere. ]
Dreams like mine? [ From the almost-audibly crackling of enthusiasm in her voice, it’s clear that she gropes more for kindred spirit than outlines. ] Paul [ She uses his name so freely. It should be obscene. ], that could mean by staying on this planet, I might be able to sharpen my own ability to see. I’d try my hardest to get better!
[ Further than a promise this time . An oath. ]
Then I’d tell you everything and I’d know how to use the crystal to help Arrakis, turn it how the Freman want it.
No. Not the same. [ His voice gives a tone of horror, danger, warning. A place someone of her heart should not tread further into her inquiries. ] Spice is dangerous and addictive. You'll end up with your eyes changed like mine and the Fremen. Arrakis is nothing a world to freely decide to live on the rest of your life.
It will change you.
[ He is trying desperately almost to communicate the dangers of living on Arrakis. How brutal it will be for her and whichever of her guardians follow. Naivety, innocence? They don't last long in the desert. He knows better than anyone. ]
Your power should be used as a last resort. People here cultivate, use and are desert power.
stop worrying about your own weird potential love triangle, get over here and help with HERS
[ Chastened, a child’s hand at a hot stove, Serenity retreats into the wide-eyed creature she was upon entering his chamber. He's not harsh with her, but it's easy to imagine that no one's done much more than exchange playful teasing with her. ]
Desert power? [ She volleys back with an added lilt of misunderstanding. The term lands completely foreign upon the landscape of her experience. ] That doesn't make sense.
[ Mama must've prayed for more time to train me. She never told me anything. None of them did. Didn't they trust me?
They never believed in you. Why would they? Place faith in a fickle little princess. Foolish errand. An ugly voice surfaces after the tendency of dead things from the subterranean waters.
She tries to right herself. Attempts, then, to silence the voice she only somewhat recognizes.
There must be a thread she can hang from. ]
If this is a terrible, cursed star, a-as it sounds, then is there light left at all to be hoped for? Nothing beautiful remains?
Edited 2025-03-27 22:16 (UTC)
guess she'd get endymion to herself in this verse :|b
[ Childish playful teasing has it's place and point. They, however, are the remnants of rulers. Now, it falls to them to take the place of previous rulers. He sees no reason not to treat Serenity as anything other than that: an equal in the spectrum of ruling. The difference is obvious to his eyes. She was not taught to rule, where he had known almost nothing other than that since a young age. A childhood was had, but the expectations and place in society was made known to him very early.
One day he would replace his father as the ruler of House Atreides.
It's people, it's fiefdom, it's history would come to his shoulders. He would have the generations and centuries on him of those before him. ]
Every planet has a power to itself. [ His hands uncurl. One cups itself and turns. Fingertips are pressed against the top of the table to make his point in gestures. ] The people of a planet are it's power. The resources it has to cultivate and harness. Specialties above others. My homeworld was ruled by sea and air power. Our standing military specialized in the combat of the water and the air. Arrakis? It is powered by the desert. The people who know how to live in the desert, use it, and harness it. It's a more organic thing than my homeworld. Arrakis is what it is because of the desert--because of the sandworms--because of the spice.
You can't tame or rule a planet by undermining the natural order that rules it. You must learn to use that order and then you control it. You live with those that call it home. [ The hand then turns and gestures to her. ] What is the power of your homeworld?
[ Hawat would be proud.... passing the analytics and teaching he gave me onto someone else. ]
The beauty of Arrakis is what it's danger is. The desert.
rare but deserved Pluto W, imo. (also not my dumb ass getting sucked down a rabbit hole*)
[ For the duration of his lesson, she surveys his microgestures with singular, and uncharacteristic, devotion to detail. The wisdom could sink into her, she partially convinces the stubborn side of her, until it syncs with her pulse. Air power. Sea power. The power of agriculture, of resource, of people. Air. Sea. People. Repeat. The backbone of the Imperium.
Spice.
Yet the Spice twists. It corrupts. So Paul says. How, then, can it be an effective or reliable power? In the grittier workings, Serenity may be a sheltered child, yet she can identify inherent contradiction.
What is the power of your homeworld? ]
Our bonds. [ (Still so impulsive!) What we share instead of what divides us. The emperor can steal Spice. Rivals can rend planets to shreds. What they cannot do is take away what two people cleave fast to. ] And something harder to explain - the Imperium Silver Crystal. [ Its nature makeup has haunted the hallways and labyrinths of the conversation thus far. May as well put its name to sound. ] The soul of my kingdom...and the reason why it will still exist no matter where I go or who I marry. [ Another epiphany today. They roll in waves upon her; the latest one brings new shades of awe to her face, her lips parted. ] I hadn’t thought like that until now.
My mother carried it inside of her body until her end. [ Her end, not the end. And there’s the power.
Two shaky hands intersect across her clavicle. ] Only then did it pass on to me.
(ooc: *about what the Silver Crystal's actual full title is. In my heart, it's always the Imperium Silver Crystal, so that's what we're going with + the fun play on words of Good Imperium vs. Bad Imperium. )
girl need better smh (watch this rabbit hole additon)
[ Paul watches as she comes to conclusions. A silent and yet joyful awe takes him, though it barely shows on his expression. He hasn't truly taught another. He has received years of training from those around him. His advisors, the Fremen. He has cultivated and memorized every lesson and every drop of information. Explanations have been given of his visions and dreams to his mother, but so little seems understood.
Although he feels lost in the sea of what he can see. Things that are unclear. Decisions and outcomes.
An idea--not a vision--comes to mind then. One more of emotional and whimsy than his mother or advisors would prefer. However, it feels appropriate. The young Queen adjacent to him does not see or know the world in data or information to be broken down. She does not follow rules or rigid tradition. She is an empath. Things must also be felt with the knowledge given for her to truly grasp what is at hand. ]
My father didn't come to Arrakis for her riches. Orders were given, making rules and ceremony follow. He didn't come to rule with an iron fist or uproot her people. He came in hopes of cultivating a bond with them. We both share the planet and obtain what is needed and allow both to live together.
[ The Imperium Silver Crystal, she says. It sounds things of myths and legends. His view on those things are cynical given the situation at hand. Lisan al-Gaib, they say. The Voice from the Outer World.
Myth and legend planned and grown over thousands of years.
It sounds intangible.
Bonds -- trades and relations. Loyalty and respect. What House Atreides has been built on. That sounds tangible and something one could rule with as a tool. ]
I think, Your Majesty, you need to see what I mean to understand it fully. [ Paul stands then. The hand that has gestured to her holds out to help her stand. Manners. He is a son of noble birth. ] Cover what you need to step outside. We won't be traveling far.
[ In fact, he does not place the nose piece of his stilsuit. He does, however, pull his own hood up to obscure his face. A gesture is given for her to follow close when she is prepared.
Paul leads her another way than how they came to his yali. Winding passage ways that are more crude than the clean cuts of the other architecture of the sietch. Within moments they have stepped out onto the rocky exterior. The hand once again lifts in order to help aid her to keep her footing. Then, he comes to a stop at the edge of a small cliff.
He raises his hand and pulls back his hood. Squats down. Once she has joined him, he points out towards the sands of Arrakis. The sun begins to set. The last rays of light sparkle in the wind and sky. Certain places glitter. Spice. Above them is the two moons.
Paul smiles--a genuine smile--and turns his attention to watching her expressions. ]
[ Hands are offered and they are taken, gladly, the gossamer of her hood tucked back towards her ears. Another shade in the evening takes no effort to become. Yes, even for one as insecure as in her footing as her - more than once, her side thumps against his with punctuations of apology as they work their way backwards and out.
She takes his arm. For guidance, she'd insist, if pressed. If not, she feels no inclination to provide excuses.
Still, once they've ventured out into the parapets of stone outside the sietch, her footfalls edge closer to caution. A small cliff to him doesn't scale so tiny to her and the newness of it all causes her head to tip with static.
She's almost done insisting: ]
You know that you can call me Serenity if you'd⸻
[ Idle chatter tangles in her voice box when she sees moons. Moons. White as an animal's teeth, they hold court in the sky as silver sentries over the landscape. What seemed inhospitable during landfall morphs to into a dreamscape of warm colors dotted over black.
He won't have to be a shrewd critic of human nature to see the emotions writ large across her face, a symphony of experience within seconds. Amazement. Grief, at the guillotine of familiarity's blade. Shock. Oh, but beyond the trapping of worship or wonder. There's tenderness that comes embraced only by kinship.
She's in love.
One palm covers her mouth, the other searches upward for the sky. If she could reach, if she'd pull them down to her...
She doesn't notice the sand drifts and breeze that pulls her cloak away, profile exposed to this new world. In fact, this might be the sole moment since she stepped into his sietch that she hasn't been wiggling with an unruly anxiety that needled her to explain or defend or beseech.
Quiet. Her dress drags against the ridges of sand, lacework sinking into grains. ]
[ Paul studies her, attempting to learn how her empathic tendencies work. Through feeling and knowing a person? Touch? Simply observing and absorbing the subtle information around her on a subconscious level? To know how a person works is to know how they will behave. Both Mentat and Bene Gesserit training in him insists he learn this. She is a stranger to the Imperium and knowing how she is will help him understand how she might be in this strange reality around her.
Blue-in-blue eyes follow her movements. Her gaze. It settles on the two moons that now hang in the sky of Arrakis. Ah, the moons. In that moment of awe on her face he can see that it was not a planet she hailed from--but a moon. The concept is not so jarring or surprising as one might believe it to be for him.
What he does wonder silently is if she can truly grasp the rule of a planet and not a smaller celestial body.
The bare hand bearing the ducal ring raises to enclose around the hand that reaches to the largest moon. Gently, he guides it down. Slowly. Letting fingers drift through the breeze that has removed her hood. The same that shifts his sand tossed curls. Slowly.
Hands then place on top of the sand below them. Once he is certain her gaze has moved to how his rests on top of them, he pushes them into the sand. It allows the shifting grains to cover them. He presses their hands futher until the sand covers their wrists--forcing her attention to the ground below them. ]
The Hand of God, [ Paul says once he has captured her gaze again. His voice low and clear despite how it seems he mumbles, ] is sacred to the Fremen. I wouldn't reach out to it unless you mean to make a declaration...
Serenity.
welp, I was SAYING. spoke to soon I guess. (good thing she's not going to figure it out so easily)
[ Her sentiment apparent and bone-settled, it takes more than an aside to regain her attention. Paul chooses prudently, however, by taking her hand in his. The sleeper awakens. A sleepwalking step's distance out of her trance, Serenity's face snaps back towards his, eyes damp although not drenched with the drops of precious life-water she'd spilled in his yali. Her stare goes through him until it pinpricks back into sharp relief.
Dark hair. He's always facing away from me.
Serenity.
She cannot, under any circumstance, look away. If she does so, she'll break the crystallization of cobwebs that span her the gorge between sleep and revelations.
And in the same way, a noise could cast the spell that'd lead to her undoing.
Why do a thousand doves beat their wings inside her chest cavity? What's the feeling she has, these sisters ecstasy and sheer terror? She desires to meld them both into one draught that she could drink to perceive just why Paul Atreides being so near and holding her hand with a careful touch brings the all-consuming requirement of an arrow to her side.
Her heart wouldn't trade the ache nor how he says her name.
She's hardly audible when she asks: ]
...did I dream of you?
Edited 2025-03-29 03:29 (UTC)
:') just wait till he flips it and does the moon reference as the kw, maybe more love or turning sou
[ Paul watches her in complete silence once she stares at him. The gaze doesn't rouse anger or suspicion unlike being stared at by his mother or the Supreme Reverend Mother. He wonders if she truly sees him at all... or if she sees the man he could become.
The name that is a killing word. So many lives gone. A holy war in my name spreading across the galaxy like unquenchable fire. Jihad.
His fingers gently squeezes her hand. Sand slips between their fingers as the motion causes it to shift. Time. Possibilities all running out. A quiet time between the storms that she can't begin to see or know. It's better that way. She shouldn't know.
If she dreamed of me... why haven't I seen her in my dreams?
He inches closer to keep his voice low. ] I'd hope your dreams aren't of me. They'd never be good dreams.
[ Only horror. ]
Edited 2025-03-29 10:22 (UTC)
just have to wait and see, but it'll be devastating in the best way.
[ Alongside an urging shake of her head, her fingers curl against his hand so that pulling it towards her is no arduous task. That, and what springs from her attempt to secure the granules of sand into an ersatz hourglass made from thumbs and wrists. Valiant. Valiant, but a fruitless task. The desert already claims her bare legs where they rest. She'd laugh at the tickle of its cosset if she weren't otherwise distracted.
He looks like Arakkis, too.
This closeness. The rise and fall of his voice, desert nighttime. Why does she crave it?
The same reason, she suppose, that she defends him against his own onslaught. ]
No, never nightmares. Those visions [ His term supplants hers. ] only leave... [ Mmmm. The exact description escapes her, which drives her to: ] regrets that I could never, ever reach the boy.
[ Reach you?
Halfheartedly, she traces with her eyes the last corona of sunlight that hugs his outline. This star adores him.
Her opposite arm pivots so that she can envelope his grasp with both hands. ]
Back on the moon, we'd regard this sort of light as holy. [ A smile eases into her lips in an earnest that'd felt foreign moments ago. ] We'd also make decrees in its glow. [ A cant of her head. Her forehead could bump some part of him. ] Vows.
[ Hands are raised together. He feels the sand pour from them like the ancient hour glasses. Her other hand covers his as well. Paul stills entirely. Every muscle in his body silences. Any subtle movement may disturb the sensation she has found herself swept up by.
Paul wouldn't be certain Arrakis--if a planet had the same capabilities of a human--would adore him. Not with what he is capable of becoming. ]
What vows? [ His question is soft as to not disrupt her in the trance, vision, whatever has grasped her mind.
It isn't the spice.
The light reflecting off the moons must have somehow caused the phenomenon to sweep her away. His gaze only breaks away for the briefest of moments to note how close she has become.
Her dreams would turn to nightmares the more she is exposed to him. Hopefully he is not the one she has seen. He would hope a kinder fate for her than the man he has seen himself potentially become. The man the universe seems to hold its breath for in wait he awakes. ]
Oh, many kinds. [ If she plays the role of prophetess, of oracle, the fervor that overtakes her isn't of roaring flames; she radiates the same sort of welcoming magnetism a man long from home would find upon entering the room that houses his hearth.
Of course, there exists the other, wilder option: she's under no trance. The moon's not tapped into spellwork. She alone skims the wavelength of universal harmonics, though she'd never use that phrase. She's not a vessel.
She Is.
A squeeze of his hands. ]
Oh, all manners of vows. Promises to see each other after long journeys, romantic confessions, secrets from one person to another. [ Has she made any of these?
In what would be a surprise to many who've met her, she doesn't volunteer. Instead: ]
And I do want to make a decree. [ Her hair flanks either side of them now, her knees creating new gouges in the sand's surface as she eases up on them to be at a better vantage point. ] We're the last. Both of us, so...
[ Up goes their grasped hands, if he doesn't fight. ]
No matter what happens, we should try and strengthen the friendship between our houses.
[ She's not asking the Duke nor Muad'dib. She seeks out Paul, with no expectations of politics or favors or protection. ]
[ A single eyebrows raises at the vagueness of her statement at first. She clarifies, of course, but he still manages to find himself mildly surprised that she makes such a simple vow. A reaffirmation of a contract her mother seemed to take quite seriously. One he is not certain his father held the same weight to--or perhaps the Duke Leto simply wished to spare the young woman in front of him the politics of the trap House Atreides found themselves weaved into. ]
You will need to learn the courts and systems of the Imperium for that strong of a vow. [ A pause. ] My mother is pregnant with my sister. I wouldn't say I'm the last Atreides.
[ Simply because he wishes her to be truly informed before she makes such a lofty vow. Especially in a manner that seems sacred to her own people. Paul can see the Bene Gesserits have not manipulated or planted their seeds in her culture and people. That doesn't mean that he can't see the patterns of deep faith that humanity has in any form.
Patterns in humanity. History. It is what led to the Butlatian Jihad ten thousand years ago.
No resistence is found in how she guides their hands.
Does a difference exist between Paul Atreides, the Duke of the House, and Maud'dib? ]
What would be your suggestion to begin strengthening the tie between our houses?
look, okay, i realize that 'starseed' sounds sketch as hell in this context but it's a canon term :|
[ She would argue in earnest that there's a stark difference. Anyone with eyes could tell! That is to say, she's still a distance away from reconciling that not everyone interprets people in the way she does. Down to their purest essence. Their light waves, their best selves.
A sister? What zigzags across her face is half-heartbreak, half-delight. And envy, for a lightning bolt's strike? Proof that there's a shadow even upon a sparkling expanse of white. He might never get his hand back at the rate she's holding it for dear life. ]
A gift. [ She bites her lips. He's not the last. She should, by all accounts, be overjoyed to hear that he'll have a familial companion soon. Blood of his blood.
...yet.
She is the last. Her mother only bore one child. ] You should cherish her. Your father left a piece of his starseed behind.
[ Bitterest of sweets. Did his father love his mother? Once more, she wonders what it's like to know a father, to see your parents in love. ]
What were they like together? [ Poor training, indeed. No royal advisors ever coached her that a question cannot answer another question. In Serenity's eyes, however, this provides the only route that's logical to take.
Show me yourself. That will bind the knot. Turn 'round to me, I want to see the face of the boy in the desert. ] Your parents.
Edited 2025-03-31 20:52 (UTC)
putting a new spin on kralizec with the Cauldron 😭😭😭
[ A simple blink. His mind fills with the image of a woman his age. Hints of bronze hair out from underneath the stilsuit she wears. Eyes round like his mothers. A gaze like hers--older than she should be. Aware of things she shouldn't know regardless of her age.
[ I may not be able to fix things before your coming, sister. Shouldn't you go back to the stars where father ?
ɪ ʜᴀᴠᴇ ꜱᴏ ᴍᴜᴄʜ ᴛᴏ ꜱʜᴏᴡ ʏᴏᴜ, ʙʀᴏᴛʜᴇʀ. ʏᴏᴜ ɴᴇᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ꜱᴇᴇ ᴀɴᴅ ᴛʜᴇɴ ʏᴏᴜ ᴄᴀɴ ᴋɴᴏᴡ. A voice responds from the edges of his mind. ]
My father was the epitome of good heart amongst politicians. Loyal. Noble. He would fight at the level his men would... I can only imagine that is what also turned my mother to him away from her order. [ Paul pauses then. ] They were very much in love. She agreed to be the status of concubine so he might marry should politics arise. She gave him a son as he wanted... when it apparently was not what her order wished. My mother has always controlled her emotions, as she had been trained to do.
Then she loved him more than she could ever say. [ She nods, certainty settling upon her conclusion. More than words could say, at the end of their union. ] And she didn't have to be his wife to know where she stood?
[ If, Serenity deliberates, Duke Leto had been a man of the make Paul describes — and he must've been, for her mother to entrust him with the heirloom of her existence — then...devotion to him would come easy. For his men and his wife.
Serenity can't call the Lady Jessica a 'concubine,' in spite of the label's accuracy, although she's only thinking and not speaking aloud. It doesn't feel right. She'd been his wife.
He loved her. She loved him. The most sacred of vows had been made, moonlight or no, legal or otherwise.
...hmm.
At long last, his hand drops. Her gaze traces up toward the sky again. ]
Thank you for telling me their story. [ The first link in the chain. ] What must that be like, I wonder — to love a person to their...?
[ Her nose wrinkles. She wants to repeat 'starseed,' though she draws a blank at what most other worlds term them. ]
Their [ Forgetting herself in her frustration, Serenity points to his chest with a squiggling motion. ] real-thems, inside.
No. She was fully aware of the politics at play. If he had married her then it would have closed any potential doors to alliances with other Great Houses. Or, they would have waited until I was born. [ The birth of a son had more implications than only what the Bene Gesserits had in mind. A daughter would mean power loss for our House. ] My father loved her dearly... but people like us don't have the liberty to marry simply for love.
[ He wonders if his sister is to be a pawn of the Bene Gesserits. If he has a say in it -- as Duke -- he would not let them near her. He would not have her live through the Gol Jabbar or be a piece to navigate through the whims of another. They will make their own decisions.
"Because you are Jessica's son. You have more than one birthright, boy."
Can I truly pick one over the other? ]
To love a person to their core? The deepest part of them? [ A huff of a smile comes to his face. ] I can't say I know from first hand experience.
[ Only that he is the result of such a bond. That he hopes his sister is the result of it and not an attempt from his mother to smooth relations with the Sisterhood.
Paul pulls his hand back. Both now hang from his knees as he looks skyward once more. He has often wondered if they could ever see Caladan from Arrakis. Of course, they cannot, as his homeworld is very far from this centerhole of the Imperium. ]
[ Core. Not the word she was searching for, apparently, given how she works at her bottom lip, albeit one that works in a pinch. As his eyes converge on their shared sky, she steals a second or so to investigate the slope of his face's contour.
When she's done so, she she breathes out: ]
You don't think you will.
[ A murmur of sand across the dunes. She might've not said it at all.
Her ankles lock under her as she sits cross-legged, elbows at her thighs. The dress she'd worn for travel may not finish her journey. ]
I used to daydream about being a wife, someday.
[ His wife, technically; equally as fair, of course, would be how that's not a fair thing to claim. She hadn't known him then. In hid place, there stood a placeholder of a man to represent every Man she could have given her heart to.
Looking back, the abstract notion doesn't fit her anymore. ]
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We have a prophecy that’s close to that one. [ Pads of her fingers play silent music against the table’s edge. ] Some day, they messiah will come to bring salvation to the universe. [ Her head dips. ] Or destruction. The final silence. But they have to make that choice.
[ It’s clear Serenity doesn’t desire a long reflection here; her shoulders shrink back, elbows at angles.
Besides, there’s more to discuss. He must understand what he means. ]
Not only healing. Ah, energy. It’s like that. [ A hand, flatly splayed, at her chest. ] I can’t explain it in words, but the what she used to shape our kingdom, to protect [ What is that, under her hand? Some manner of luminescence she doesn’t notice? No trick of the light this time? ] her people, transferred to me. She would’ve told your father that.
[ A far-off glaze touches her eyes. ]
She must have trusted him with our most precious secret if she wanted to unite our people. I wish that I could show you- I’m so bad at saying what I mean.
day off so apologies for boomerangs on both threads muahaha
Something about the statement strikes him. That feeling of purpose fills him and covers with dread. She may not mean the same haunting feeling that comes to him about his path. It could mean something else entirely. He isn't sure what is the cause of the feeling. Does he truly want to know? ]
The final silence.
[ I don't want to see what that could be--what it will be.
He notices the light but does not point it out. It could break her concentration and cause the conversation to shift. Information, data, is still needed. The light seems to react to her emotions. No doubt something else will come forward to cause the reaction. ]
A power like that must mean more than simply being for a Great House to take such a risk in a marriage. [ Blue-in-blue eyes stare down at the cup in front of him. ] Why unite your people with my house? There had been plenty of others that have male heirs.
YAY enjoy your day off! i have a tag for the other thread coming up soon.
[ What follows should be qualified with a 'if you'll forgive me for speaking so plainly,' but Serenity forgets.
Unless it's simply not within her make to do so. ]
Your people loved your father. They devoted themselves to him. They [ She forces down the impulse to let the sadness flicker across her face. ] died for him. And anyone can tell that those who survived to be with you love you, too. You [ Nod. ] have the same sort of heart in you, the kind that can care for a people you weren't even born into.
[ A bloodline of honor. No. A family of good people. ]
Mama would've cared about that. She always said she was very old...older than most people thought, and she'd seen terrible things across the stars. [ Evidence by her daughter's demeanor, the older queen had never done a deeper dive on the topic. ] So she believed it's part of our duty to nuture the good out there. Like your family. It would've made her proud to see that sort of union.
soon a three day weekend....
[ Did he know?
Eyes flick downwards at the mention of those who died for his father. His house. The people of Caladan who swore loyalty. The countless ones he wonders if they can even find the names for. How their families at home must feel. How Caladan must feel, especially under control of another house now. More to consider in how he would approach. Their names will need to be noted and placed in honor.
So many moving pieces. ]
If things move down a path... it won't be love that people have for me.
[ Images flash in his mind. The worship, the followers, the praying at the shrine of his father's skull. A haunted expression covers his face. It isn't love. It's blind devotion to an idea that had been socially engineered. None of it is the same sort that his father, grandfather, or anyone in the line of the Atreides. ]
Marrying me would have also meant that you either no longer had your kingdom as a separate entity, or I was considered a Queen Consort. Your entire kingdom could have become vassals for the House Atreides. The Emperor would have been involved. [ He twists the ring more and more. ] Unless your mother hadn't intended for the kingdom to follow you.
[ Plans within plans. How many are plans and how many are ones not considered? He can't imagine a Queen not considering the political machinations around this situation. ]
Was she really willing to risk the loss of power for her kingdom to marry into a "good" family in another kingdom?
I'm getting time off soon too, YES GOD
I wonder if it would have put a larger target on my father's back for the Emperor to fear if he knew.
Is he insinuating...? Luckily, Serenity isn't the sort of high-blooded woman to take offense at implication, if she reads it as such. There exists a chance that she doesn't.
She longs, in fact, to comfort him when ghosts of pain cross his features.
Instead, she allows a thought to slip out. ]
I wish Pluto were here. She'd be able to answer each one of your questions. [ Another woman at the keenest position. What would the Bene Gesserit conceive of it? But Serenity registers that she's produced another mystery for him, not a hint to the puzzle.
She waves a hand. ] Out of all of the planetary guardians, she was my mother's closest companion. It's part of her job to mind secrets. [ Our. She plucks that word from a garden of intention.
Why? She couldn't say, herself.
One foot aloft in the metaphorical air, she tosses the last of pretense out with flourish. ]
She glimpses the future, like my mother could.
\o/ PRAISE BE
Prescience. [ The terminology is offered in way of explanation. ] The ability to see things from the future. Most humans are capable of it to different levels. Some, more than others. They say that spice can open the mind more to the ability.
[ If only I could speak to this Pluto. ]
I have dreams. [ Paul has no intention of going into further detail on them now. They're horrifying for him, let alone another person to fully know of them. ] Things can happen just as I've dreamed them. It's more frequent on Arrakis thanks to the spice.
Bless the maker, etc (also Setsuna come collect your princess)
Besides, her interest spins elsewhere. ]
Dreams like mine? [ From the almost-audibly crackling of enthusiasm in her voice, it’s clear that she gropes more for kindred spirit than outlines. ] Paul [ She uses his name so freely. It should be obscene. ], that could mean by staying on this planet, I might be able to sharpen my own ability to see. I’d try my hardest to get better!
[ Further than a promise this time . An oath. ]
Then I’d tell you everything and I’d know how to use the crystal to help Arrakis, turn it how the Freman want it.
Pluto she needs help stop googoo eying her hubby!
It will change you.
[ He is trying desperately almost to communicate the dangers of living on Arrakis. How brutal it will be for her and whichever of her guardians follow. Naivety, innocence? They don't last long in the desert. He knows better than anyone. ]
Your power should be used as a last resort. People here cultivate, use and are desert power.
stop worrying about your own weird potential love triangle, get over here and help with HERS
Desert power? [ She volleys back with an added lilt of misunderstanding. The term lands completely foreign upon the landscape of her experience. ] That doesn't make sense.
[ Mama must've prayed for more time to train me. She never told me anything. None of them did. Didn't they trust me?
They never believed in you. Why would they? Place faith in a fickle little princess. Foolish errand. An ugly voice surfaces after the tendency of dead things from the subterranean waters.
She tries to right herself. Attempts, then, to silence the voice she only somewhat recognizes.
There must be a thread she can hang from. ]
If this is a terrible, cursed star, a-as it sounds, then is there light left at all to be hoped for? Nothing beautiful remains?
guess she'd get endymion to herself in this verse :|b
One day he would replace his father as the ruler of House Atreides.
It's people, it's fiefdom, it's history would come to his shoulders. He would have the generations and centuries on him of those before him. ]
Every planet has a power to itself. [ His hands uncurl. One cups itself and turns. Fingertips are pressed against the top of the table to make his point in gestures. ] The people of a planet are it's power. The resources it has to cultivate and harness. Specialties above others. My homeworld was ruled by sea and air power. Our standing military specialized in the combat of the water and the air. Arrakis? It is powered by the desert. The people who know how to live in the desert, use it, and harness it. It's a more organic thing than my homeworld. Arrakis is what it is because of the desert--because of the sandworms--because of the spice.
You can't tame or rule a planet by undermining the natural order that rules it. You must learn to use that order and then you control it. You live with those that call it home. [ The hand then turns and gestures to her. ] What is the power of your homeworld?
[ Hawat would be proud.... passing the analytics and teaching he gave me onto someone else. ]
The beauty of Arrakis is what it's danger is. The desert.
rare but deserved Pluto W, imo. (also not my dumb ass getting sucked down a rabbit hole*)
Spice.
Yet the Spice twists. It corrupts. So Paul says. How, then, can it be an effective or reliable power? In the grittier workings, Serenity may be a sheltered child, yet she can identify inherent contradiction.
What is the power of your homeworld? ]
Our bonds. [ (Still so impulsive!) What we share instead of what divides us. The emperor can steal Spice. Rivals can rend planets to shreds. What they cannot do is take away what two people cleave fast to. ] And something harder to explain - the Imperium Silver Crystal. [ Its nature makeup has haunted the hallways and labyrinths of the conversation thus far. May as well put its name to sound. ] The soul of my kingdom...and the reason why it will still exist no matter where I go or who I marry. [ Another epiphany today. They roll in waves upon her; the latest one brings new shades of awe to her face, her lips parted. ] I hadn’t thought like that until now.
My mother carried it inside of her body until her end. [ Her end, not the end. And there’s the power.
Two shaky hands intersect across her clavicle. ] Only then did it pass on to me.
(ooc: *about what the Silver Crystal's actual full title is. In my heart, it's always the Imperium Silver Crystal, so that's what we're going with + the fun play on words of Good Imperium vs. Bad Imperium. )
girl need better smh (watch this rabbit hole additon)
Although he feels lost in the sea of what he can see. Things that are unclear. Decisions and outcomes.
An idea--not a vision--comes to mind then. One more of emotional and whimsy than his mother or advisors would prefer. However, it feels appropriate. The young Queen adjacent to him does not see or know the world in data or information to be broken down. She does not follow rules or rigid tradition. She is an empath. Things must also be felt with the knowledge given for her to truly grasp what is at hand. ]
My father didn't come to Arrakis for her riches. Orders were given, making rules and ceremony follow. He didn't come to rule with an iron fist or uproot her people. He came in hopes of cultivating a bond with them. We both share the planet and obtain what is needed and allow both to live together.
[ The Imperium Silver Crystal, she says. It sounds things of myths and legends. His view on those things are cynical given the situation at hand. Lisan al-Gaib, they say. The Voice from the Outer World.
Myth and legend planned and grown over thousands of years.
It sounds intangible.
Bonds -- trades and relations. Loyalty and respect. What House Atreides has been built on. That sounds tangible and something one could rule with as a tool. ]
I think, Your Majesty, you need to see what I mean to understand it fully. [ Paul stands then. The hand that has gestured to her holds out to help her stand. Manners. He is a son of noble birth. ] Cover what you need to step outside. We won't be traveling far.
[ In fact, he does not place the nose piece of his stilsuit. He does, however, pull his own hood up to obscure his face. A gesture is given for her to follow close when she is prepared.
Paul leads her another way than how they came to his yali. Winding passage ways that are more crude than the clean cuts of the other architecture of the sietch. Within moments they have stepped out onto the rocky exterior. The hand once again lifts in order to help aid her to keep her footing. Then, he comes to a stop at the edge of a small cliff.
He raises his hand and pulls back his hood. Squats down. Once she has joined him, he points out towards the sands of Arrakis. The sun begins to set. The last rays of light sparkle in the wind and sky. Certain places glitter. Spice. Above them is the two moons.
Paul smiles--a genuine smile--and turns his attention to watching her expressions. ]
love at first sight, but not with him.
She takes his arm. For guidance, she'd insist, if pressed. If not, she feels no inclination to provide excuses.
Still, once they've ventured out into the parapets of stone outside the sietch, her footfalls edge closer to caution. A small cliff to him doesn't scale so tiny to her and the newness of it all causes her head to tip with static.
She's almost done insisting: ]
You know that you can call me Serenity if you'd⸻
[ Idle chatter tangles in her voice box when she sees moons. Moons. White as an animal's teeth, they hold court in the sky as silver sentries over the landscape. What seemed inhospitable during landfall morphs to into a dreamscape of warm colors dotted over black.
He won't have to be a shrewd critic of human nature to see the emotions writ large across her face, a symphony of experience within seconds. Amazement. Grief, at the guillotine of familiarity's blade. Shock. Oh, but beyond the trapping of worship or wonder. There's tenderness that comes embraced only by kinship.
She's in love.
One palm covers her mouth, the other searches upward for the sky. If she could reach, if she'd pull them down to her...
She doesn't notice the sand drifts and breeze that pulls her cloak away, profile exposed to this new world. In fact, this might be the sole moment since she stepped into his sietch that she hasn't been wiggling with an unruly anxiety that needled her to explain or defend or beseech.
Quiet. Her dress drags against the ridges of sand, lacework sinking into grains. ]
honestly, probably best for her 😔
Blue-in-blue eyes follow her movements. Her gaze. It settles on the two moons that now hang in the sky of Arrakis. Ah, the moons. In that moment of awe on her face he can see that it was not a planet she hailed from--but a moon. The concept is not so jarring or surprising as one might believe it to be for him.
What he does wonder silently is if she can truly grasp the rule of a planet and not a smaller celestial body.
The bare hand bearing the ducal ring raises to enclose around the hand that reaches to the largest moon. Gently, he guides it down. Slowly. Letting fingers drift through the breeze that has removed her hood. The same that shifts his sand tossed curls. Slowly.
Hands then place on top of the sand below them. Once he is certain her gaze has moved to how his rests on top of them, he pushes them into the sand. It allows the shifting grains to cover them. He presses their hands futher until the sand covers their wrists--forcing her attention to the ground below them. ]
The Hand of God, [ Paul says once he has captured her gaze again. His voice low and clear despite how it seems he mumbles, ] is sacred to the Fremen. I wouldn't reach out to it unless you mean to make a declaration...
Serenity.
welp, I was SAYING. spoke to soon I guess. (good thing she's not going to figure it out so easily)
Dark hair. He's always facing away from me.
Serenity.
She cannot, under any circumstance, look away. If she does so, she'll break the crystallization of cobwebs that span her the gorge between sleep and revelations.
And in the same way, a noise could cast the spell that'd lead to her undoing.
Why do a thousand doves beat their wings inside her chest cavity? What's the feeling she has, these sisters ecstasy and sheer terror? She desires to meld them both into one draught that she could drink to perceive just why Paul Atreides being so near and holding her hand with a careful touch brings the all-consuming requirement of an arrow to her side.
Her heart wouldn't trade the ache nor how he says her name.
She's hardly audible when she asks: ]
...did I dream of you?
:') just wait till he flips it and does the moon reference as the kw, maybe more love or turning sou
The name that is a killing word. So many lives gone. A holy war in my name spreading across the galaxy like unquenchable fire. Jihad.
His fingers gently squeezes her hand. Sand slips between their fingers as the motion causes it to shift. Time. Possibilities all running out. A quiet time between the storms that she can't begin to see or know. It's better that way. She shouldn't know.
If she dreamed of me... why haven't I seen her in my dreams?
He inches closer to keep his voice low. ] I'd hope your dreams aren't of me. They'd never be good dreams.
[ Only horror. ]
just have to wait and see, but it'll be devastating in the best way.
He looks like Arakkis, too.
This closeness. The rise and fall of his voice, desert nighttime. Why does she crave it?
The same reason, she suppose, that she defends him against his own onslaught. ]
No, never nightmares. Those visions [ His term supplants hers. ] only leave... [ Mmmm. The exact description escapes her, which drives her to: ] regrets that I could never, ever reach the boy.
[ Reach you?
Halfheartedly, she traces with her eyes the last corona of sunlight that hugs his outline. This star adores him.
Her opposite arm pivots so that she can envelope his grasp with both hands. ]
Back on the moon, we'd regard this sort of light as holy. [ A smile eases into her lips in an earnest that'd felt foreign moments ago. ] We'd also make decrees in its glow. [ A cant of her head. Her forehead could bump some part of him. ] Vows.
THANKFULLY.... he would explain things
Paul wouldn't be certain Arrakis--if a planet had the same capabilities of a human--would adore him. Not with what he is capable of becoming. ]
What vows? [ His question is soft as to not disrupt her in the trance, vision, whatever has grasped her mind.
It isn't the spice.
The light reflecting off the moons must have somehow caused the phenomenon to sweep her away. His gaze only breaks away for the briefest of moments to note how close she has become.
Her dreams would turn to nightmares the more she is exposed to him. Hopefully he is not the one she has seen. He would hope a kinder fate for her than the man he has seen himself potentially become. The man the universe seems to hold its breath for in wait he awakes. ]
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Of course, there exists the other, wilder option: she's under no trance. The moon's not tapped into spellwork. She alone skims the wavelength of universal harmonics, though she'd never use that phrase. She's not a vessel.
She Is.
A squeeze of his hands. ]
Oh, all manners of vows. Promises to see each other after long journeys, romantic confessions, secrets from one person to another. [ Has she made any of these?
In what would be a surprise to many who've met her, she doesn't volunteer. Instead: ]
And I do want to make a decree. [ Her hair flanks either side of them now, her knees creating new gouges in the sand's surface as she eases up on them to be at a better vantage point. ] We're the last. Both of us, so...
[ Up goes their grasped hands, if he doesn't fight. ]
No matter what happens, we should try and strengthen the friendship between our houses.
[ She's not asking the Duke nor Muad'dib. She seeks out Paul, with no expectations of politics or favors or protection. ]
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You will need to learn the courts and systems of the Imperium for that strong of a vow. [ A pause. ] My mother is pregnant with my sister. I wouldn't say I'm the last Atreides.
[ Simply because he wishes her to be truly informed before she makes such a lofty vow. Especially in a manner that seems sacred to her own people. Paul can see the Bene Gesserits have not manipulated or planted their seeds in her culture and people. That doesn't mean that he can't see the patterns of deep faith that humanity has in any form.
Patterns in humanity. History. It is what led to the Butlatian Jihad ten thousand years ago.
No resistence is found in how she guides their hands.
Does a difference exist between Paul Atreides, the Duke of the House, and Maud'dib? ]
What would be your suggestion to begin strengthening the tie between our houses?
look, okay, i realize that 'starseed' sounds sketch as hell in this context but it's a canon term :|
A sister? What zigzags across her face is half-heartbreak, half-delight. And envy, for a lightning bolt's strike? Proof that there's a shadow even upon a sparkling expanse of white. He might never get his hand back at the rate she's holding it for dear life. ]
A gift. [ She bites her lips. He's not the last. She should, by all accounts, be overjoyed to hear that he'll have a familial companion soon. Blood of his blood.
...yet.
She is the last. Her mother only bore one child. ] You should cherish her. Your father left a piece of his starseed behind.
[ Bitterest of sweets. Did his father love his mother? Once more, she wonders what it's like to know a father, to see your parents in love. ]
What were they like together? [ Poor training, indeed. No royal advisors ever coached her that a question cannot answer another question. In Serenity's eyes, however, this provides the only route that's logical to take.
Show me yourself. That will bind the knot. Turn 'round to me, I want to see the face of the boy in the desert. ] Your parents.
putting a new spin on kralizec with the Cauldron 😭😭😭
She smiles at him. Adoration.
ᴘᴀᴜʟ. ɪ ʟᴏᴠᴇ ʏᴏᴜ. ɪ ᴜɴᴅᴇʀꜱᴛᴀɴᴅ ᴡʜᴇɴ ɴᴏɴᴇ ᴏɴᴇ ᴇʟꜱᴇ ᴄᴀɴ. ]
I hope she is a gift.
[ I may not be able to fix things before your coming, sister. Shouldn't you go back to the stars where father ?
ɪ ʜᴀᴠᴇ ꜱᴏ ᴍᴜᴄʜ ᴛᴏ ꜱʜᴏᴡ ʏᴏᴜ, ʙʀᴏᴛʜᴇʀ. ʏᴏᴜ ɴᴇᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ꜱᴇᴇ ᴀɴᴅ ᴛʜᴇɴ ʏᴏᴜ ᴄᴀɴ ᴋɴᴏᴡ. A voice responds from the edges of his mind. ]
My father was the epitome of good heart amongst politicians. Loyal. Noble. He would fight at the level his men would... I can only imagine that is what also turned my mother to him away from her order. [ Paul pauses then. ] They were very much in love. She agreed to be the status of concubine so he might marry should politics arise. She gave him a son as he wanted... when it apparently was not what her order wished. My mother has always controlled her emotions, as she had been trained to do.
She wept the night my father was killed.
either way, it's depressing!
[ If, Serenity deliberates, Duke Leto had been a man of the make Paul describes — and he must've been, for her mother to entrust him with the heirloom of her existence — then...devotion to him would come easy. For his men and his wife.
Serenity can't call the Lady Jessica a 'concubine,' in spite of the label's accuracy, although she's only thinking and not speaking aloud. It doesn't feel right. She'd been his wife.
He loved her. She loved him. The most sacred of vows had been made, moonlight or no, legal or otherwise.
...hmm.
At long last, his hand drops. Her gaze traces up toward the sky again. ]
Thank you for telling me their story. [ The first link in the chain. ] What must that be like, I wonder — to love a person to their...?
[ Her nose wrinkles. She wants to repeat 'starseed,' though she draws a blank at what most other worlds term them. ]
Their [ Forgetting herself in her frustration, Serenity points to his chest with a squiggling motion. ] real-thems, inside.
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[ He wonders if his sister is to be a pawn of the Bene Gesserits. If he has a say in it -- as Duke -- he would not let them near her. He would not have her live through the Gol Jabbar or be a piece to navigate through the whims of another. They will make their own decisions.
"Because you are Jessica's son. You have more than one birthright, boy."
Can I truly pick one over the other? ]
To love a person to their core? The deepest part of them? [ A huff of a smile comes to his face. ] I can't say I know from first hand experience.
[ Only that he is the result of such a bond. That he hopes his sister is the result of it and not an attempt from his mother to smooth relations with the Sisterhood.
Paul pulls his hand back. Both now hang from his knees as he looks skyward once more. He has often wondered if they could ever see Caladan from Arrakis. Of course, they cannot, as his homeworld is very far from this centerhole of the Imperium. ]
Maybe you will one day.
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When she's done so, she she breathes out: ]
You don't think you will.
[ A murmur of sand across the dunes. She might've not said it at all.
Her ankles lock under her as she sits cross-legged, elbows at her thighs. The dress she'd worn for travel may not finish her journey. ]
I used to daydream about being a wife, someday.
[ His wife, technically; equally as fair, of course, would be how that's not a fair thing to claim. She hadn't known him then. In hid place, there stood a placeholder of a man to represent every Man she could have given her heart to.
Looking back, the abstract notion doesn't fit her anymore. ]
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PAUL i'm crying, i just want him to be happy.
:') :') :') i can't wait for them to adapt CoD and everyone cry
i'm already weeping (at least he gets to do somewhat normal teen stuff in this thread)
blind timothee is gonna SEND ME TO A GRAVE
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