Five broken promises: A series about the Upapandavas and the pandavas, set before and during the war SERIES IN PROGRESS, INDIVIDUAL FICS COMPLETE
Sneh: Drabble. Marathi, English translation by @rishabhaa COMPLETE
Unsaid: Duryodhan and Lakshman COMPLETE
Fireflies: Yudhishthir and Prativindhya COMPLETE
Chhoti Si Chiraiyyaa(AO3) Chhoti Si Chiraiyya(Tumblr): A songfic about Navigating grief and regret and pain- The Pandavas about the Upapandavas COMPLETE
Reunions (AO3) (Tumblr) : Fixing the shitty upapandava reunion scenes in adaptations. POV Nakul COMPLETE
Hidimbaa's Heartbreak: What it says on the tin. COMPLETE
Sukh Kalale: Rukmini x Satyabhama, Modern AU, Marathi, WIP
And the Orchids Still Bloom: Drupada x Virat, Modern AU, COMPLETE
Sahachara: Sahadev x Transmasc!OC, WIP
On His Own Terms: Shikhandi and the Panchal Family
Main fic: On His Own Terms
Shikhandi moodboard
Character studies(will be added later)
An old poem: Shikhandi
Shikhandi: In Focus, In fragments- @noisybasementrebel's character sketch/tribute to Shikhandi
Dhrishtadyumna
Drishtaketu: Dhrishtadyumna's eldest son
More will be added as this masterlist is edited, I will make stuff I forgot or make new stuff!
Moodboards:
Drupada and Prishati: (Couple moodboard)
Satyajita
Dhrishtadyumna and Shashikala (Couple moodboard)
Yudhamanyu and Uttamaujas (Twins moodboard)
More stuff will be added as I make more!!
Tags:
#Panchal family - Mine and other's stuff about the panchal family
#Surhut yaps about the nextgen
#incorrect mahabharat quotes - what it says on the label
He runs into sthunakarna, and bares his heart to him. It feels surprisingly good, maybe even better than he expected.
He doesn't look like his mother anymore. He doesn't sound like his mother anymore. His new body... it's all lean muscle and a wonderful bushy moustache and his hair is so soft and wavy and he's decently tall(still shorter than most of his family, though). He speaks once, and he doesn't know what to feel. His new voice is melodious, it's like honey and butter spreading smooth on freshly roasted bread. But no matter how absolutely ruined his old voice was, at least it was like his mother.
Mother talks about the small stone house, still on the palace grounds, less than an hour's journey on horse.
He doesn't realise she talked about it so he could be saved from seeing how ill she had become of late. He postpones his plans, and the house stays locked.
"You sound good," she says, sitting up from the bed with no small effort. "You look happier," she continues. At his hesitant expression, she says, "No matter what you look like, you will always be my child. I will never stop loving you,"
He cries at that. He doesn't think he stops crying until her ashes are in the water.
They called it maternal depletion. She gave so much of herself to them that there was nothing left in her.
He can't face anyone. He sees her in their faces, but not in the way he saw her in himself. All he sees is her pain.
The little stone house is opened, cleaned, and he begins living there.
If no one hears him, is he really speaking?
For the first time in years, he allows himself to think about Ambika and Ambalika. They had only one child each. But the way the kurus took everything from them....
He half wonders if he should try to find them. In some universe, maybe he even succeeds. But not here.
He prays to mahadeva, he begs his lord to grant them peace wherever they are, but he can't get through the prayer.
His voice is hoarse again.
There is no one to seek comfort from, now. Except for him.
They share a quick, perfunctory hug,
He breaks mirrors because he can't bear the fact that he has lost the only thing he has of her.
What use is his melodious voice when he might forget hers soon?
That night, they finally talk. The deep chasm between them may never be repaired, but they start building a bridge. Baba tells him, "You sleep on your left side. And you like wearing rings. And the colour green. You wear a lot of green. And you never, ever hesitate to ask me for things. And-"
"And?" he prompted gently.
"I like giving them. You have to understand, son, that I am a very selfish person. I don't give things away so easily. I hold onto them. But when you ask for them, I- I find it easy to let go, to give you whatever you want. Just like she did. You still have a lot of her in you, Shikhandi, a lot, lot more than just her looks. And you swallow the bitter acrid sting of pain and act as if everything is alright, just like her."
That doesn't take away the pain of losing his voice. But maybe, just maybe, it gives that pain a place to stay.
But oh, he feels so happy. His body feels like a home for the first time ever and he doesn't feel the urge to punish himself for existing like he used to.
The next time he sits down at the altar, he notices his voice, the way it vibrates in his chest and the way the words move around in his mouth. He notices, that it sounds beautiful when he sings. He shyly asks Manu if he can teach him.
He wanders around with a skip in his step, warbling a tune wherever he goes. He talks incessantly, and jitu looks at him in shock and awe and Shikhandi can tell he's a bit annoyed and would like to go back to work but he doesn't tell Shikhandi to stop. So Shikhandi doesn't.
Life slowly comes back to normal.
It's a winter afternoon, warm and sunny, when he starts the habit of visiting Shalaka.
It takes half of winter and all of spring and a fourth of summer before the walls between them break down, and he cups her tear streaked cheek in his palm and tells her that she has been on his mind this whole time, despite everything(its a half truth but he's more focused on being romantic.)
They run through the house like children, giggling and flirting and chasing each other, until she has him pinned down on the bed, absolutely at her mercy.
It's a repeat of that night, but he hasn't lost his voice. Somewhere amidst the moans of pleasure and the sweet words whispered to her, he has found it.
one thing i find really interesting about radha is that she isn't just this endlessly patient, submissive woman sitting around waiting for krishna to remember she exists 😭 she wants him. she gets jealous, angry, possessive, demanding, she sulks, she complains, she can basically go “actually fuck this” when he's being annoying. and in some of the later erotic vaishnava traditions, she eventually gets tired of always being the one in the receptive position, being mounted, and wants to reverse the whole dynamic, and mount krishna. she wants to pursue him. she wants to be the one calling the shots. and honestly that makes her so much more interesting than just “krishna's devoted girlfriend.”
basically radha and krishna really said “wait what if i was you” and committed to the bit 😭
there's this later vaishnava līlā where they straight up swap clothes. radha puts on krishna's yellow clothes, crown, sometimes his flute, while krishna puts on radha's sari, veil and jewellery. basically radha becomes hari and hari becomes radha. (picture above)
and it's not just “lol krishna is wearing a sari.” the whole point is that they're so ridiculously absorbed in each other that they start taking on each other's identity. lover and beloved, masculine and feminine, pursuer and pursued — all of it gets flipped around for the līlā.
also pls don't let the internet gaslight you about vishakha 💀 vishakha is normally one of radha's closest sakhis, not simply another name for radha in these stories. radha is associated with the nakshatra of vishakha.
vidyapati has a poem about krishna taking radha's clothes, but that's not the same thing as the literal radha↔krishna outfit swap. the actual role-reversal thing fits much better into the later vaishnava līlā-hāva tradition.
and honestly the funniest part is that krishna goes along with it. since she is tired of being mounted, she and krishna decide to shake things up.
which is why i find the radha connection to viśākhā nakshatra interesting too. viśākhā has this whole imagery of branching, choosing a direction, wanting something and actually going after it. there are two paths and you have to pick one. you're not just standing there waiting for somebody else to decide where you're going.
and i think that's a way more interesting feminine archetype than the whole “strong woman = woman who acts like a man” thing because boringggg. radha can be feminine and still be aggressive. romantic and still demanding. deeply in love and still want power in the relationship. she can want someone without turning herself into this passive little object waiting to be chosen.
because that's the thing about radha: she wants krishna too. it's not just krishna desiring her while she patiently receives his affection. sometimes she wants him enough to completely flip the dynamic. the woman who's normally being pursued decides she's going to pursue. the beloved decides she's going to become the lover.
and then she literally puts on his clothes.
radha really looked at krishna and went “you've had your turn. move.” before stealing his entire wardrobe 😭
It has been quite a few months, and Shikhandi had almost settled into a routine. His quarters were a little ways away from the prince’s, but his days were spent following him around as the king went on conquest after conquest. He longs to accompany him when he realizes that Panchal is throwing itself against Hastinapur, again and again and again— even as hopes grow slimmer and slimmer. But his job is to be not much more than overglorified nanny, and so he watches over Satyajit’s lessons, and as he wipes away the dirt and blood on the prince’s skinned knees, he observes. He learns.
Swords.
Daggers.
Bows and Arrows.
Spears.
Battleaxes.
The weapons slowly make a home inside Satyajit’s quarters, but Shikhandi doesn’t touch them. They don’t know who he is. He knows what happens when a mere attendant touches the weapons meant for royals. He’ll just have to buy his own. He cannot risk anyone figuring out the truth— at least not yet.
He saves up and buys a dagger for himself. It’s not fancy like the one he knows the prince will be given soon— not to practise with but to make his own, but the cheapest one at the shop. It will do for now— for practicing everything he has observed the prince do. Now, beneath his bed lies a trunk, in which he has begun building his personal armoury beneath the layers of clothes and other materials. One month’s salary buys a knife. Two months’ salary buys a dummy sword— one meant for practicing young boys. Three month’s salary saved gets him a basic hunting bow and one more month of saving gets him a meagre quiver.
But that is not the only thing he observes. He observes how men walk and talk, how they move and behave. It’s like he is a scholar— except what he studies are not texts or stories of gods, but humans. From the shadows, he watches the prince’s etiquette lessons— now learning everything the opposite of what was taught to him as a child. A quiet envy curls up inside his gut— a cruel voice that says you will never be like them, you cannot be a real man, not in this life,— and he strives to rid himself of it. It’s an ugly feeling. He hates himself for feeling a strange jealousy of Jitu’s boyhood, of the way he moves through the seasons of life and grows up. He lets the monster within him grow and grow and curl inside his stomach and throat and arms.
The pain keeps him awake sometimes. It goes deeper than Jitu’s skinned knees, deeper than the king’s pulled muscles, deeper than the monthly cramps he once used to experience, deeper still than the headaches that plague the queen when she is expecting. The ache is in his bones, the ache is a price, it’s a reminder of what he gave up and who he became and how he can never go back to that dreamy-eyed girl who just wanted a good man who would let her be queen and make a home with her—
Amba was dead. A ghost lived in Ahichhatra in her place.
The way Shikhandi lived- fearless, unashamed, and joyful, completely on his own terms and possessing a spark of righteous anger- was the way Amba died.
And the way Amba lived- struggling against an assailant hell bent on dishonouring her, trying to get to her lover, letting anger cloud her movements, making them clumsy- was the way Shikhandi was dying right now.
There are many people who don’t share this sentiment, but I have an appreciation for when a fanfic is so separated from canon that it could’ve easily been its own original novel, and yet the author was only ever going to put that much energy into it if their favourite characters got to be there
I think there’s a difference between “the author stripped the media of everything it had to replace it with something easy” and “the author thought up a concept they really really like and are bestowing it upon the character like a medal”
it's the opposite of sanding off the serial numbers. like you really invented a brand-new AU just to put your blorbos in. you built an entire world just for them to play in. it's like rat park but for blorbos. i love you so much i invented whole new situations just for you. beautiful
Of course, a man on a horse is faster than a man on foot. The King and Prince soon catch up to him.
“Why. Do. you. keep. running. away.” Drupad asks, his teeth gritted and his forehead now permanently pursed in a frown.
“I don’t like you. You turned me away in my hour of need,” Shikhandi replies simply.
“What?”
“You turned me away in my hour of need, Maharaj Drupad,” he repeats.
“I don’t know what you are talking about.”
Shikhandi sighs. It was useless to even try and convince the king of his identity, and it was tiring to hold more grudges than he was meant to.
“As I was saying, thank you very much for the hospitality. I still despise you,”
“What’s despise?”
“Satyajit, I told you to stay on the horse!” Drupad said.
“It means I don’t like your father, Prince Satyajit, but you should not worry about that,” Shikhandi answers as politely as he can. Satyajit was still five. And Shikhandi might not like Drupad but he thought it was unfair to take his ire out on the boy.
“Does that mean you don’t like me?” Satyajit asks, his eyes turning huge and shiny, his hands gripping his father’s dhoti as he moves to hide behind Drupad, who is now glaring at Shikhandi.
“No, Jitu! Whoever told you that?”
“You don’t like my father and he is so nice!”
“You know, we met once. He said something very mean to me and I did not like that, so I do not like him.” Shikhandi tries, but all his efforts go in vain and each explanation only brings forth more questions and more tears.
“Stop making my son cry!” Drupad finally shouts. “I had been hoping to take him out for one good hunting trip before his training starts, and this is what happens. Fantastic! I don’t know who you are and I don’t know what are your goals are, but if you are anything but perfectly nice to my son, I will chop you up into pieces and feed you to my horses,”
Satyajit disappears even more behind the king and Shikhandi sighs.
“Fine. I’ll get out of your hair! But if I bother you so much why did you come looking for me?”
“I asked him to,” Satyajit says quietly, his head peeking out from behind his hiding place.
Against his will, Shikhandi cracks a small smile and kneels down. “Why?”
Satyajit now finally steps forward, looking directly at Shikhandi.
“I like you! You tell me soooo many stories! And you do the voices and faces! And you know so much about trees and animals and rivers… Can you come home with us? You don’t have one of your own anyways,”
“I have a home!”
“You sleep on a tree!”
“In a treehouse!”
“Don’t you want a nice room?” Satyajit shrugs. “With paintings on the walls and soft sheets and windows with curtains and—”
To be honest, a proper room sounds good.
“Mother is looking for a babysitter for me, the old one quit because she was getting married…”
A steady salary also sounds really, really, really good right now. He doesn’t care that its supposed to be beneath Amba. He needs to train and a salary might get him access to weapons and instructors.
“Fine,” Shikhandi sighs and plods after them back to the campsite. In his mind, possibilities spin out, and he plans to finish his duties as quick as possible and devote the rest of the time to training. The child is endearing but he must not get attached. His only goal is to avenge Amba.
Shikhandi's voice has always been a sore spot for him. Before he finally got a man's body, his voice had been a high, warbling thing, its tinkling immediately giving away who, or rather what, he was. Jitu thought it was nice. But shikhandi did not.
All it did was remind him. Remind him he was stuck in a girl's body, that he was a wraith of vengeance and carrying a burden of times long gone(even if he would never complain about it, and bear the weight of it admirably). All it did was remind him of being trapped. Both in a body that felt wrong, wrong, wrong, and the way his mother and father had taken to trapping him to keep him safe.
He did not have much opportunities to socialise. Even later, the sting of not being able to hold a conversation for long, the way he always feels like an outsider, it never goes away, no matter how much Agnijaa tries to help or how many apologetic looks his father shoots him across the table.
He understood why, he understood how, but it still hurt.
When he accompanied his father on military campaigns, when Jarasandh was still the powerhouse in the east, shikhandi wouldn't speak much so as to not give away who he was and communicated only through grunts and battle cries. Kaivalya or baba knocked him out, pressed their hands on his mouth so he wouldn't scream when arrows were being pulled out or his stab wounds were being operated on.
He used to hear Jitu, then, mingling with the kings and princes and generals in the camp, no matter how much he despised the bravado the bloodthirsty men displayed. He used to hear Manu and Uttam, making rousing speeches to raise morale, and he used to sit in his tent and wonder if he could ever be a part of that world.
He kept his throat hoarse with cold, sharp drinks and stale oily food on the road, and even then, he didn't speak much. He wished to bare his heart to the woman he met on his travels, the one with as many walls up as him. He wished to talk to her, late into the night, he wanted to sing her praises to anyone who heard, but his voice was disfigured from everything he did and he couldn't talk normally to people anyways. It was exhausting.
He did sing, though, when he came home and couldn't put her out of his mind. He hummed under his breath as he painted her likeness, and burst into song when he walked around the castle. And when Jitu found out that the woman was a princess, and convinced father to ask for her hand in marriage to him, he thanked him profusely, and talked about how he was afraid she'd hate him. Jitu shook him by the shoulders, saying, "she would never hate you"
He lost his voice when she ran out of the chamber on their wedding night, not finding it in himself to explain, let alone protest.
Sahadeva: Knows the future but doesn't talk about it.
Dushala: The ideal isekai subject is a young woman slotted into the role of "villainess" despite her lack of agency.
Draupadi: Spawns full-grown into the setting knowing who she's "supposed" to marry; goes the reverse-harem route. There can be no doubt that the Mahabharata we have access to is the result of her edits to the "original" story in which Arjuna was the villain.
Like how is THIS the closest to a dark skinned Ram we got and it's not even a Ramayana adaptation??? It's ridiculous! And don't get me wrong, when it comes to the actual Mahabharatam, I don't think even SSR will cast a dark skinned Arjun or dark skinned Draupadi. Maybe a dark skinned Krishna at best. The colourism is entrenched way too deep across our industries
Like that's not even Ram! That's someone's vision of Alluri Sitarama Raju cosplaying as Ram as envisioned by his communist boyfriend! WHERE IS DARK SKINNED RAM IN ANY OF THE RAMAYANA ADAPTATIONS??
that minor character doesn't need 5000000000 fans they only need one fan with lots of problems who can love them enough singlehandedly that it's the equivalent to the combined love of 50000000001 fans. that one fan? is me
Constantly obsessed with the concept of a man forced to be a myth. What do you do when every step you take is embedded into the text. Every word you say prose to read. You're part of something bigger than yourself. The narrative tugs you along like water currents. There is no time to rest, to be human. You must be great, you must be legend
In the little daylight that’s left, Shikhandi packs up his meagre posessions and follows the king.
The hot meal feels like heaven, even if the bread is stale and the gravy is watery. The boy— Satyajit— talks his ear off, asking for story after story, saying how it is SO COOL that he sleeps on a tree and lives on his own— Shikhandi feels a strange ache in his chest, and realizes that he cannot remember the last time he was around children. Amba wanted them. Shikhandi only wants revenge. But that night, on the floor of the tent, he sleeps more soundly than he has in a long, long time, and is only woken up when the sun shines through the window of the tent and the king and prince have already gone out. There is a bow and a quiver of arrows by the king’s bed.
“Only until they’re camping here,” Shikhandi tells himself, and helps himself to a hot bath, a dhoti that hasn’t been torn and muddied seven different ways, and a glass of milk. He hides the bow under the mattress, the quiver under his blanket, and decides to get some sleep. He needs his strength if he is going to vanquish a skilled warrior like Devavrata.
In his sleep, he hears the Prince talk to his father.
“Please baba, can we take him home? Please?”
“Satyajit, we can’t just-”
“Our palace is sooooooo big! There’s definitely room for him!”
“What? Satyajit, you know that’s not how it works,”
“Weren’t you looking for a babysitter for me?”
“I can’t just hire him! I don’t even know who he is!”
“Why?”
“Because he isn’t telling me ANYTHING!”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, Satyajit. Now eat your lunch,”
“Where’s the deer we hunted?”
“In the curry.”
“Why is it in the curry?”
“Because the cook-” The king began, before sighing tiredly.
Shikhandi does not want to babysit the prince. But he still goes with them when they want to fish at the river after lunch, and sleeping through breakfast and lunch has made him hungry, so he stays for dinner. The patterned cloth of the tent bearing tassels of some shiny thread and tapestries of stories about gods and demons makes a strange ache spring up in his heart.
That night, the boy— Satyajit— has fallen asleep, but Shikhandi lies awake in the tent as he has slept through the morning and early afternoon. The General, (Mriganka?) is talking about how they should actually do a puja in honour of Shiva, for his blessings to the army had finally gotten them Victory in the latest battle over the Kurus. Drupad was agreeing. And all Shikhandi can think about is that they could have solved the problem of the Kurus attacking them permanently if Drupad had taken his garland and—
An epiphany suddenly strikes him.
He hates Bheeshma. Panchal hates Bheeshma.
He is devoted to Mahadeva. Panchal is devoted to Mahadeva.
He needs to prepare, to train. The Prince would begin his training soon.
Well—
He stops himself, though. His only goal is bringing about Bheeshma’s death, nothing else. He must NOT get attached to anyone, least of all a child, and not even an ordinary child, but the child of the one who had spurned him. Amba doesn’t let go easily.
And although one part of him would like to do nothing more than wander around singing Mahadeva’s praises, he knows the purpose of this body is different. Someday, though. Someday. Right now, he takes the bow and quiver he had hidden under the blankets and disappears into the night.
One summer day, when he is out foraging, he realizes somewhat belatedly that he has forgotten to take along any water. The sun beats down on his back like a thousand unrelenting arrows and his head spins until he can’t think. When he enters the shadow of a tree, he is instantly hit by a cold flash, his teeth chattering and arms shivering. He still can’t stop sweating, and the constant ache he feels is now throbbing and growing more intense. Bile rises up to his throat, and he can barely grab a tree trunk for support before everything goes black. He can open his eyes after a bit, but cannot get up. Somewhere in the background, a peacock crows. He wants to get up, but his arms go limp every time he tries to push himself off the ground. The next time he opens his eyes, a flash of blue and green goes past.
Feathers tickle him.
“BABA!! THERE’S A MAN HERE!” A high, warbling voice shouts.
“What?” A second voice— perhaps the aforementioned ‘baba’?
“What happened, Prince Satyajit, what are you- Oh.” a deep, calm— slightly older— voice says before stopping short.
He feels water on his face and blinks awake. A man helps him up. He is leaning against the tree branch when he realizes who exactly was the child that called out to his father.
“Maharaj Drupad,” he says as frostily as he can. “Thank you for giving me water when I was thirsty. I shall be on my way now,”
The man who helped him up is looking between them with a puzzled expression on his face.
The peacock crowed again.
“Come back to our camp, young man,” The king says, either oblivious to or ignoring his frostiness. “Senapati Mriganka, please make arrangements for him to be treated from whatever ails him,”
He swallows. He does not think he is young, nor that he is a man. He does not know what he is. He bears no name, no lineage, no connections or family. He shakes his head. Why should he go back to the camp of the one that spurned him? The General seems sensible enough though. Might be useful later, Panchal was an enemy of the kurus, was it not?
“No, no, there is no need, really,” He pushes back. “My house is nearby, I will be on my way,”
He scales the tree and lies on the cold, wooden floor of the treehouse. The idea of getting some weapons sounds tempting to him. He realizes cannot live on berries and leaves, he needs to hunt if he wants to keep up his strength. He didn’t know how to do that, but if he could teach himself to survive in the forest for months, he can definitely teach himself to hunt and all that comes with it. It is almost sunset when he realizes the king has followed him and has been watching him all this while.
He picks up a stray pebble and launches it at Drupad’s head.
“What was that for?” The king yelps, quickly nocking an arrow and pointing it at him.
“You followed me home!”
“My son wouldn’t stop hounding me about ‘that strange man!’”
“Oh my god! You are impossible!” he sighs, and jumps down from the treehouse window, and realizes he has a problem. His stock of random pebbles was still up in the treehouse. His eyes wander around the forest floor, wildly searching for a stick or a stone. He reaches out to grab a stone, but his fingers fail him and land upon a peacock feather. Out of any other options, he begins tickling the king. The bow falls from Drupad’s grasp and Drupad just stands there, hands folded, looking at him with a deeply tired expression.
“At least tell me your name, so I can tell Satyajit you reached home safely,”
He looks at the peacock feather in his hands, the flashes of blue and green that had danced in front of his closed eyes that afternoon, and curtly says, “Shikhandi. Nice to meet you. Now get out of my house,”
“Your house?” Drupad says again, and Shikhandi thinks he sounds incredibly similar to some noblemen’s catty daughters he knew as a child. “You sleep on a TREE!”
“And?”
“What am I supposed to tell my son?”
Shikhandi groans. “That’s what you’re worried about?”
“You will understand when you have children of your own,” Drupad says.
Shikhandi buries his face in his hands, and a plan begins forming in his mind. Of course, a hunting camp. He could go right now, grab some weapons and disappear in the dead of the night. Of course, he would have to find a new place to live. One thing at a time, though, he thinks, and says, “Fine, I’ll come with you,”
